Your most memorable Neo Geo moment...

I have to say that from the start of the Neo, in 1990, I've had plenty of great memories of the Neo. I remember it was during Christmas time that I walked into Babbages (Electronic Retailer in CA) and saw the most damn expensive home system ever made. And gawd, "are those cartridges BIG or expensive enough?" Had to get it anyway, but with my luck, they were out of stock. Yep, sold out within a few hours. Coming from the arcades, I've always been fascinated with the Neo simply because it was the first home console that had exact quality from it's arcade to it's home games.

Receiving my stipend check from USC in 1990, instead of those oh, so boring books, I cashed it out for a Neo. Title after title, I bought every AES game in sight, English and Japanese, until I hit Viewpoint. The purchase of Viewpoint totally changed my relation to SNK. Purchased from Game Stuff in Monterey Park, I came home, popped open the cart, fired it up. "uh, what the hell? It's a one player game only." In the back of the insert, it says "Two players simultaneous." I thought this was somewhat weird, considering that I played the promo copy at an arcade near SNK back then and it was 2 players simultaneous.

I was pissed. Spending $205.00 for this game, it wasn't the "arcade perfect" translation that SNK promised.

What to do? At that period of time, SNK had a game counselor/gaming guru they called "THE GAMELORD." Furious as I was, I called him up and complained I was misled. SNK, being very accomodating, said either I can have my money back or trade it in for another game. "Come down, he said, we'll take care of it on the spot." Ah, my dreams were answered, being able to step into SNK and kick it with some of the SNK honchos. SNK at the time of their Torrance location, I was about 15 minutes from there. Drove down, totally forgetting that I came there to switch out the Viewpoint, I met up with the Game Lord.

I tell you the employees at SNK are so laid back, so friendly, right when you step in the door. Everyone would greet you with a smile, like you're walking into a sushi bar. Was this place dope? Oh yeah, every inch of it. Right when you walk in, you see the "happy" receptionist, to the left of her a minty fresh Neo Geo mini cab with the rare 19 inch monitor version. Upstairs were the offices of the U.S. Executives and behind the building, the tech dept and warehouse (full of AES and MVS cabinets...all Brand new).

So the GameLord invites me in, showing me each part of their beautiful office building, heading back into his office. His office, being no different from some of our collections, held a Pro Sony RGB Monitor connected to what else? NEO AES. Behind his desk, the full AES set (up to that point, there wasn't many titles) and more importantly, proto carts.

After checking out his titles, we head back to the tech area where there's two cabs, pretty beat up, but were mainly used for testing purposes.

I can't remember the year, but Fatal Fury 2 was out by this time and so the SNK Gamelord challenged me to a few rounds. Uh, I clearly showed him who was going to be called the Gamelord at that moment and Cheng-Sinzan was the man of the game.

So basically, this meeting was my invitation to SNK and my most memorable experience. The Gamelord and I became good friends, held some Neo all nighters at his and his friend's place (played for 15-20 hours straight at times) and pretty much, I was a regular at the SNK offices each week. Such a wonderful place, with wonderful people. Because of this experience, I started collecting the Neo more seriously and respected them as a company, even though some of their games aren't the best.

So what game did I go away with for Viewpoint? Uh, embarassingly, 3 Count Bout. Not my choice, my two bonehead friends who came with me recommended it (who both loved Nintendo, not the Neo). I still have that damn game. Using it as a door stop.

My most memorable Neo-moment was in the summer of 1992. I was in an arcade near my home and surrounded by dozens of people watching me playing because I was where nobody in my town managed to reach until then.

And then the words which nobody in that place will never forget sounded clear around us:
"I've chisel your gravestone... Sleep well..."

1996!

Getting my first NEO along with FF2, AoF and WH! <img src="graemlins/drool.gif" border="0" alt="[Drool]" />

Mine was going into the arcades and was going to play fatal fury but as i walked up to the machine i heard the AGAIN LEGENDARY MEN RETURN intro for fatal fury 2 and could not believe my eyes at the great colours the game had.. a japanese boy was there and i played against him and when Mai won he pointed to the screen as her tits bounced and we both laughed, it was so good that i wanted that game and then got my system and waited till game came out to be happy at home but i will always remember that rocking intro voice

edit also as above when i got to krauser in single mode, i though at first he was lawrence bloods brother as they looked alike and never knew much about the game then and people were saying look hes at the end boss, shame i was shit at streetfighter 2 as i use to get my ass whipped at that

[ May 13, 2002: Message edited by: Lee Gray ]</p>

One chilly night in 1993, my dad and I went on our traditional grocery shopping at Safeway. I spotted a MVS machine in the corner and asked my dad for a quarter... you know, back when arcades were cool enough to only charge you 25 cents.

