The modern revival of the Samurai Shodown series was released in June 2019 for consoles, with the PC version notably missing from the lineup. Prior to its initial release, SNK announced that the PC release of the 2D weapons fighter would be exclusive on the Epic Games Store, following a release of the NeoGeo Collection on the same service.
Patient fans who awaited the release of Samurai Shodown on Steam following the end of SNK's exclusivity deal with Epic Games can now except the game soon. Alongside the announcement of the Steam version of Samurai Shodown, a familiar face was revealed as its next DLC character, set to release on the same day.
SNK announced over the weekend that the long-awaited Steam release of Samurai Shodown will arrive on June 14, almost a full year since it was first made available on the Epic Games Store. The second major announcement was the reveal of Shiro Tokisada Amakusa, the official third DLC character from Season 3 of Samurai Shodown following Cham Cham and Hibiki Takane from The Last Blade series. After the announcement only two DLC characters remain to be announced, with the last one confirmed to be a guest character from the Guilty Gear franchise.
Veteran fans of the Samurai Shodown series will remember Amakusa as the final boss of the first Samurai Shodown in 1993. Since Samurai Shodown 3, he has been a playable character in almost every game in the main series and one of the game's central figures. With the release of Amakusa, he is the second-to-last fighter from the original Samurai Shodown to be included in the 2019 game. The only remaining character is Genan, who has yet to appear in a modern Samurai Shodown title following Samurai Shodown 6.
What's most peculiar about the sudden announcement of Amakusa, especially for an important and notable character in the series, is the lack of a gameplay trailer. In the past, characters like Hibiki Takane were heavily promoted leading up to their release. With Amakusa a mere month away, some fans assume the announcement was made in conjunction with the Steam release and not as its own, with a gameplay trailer more than likely arriving soon.
Another critique circling among fans is the lack of a rollback netcode announcement, with the PC and console versions being notorious among its playerbase for dodgy online gameplay. With the recent announcement from SNK that the King of Fighters 15 will have netcode, many players are asking for many other SNK titles to also receive updated playability.
Samurai Shodown is available on PC, PS4, Stadia, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.