TVTropes Now available in the app store!
Open

Follow TV Tropes

Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium

Go To

Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium (Video Game)
"2001 is the year we make contact!"
"This battle is about to explode!"
"This is gonna be a match to remember!"
"Live and let die!"
"Go for broke! FIGHT!"

Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium 2001 (a.k.a. Capcom vs. SNK 2: Millionaire Fighting 2001 in Japan) is the third installment (fourth, if you count Capcom vs. SNK Pro) in the SNK vs. Capcom series. As the name suggests, it's developed by Capcom. It was released for the arcades, Dreamcast, PlayStation 2, GameCube, Xbox, and PlayStation Network. In 2025 it was released, complete with online play, as part of Capcom Fighting Collection 2, alongside Milennium Fight 2000 Pro.

The game extended the roster to (almost) all the fighting line of both companies, along with the full Capcom vs. SNK Pro cast returning:

    Characters 

Capcom

SNK

The two bosses were created for this sole game: God/Ultimate Rugal and a special version of Shin Akumanote , who were the result of one absorbing the other's power.

This time, the Ratio system was modified to allow the player to give ratios to the characters as they wished (and thus dubbed the Free Ratio system), with six Grooves to choose from, plus a customized system which can be created by the player themselves. Like with the first game, an Updated Re-release of this game was also made available, titled Capcom vs. SNK 2 EO. Depending on the version, EO stands for Easy Operation (Japanese release) or Extreme Offence (European markets). Unlike CvS Pro, however, it doesn't add any characters, instead providing an alternative, beginner-friendly control scheme.


This page is about to explode! FIGHT!