And there it was. World Heroes 2. I had NO idea part 2 was in the works, but lo and behold, it's here and it's real.

I didn't read magazines back then so WH2 came as a total surprise. It was a great time to be a kid I can tell you that! <img src="graemlins/glee.gif" border="0" alt="[Glee]" />

My most memorable Neo Geo moment? OK. . . you asked for it!

It was Spring, sometime in the early 90s. I guess maybe it was Spring 1992. Yeah, it must have been because I was a Sophomore at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, IN.

Anyway, every Spring ND held a week-long festival filled with games, concerts, and various other events. Well, it just so happened that one of the organizers of the Spring festival got SNK to come up to ND to hold a a 3-day Video Game Tournament!

I didn't even know about it until it was almost happening. Known as a huge video game enthusiast around the dorm, a few guys had posted a flyer for the tournament outside my door and jokingly asked if I was going to win it. I looked over the flyer and first prize was a Neo Geo Gold AES! Sweet! I told them all that I was going to win it even though I didn't really have as much confidence as I made it seem I did.

You see, we had a Neo Geo MVS in our Student Center. I think it had Soccer Brawl, League Bowling, Fatal Fury 1 and King of the Monsters 1. Being a huge Street Fighter 2 fan, and having NO SF2 in the Student Center I had played FF a few times and decided that it was a pretty crappy knock-off. League Bowling wasn't very impressive, and Soccer Brawl was kinda fun except that the only times worth playing were Japan ans Korea (they had Strikers with Cheap Powerups.) KotM was OK, but DAMN hard to get very far on 1 quarter (I was a poor student!)So I wasn't exactly the Neo Geo's #1 fan.

But anyway, video games were video games and I went to check out the tournament area as soon as it opened.

Wow! They had shipped in about 20-30 AESs and rented as many 20" TVs and set up in a huge room. It was a SWEET setup! They had all sorts of games, including some prototypes (Last Resort and Mutation Nation)! And the quality of the AES was phenomenal. These WERE arcade games.

I met the lady in charge of marketing at SNK (she was very nice) and the student in charge of the tournament and got the lowdown on the tournament. The rules were vaguely as follows:

Day 1 - Qualifiers all day long. They were going to take the top 50 scores for playing Mutation Nation (a prototype at the time.) You could play alone or with a 2nd player, but you only had one credit (3 lives) to get as high a score as possible.

Day 2 - Qualifiers continued for first 1/2 of the day and then 2nd Round Qualifiers began. The top 50 Qualifiers would play Fatal Fury for points! The top 5 scorers on Fatal Fury would advance to the 3rd Round the next day.

Day 3 - 3rd Round and Finals. The 3rd round consisted of playing King of the Monsters and Robo Army. The top 2 combined scorers would advance to the Final Round where they would square off against each other on a raised stage with one winner-take-all game of Soccer Brawl. This was played on a giant screen TV too!

They had practice machines set up with Mutation Nation in them, and official tournament machines set aside for when you were ready to give it a go officially.

So, of course, I was pumped! I had gotten there very early in the day. There were almost no people there yet. I sat down and practice MN for about 15 minutes. It was a side-scroller. No big deal I thought. I went over to the tournament area and signed up. There were hardly any people around so I ended up playing single-player. I did OK I thought. Good enough for first place at the time. Although, there had only been a handful of people that had tried before me.

Well, I eventually left the tournament to go to classes, but I returned periodically to see where I stood. Upon my return later that afternoon, I found TONS of people at the tournament. Some of them practicing for hours before hitting the tournament machine. And to my dismay, everyone was playing 2-player games and getting way further into the game! Ack! I had quickly dropped into the 30s!

I was sorta pissed. Mostly at myself for not having the patience to practice or the forethought of waiting to play with a 2nd player to advance further into the game.

I complained to the nice Marketing lady that early competitors had a disadvantage and she smiled and said that I could retry with a partner if I desired. Hell, yeah! That lady rocked!

