SNK producer very interested in working more with Capcom in the future after Terry and Mai join Street Fighter 6

The original rivalry between Capcom and SNK in fighting games dates back over 30 years now, although the companies maintain much friendlier terms compared to the early days of arcade gaming.

With Fatal Fury’s Terry Bogard and Mai Shiranui joining Street Fighter 6 as the series’ first guest characters, one of SNK’s executives has expressed hope to work more with Capcom in the future as well.

Longtime SNK producer Yasuyuki Oda was recently interviewed by Push Square for the upcoming Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves, where he was directly asked about the collaboration and their relationship with Capcom.

We’d already heard a lot about the crossover from Street Fighter director Takayuki Nakayama and producer Shuhei Matsumoto, but not so much from the SNK camp’s perspective.

“We’re really good friends with Capcom and the Street Fighter team,” Oda said via Push Square. “We actually started talking about this collaboration about two years ago at EVO. We’re just really happy that they were able to announce it on such a big stage, and congratulations to this team.”

When Fatal Fury Returns gameplay was first revealed, we also asked about their status with Capcom, but they were obviously much more coy at the time.

He goes on to reveal that they still meet regularly with Capcom staff and that he is interested in collaborating further if Terry and Mai proves to be a success.

“We met them quite recently, so if (SNK’s characters) continue to be a success for them, there will definitely be more possibilities in the future,” Oda said. “We are still interested in working with them.”

Previously, Street Fighter’s protagonists shared much the same sentiment, with Terry and Mai seemingly serving as a testing ground for more possibilities.

They say they are interested in doing a new Capcom vs. SNK as well as a Street Fighter crossover for SNK, although they say nothing has been decided on that front yet.

There is speculation that special character development for The King of Fighters 15 could be Capcom-related, but it might be best to save it for City of the Wolves at this point.

The two companies now share other connections beyond their geographic location in the Kansai region of Japan.

Oda himself had left SNK after their initial bankruptcy in 2001 to join Dimps alongside other developers at the studio where he worked as a designer for Street Fighter 4 and Street Fighter X Tekken before returning to SNK for King of Fighters 14.

Nakayama is also very open about his love of classic SNK titles, so there seems to be a lot of respect and camaraderie between the companies again.

With the recent announcement of the Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection in addition to the SF6 inclusion of Terry and Mai, hope is reborn that the classic Capcom vs. SNK games might finally receive a modern take after over two decades.

Speaking of which, did you know that one of Capcom’s fighters against SNK was the first game to feature console crossplay way back in 2001?

Terry is expected to release in Street Fighter 6 this fall, followed by May early next year, while SNK is expected to make its KOF15 announcement at Evo 2024 next month.

Things have definitely gotten a lot more interesting in the fighting game space lately, especially when it comes to Capcom.