Customer Reviews

SNK Arcade Classics Vol 1

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Hello fellow Neo Geo and SNK fans.

Well we all waited for it.

Looked to be amazing!

Its not.

It fails on many many levels.

The good news first.

You get 15 games!

Neat intro and the design is pretty cool overall.

The bad news......yikes.

Every game on here is busted. There is either slowdown up the wazoo(KOF94) or there is this weird almost video refresh problem(fire up Magician Lord to see it really go nuts)

Samurai Showdown has the blood but the sound is jacked up big time.

ShockTroopers is the 1 man rom.

Baseball Stars 2 runs almost perfect but they still messed this up. Its a strange version of the ROM where all of the teams have different names(Korean or Euro I am guessing)


The save option takes about 10-12 seconds everytime you change an option.
I cant believe how bad the emulation is on this.
I think they tried a little too hard to copy the way the Capcom Collections are and that "backend" is eating up too much resources and the games themselves are suffering.

Overall yeah it was only $[...] US but I really didnt expect the games to run and look like crap on here when all of the previous collections run perfect(minus Metal Slug Collection).

SNK Playmore has been releasing budget priced compilation discs on the PS2 of their various franchises for a while now, and SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1 continues the tradition. The first thing you'll notice is that, finally, SNK has changed up the menu screen, and added goals to each of the 16 games that when completed will unlock new features and extras. Featured here in this collection are titles found on previous collections like the first installments of Art of Fighting, World Heroes, Metal Slug, and Fatal Fury; but there are some real gems to be found here as well. Baseball Stars 2, King of the Monsters, King of Fighters '94, Samurai Shodown, Last Resort, Top Hunter, and Shock Troopers are all wonderful experiences that make this compilation worth picking up alone. Some games aren't all that special, like Burning Fight, while others are decent enough like Super Sidekicks 3 and Sengoku. That being said, you won't find any bad games in this collection, but what really hurts it are some technical issues. Shock Troopers and King of the Monsters specifically suffer from some very noticable slowdown, while Art of Fighting, Fatal Fury, World Heroes, and Sengoku feature archaic controls that show the age of the games. Flaws aside though, you can't beat what you get with SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1: 16 games ranging from decent to great, a nice list of unlockables, and an ultra-budget price tag. All in all, if you're an SNK fan, you already know this collection is a must own.

Oh yes, the Neo*Geo. For those who remember, this was the most powerful video game system for its time. But the high price keep it out of reach of most gamers. So we just played it at the arcade of the MVS (or arcade machine) rather than buy the AES (or home gaming system).

Fast-forward to 2008. SNK Playmore releases SNK Arcade Classics Vol 1. This collection gives us some of the Neo Geo's most well known games(Samurai Shodown, MAGICIAN LORD, King of Fighters 94, Metal Slug, & Baseball Stars 2) & a couple of unknowns (Shock Troopers & Top Hunter which I never heard of til this collection was announced).

This collection uses a goal or "metal" system by which you can unlock things by doing certain tasks which vary from game to game. Unlockables include World Heroes, skill lists, game artwork & soundtracks. This should keep the fun factor up for a while. You can also set up checkpoints so you can come back later to that point at another time. This is very useable for tough games like Magican Lord, Last Resort & the 3 sports titles featured here.

Some have complain about emulation issues with some of the games. Yet I have no problems playing any of the games in this collection. The game with the biggest issues emulation-wise is Shock Troopers which has some slowdown & in-game loading... but is largely playable & is one of my favorite games in this set.

Also Fatal Fury & Art of Fighting are NOT the same as the ones that appear in their respective collections. (the former's date has been fix so when you beat Geese, the date they show is in real time just like in the arcade & Mr. Big & Mr. Karate's not already unlocked in the latter.)

At the end of the day, one can argue over the games chosen for this set or their emulation but they play well despite what previous reviewers have said. Also with 2 players, these games are very fun (NOTE: you can't win metals/unlock things in 2-player mode). Now we'll see if SNK Playmore
makes a Vol 2.

The game has great titles in it, but would have liked to have seen more games such as ghost pilot and samurai shodown 2, 3, or 4. But I guess thats what sequels are for. I sure hope that they make an snk part two and included at least ghost pilot. that game rocks. but overall It has some great games on the disc. I really enjoyed magican lord and neo golf. If you own a ps2 and haven't gotten this game, do so, you won't be disapointed. 4 stars for good games!!!!

Overall, a nice collection. Some slow downs on some games, but still worth getting. Lets hope Vol.2 comes out before the end of the year.
2008

I don't know why there are soo many complains about this videogame collection, this is FREAKING COOL to me!

* I mean... Shock Troopers and Sengoku ARE THE COOLEST GAMES in the collection! (WILD, INSANE, POWERFUL and WITH A VENGANCE!!!)

* Samurai Showdown, King of Fighters 94 and King of the Monsters are INSANEST WILDEST FIGHTING GAMES!!!