  • Adaptational Personality Change: In this game, Hibiki is now a more confident warrior, and shows no sign of her shy, reluctant personality from her original appearance. Notably, she has a special intro with Rolento where he flings a knife at her and she bats it away without even looking. This has the terrifying implication that her Bad Ending in The Last Blade 2 (in which she continues her search for Setsuna alone, rather than Walking the Earth with Amano) is canon.
  • Adaptational Skill: Most Grooves gain extra sub-systems/abilities that were not present in their source games:
    • C-Groove, based on Street Fighter Alpha 3's A-ISM, gains rolling from The King of Fighters (introduced in KOF '96), though it can be argued that this odd choice of a cross-company mechanic is based on the Zenpou Tenshin, a special move Ken and Akuma had access to in the Alpha series. C-Groove is also the only Groove that allows for Level 2 Super Combos; while faithful to the mechanics of the Alpha series, these wouldn't have much use beyond slightly more damage, so this game adds the ability to cancel Level 2 Supers into a special move or even a Level 1 Super.
    • A-Groove, based on Alpha 3's V-ISM, also gains rolling and the ability to perform Level 1 Supers (including at the end of a Custom Combo at no additional meter cost), though it lacks the ability to air guard unlike C-Groove. (In Alpha 3, only the Super Turbo-based X-ISM lacked aerial guarding.)
    • P-Groove has the simplified meter given to X-ISM in Alpha 3, which in turn is based on Super Street Fighter II Turbo. However, this alone wouldn't give the Groove much of a niche, so it was given the Parry from Street Fighter III, as well as the short hop from KOF as a way to emulate the "universal overhead" attack from Street Fighter III. EO additionally gives this Groove another mechanic from Street Fighter III, that being the ability to cancel any special attack into a super.
    • S-Groove, based on Extra Mode from The King of Fighters '97 and '98 (which is in turn based on KOF '94 and KOF '95) allows characters to run, matching the other two SNK Grooves, instead of the dashes found in the earlier KOF entries. While The King of Fighters '96 introduced running and used a manually charged meter, it also introduced rolling in place of dodging; the combination of running and dodging was exclusive to CvS2 until The King of Fighters '98 Ultimate Match some seven years later.
    • N-Groove, based on the Advanced Mode from KOF '98, is largely unchanged.
    • K-Groove is based on the Rage Gauge from Samurai Shodown. However, to create a parallel to P-Groove, K-Groove was additionally given the Just Defend mechanic from Garou: Mark of the Wolves.
  • Aliens in Cardiff: While this game does have a couple of stages set in noteworthy venues that people will have heard of like New York City and London, there are also stages in Barentsburg, Norway and Kinderdijk, Netherlands.
  • Ambidextrous Sprite: As usual, Sagat's eyepatch/scar and Vega's claw/tattoo. Chang's ball and Maki's tonfa also swap hands but at least that isn't as unreasonable. Yamazaki also switches which hand he has pocketed when he changes sides (in-canon he always keeps his right hand pocketed).
  • Anachronism Stew: Cammy White in this game is her mind-controlled Shadaloo assassin self even though this game is set in 2001. In the Street Fighter canon, even with Comic-Book Time taken into account, Dhalsim frees her from Shadaloo during the events of Street Fighter Alpha 3, long before 2001. (Though unconfirmed, and despite Capcom's adherence to sliding timescales and vague dates, the Alpha series is generally assumed to be set in the late 80s/early 90s.note )
  • Arrange Mode: In addition to the game's signature Free Ratio fights, the game can also be configured to have more traditional 1v1 "best x out of 2x-1" and The King of Fighters-style 3v3 fights that don't use the Ratio system.
  • Artistic License – Geography: The Nairobi stage shows an erg, or a desert that is filled with sand dunes. Race trucks that are typical of the Paris-Dakar Rally race over the stage. The real-life Nairobi is not in a desert area at all, instead being in a subtropical highland climate, and has never been part of the Paris-Dakar Rally.
