SNK

SNK Corporation is a Japanese video game hardware and software company. SNK is an acronym of Shin Nihon Kikaku (新日本企画). The company’s legal and trading name became SNK in 1986.

The original SNK was founded in Osaka, Japan, in July 22, 1978 by Eikichi Kawasaki, and existed until October 30, 2001. Anticipating the end of his first company, Kawasaki founded the company Playmore Corporation in August 1, 2001, which in July 7, 2003 became SNK Playmore Corporation. Due to this strong resemblance to the previous company both in name and identity, SNK Playmore is sometimes referred to simply as SNK.

On April 25, 2016, SNK Playmore offcially rebrands themselves as their original name, SNK, entirely dropping the Playmore name. According to a 4Gamer interview, this was actually decided from votes by all their employees. On December 1, 2016, SNK Playmore officially changed its corporate name to SNK.

SNK is most notable for creating the Neo-Geo arcade system, and several franchises of games including The King of Fighters, Metal Slug, Samurai Shodown and Fatal Fury. SNK also helped publish many games including Rage of the Dragons, World Heroes, Ninja Master’s and Sengoku along with Double Dragon for the Neo Geo.