* Metal Slug, Burning Fight and Magician Lord THEY PACKED PUNCH AND POWER!

* Neo Turf Masters, Next Glory and BaseballStars are sport games but SOOO FUNNY!!!

The rest is not THAT good, but the games I mentioned make this collection worth buying it!

Maybe the reason that many people are complaining is about the graphics. Well, the graphics are not in the best quality but it looks CLEAR enought to play. Maybe people hoped that the graphics would be remeastered, but what the heck! It looks VERY CLEAR to me!

Adios.

This collection has 16 of some of the best Neo-Geo games ever released. At first I was in awe, but after putting them in and playing, it hit me like a ton of bricks that these aren't the premiere games that they once were. The graphics have aged and the some of the games are simply beautiful "NES" games. I mean, the graphics are better than NES games but the mechanics and strategies are basically the same. Wizard Lord, Burning Fight, etc. You'll be over them in 30 minutes tops.

Though they are still a great collection to have. The only thing was that after I unlocked "World Heroes" my favorite game on the collection (more for nostalgic reasons than anything) the memory card said it was corrupted and then I had to try to unlock the game again. I believe turning off the game while in session might do this to the memory card similar to how it did for the Sega Genesis collection.

Great collection of Neo Geo games, and great price considering some of these games went for 200 dollars when they were originally released. I'm glad they put more than just the usual fighters on here, because games like Magician Lord and Last Resort deserve to be played. The loading times when switching between games are longer than some other games for the PS2, but they're not unbearabe. I can't wait for volume 2, and I hope it's the same mix of genres.

This is a great value for 14.99 ! There are some true classic on here. I highly recommend Metal Slug, Samurai Showdown, Last Resort, World Heroes, and Magician Lord . The other games are decent also. The emulation is not perfect, but for the most part, these are the Neo Geo arcade games we all loved. This is a must own for all retro-gamers.

Over the last few years since SNK's surprising rise from the corporate ashes, the long running game company has released some anthologies of their more celebrated titles on their 1990's arcade game machine Neo-Geo. To date they have released World Heroes Anthology, Fatal Fury Battle Archives Vol. 1 & 2, Metal Slug Anthology and the Art of Fighting Anthology. On the horizon are a King of Fighters Anthology and a Samurai Showdown anthology (YAY!!!!).

Why am I mentioning this?

Well, it's due to the fact that SNK has included the 1st World Heroes, Fatal Fury, King of Fighters, Samurai Showdown, Art of Fighting and Metal Slug games on the new SNK Arcade Classic Vol. 1 for the PS2 and PSP. Being that this collection has 16 games on it (you have to unlock World Heroes BTW), 4 (soon to be 6) of those games are already on other anthologies that hardcore SNK fans have already bought. That leaves 10 games (Baseball Stars 2, Burning Fight, Last Resort, King of the Monsters, Magician Lord, Neo Turf Masters, Sengoku, Shock Troopers, Super Sidekicks 3, Top Hunter) that someone owning the anthologies wouldn't have already.

So who was this collection targeted to? I'm guessing the more casual classic games fan that might want more of a sampling of what SNK had to offer in the 90's instead of diving into the individual anthologies themselves for some of the gamns. However this will have some people like myself buying a collection of 16 games that has 6 on it that I already own. Also, there is the argument of people wondering why they put some sequels on here but didn't put some of the best games of other respective series on here like Fatal Fury 3, World Heroes Perfect, Samurai Showdown 2 and Metal Slug 3, Sengoku 3 instead of the 1st games of those long running seires.

One thing this entry has going for it is sheer variety. You have everything from action platform games to sports to shooters to one-on-one fighting to beat-em-ups. A few of the games can get a bit monotnous on one player (Burning Fight and Sengoku) in particular but while being far from the best types of games in that particular beat-em-up genre, since this only costs 15 bucks it makes the uneven quality of the games somewhat even out.

Being a Shooter fan, I absolutely love Last Resort and the Mercs style overhead shooter/action game Shock Troopers. We also can't forget about the action/platform masterpiece that is Magician Lord. That's still one of my favorite games of all time. Baseball Stars 2 is still one of the most fun pick-and-play baseball games of all time IMO. Turf Masters is also a lot of fun even though I'm not that much into golf games. And the original Samurai Showdown is still a classic regardless that the sequel bettered it in terms of number of characters and backgrounds.

The emulations are pretty much dead on and I found it funny that Last Resort which was plagued by slowdown on the Neo Geo has almost no slowdown on this version which makes a maddeningly at time difficult game even that much harder. Some people have complained of slowdown in certain games but to be frank I haven't seen it. Also, the version of Metal Slug on here doesn't suffer from the load times on the Anthology version, but the control does seem to lag a bit in comparison especially when the action gets really hectic.

If you're a casual fan just wanting to sample what SNK was about, this is a terrific deal to see what the NEO GEO was during it's prime. If you already have the before mentioned anthologies, then it'll depend on how much you want one or more of the 10 remaining games on here.