  • Art Shift: While Chun-Li retained her alternate Alpha sprites (her Street Fighter II qipao drawn in the Alpha style) that were originally used for her secondary moveset in Street Fighter Alpha 2 (and later in the Marvel .vs games and as her X-ISM sprite in Alpha 3) in the first Capcom vs. SNK, for 2 she was redrawn similarly to Ryu and Bison, this time drawing more from her appearance in Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike. She was the only character from the first game to get totally new sprites and thus Morrigan's "traditional" look would hang around for yet another game (although every returning character was given several new animations due to having new special attacks, the change to a six-button control scheme necessitating new basic attacks, and the addition of Grooves that grant characters abilities that they never had in their home series).
  • Ascended Extra:
    • Ryuhaku Todoh, Maki, and Eagle, characters who had formerly appeared in the first Art of Fighting, Final Fight 2, and the original Street Fighter, respectively, made their unexpected returns as playable characters. Indeed, it has been said that Capcom deliberately chose more obscure newcomers for this game.
    • Yun, Eagle, and Maki appearing in this title allowed them to join the roster of the GBA, PSP, and Capcom Fighting Collection 2 ports of Alpha 3.
  • Ascended Glitch: Most (in)famously, roll cancellingnote  has been accepted by the CvS community and widely factors into high-level Tournament Play because it allows several characters and grooves who would be useless in Tournament Play without the glitch to become viable in tournaments. While retained in the Dreamcast and PlayStation 2 ports of the arcade game, the EO-branded versions (GameCube and Xbox) do not have it. Without this glitch, the K-Groove would overpower all other grooves in non-EO version tournaments.
  • Assist Character: Most of them only appear in the main characters' Super Combos:
    • Yun is assisted by Yang, who either performs his Raishin Mahhaken Super Art alone or teams up with his brother to perform the Hiten Soryujin (Yun's Level 3) together.
    • In what is a likely nod to the Team-Up Attacks found in Rival Schools, Kyosuke is assisted by Batsu and Hinata in his Level 3, Final Symphony Remix.
    • Chang shares his moveset with Choi, who hangs out behind Chang but can be called in from the midground to use certain special attacks.
  • Battle Amongst the Flames: The burning Osaka stage where you fight God/Ultimate Rugal or Shin Akuma is set against a backdrop of the rest of Osaka burning down.
  • Battle in the Rain: The Osaka Castle stage where you fight the regular/unpowered version of Rugal or Akuma as a Final Boss is set on the roof of Osaka Castle in the middle of a thunderstorm. Because its rain effect causes performance problems, this stage is banned in tournaments.
  • Battle Intro: Loads of them, probably the most out of Capcom's 2D stable, though a majority are reused from the original Capcom vs. SNK. Many of these play homage to iconic scenes in previous games (Kyo and Iori recreate their KOF '98 match intro, for instance), play up the similarities between certain fighters (Ken and Terry's intro, as American heroes of their respective games, became iconic among fans), or are simply there for cool factor (like Geese blowing away Bison's cape with a Reppuken).
  • Boss Rush: After both God/Ultimate Rugal and Shin Akuma are defeated, a Boss Challenge mode will unlock. By holding a button combination when selecting an Arcade Mode option (Ratio Match, 3-on-3 Match, or Single Match), you'll enter a boss-only version of the single player ladder where you complete four fights against "boss" opponents (M. Bison, Geese Howard, Evil Ryu, Orochi Iori, Akuma, or Rugal Bernstein) before fighting Shin Akuma or God Rugal at the end. Every match is fought at the Osaka Castle stage except for the last fight, which takes places at the "main" Osaka stage (the burning city) just like in a proper Arcade Mode run. If Single Match is selected then it's just a standard Three Round Deathmatch in each match while Ratio Match pits your team against a single Ratio 4 opponent in each stage. For 3-on-3 you will fight each character partnered with two randomly selected normal characters (this includes the final fight, which is normally a solo battle even in 3-on-3 mode). This mode does not allow continues so a loss on any opponent is a total reset. Win this version of Arcade Mode and you'll unlock the Extra Options, which among other things lets you turn on unlimited health (which is useful for beating the "All Survival" mode to unlock unlimited Groove Edit points).
  • Bowdlerise: The North American version is notable for its level of censorship not found in any other Capcom fighting game:
