The series was initially developed for SNK's Neo Geo MVS arcade hardware and received yearly installments up until its tenth entry, The King of Fighters 2003 — thereafter, SNK moved away from annual The King of Fighters releases and games adopted a Roman numbered format, while simultaneously retiring the use of Neo Geo.

SNK also created original characters to serve as protagonists, with individual story arcs, interacting with fighters from Art of Fighting and Fatal Fury, among other titles.

There is an added Challenge Mode where the player must win certain matches against the CPU in KOF '98 under specific conditions, a media gallery featuring listenable tracks from each game, and a collection of official illustrations.

[52] The basic gameplay system of KOF is similar to SNK's previous games like the Fatal Fury series, Art of Fighting and Samurai Shodown.

As with most other fighting games, each character has a set of basic, unique, and special moves the player can perform using a specific series of joystick and button inputs.

If a character is losing a match against the opponent, then the player can call one of the remaining teammates standing on the sidelines to jump in and perform a support attack.

[55] Three games—The King of Fighters '99, 2000, and 2001—added the idea of each team being given an extra character that can assist the player to produce more attacks or combos against the enemy.

The first game in the series, KOF '94, centers on a black market arms dealer named Rugal Bernstein, who hosts a well-known fighting tournament to lure worthy adversaries into his trap so that he can kill them and turn them into stone statues, adding them to his collection of defeated martial artists.

KOF '99 introduces a new story arc involving a mysterious corporation known as NESTS, which seeks to create an army of genetically altered fighters.

[61] KOF 2003 begins a new story line focusing on another new lead character named Ash Crimson, a young man who seeks to possess the powers of the Three Divine Vessels for his own unknown agenda.

He enjoys Tensai Bakabon, Ashita no Joe, Tiger Mask and Devilman, as well as arcade and Super Famicom games.

[70] SNK staff members noted that due to the great popularity of some of the series' characters, it is difficult to design new ones that might have the same appeal.

[71] During the mid 1990s, The King of Fighters was SNK's most popular IP as their other famous works like Art of Fighting 3 and Fatal Fury 3 were poorly received by the gamers.

Eolith negotiated a license agreement in the same year to keep producing the KOF series because of the franchise's popularity in Korea and worldwide.

Fearing disappointing returning fans, Eolith decided to maintain most of the common parts from The King of Fighters while adding new elements to it.

[82] The decision to create The King of Fighters XIV was made when SNK Playmore's CEO Eikichi Kawasaki decided the company should return to producing appealing fighting games rather than Pachinko-Slot Machines and Mobile Apps.

[90] Feeling the previous title had outdated graphics for a 2016 game, SNK chairman Zhihui Ge said that XV would the Unreal Engine 4 to provide a better presentation.

[106][107] Another manhua series is King of Fighters RX Project '00 (拳皇RX) in three volumes that was officially sponsored by SNK-Playmore Hong Kong.

[117][118] The first season retells the story of the first games with Kyo Kusanagi leading the Japan Team to participate in the title tournament, eventually encountering the host, Rugal, who is using the power of the mythical creature Orochi.

The drama originally aired on the Game Dra Night and Neo Chupi and was then released by Pony Canyon CD on July 7, 1999.

The guidebook The King of Fighters Perfect Reader includes the bonus CD drama KOF: Mid Summer Struggle.

[189] The formation of the Three Sacred Treasures Team in The King of Fighters '96 had a major impact with fans because it was appealing because of the Orochi saga and because of its incorporation of Japanese mythology.

[190][191] Although Kyo's story arc ends with The King of Fighters '97, he has remained a more popular hero than his successors like Ash Crimson in Western regions, which led to Ignition Entertainment promoting KOF XII using him.

[194] GameType lamented most characters a have a tendecy to retain their classic outfits with few exceptions like Terry Bogard, Kyo Kusanagi, and Robert Garcia.

While exploring the story, they hoped the return to the Orochi narrative based on the handling of Chizuru Kagura in 2003 would appeal more to the audience as GameType did not enjoy the NESTS arc from previous installments alongside Nona's artwork.

[78] With KOF XIV, SNK noted the series' popularity was still dominant in South America and China, leading to the creation of teams composed of characters from those areas.

[199] Kakuchopurei.com felt the series offered a balanced cast which would help any newcomer while also agreeing with The Daily Star on how SNK handled the story lines.

[201] Singer Del the Funky Homosapien has recorded a song titled "The King of Fighters" whose lyrics involve the characters and special moves.

In an interview with Ignition Entertainment's director of business development Shane Bettehausen, Alex Lucard of Diehard GameFan said that North American SNK fans detested Ash and complained about his inclusion in The King of Fighters XII without a storyline while popular series' characters were overlooked.

[204] Ben Herman, president of SNK Playmore USA, commented that although he received complaints about the English voices for the game, Maximum Impact sold over 100,000 units as of May 2006, becoming a commercial success.