While using Neo-Geo MVS, this one includes 68 KB of RAM of video and 64 KB of RAM. This made The King of Fighters '96 (1996) the first game to break the technical limits of the MVS system.
The sub-boss character, Chizuru Kagura, was the hardest one to create. Her pixelated image was completed in a month, and the designer in charge of her often worked until six in the morning.
Kasumi Todoh was added to the cast since the coinciding release of Art of Fighting 3 (1996) had increased the character's profile.
Geese Howard from Fatal Fury: King of Fighters (1991) was first meant to appear in The King of Fighters '95 (1995), but developers abandoned this idea. When The King of Fighters '96 (1996) began development, the staff decided to make Geese become a playable character. The Boss Team in which he starred along with Wolfgang Krauser from Fatal Fury 2 (1992) and Mr. Big from Art of Fighting (1992) received "special treatment", such as music for each individual member (in comparison to other teams, who only had one). Due to memory restrictions, some of the special moves that were designed for Geese had to be left out of the game.
The development period for The King of Fighters '96 (1996) dragged on right up to the time of its scheduled release. At the location test for the title, Mature and Vice were still not included in the game, since the staff did not have enough time to completely design them.