POSTED:   Saturday, July 9th, 2022

(8-20-2022)

Rare Assets from Garou: MOTW Sequel Uncovered

  

Back in May, new high quality concept artwork and 2D character sprites from the highly secretive and mysterious canceled Garou: Mark of the Wolves sequel surfaced online. After 20 years of existing on random CD-ROMS... new assets from the canceled MOTW 2 sequel are continuing to be leaked, giving us a behind-the-scenes glimpse of what could have been a blockbuster sequel to SNK's beloved 2D fighting game masterpiece. A Japanese Twitter account by the name of @2021kduck recently shared some additional assets from Garou: MOTW 2, including early stage designs and more 2D character sprites!
 

Before we get to the new leaked content... here's a quick recap of MOTW 2 assets discovered 2 months ago. Below is a crisp image showing all returning MOTW 1 characters sprites alongside 7 planned newcomers in the game. Appearing in the third row, an injured Joe Higashi was also planned to make a cameo (possibly during a win pose or cut-scene) as a support character for his female Muay Thai apprentice, Kuan / Kuwan.
 

See the previous article from May 2022 for additional concept artwork of Joe Higashi, along with 2D sprites of Kuan and other canceled characters for Garou: MOTW 2.
 
 
Now that we're all caught up... have a look below at these hot-off-the-presses uncovered MOTW 2 character sprites which appear to be new moves / animations for some of the returning cast members! Additionally, and perhaps most impressively, one of the new 2D sprites apparently confirms a planned cameo by none other than Garou / Fatal Fury series veteran, Andy Bogard.

  

 
                


              

Considering Andy Bogard didn't appear in the original MOTW 2 sprite sheet revealed a while back, it's not very likely that he was going to be playable (probably a cameo like Joe). Nonetheless, seeing Andy actually drawn in the Garou: MOTW style is a treat for us old school SNK 2D sprite fans!

[UPDATE] Directly below is a sprite sheet for one of Garou: Mark of the Wolves 2's newcomers (name unconfirmed) containing some of his key movement animations like walking, jumping, and even rolling. This character uses boxing as his fighting style. For more Garou: MOTW 2 character sprite sheets, be sure to check out our new article after scrolling through!
 




                  




It appears Terry Bogard was going to have a Diagonal Rising Tackle in Garou: Mark of The Wolves 2!




          

The uploader said many of the other character sprite files are unfortunately "distorted" and/or unfinished, as seen above. However, we can still make some of them out. The sprite on the left appears to be a throw technique by Kevin Rian, while the sprite on the right looks like a new move by Tizoc. The uploader, who posted these assets from CD-ROMs, also mentioned that there are approximately 10 to 20 new move files for returning characters.


In addition to the character sprites, a small handful of early Garou: Mark of the Wolves 2 stages / backgrounds were uncovered. The first two stages directly below (a windmill stage and a nighttime city stage with a river running through it) are among the most polished, but clearly weren't finalized before the game was canceled. Other backgrounds that you'll see further down were in the very early stages of perspective sketching and coloring.


 
 






















 
(PART OF THE ABOVE BACKGROUND)
 









The purple and blue sky (above) was supposed to be the under-layer of the coliseum stage (directly above it). This also appears to be one of the most polished, nearly-finished new stages from Garou: Mark of the Wolves 2. In the future, we might even see some 2D spriters mesh these backgrounds & character sprites together into Animated GIF form for a more accurate depiction of how these graphics would've looked if the game was finished.


Finally, below is the tweet from @2021kduck showing the actual CD-ROM discs that contained all of the assets you see above. His tweet says the CD-ROM was apparently left by "Mr. K", a Garou: MOTW team programmer who went to Odaiba when the old SNK moved to developing pachinko games.
 
 
To state the obvious... it may be slightly (or very) heartbreaking for Garou fans to see these materials go unfinished, especially knowing there's very little chance SNK will ever resurrect this canceled project. Nonetheless, it's definitely cool to finally have this small glimpse into the very early development of a mysterious canceled project by SNK that has been talked about and rumored for decades!

It should be noted that the legitimacy of these assets (while very convincing and likely legit) were not "officially" confirmed or released by SNK themselves. If you ask me, that Andy sprite looks too legit to be a fake... but ya never know.
 
 
*This article may be updated with additional information, character sprites, and/or background assets if new content is revealed in the coming days. Thanks for reading and keep it here on Fighters Generation for more.
 ~TFG Webmaster, Frank Joseph | @Fighters_Gen

 

 Source:  @2021kduck (Twitter):            Related Tweet:  @Fighters_Gen:

Related News  |   July 2022
Character Animations from Garou: Mark of the Wolves Sequel

Following recent news from last week, some very interesting Garou: MOTW 2 content has surfaced online, including nearly-finished character animations from SNK's canceled sequel. Thanks to several members on FGC Twitter, we can now view the actual animations...

Related News  |   May 2022
MOTW 2 Character Sprites, Artwork

Previously, SNK confirmed a Garou: MOTW sequel was in fact planned after the release of the first game, but unfortunately was canceled. A Japanese account on Twitter recently shared what appear to be never-before-seen images of character sprites from Garou: MOTW 2.

Related News  |   January 2021
 MOTW 2 Mock-up by Streets of Rage 4 Artists

As you might know, a direct sequel to Garou: Mark of the Wolves was in development by SNK in the early 2000's, but the project was (sadly) canceled. Many years later, unfinished 2D character sprites from MOTW2 surfaced, unveiling several new character designs who were planned for the sequel. Two artists from Lizardcube Games (Streets of Rage 4)..

Related News  |   May 2022
 KOF: The Ultimate History by Bitmap Books

Bitmap Books is an award-winning independent publisher of retro gaming books, celebrating the rich history of software, hardware, developers, and influential series of gaming. Now available to pre-order, Bitmap's latest tome features 544 beautiful pages...

Related News  |   March 2022
 TFG Discord Server Now Live!

As part of TFG's 20th Anniversary celebration this year, we've opened up an official Discord server as a new way to connect the community and fighting game fans. If you're on Discord, consider joining Fighters Generation's official server — featuring a wide range...
  Related TFG Links:  Garou: Mark of the Wolves,  Terry,  Andy,  Joe Higashi | TFG NEWS
       FOLLOW    ON:                            
   MORE NEWS CHARACTERS GAMES