    • Moves with "Genocide" (Tiger Genocide and Genocide Cutter) in them were replaced with "Destroyer." Yamazaki's S&M move had its name changed as well. Rugal calling out his Genocide Cutter was replaced with a generic grunt, and Sagat cuts off the "Genocide" part from his Tiger Genocide, which, again, was replaced with a generic grunt. God Rugal was changed to Ultimate Rugal. Shin Akuma was untouched and became a Bilingual Bonus, the "shin" here meaning "god" rather than "true" as in other appearances, as Capcom likely assumed American players didn't understand Japanese.
    • Some storyline-related words are not spared. Satsui no Hado was translated to Evil Energy while Orochi Power to Dark Power. While it's partially understandable to rename the Satsui no Hado as Evil Energy, there's no reason why Orochi Power was renamed.
  • Break Meter: A guard crush meter is located beneath the life meter. It acts similarly to the Guard Power Guage from Street Fighter Alpha 3 except that you do not lose segments of this meter if you are Guard Crushed (a state where you are stunned and unable to block for a very short amount of time) or perform an Alpha Counter, and anyone in P-Groove takes extra guard meter damage when blocking attacks in non-EO versions of CvS2, forcing them to try to parry more. This meter is reduced whenever attacks are blocked, slowly recharges otherwise, and causes a fighter to be Guard Crushed if the meter is fully drained. The meter will instantly reload to full either after an opposing fighter lands an attack or combo following a Guard Crush or the opponent fails to attack before the Guard Crush state and its corresponding animation ends.
  • Call-Back: C-Groove and S-Groove match the Capcom and SNK Grooves in Capcom vs. SNK: Millennium Fight 2000 respectively in both function and color.
  • The Cameo: Quite a number of them, in both the battle intros and in the background. For example... Would probably require its own page to go into specifics.
  • Comeback Mechanic: The most obvious examples are S-Groove (where an opponent gains the ability to launch Level 1 Super Combos while close to death without costing any meter and gains access to MAX Mode and Level 3 moves should they charge up the meter in this state) and K-Groove (attacks do more damage and characters receive access to a Super Move once it's full, but the MAX state only lasts a limited amount of time and ends the moment the Super Move is used).
  • Composite Character:
    • In the sense of gameplay, most of the CvS1 vets play like a fusion of their Normal and Extra versions, incorporating specials and Supers from both move lists (with the Normal versions taking priority). As a result, this makes CvS2 the only KOF-related game to date where Kyo has access to his 101 Shiki Oboro Guruma and his R.E.D. Kick/707 Shiki Komahofuri at the same time; the latter replaced the former as part of Kyo's moveset overhaul in The King of Fighters '96 and — aside of EX Kyo in CvS1 and Kyo Kusanagi Classic in Maximum Impact 2 — Kyo would only regain the Oboro Guruma when briefly reverted back to his original moves in XII and XIII.
    • Not only does Hibiki have her two Power Mode Supers from The Last Blade 2, but she also has her Speed Mode combos converted into a Level 3 Super, giving her traits of both modes.
  • Critical Status Buff: If a fighter using S-Groove takes enough damage for his or her life gauge to flash (under 25% health), that fighter is freely able to perform Level 1 Supers without having to completely charge the meter to get into MAX Mode. If the fighter does fully charge their Super Combo Gauge and gets into MAX Mode while the life gauge is flashing, the fighter can perform a Level 3 Super.
  • Desperation Attack: A fighter using S-Groove gains access to a Level 3 Super when in MAX Mode (accessed by fully charging their super meter), but only when their health is low enough for the lifebar to start flashing.
  • Do Well, But Not Perfect: If you want to unlock Groove Edit and Osaka Stage 2 (the aforementioned Battle in the Rain locale), you need to defeat Rugal or Akuma, not their final forms. So you need to complete the game within the constraints to fight a boss but not the True Final Bosses.
  • Dramatic Wind: God Rugal's Idle Animation causes his tailcoat to begin billowing on its own.
  • Dub-Induced Plotline Change: The western release threw away all the unique win quotes (numbering in the hundreds) and replaced them with completely different lines in English.
  • Earn Your Bad Ending: Do too well in a single player campaign and earn too many points, and Shin Akuma or God Rugal will slay the other, set Osaka on fire, and challenge you to a fight. Because Osaka is set on fire, this counts as a Bad Ending.
  • Excuse Plot: The Masters Foundation and the Garcia Financial Clique sponsor a fighting tournament with a grand prize of a million dollars in order to smooth over tensions between the two and to raise money for charity.
