With the release of the NGCD style controllers by 8bitdo, NeoGeo has been on my mind. I'm a huge fan personally--see avatar ;)
However, I mostly interfaced with NeoGeo via the MVS arcade units as a kid and the ports and collections, which started around the PS1/SS era. The AES was too rich for my blood, not just the unit, but the actual software with carts going for 200 buck in 90s money.
To rectify this, SNK created a CD version of their hardware. Games were priced like contemporary competitors and finally the NeoGeo was available at home at reasonable prices. Problem was load times. I think the first unit was single speed. There was a faster CD-Z unit that doubled the speed. But we weren't used to load times at the time. Plus the NeoGeo had fast paced arcade games as its core, you couldn't really hide like other developers did on other machines.
But, even with that, I still missed the unit. I didn't have the cash to support another system, even with much cheaper games. I've thought of buying a unit and collecting CD games, but even those have been going up in price too! The NeoGeo Halo Effect is real. Windjammers CD is around 80 bucks used in eBay right now as a example. Although the fighters are pretty cheap! But there are better ways to play the fighters these days.
I do kinda wish I got one around 2011, before the retro market got crazy. I always wanted original NeoGeo hardware as a fan and that was my best bet pockets wise lol.
One cool thing, as a VGM fan as well, is that many of the CD versions of the games had arranged soundtracks. Some had other additions as well. I think Metal Slug had a training mode.
However, I mostly interfaced with NeoGeo via the MVS arcade units as a kid and the ports and collections, which started around the PS1/SS era. The AES was too rich for my blood, not just the unit, but the actual software with carts going for 200 buck in 90s money.
To rectify this, SNK created a CD version of their hardware. Games were priced like contemporary competitors and finally the NeoGeo was available at home at reasonable prices. Problem was load times. I think the first unit was single speed. There was a faster CD-Z unit that doubled the speed. But we weren't used to load times at the time. Plus the NeoGeo had fast paced arcade games as its core, you couldn't really hide like other developers did on other machines.
But, even with that, I still missed the unit. I didn't have the cash to support another system, even with much cheaper games. I've thought of buying a unit and collecting CD games, but even those have been going up in price too! The NeoGeo Halo Effect is real. Windjammers CD is around 80 bucks used in eBay right now as a example. Although the fighters are pretty cheap! But there are better ways to play the fighters these days.
I do kinda wish I got one around 2011, before the retro market got crazy. I always wanted original NeoGeo hardware as a fan and that was my best bet pockets wise lol.
One cool thing, as a VGM fan as well, is that many of the CD versions of the games had arranged soundtracks. Some had other additions as well. I think Metal Slug had a training mode.
