SNK Killer List 5

The five SNK Playmore Ps2 game I just can't find.Not the best fighter collection. I can't help but want to have all the SNK fighters, good or bad. Its history.

The huge character sprites in the early Art of Fighting games is a little goofy but spawned some of the more memorable SNK characters.

Now this is a serious fighter collection. Two solid arcade games worthy of being on any fans shelf. Its got 72 characters! This game is at A & C Games on Spadina but they want $50. I'm holding out for a $20 copy at Game Shack.

I've never seen this game for sale anywhere, new or used. Two more arcade perfect Neo Geo games. I can only imagine its more of what made 2000/2001 so good plus a few new characters.

Since I got rid of my PS1 collection I've been missing me some Metal Slug X. For $30 I can get this new at Game Shack on Young St. It has six games! Thats more Metal Slug than any one person should have access to.

A Closer Look At SNK's Arcade Library

The Future Is Now
With Vol.1 of an arcade collection released earlier this year on PS2 and soon to be released on Wii, SNK have thrown but a tray of appetizers out for ravenous hard core arcade fans to munch on. Before we look towards the obvious Vol.2 lets roll up our sleeves and dig for the treats SNK has buried at the bottom of its freezer.

Images KLOV

The Early Years 1979-1985
Not exactly Pac Man and Galaga
These early games were fun but didn't really stand up to the competition at the time. SNK needed a calling card game, a mascot, anything to stand out and win a few of the quarters destined for the bellies of Defender, Donkey Kong and Tempest. SNK's early years are fairly forgettable. Not much here worth putting on an arcade collection. I, like many gamers, did not own a Neo-Geo as a kid. I played most of these games via PC emulation although my memories of late 80's Saturdays afternoons spent at Electronic Avenue video arcade in the North Sydney mall, loosing many dollars to SNK games are vivid and many. As with all the games I blog about from this moment forward let it be known to all, I use emulation. I payed for a lifetime of free plays as a kid.

Ozma Wars 1979

Satan of Saturn 1981

Main Event 1984

Mad Crasher 1984

Alpha Mission 1985

The late 1970s and early 1980s were pretty much standard fair for SNK. The company pumped out a few dozen games, most of them pretty average and with the exception of Alpha Mission they really didn't produce any exceptional titles in those first few years as a struggling arcade publisher/developer. SNK were creative and resourceful however, and they managed to try and develop for almost every type of genre possible and even helped invent a few along the way.
By 1986 they demonstrated an obvious talent for developing action oriented shooters and were about to tighten the screws on the quality of their games in the face of fierce competition from Capcom, Konami, Data East and Taito. Arcade technology was moving forward in what seemed like huge leaps in the late 80s and SNK's games were about to get a whole lot better.

The Late 1980s
The Calm Before the Storm

The last SNK cabinet style before the Neo Geo hit.

Athena 1986

P.O.W. 1988

Mechanized Attack 1988

Prehistoric Isle 1989

Ikari III- The Rescue 1989

With a strong emphasis now on pushing powerful & expensive technology, SNK really started to pull ahead in the late 1980s. The graphics and art were beginning to hold up against Taito's and Capcom's. Players were treated to high quality sound and state of the art effects on more and more SNK games and most importantly kids were lining up to dump in their money. For the first time the company was turning a solid profit. As good as their games were in the late 1980s SNK was about to get a boost of power incredable enough to make a Libyan terrorist proud. SNK was secretly developing a technology that would forever place them at the pinnacle of hard core arcade and home gaming.


1991 The Neo Geo Hits Hard!Gone are the old style cabinets, the wood finish
and three button controls. The Neo Geo set a new standard.

The early 1990s...







The Home system...

Who cares if no one could afford it? You could buy the same game for the Neo Geo home system that you were playing in the Arcade!

I wanted one of these so bad.

The mid 1990s too many fighters.
Mid 90s cabinet






The late 1990s & the death of arcades...
The last North American Neo Geo cabinets





Much more soon...

Wii Fit Balance Board

Just in case you weren't familiar with Wii Fit & the Balance Board, Heres how it works:

Wii Punchout

According to Kotaku and its sources Punchout, the best candidate for motion controls added to an older Nintendo IP, is rumored to be coming out of retirement for one more big fight on the best selling system. The popular speculation sees the balance board being used for dodging and weaving and the controllers for throwing punches. Heres hoping for both Little Mac and Mii's as playable characters, and Bald Bull!

MEGA MAN 9

The year is 199X!
Everybody loves the blue bomber.

The Facts:

• Mega Man 9 will use (or limit itself to) the visual style of the first six NES games. 8-bit graphics, meaning 52 possible colors, 16 colors displayed at once, etc.
  

• The music sounds very similar to the midi tracks found on the NES carts.

• The game being developed by NTI Creates, the people who made the Mega Man Zero games.

• A few bosses include; Plug Man, Galaxy Man, Jewel Man, Concrete Man, Hornet Man, Magma Man and Splash Woman.

• The game is going to be available for download only via Wii, PS Network, and X-Box live in 720p or 1080i.
  

• It will be available in japan in September, no word on the rest of the planet.
  

A trip down Mega Man memory lane...
Notice how the little guy is jumping in every shot? You do a lot of jumping in Mega Man, a lot of jumping and a lot of dieing.

The opinions are pretty split among the hardcore Mega Man fans as to Capcom's choice to revisit the 8-Bit era rather than continue the series in a pallet closer 16-32 bit graphics. It was no doubt a lot faster to develop this way and for $10 is definitely going to be worth it. If were lucky we'll be playing a new 8-bit Mega Man by Christmases. Now how about a new 8-bit Duck Tales?