SNK
Japanese video game company
SNK Corporation (Japanese: 株式会社SNK, Hepburn: Kabushiki gaisha SNK) is a Japanese video game developer and publisher. It was founded in 1978 as Shin Nihon Kikaku (新日本企画; lit. 'New Japan Project') by Eikichi Kawasaki and began by developing arcade games. SNK is known for its Neo Geo arcade system on which the company established many franchises during the 1990s, including Art of Fighting, Fatal Fury, Metal Slug, Samurai Shodown, and The King of Fighters; it continues to develop and publish new titles on contemporary arcade and home platforms. Since the 2000s, SNK has diversified from its traditional arcade focus into pachislot machines, mobile game development, and character licensing.
In 2001, due to financial troubles, the original SNK Corporation was forced to close. Anticipating the end of the company, founder Kawasaki established Playmore Corporation, which acquired all of the intellectual property of the SNK Corporation. In 2003, Playmore Corporation was renamed to SNK Playmore Corporation. In 2016, SNK dropped "Playmore" from its name. It has been owned by Electronic Gaming Development Company, a subsidiary of the Saudi Arabian Misk Foundation, since 2022.
History
Beginnings (1973–1981)
SNK was founded in 1973 as Shin Nihon Kikaku and reorganized on July 22, 1978, as a stock company (kabushiki gaisha) under the name "Shin Nihon Kikaku Corporation".
The public source identifies “SNK” as japanese video game company. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Japanese, video and game.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “SNK”, the useful work is to connect “japanese video game company” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Contemporary correspondence, administrative files and participant testimony can test how later narratives organized the event or institution. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1044563. VIAF identifies the subject as 124589095. The Library of Congress control number is no2009035986. 5 of 7 selected statements include explicit references; 5 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1978, 2001, 2003 and 2016.
Institutional narratives can privilege the records that survived while minimizing voices that were never formally collected. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.
- Event chronology
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Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “SNK”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow SNK primary sources, SNK archive and Japanese research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “SNK” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.