the appearance of characters' faces will change in response to blows, etc. It's a lot more realistic than anything anybody's ever done in the industry."
Coming on the heels of Fatal Fury, SNK's most successful Neo-Geo piece to date, the company expects this next fighting game to help boost their system to a new level of market penetration.
EXPANDING MARKET SHARE
Creative marketing ideas are the next element in SNK's plans. "We've already learned a lot from our success with Neo-Geo so far," John Barone stated. "When we first introduced this concept, it took a long time to overcome the prejudices that
people had built up from their past experiences with video game systems. We learned not to position our product primarily as a system, but to stress the quality of each software title as it came along. We only pointed to the system aspect as a secondary selling point. To be competitive in the video game business, the quality of the individual games is the crucial ingredient."
"We had a string of very strong games that helped Neo-Geo get accepted," Susan Jarocki pointed out. "Ninja Combat, which was only our fifth Neo-Geo title, was a winner. Baseball Stars and Sengoku also did a lot to really put us on the map. These titles were good enough to really compete with kits from other factories in the market at the time. And, we sold them for a fraction of the cost. As we kept coming out with more and more quality games at an affordable price, the industry recognized the value of the system behind
it.,,
Added John Barone: "When SNK received the award from operators for `most innovative new technology' at the AMOA show, we knew we'd really gotten over the hurdle."
CREATIVE STEPS
What creative steps will SNK take to achieve its daring goal of doubling its sales volume in a single year? The first step has already
been taken: last fall, SNK lowered the distributors' cost for Neo-Geo titles. "That surprised a lot of people," smiled John. "Many believe that once SNK established Neo-Geo solidly in the marketplace, we'd raise software prices. When we lowered them instead, nobody knew what to say. By taking that move, we made a clear statement about our intention to support the industry and keep Neo-Geo moving forward."
Another creative marketing move could be allowing other video manufacturers to license titles for the Neo-Geo system. Said John: "It's not easy to sell a conventional kit in today's climate against a single megahit like Capcom's Champion Edition,
Eastern Sales rep Jim Chapman
Service chief Tommy Lynn
Latin America sales topper Taro Yamaguchi (right) and assistant Elida Davalos
