Characters
With the exception of Tam Tam and Amakusa, the remaining cast of the original Samurai Shodown return for the sequel, being joined by six new characters:
Genjuro Kibagami - a cruel and merciless swordsman who is Haohmaru's greatest rival.
Cham Cham - a young cat-like girl who is the younger sister of Tam Tam (who was transformed into her pet chimpanzee Paku Paku as divine punishment for losing and failing to protect his village's two sacred stones from Mizuki and her loyal forces).
Neinhalt Sieger - a noble and valiant knight from Prussia who fights with a giant gun-containing gauntlet.
Nicotine Caffeine - an old diminutive monk who serves as the wise master of Haohmaru and Genjuro.
Kuroko - the background referee who serves as a hidden boss of the game. Kuroko's move-list is interesting as he uses moves that are used by some of the characters in the game as well as characters from other SNK fighters such as Ryo Sakazaki and Tung Fu Rue. His super move in the game is a comical version of Ryo's Ryuko Ranbu.
Mizuki Rashojin - a vengeful spirit who desires to carry out Ambrosia's will in bringing forth chaos and destruction to the world. Mizuki is the first female final boss in the series and the only boss to have assistance from an animal (a dog-like demon named Maju who serves as both Mizuki's personal pet and guardian).
Release
Samurai Shodown II was originally released for the Neo Geo arcades and home consoles in 1994. In spite of its considerable popularity, the game went for several years without being released on any other system, except a 1996 port of the Neo Geo CD version for Windows-based PCs only in Japan. It was ported to the PlayStation, in the form of the Samurai Spirits Kenkaku Shinan Pack (which combines the first two games into one package and was also only released in Japan).
However, an Xbox Live Arcade port and a PlayStation 2/Wii anthology containing every Samurai Shodown game were announced at the Tokyo Game Show 2007. It was released on Xbox 360 on September 10, 2008, and on the Wii's Virtual Console in Europe on August 8, 2008 and in North America on August 25, 2008, at a cost of 900 Wii Points. On December 18, 2012, SNK Playmore released the game on the onboard memory of the Neo Geo X portable console. It was also ported for iOS and Android platforms and released on iOS App Store and Google Play in June 2013.
A digital PC version of Samurai Shodown II with Neo Geo emulation was bundled with many other SNK Playmore Neo Geo emulated ports and released on the Humble Bundle store on December 8, 2015. Though the browser version of some of these games including this one played a bit too fast in the emulated software window, they had Steam client versions available. This game and many others in the Neo Geo 25th Anniversary bundle that were on Humble Bundle were later released for DRM-free download on GOG.com on May 31, 2017.
As with the original Samurai Shodown, the Neo Geo AES version censors all blood in the game. However, Samurai Shodown II also includes a "blood code" to enable all blood; SNK provided this code to gaming magazines for publication and to those who called their customer service department.
Reception
Samurai Shodown II was even better-received than the original. The four reviewers of EGM gave the Neo Geo home version a unanimous score of 9/10 and the "Game of the Month" title, saying that the game improved in every aspect over its already excellent predecessor. They later ranked it #4 in the 1995 EGM's "Hot 50", higher than any other fighting game. GamePro criticized that the combos are still unbalanced, with some characters able to do far more damage than others, but praised improvements such as the revised POW meter and secret moves, as well as "the best graphics ever seen in a hand-drawn animated fighting game." They further remarked that, in combination with other recent releases such as Fatal Fury Special, SNK was close to overtaking Capcom as the premier maker of fighting games. A reviewer for Next Generation said that the game was the same as its predecessor aside from some "minor improvements", but that "that's what makes it so darn good."
Samurai Shodown II made GameSpot's list of the greatest games of all time and EGM's list of top ten cult classics. It was also ranked as the 18th best arcade game of the 1990s by Complex. Retro Gamer included it among top ten Neo Geo games: "With its beautiful graphics, silky smooth animation and eclectic character roster, the second part of SNKs Samurai Shodown series is easily its best. The 202-meg cart featured new fighters, glorious backdrops and even slicker controls than the impressive original. A massive arcade success, Samurai Shodown II was a fantastic two-fingered salute to Capcom and proved that SNKs style and ambition knew no bounds. It certainly lacks the depth of later games in the series, but for sheer fun and accessibility Samurai Shodown II is without equal. A truly monumental fighter that still plays brilliantly today." In 2008, they gave the XBLA re-release a review score of 91%. In 2019, Game Informer ranked it as the 9th best fighting game of all time.