A PlayStation Plus subscription is unnecessary to enter. The purpose of this test is to improve the game’s online functions. On October 27, SNK announced an Open Beta Test for SONY's PlayStation 4/5 systems, during the State of Play conference. Other divulgation means are: a revealed character sheet written by Tomohiro Nakata, the theme songs of the formed team, idle poses and the story of the teams already formed. Starting with the 11th Character Trailer (Yashiro's Reveal Trailer), SNK starts to reveal silhouettes of the next characters to be confirmed the day prior to the trailer's release. The promotion of the game is through trailers that were initially weekly, but due to the postponement of the game, they became biweekly. Yasuyuki Oda ( Garou: Mark of the Wolves and The King of Fighters XIV) is the producer, Kaito Kusaka is the director, Eisuke Ogura is the creative director and Tomohiro Nakata is the main illustrator. This game is the second chapter of the fourth canonical saga for the series, and is the second SNK game to use the Unreal Engine graphic motor (Unreal Engine 4), the first being Samurai Shodown (2019). This is the first canonical game of the series to have Rollback Netcode (and the second mainline game with Rollback, being the first The King of Fighters 2002 Unlimited Match). It is currently not known if the game will have crossplay or not.
The game will be released for PlayStation 4/5, Xbox Series X/S, Windows 10, Steam and Epic Games. In June, SNK announced that the game had been postponed once again and will be released in the February 17, 2022, due to the rising cases of COVID-19 and the state of emergency in Japan. However, the date was postponed to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It was officially announced at EVO 2019 and was originally slated for release in 2020.
The King of Fighters XV ( Japanese: ザ・キング・オブ・ファイターズ XV ( フィフティーン ) Chinese: 拳皇15), officially abbreviated as KOF XV ( ケーオーエフ フィフティーン), is the upcoming fifteenth instalment of The King of Fighters series.