King of the Monsters^[a] is a fighting game developed by SNK, released for arcades in Japan in 1991, and ported to the Neo Geo AES later that same year.^[1] The game features playable giant monsters that are reminiscent of characters from kaiju and tokusatsu films.

In 1992, a sequel titled King of the Monsters 2 was released for arcades. Months later, King of the Monsters was ported to the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. It would then be ported to the Sega Genesis in 1993. It was included in the video game SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1, which was released for the Wii, PlayStation 2 and PSP in 2008.

Gameplay – King of the Monsters

Players choose one of six monsters (four in the 16-bit ports) for battle, and two players can join forces to fight the monsters together. Battles end when one of the monsters is pinned for a three count or if time expires (in which case the player loses).

The game consists of 12 total levels (8 in the 16-bit ports) which takes place in 6 cities in a futuristic 1996 Japan. Each city is featured twice with the game beginning and ending in Tokyo. Other cities include Kyoto, Okayama, Osaka, Kobe and Hiroshima (the latter two are omitted from the SNES port.

The Sega Genesis port only features Tokyo with the other cities being “Mega Port”, “Dragon City”, and “Castle City”). The player first must defeat all six monsters, with the last monster being oneself, but in a different palette. Then the player must defeat the six monsters again, in the same order, but this time in different cities.^[2]

Characters – King of the Monsters

• Geon: A Godzilla-like dinosaur.
• Woo: A King Kong-like giant gorilla (not available on the ports).
• Poison Ghost: A creature composed of toxic waste (not available on the ports).
• Rocky: A giant Moai-like golem made of boulders.
• Beetle Mania: A large beetle-like creature.
• Astro Guy: A giant Ultraman-like superhero.

Other appearances

In 1992, a sequel called King of the Monsters 2: The Next Thing was released. In 2005, three characters from that sequel (Cyber-Woo, Super Geon and Atomic Guy) were featured in the SNK Playmore game NeoGeo Battle Coliseum, a fighting game featuring many of the company’s popular characters. These characters also appeared as character cards in the DS game SNK vs Capcom: Card Fighters DS.

In addition, to the original ports, King of the Monsters was included in SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1 featuring many rare pieces of the game’s production art production art. In 2018, the game was ported to the Nintendo Switch Shop by Hamster as part of their Arcade Archives line.^[3] The port features two extra features in a High Score Mode and Caravan Mode.^[4] A Neo Geo CD version was advertised and even previewed, but it never released.^[5]

Ugly Hero (Theme of Astro Guy)

Like a Beetle (Theme of Beetle Mania)

Pyramid Power (Theme of Rocky)

Entirely Breaker (Theme of Geon)

King of the Monsters (Opening Demo)