  • Fusion Dance: If you get to God Rugal and win, Akuma's influence starts forcing itself onto Rugal's body by way of the Satsui no Hado Rugal stole from him, essentially turning Rugal into Akuma (but retaining Rugal's fashion sense).
  • A God Am I: Both Shin Akuma and God Rugal have this in their names. And it's not for show...
  • Gratuitous English:
    • Finest K.O., though it was changed to Dramatic K.O. for the North American and European versions.
    • More than a few characters get this (even if it's simply name-calling their attacks), with standout cases being Guile, Cammy, Terry, King, and Geese.
  • Hit Stop: If you hit someone with Haohmaru's standing Hard Punch (which is his massive Hard Slash from Samurai Shodown) everything will stop moving briefly to emulate the effect of hitting the Hard Slash in Samurai Shodown. It's the only basic move in the game to behave like this (not even Nakoruru's HP produces this effect, despite coming from the same series).
  • Jiggle Physics: Mai (obviously).
  • Land of Tulips and Windmills: The Kinderdjik stage has a few windmills. Truth in Television, as Kinderdijk indeed has the largest windmill network in the Low Countries.
  • Large-Ham Announcer: First and foremost, Hiroaki Asai.
  • Launcher Move: Pressing d/f+HK with Kyosuke will pop the opponent into the air. You can then give chase and execute an Aerial Rave on them, similar to Rival Schools.
  • Lazy Artist: Characters ported from the Street Fighter Alpha series and Morrigan look like they're copied directly from their origin game.
  • Long Song, Short Scene: The Groove selection music is longer than the countdown used on the actual screen, so the announcer will always get cut off.
  • Mana Meter: Known as Grooves, players get to choose between six of these for their super meter:
    • C-Groove functions like the A/Z-ISM in Street Fighter Alpha 3 by giving you a traditional 3-stock super meter where the strength of your Super Combo depends on how many stocks that you choose to spend at once, while adding in roll cancelling. It allows characters to perform Alpha Counters at the cost of 1 super stock and a portion of the guard crush meter, but does not shorten the guard crush meter when an Alpha Counter is performed, making the guard crush meter function as another Mana Meter.
    • A-Groove functions like V-ISM in Alpha 3, allowing you to perform Custom Combos (which allow players to chain together moves that normally can't be chained at the cost of losing the ability to block), while adding roll cancels and the ability to perform a Level 1 Super Combo at the cost of 50% of the meter. A-Groove also has access to Alpha Counters at the cost of 50% of the A-Groove and a portion of the guard crush meter without cutting the guard crush meter's capacity, which functions identically to C-Groove.
    • P-Groove functions like X-ISM in Alpha 3, allowing you to perform a Level 3 Super Combo by spending all of your meter once the Super Combo Gauge is full. It also adds parrying from Street Fighter III and short hops as a way to simulate the universal overhead from Street Fighter III. Unlike the III series, P-Groove does not allow you to perform neither EX moves nor Red Parries, and it severely shortens your guard crush gauge in non-EO versions of this game. Parries are much more difficult in non-EO versions of this game due to the far fewer frames per character present compared to Street Fighter III proper, leaving far fewer active frames for players to parry against. The EO versions of CvS2 (including the ranked online mode of this game in Capcom Fighting Collection 2) would lengthen the size of the guard crush meter to that of K-Groove's and loosen the parry window timing to account for the far fewer active frames, thus making it easier to perform parries. The EO versions also gave players the ability to cancel special moves into super moves as was possible in Street Fighter III, allowing P-Groove players to hit confirm specials into a Super Combo.
    • S-Groove functions like pre-KOF '97 entries in The King of Fighters (as well Extra Mode in KOF '97 and '98) with a meter that you must manually charge to enter MAX Mode. If you are in MAX Mode, you have a limited amount of time to perform a Level 1 Super unless your lifebar is flashing, in which then you can perform a Level 3 Super. If your lifebar is flashing and you are not in MAX Mode, you can perform Level 1 Supers at no cost at all. Characters can run in this mode instead of dashing.
