That Raiden Screeny above does look pretty nice.
Eh, it's hard to know exactly what to want at the moment. I WANT them to make something that people won't belittle with stupid squabbling from day one. I unrealistically want every new character from XIV back, and some more new ones, and some old returning cast. I want Player characters cheering in the background, for a XI style tag system to be a OPTION for play, and some type of modes that SNK can claim as their own in Fighters going forward, much as ASW claims their SP stories as something to expect in their games.
My unrealistic desires for XIV would be for SNK to bank on the entirety of their catalogue and talents, and use that to prop the game up as their greatest series. If we're not getting pure KOF sprites anymore, include some spritework mini-games to explain the teams motivations and stuff. Get the Metal Slug Attack / Defense team to make a 2 or 3 Stage Ikari Slug game, Have in-between stages minigames like the bottle chopping and special move practice from Art of Fighting Arcade, bring back the arm wrestling from Fatal Fury, or do something with the skeleton of Samurai Shodown RPG. Do some spritework 2D stuff to keep the NeoGeo aspect constantly alive.
I think they'll have to be some compromises to give the masses what they want, though. Will we get much less characters out-the-gate, if we get those better graphics so many beg for? If we get special intros to return, will the characters have less EX moves? Will we get less stages, but each stage has 3 or 4 phases to it? *shrug* I'd actually love to see character intro animations, new outros, and growing rivalries pushed out with Patches. If Iori wins Evo, by defeating a Chin Getsai, give them a special intro to earmark the event! If fans start shipping a couple for some reason, play with the idea in game. Help the game react to the community, and give people a bit of something new to look forward to.
Definitely want them to get the netcode stuff sorted too, or course. Code Mystics seems to know how to wrap Rollback around their gameplay, get their consultation from Day 1 of Network production. Take cues from KI's way of having a double-FPS simplified version of the game running in the background, to let the rollback-code have a wider selection of frames to choose from, which meant that the rollbacks weren't as visually jarring as those in things like SFxT and SFV. Continue with the party lobby system, and bring back the features that XII tried to have like Clan-Battle lobbies.
Hopefully we have a tease around year's end. A model standing in a stage like May's quick preview in Guilty Gear would start setting expectations nicely.
