Neo-Geo AES question

I'm new to the community and i just wanna know a little more about SNK and the AES. Why exactly were AES games so expensive when they came out? And where were the U.S versions of the newer games sold? Like SVC and that. I'd figure that U.S games were discontinued meanwhile the Japanese games were still made up until the point where legit games were discontinued.

AES games were expensive because ROM chips are very expensive compared to optical media.

And they were more expensive that any other ROM cart-based system carts because of the amount of ROMs used.

Yep

And USA games were produced right to the death (SSVS)

From what I remember, Neo Geo games were sold in game stores in the early '90s when the AES was first released. Nobody I knew (including myself) owned a Neo Geo, since the prices were outrageous. We all wanted one, but we were perfectly happy with our Super Nintendos. Around the mid 90's, Neo Geo stuff disappeared from retail stores. I always assumed the console had died, but apparently games were still available through a mail order catalog. After the catalog died out, I think Neo-Geo.com was given the English distribution rights.

There's probably more to the story than that, but that's how it goes as far as I know.

Mushiki said:

AES games were expensive because ROM chips are very expensive compared to optical media.

And they were more expensive that any other ROM cart-based system carts because of the amount of ROMs used.

Click to expand...

In addition, small run manufacturing costs lead to a much higher bottom line.