    • N-Groove functions like Advanced Mode in KOF '97 and '98 in that you are allowed to stock up to three full charges to enter MAX Mode. If you are not in MAX Mode, you can perform Level 1 Supers at the cost of 1 stock. If you are in MAX Mode, you can perform Level 3 Supers at the cost of another stock and ending MAX mode. This Groove allows you to roll cancel as well as Alpha Counter like in A-Groove and C-Groove.
    • K-Groove, based on Samurai Shodown's Rage Gauge, allows you to enter a temporary powered-up state by either taking damage or by performing Just Defends from Garou: Mark of the Wolves; no offensive actions are capable of filling the gauge. While you are in the Rage state, you can have access to a Level 3 Super Combo.
  • Market-Based Title: Or rather, Market-Based Subtitle. Millionaire Fighting 2001 became Mark of the Millennium 2001 when it was ported overseas, though the announcer still says "Millionaire Fighting 2001!" at certain points on the character select screen.
  • Mini-Boss: If the player has met certain conditions, the game will be interrupted by a Ratio 4 M. Bison or Geese before they can continue to the final stage.
  • Mook Promotion: Well, calling him a "mook" is quite a stretch, but in the previous game Rugal was just one of the common opponents you could face in Arcade Mode, while here he's one of the Final Bosses.
  • Multiple Endings: Occurs depending on the player's performance. Three possible endings can occur while the player character(s) celebrate(s) winning the tournament in Osaka:
    • The celebration is uninterrupted, as the camera zooms out of the stadium to a shot of Akuma or Rugal's foot.
    • Akuma or Rugal interrupts the celebration, demanding a match against the winners on top of Osaka Castle. If the player wins, they comment on their strength before challenging their true rival (the other boss), as a large explosion occurs. The fates of everyone are left unknown.
    • The celebration is interrupted by the fight between Akuma and Rugal. Depending on the player's Groove, one of two scenes play. In one, Akuma mortally wounds Rugal, only for the latter to infuse his Orochi force into Akuma, who is driven insane by the power and turns into Shin Akuma. In the other, Rugal kills Akuma and absorbs the Satsui no Hado from his body (his special intro has him throwing away Akuma's corpse), transforming into God/Ultimate Rugal. The empowered boss sets Osaka on fire. The winning team goes on to fight the bosses in the Osaka Ruins. Defeating Shin Akuma has him being swept into the sky by the Orochi Power while God/Ultimate Rugal's defeat results in Akuma possessing Rugal's body, turning it into his own, before walking away. The following news coverage depicts Osaka being rebuilt, the critical reception to the tournament, and the (text-only) fates of the champions.
  • Multi-Slot Character: The game has both Rugal Bernstein and God/Ultimate Rugal (also known as "Satsui no Hado Rugal"), as well as Akuma and Shin Akuma (also known as "Orochi Akuma"). Unlike their source series, both superpowered incarnations are the result of one absorbing the other's power, leading to them having moves used by their rival (such as Rugal being able to perform a variant of the Shun Goku Satsu). Evil Ryu and Orochi Iori also return from the first game alongside their normal personas.
  • Mythology Gag: Among many examples...
    • Guile and Rugal have a special intro referencing The King of Fighters '94, where a statue of Guile could be seen amidst the various other statues in Rugal's collection. It can also double as a visual gag based on the infamous "Handcuffs" glitch from Street Fighter II, where it was also known as "Guile's Statue."
    • During his intro sequence, sometimes Haohmaru will say the Japanese phrase "Iza, jinjou ni shoubu!" ("Now, let's fight fair and square!") This is the exact phrase used by the announcer to signal the beginning of the match in his home series, Samurai Shodown.
    • One of Ryu's winning quotes says "What strength! I won't forget there are many like you all over the world!", which is a reference to what defeated opponents would say in the original Street Fighter. Another carryover from that game is his very simple winning quote of "All right!", which was said when the player wins a round.
    • Ryu and Ryo's special intro sees them jumping away from the center of the screen, which is a reference to how fights start in Art of Fighting.
    • Vice and Rugal's special intro has Mature standing beside Vice and bowing to Rugal, as they were Rugal's secretaries in KOF '94 (Mature) and '95 (Vice) before being Promoted to Playable in '96.
