Bringing the old school arcade home
This week's edition is actually going to focus on a PS2 title. Yep, that's right. It's new, but it's old and it also affects the Wii's Virutal Console. Confused yet? Well, let's take a look at this game!
SNK Arcade Classics Volume — for the PS2
SNK was a pretty big game manufacturer in the 90s. I remember seeing their arcade boards everywhere. What made them special was that you had a choice of games to be able to play. Some arcade boxes featured only one game, though when Street Fighter 2 became a huge thing (damn, writing that makes me feel old now). Many of those games found on those machines (and to some extent on the Wii's Virtual Console) are found on this compilation disc. And you get 16 games on here for $20.
The games come from the arcade boxes as mentioned before, but SNK also had a little home game system called the Neo Geo (anyone else remember this). It was a killer 24-bit machine that replicated to a tee all the SNK games that you could find in the arcade. If it was so awesome, what was the problem you may ask? Well, the console itself was about $500 US at the time and the games, because they ranged from 100-330 Megs on a cartridge, were about $200. Remember, the SNES and Genesis and TurboGraphx-16 could be purchased for $200 or lower and the games ranged from $25-$50. Put the system and games into Canadian funds in the early 90s and you can see why not too many people flocked to the system.
The games were quite decent though. Their sprites (graphics) were huge compared to the home systems and the colour palate couldn't be beat. You were truly getting an arcade experience at home when getting this system. The one thing that stands out while playing these games on this compilation (or the VC) is that they were indeed coin suckers. SNK wanted you to keep sinking quarters into their machines to continue (as did all arcade game manufacturer back in the day), so you won't be surprised that these games are SUPER cheap with the AI and level design (this goes for the side scrollers mostly while the fighters that are in the style of Street Fighter 2 have decent difficulty levels).
The 2D fighters include: “Art of Fighting,” “Fatal Fury,” “Samurai Showdown” (uncensored, finally), “The King of Fighters ‘94” and “World Heroes.”
I always found Samurai Showdown to be a great, unique fighter while World Heroes, although nothing more than a big rip-off of SF2, a blast to play. The unfortunate thing about these games, though, is that you really need a good arcade style joystick to really get that old school feeling. The D-Pad and button layout just isn't the same.
I won't go on with listing the other side-scrollers or other games seeing how you can go online and find them, but I'll just say that getting “Metal Slug” and “Magician Lord” together on this disc for less than buying them both for the Wii Virtual Console says something.
Don't waste your money shelling out for these games on the Wii when you can get them in this package. There is unlock able content courtesy of a system that resembles Xbox Live's achievements, so you'll be playing these games over and over. Have a blast from the past and get this collection.
SNK Arcade Classics Volume — for the PS2
SNK was a pretty big game manufacturer in the 90s. I remember seeing their arcade boards everywhere. What made them special was that you had a choice of games to be able to play. Some arcade boxes featured only one game, though when Street Fighter 2 became a huge thing (damn, writing that makes me feel old now). Many of those games found on those machines (and to some extent on the Wii's Virtual Console) are found on this compilation disc. And you get 16 games on here for $20.
The games come from the arcade boxes as mentioned before, but SNK also had a little home game system called the Neo Geo (anyone else remember this). It was a killer 24-bit machine that replicated to a tee all the SNK games that you could find in the arcade. If it was so awesome, what was the problem you may ask? Well, the console itself was about $500 US at the time and the games, because they ranged from 100-330 Megs on a cartridge, were about $200. Remember, the SNES and Genesis and TurboGraphx-16 could be purchased for $200 or lower and the games ranged from $25-$50. Put the system and games into Canadian funds in the early 90s and you can see why not too many people flocked to the system.
The games were quite decent though. Their sprites (graphics) were huge compared to the home systems and the colour palate couldn't be beat. You were truly getting an arcade experience at home when getting this system. The one thing that stands out while playing these games on this compilation (or the VC) is that they were indeed coin suckers. SNK wanted you to keep sinking quarters into their machines to continue (as did all arcade game manufacturer back in the day), so you won't be surprised that these games are SUPER cheap with the AI and level design (this goes for the side scrollers mostly while the fighters that are in the style of Street Fighter 2 have decent difficulty levels).
The 2D fighters include: “Art of Fighting,” “Fatal Fury,” “Samurai Showdown” (uncensored, finally), “The King of Fighters ‘94” and “World Heroes.”
I always found Samurai Showdown to be a great, unique fighter while World Heroes, although nothing more than a big rip-off of SF2, a blast to play. The unfortunate thing about these games, though, is that you really need a good arcade style joystick to really get that old school feeling. The D-Pad and button layout just isn't the same.
I won't go on with listing the other side-scrollers or other games seeing how you can go online and find them, but I'll just say that getting “Metal Slug” and “Magician Lord” together on this disc for less than buying them both for the Wii Virtual Console says something.
Don't waste your money shelling out for these games on the Wii when you can get them in this package. There is unlock able content courtesy of a system that resembles Xbox Live's achievements, so you'll be playing these games over and over. Have a blast from the past and get this collection.