They I devised my evil plan!
<img src="graemlins/smirk.gif" border="0" alt="[Smirk]" /> I ran back to my dorm and found a friend of mine who wasn't really into games. I got him to agree to play as my partner, and let me have all the points! Muahahaha. It was perfect!

We went back to the tournament room, practice for a while, and then sat down to qualify. The guy recognized me and told me I could only qualify once. I protested and informed him that the nice marketing lady said it was cool. She confirmed it, and reluctantly let me re-qualify. Haha!

Well, to put it succintly. I choked. My friend ended up with more points than me, and worst of all, my original score from the morning was better! <img src="graemlins/ohno.gif" border="0" alt="[Oh No]" /> Blah!

I went back to my room disheartened. But just in case I would qualify, I went to the arcade later that night and brushed up on my Fatal Fury. Trying to figure out the patterns that would give you a Perfect and tons of points!

After the Day 2 qualifiers I returned to find out that I HAD made the cut! 48 out of 50! Yeah! <img src="graemlins/glee.gif" border="0" alt="[Glee]" /> Then I looked at the score beside my name. They used my original qualifying round score! The 2nd attempt would have NOT made the cut! Hahaha. Holy shit I was lucky.

So, I made it. And being the "Wizard" I am. I owned up on Fatal Fury with plenty of Perfects and made it into the Top 5.

I sized up my competition for the next day. The guy that Qualified 1st in the 1st Round was a Neo Geo master. I recognized him from the arcades. He also qualified 1st in the 2nd round. I believe I qualified 2nd in the 2nd round.

Knowing that I sucked at the King of the Monsters and Soccer Brawl (the Championship Game), I went down to the Student Center arcade and 'invested' 2 bucks on practicing.

As I stated before, KotM was pretty damn hard, and it was nearly impossible to beat the first monster on one quarter. So I concentrated on just staying alive for as long as possible and doing "safe" moves to score points.

Soccer Brawl was all about the Japanese/Korean teams that had stikers that shot the ball in a corkscrew fashion to 'fake-out' the goalies. You had NO control over the goalies. You had to rely on the computer to save your ass. I was confident that I was going to lose even if I got to the Championship Round.

The 3rd Day arrived. I did OK at the first game, Robo Army, and I went on to play KotM. And somehow, and I don't know how, I managed to BEAT the 1st monster with my ONE credit. That ALONE assured me entrance to the Championship Game!!!

Sure enough, I qualified 1st in the 3rd round and Mr. NeoGeoMaster qualified 2nd. Still confident in my loss (and he seemed confident in his win), I jokinly asked what was 2nd prize. You know what it was? NOTHING. That's right. There was no 2nd prize! I told the nice marketing lady that she should at least give 2nd prize a T-Shirt. And, of course, she agreed. She gave us both T-Shirts before the Match.

Well, they fired up the AES on the big screen, and we both nervously picked up our controllers and picked... Japan and Korea. Big surprise! I someone managed to jump out to a 3-0 lead and held on for a 5-2 win!!! That AES was all mine! <img src="graemlins/drool.gif" border="0" alt="[Drool]" />

SNK had even gotten Andy Eddy (from Electronic Gaming Monthly) to cover the finals event! I got my picture in the EGM with Turtles in Time for the SNES on the cover (I still have that somewhere,) and took home a brand new SNK Neo Geo Gold AES!! <img src="graemlins/glee.gif" border="0" alt="[Glee]" />

So that's MY most memorable Neo Geo moment ever.

P.S. My AES broke a few months later! They repaired it for free though. Also, I ended up selling it for money later. blah! But I recently got a 4-slot MVS to make up for it. Nearly 10 years later! <img src="graemlins/smirk.gif" border="0" alt="[Smirk]" />

Wow, these make for amazing reading. My personal experiences pale in comparison, but here are a couple of outstanding ones...

Seeing the NGPC for the first time. I thought back to the stupidly expensive console that i had shunned as a young boy, and thought that it might be cool to at least have a look. I was so blown away that decided to buy one on the spot, and since then i have researched AES, played lots of MVS where i could find it, and become a minor-league SNK fan.

Another thing i loved was a camping trip to France a couple of years back. The campsite had a couple of 1-slots including Metal Slug 1. At last, i had become the older, better gamer which i had once crowded around and admired. I think i finished the game in 3 credits, a modest feat, but the crowd of kids was dumbstruck as apparently no-one had beaten it before... hard to believe, but i was chuffed anyway.