    • Rock and Geese get a special intro to mark the first time Rock has been able to stand before his Archnemesis Dad, as they aren't able to in their own series (as Geese died in Real Bout Fatal Fury, 10 years in-universe before Rock's fighting game debut in Garou). This predates the first time they would meet in an SNK game, which came in NeoGeo Battle Coliseum.
  • New Work, Recycled Graphics: Reuse of Street Fighter Alpha sprites, and the ensuing clash in art style and animation quality, was one of the strongest complaints. Morrigan's constant reuse of her very first sprite is still a vivid running joke in many circles. It's worse considering that Chun-Li got a new sprite based off her appearance in Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike. Ditto with Eagle, Maki, Yun and Kyosuke getting new sprites as well. Granted, Yun would have only been the only one of the bunch for whom recycled sprites would have made sense (although the Street Fighter III sprites had a different art style than what CvS2 employs, hence him being redrawn as well); Eagle only had his Street Fighter sprites from 1987, Maki's from Final Fight 2 for the SNES, and Kyosuke's from the 3D-only Rival Schools — all of them would clash horribly with the in-game graphics.
  • Non-Dubbed Grunts: Like other fighting games of the time. Some special introductions are full of dialogue (and sometimes even Mythology Gags) that are completely incomprehensible if you don't understand Japanese. Special post-battle victory banter text were dropped in the overseas versions similar to what happened in the Street Fighter Alpha games.
  • Optional Boss: Bison and Geese. Originally the final bosses of the previous installment, they are now mid-bosses who interrupt you without a cutscene.note  Looks like they want payback from the last encounter. Fortunately, they aren't modified-for-CPU unlike before as they play by the same technical rules.
  • Original Generation: God Rugal and the Orochi-powered Shin Akuma.
  • Pet the Dog: Balrog's ending has him donating his reward money to a charity. By accident.
  • Please Put Some Clothes On: Maki. Surprisingly, Mai, the one character who is notorious about this, and whom Maki is frequently accused of being modeled after in terms of appearance, gets away without so much as a peep.
  • Power at a Price: A-Groove allows you to enter a Super Mode that allows you to chain together moves that normally would not combo, allowing you to basically manually build your own Super Combo. These manual Super Combos are known as Custom Combos. However, you lose the ability to block, and getting hit causes you to exit the Custom Combo state prematurely.
  • Practical Taunt: Taunting gives the opponent meter. While that's usually not a good thing, K-Groove's super bar won't carry over to the next round if it's active, so taunting to fill your opponent's K-Groove bar before you lose a character is extremely helpful.
  • Pressure-Sensitive Interface: In the EO versions. The strength of punches and kicks is determined by the pressure exerted on the L and R buttons in an attempt to simplify the controls for the GameCube and the Xbox.
  • Punch Parry: Available on both ends of the spectrum: Street Fighter III's Parries are available for P-Groove users while Garou: Mark of the Wolves's Just Defend system is exclusive to K-Groove.
  • Rooftop Confrontation: The Osaka Castle stage where you fight the regular/unpowered version of Rugal or Akuma as a Final Boss is set on the roof of Osaka Castle in the middle of a thunderstorm. Because its rain effect causes performance problems, this stage is banned in tournaments.
  • Set Swords to "Stun": Some characters carry bladed weapons (the Samurai Shodown characters in particular but also Hibiki from The Last Blade for the same reason and Vega's signature claw). No one gets cut (although the "slash" hit effect is used for their weapons) and the whole cast is capable of a Bare-Handed Blade Block (although the weapon users can typically inflict high amounts of guard damage to go some way to justifying the reality of trying to stop a sword with nothing but one's hands), with fights ending on a usual "KO". This even includes Haohmaru's frightening standing Hard Punch (a huge, forward-stepping slash that is his Hard Slash in Samurai Shodown), which even keeps its Hit Stop effect from Samurai Shodown when it connects, which no other basic move can cause.
  • "Shaggy Dog" Story: Some of the character endings turn into this (with some of them Played for Laughs). Maki never finds Guy, Mai never finds Andy (nor does she trick him into marrying her), Rolento doesn't find anyone to join his army, Balrog wins the prize money, but accidentally gives it to charity, etc.
  • Shout-Out: Check the page.
  • SNK Boss: Predictably, both of the True Final Bosses: Shin Akuma and God/Ultimate Rugal. The first is Akuma being given Rugal's Orochi Power while the latter is Rugal taking the Satsui no Hado. Getting to them is one challenge. Fighting them, on the other hand, well... good luck. As much as they follow the same rules of regular play (a.k.a. unmodified-for-CPU and the same exact high damage yet very low health values as when used by the player), their A.I. is lethal even on the easiest setting. The A.I. will instantly get out of dizzy due to A.I. mashing input commands. Due to how difficult some of the special moves are (mostly from God Rugal), the A.I. executes them without problem. The A.I. will also do high-damaging combos and input-canceling (i.e. Ashura Senku into a special move) whenever necessary. The lower the health, the tougher the A.I. You literally have to understand the game's exploits to even stand a chance.
  • Spectacular Spinning: Zangief. Eagle less so. They even have a special intro solely on the basis that Double Lariat and Manchester Black are essentially the same move.
  • Sprite/Polygon Mix: The game has sprite-based characters and 3D backgrounds, similar to Marvel vs. Capcom 2 from the previous year and a technique later adopted by the BlazBlue series.
  • Stock Audio Clip: Most characters were re-recorded, but others reuse voice samples from older games (e.g. King from The King of Fighters '96, Yun and Akuma from 3rd Strike).
  • Stripperiffic: Mai and Morrigan, who's technically not even wearing clothes. Maki is also this, but slightly less so.
  • Suddenly Significant City: While the real-life Osaka has made bids to host significant world championships like the Olympics and failed unlike other more famous Japanese cities like Tokyo, Osaka hosts this game's tournament's championship match. The real-life Osaka is the city in which both Capcom and SNK have their headquarters stationed. If the players do too well in the single player campaign, either Shin Akuma or God Rugal sets Osaka on fire to set up the True Final Boss match, an outcome no one anticipated or wanted. The epilogue indicates that five lives were lost in what is publicly believed to be a "mysterious explosion" and repairs are underway thanks to donations from the tournament committee, though public sentiment about the tournament itself is overall positive.
  • Took a Level in Badass: Ryuhaku Todoh was basically a Joke Character in Art of Fighting with only one special attack. It took the efforts of daughter Kasumi in sequels (and The King of Fighters) and then his big return in this game to show just how badass the Todoh Style can be.
  • Tournament Arc: The Garcia Financial Clique and the Masters Foundation sponsor a joint fighting tournament to smooth over their rivalry, pay a million dollar grand prize to the winning team, and raise money for charity. Unusually for tournaments featuring many of these fighters, this tournament is a clean competition that has no corrupt motives, averting Not Just a Tournament despite having criminals such as Balrog, Vega, Rolento, Yamazaki, and Chang as entrants, though it can be interrupted by criminals like an Optional Boss or a True Final Boss who cause incidents that the tournament organizers and hosts did not plan for or want.
  • True Final Boss: If certain conditions are met, the player team will be challenged by Akuma or Rugal after the final round of the single-player campaign. If certain additional conditions are met, they will be fought by Shin Akuma or God/Ultimate Rugal.
  • Updated Re-release: Capcom vs. SNK 2 EO, with many tweaks, and two new Groove choices. The GameCube version dropped online multiplayer, though. The export original Xbox version of EO was the first version to have online multiplayer matches outside of Japan.
  • Vocal Evolution: Unusually, Cammy's voice went from a fluent English voice actress (voice director Susan Hart, using stock audio from X-Men vs. Street Fighter) in the first game to a Japanese seiyuu reciting English phrases here (Miki Nagasawa, who also voices Maki).
  • X Meets Y: Like Capcom vs. SNK: Millennium Fight 2000 before it, CvS2 blends the gameplay principles of the two companies' flagship franchises. This game takes the three-person team mechanic that The King of Fighters is best known for and combines it with the Groove System, which is an evolution of the "-ism" mechanic from Street Fighter Alpha 3.note 

Hey, who allowed them to write this page? It's way too strong to compete; I mean, what's up with that? Someone's gonna have to take that Troper down!

Alternative Title(s): Capcom Vs SNK 2 Mark Of The Millennium 2001, Capcom Vs SNK 2 Millionaire Fighting, Capcom Vs SNK 2 Millionaire Fighting 2001, Capcom Vs SNK 2

Top