Fatal Fury Special release. I was shocked! as a gamer, it was a unique moment the day I had played it at the arcades. Now I have the homecart. And I am fucking happy too.


That's still my favorite game ever, and I still play it regularly.

Worst dislikes by Duck King: Rising tackles! <img src="graemlins/angry.gif" border="0" alt="[Angry]" /> <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[LOL]" /> <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[LOL]" /> <img src="graemlins/lol.gif" border="0" alt="[LOL]" />

Summer of 1992. Playing NAM 1975 and Magician Lord at some resort in LA. Those were the days. *sigh*.

Later,
Jordan>

When I found the twins, and the deal went through.

My most memorable moment is when I bought Metal Slug 3...

...my first "important" and "most wanted" cart...

...I went immediately at home and I forgot even to have dinner

Yeah,my best Neo-Geo moments don't involve getting to meet the guys at the Neo offices either <img src="graemlins/crying.gif" border="0" alt="[Crying]" />
Probably my best memories are cruising up to the local Aladdin's Castle and playing King of the Monsters for the first time way back when it first came out.I think Cyber Lip ,Baseball Stars,and ???? were loaded into it as well.The funny thing is that the first time I saw the MVS cabinet,I thought it was one of the UGLIEST game cabinets I had ever seen.Cool games,but UGLY artwork(none).I loved games like Galaga ,Defender and Joust AND they had ultra cool artwork on the cabinets.Not the Neo-Geo though.Who would have guessed that the first arcade I ever bought was a Neo..

The game that Pushed me to buy a Neo home system though was Samurai Showdown.I was spellbound the first time I played it.Finally got one around 94'. I was also in heaven when I first played Samurai Showdown 2,Art of Fighting 2,KOF 95'-96' and Metal Slug.Masterpiece games(I think)

Shortly after Metal Slug came out,and I passed it up like a fool,I came across an MVS 2 slot for sale.Original 25" inch cabinet,with four games,Metal Slug,Spinmasters,Bust-a-Move,and Samurai Showdown II ,mint,for 1200$ at the time.I couldn't believe it.Well.. I had just gotten a nice fat Christmas bonus,and the rest is history.
I couldn't stop grinning like an idiot the whole time driving that baby home.What a day,It was pathetic,but very memorable.

Not only was my Neo-Geo sickness really starting to show with buying that bugger,but It also sparked another with the purchase of the Arcade.Since then I have collected Arcade Machines with a passion,and continue to Play and collect the Neo games.I wouldn't go back and change any of it though...it's been a fun(and a bit crazy) ride.

wow Katsu, that was quite a cool story. I think I still have the EGM with TMNT 4 on the cover too. Only thing I'm curious about, you say Last Resort and Mutation Nation were prototypes, and that Mutation Nation gave three lives... since the final version only gives you one, I guess the prototype was kinda different? Anything else you remember about it? These things always kinda interest me.

Anyway, while I don't have any really good stories, I guess there's two moments that stand out for me... the first being my first experience with a Neo-Geo, seeing a 6-slot MVS at an arcade called the Gold Mine. Magician Lord and NAM-1975 were such cool games and got me interested in the Neo, even though I was too young to afford one (and my parents didn't go for the whole $200 games idea)

The other would be the first time I played Shock Troopers with headphones plugged into the MVS... it was then that I realized "Holy shit, this game is better than Metal Slug 1 or 2!"... and this game is what ultimately led me to finally realize my childhood dream of owning a Neo-Geo MVS. <img src="graemlins/mrt2.gif" border="0" alt="[Mr T]" />

BBH,

Are you talking about the Gold Mine in El Centro Mall? <img src="graemlins/mrt2.gif" border="0" alt="[Mr T]" /> I remember that place! It's kinda like a crappy Spencer's with a pool table in the back. That place always kinda creeped me out.

I spent countless hours at the Nickelodeon Arcade at the same mall. That arcade was the best one for 100 miles in any direction. I remember when they would have specials like 35 tokens for $5.

Well, anyway, my memory could be fuzzy. The prototype of Mutation Nation might have only been one life as well. The point is that you only got one credit.

If you still have that EGM with TMNT: Turtles in Time on the cover. Look for a small picture of me in teh Letters section holding up the huge Neo Geo Gold box with the nice marketing lady.

OMG, I just pulled out that EGM issue (June 1992, Volume 5, Issue 6). I'm on page 20.

1) I look like dork.
2) I'm skinny as a rail. . . about 130 lbs! (I'm about 175/180 now.)
3) That NG Gold box is HUGE!
4) OMG those games in the issue are OLD!

Anyway, the text reads:

"SNK HOLDS TOURNAMENT AT NOTRE DAME UNIVERSITY

SNK held a Neo-Geo contest at Notre Dame Univ. on April 24, 1992. Students got to try out the newest software and had the chance to win a NEO-GEO gold system. Over 500 students attended this event.

[lame picture of me]
[caption reads]Robert Nava won the NEO-GEO Gold system at the Notre Dame tournament."

Haha. It's not even Notre Dame University. It's The University of Notre Dame!

[ May 14, 2002: Message edited by: Katsu ]</p>

When I came with my neo geo and FFS at school for the end of the years. everybody wanted to play and there was a big queue in front of the console to play. Some pupils of the other classes came even if they had another occupations. Everybody wanted to see the game, it's was a wonderful moment.

My greatest Neo Geo moment was the first time I saw Art of Fighting and World heroes at the Arcades. I was totally thrilled.

My second moment was when I got my first Neo Geo System back in 1994 with Samurai Shodown 2 and Super Sidekicks 2.

Cool topic!

Mine was going to the arcade with my friend marc to play Shin Samurai Spirits in downtown St. Paul when it was first released. From there on, 3 weekly trips to the arcade became a nessesary ritual (till we graduated anyway). Very fond moments indeed!

Shin Samurai Spirits here also - 1995 working for a videogame store by myself, and it was oh so slow sometimes...what to do? Get paid to play SSS and Nam '75 all day WooT!

My most was seeing my uncle and the person who sold him the arcade playing art of fighting 2. I saw YURI, then i played it and loved her soooo much. She has been my fave ever since. Art of fighting 2 has a special place in my heart. I love that game soooooo much! I will always remember the arcade sitting there in the middle room of my house and watching my uncle show me yuris moves. <img src="graemlins/glee.gif" border="0" alt="[Glee]" />

Great post Treiu! There's some real interesting reads in here. I wish I had a good story to share .

It's really hard to say that there was "a" moment.

Moment 1: 1990 when my local arcade got an MVS machine with Ninja Combat... mmmm... Ninja Combat... and Baseball Stars, Super Spy, and League Bowling.

Moment 2: 1992/early '93. Same arcade got Fatal Fury 2... mmmmm... Fatal Fury 2. That game was just too sweet. Really made me wonder about that Neo Geo, it was becoming a system to be reckoned with. Just too expensive, though.

Moment 3: Went on a trip with my German class to Ball State University (was just a high school sophomore at the time) in 1993. The university's arcade had an MVS machine. It had this "Samurai Shodown" game I had read a bit about. How good could it be? 2 minutes later, I swore I'd be getting a Neo Geo. Shoot. I wonder if that's really why I'm a graduate student at Ball State now; they introduced me to Samurai Shodown...

Moment 4: Several months later, in December of 1993. Steger, IL. Approximately 6 p.m. (give or take 30 minutes). Bought it just like I said I would.

Moment 4b: Got Samurai Shodown in May of '94.

Moment 5: Pretty sure it was the winter of '95/'96. I bought my first two new AES games (new as in not used, not new releases) from NCS for under $60 each.

Moment 6: Buying my first new release, KOF 2000. Felt like I really joined the ranks by doing that. Also bought Shodown 3, Sengoku 2, KOF '98, and KOF '99 new at that same time.

I suppose the biggest thrill came when a few guys wanted to join in KOF '94: them vs. me. There really isn't that big an arcade scene here. Furthermore, I saw few people ever using the MVS machine, so that was just a nice moment to actually see some people wanting to use it. On top of that, to have it person against person. It was fun sending the guys away after nailing them with several power geysers. They didn't quite expect to see any supers (they couldn't do any).

Other than that, my reaction to finding out more games would be released after KOF 2000 was ... let's just say it was disruptive to the dozen graduate students who happened to be in the room at the time. Quite a moment. Helped show the dream of the Neo becoming the longest lived system could still become a reality.

Some nice Neo moments.