First Neo Geo game you ever saw/played?

[Naika]

I was in Thailand between 1989 to 1990 visiting my grandparents and two arcade games I played with my dad were Final Fight, and an SNK MVS game...NINJA COMBAT! The bright colors and the sound was what attracted me to the game, and the idea that I was playing two ninjas was awesome.

 

[turbosage]

I remember seeing Nam 1975 at an old bowling alley back when I was a kid. I think that was the first time ever actually seeing the Neo in motion. Looked fantastic really! I was blown away! And this was next to TMNT, Double Dragon II and Bad Dudes!

The first time I actually ever played an MVS cab would be in 1991 at our local Fair. A traveling arcade came with a tent that housed 20+ cabs. I remember taking $5 and changing it in for quarters and spending ALL of it on Magician Lord. I got to the swirling circle boss on stage 2 after finally exhausting my allowance on that day. When I met up with my parents later they asked what I spent my money on and I told them on an amazing game called Magician Lord!! My dad told me how much of a waste of money that was, but in all seriousness I knew that it was money well spent. The memories of that day and the feeling I get every time I boot it up (NEO GEO CD yo!) was so worth the week's worth of chores I did for that $$

 

[lethalsilicong5]

It took me a long time to realize that SNK and Neo Geo were a thing. Born in '88, I missed the whole arcade thing so the first Neo Geo game I played was actually Sonic Adventure for the Neo Geo Pocket Color. It came as a bundle and I begged my mom to get it just for the game alone, I had no idea was Neo Geo was and why Sonic wasn't on a Sega Handheld. I never got any other games for it. ><

My first real Neo Geo game was about a year later, when I found Metal Slug at a local bowling alley. Can't recall the cabinet at all, but I'll never forget that experience as Metal Slug became on my personal favorite franchises while growing up.

 

[Neorebel]

I remember taking $5 and changing it in for quarters and spending ALL of it on Magician Lord. I got to the swirling circle boss on stage 2 after finally exhausting my allowance on that day. When I met up with my parents later they asked what I spent my money on and I told them on an amazing game called Magician Lord!! My dad told me how much of a waste of money that was, but in all seriousness I knew that it was money well spent.

Hell yeah! What do parents know!?! That game I think is one of the most challenging platformers, next to Deadly Towers for the NES. It's so rewarding when you progress though. Magician Lord must have been a landmark quarter muncher back in the day!

 

[dspoonrt]

It took me a long time to realize that SNK and Neo Geo were a thing. Born in '88, I missed the whole arcade thing so the first Neo Geo game I played was actually Sonic Adventure for the Neo Geo Pocket Color. It came as a bundle and I begged my mom to get it just for the game alone, I had no idea was Neo Geo was and why Sonic wasn't on a Sega Handheld. I never got any other games for it. ><

My first real Neo Geo game was about a year later, when I found Metal Slug at a local bowling alley. Can't recall the cabinet at all, but I'll never forget that experience as Metal Slug became on my personal favorite franchises while growing up.

You really should get more games for the NGPC (if you still have yours). It's a great little system.

 

[Ninjainspandex]

My first Neo Geo sighting was rather late as I live in Wisconsin and arcades were few and far between, only really a cab or two in a bar or in a Chuckee cheeses which I never really went to much as a kid. But around 2002 I was like a sophmore in highschool and our school ski team went on a trip up north to the Dells (Basically the Wisconsin version of disney world with sort of a lumberjack theme). They had a real arcade there attached to the Hotel with like 100 cabs, but the one that caught my attention was a big red 1 slot neo geo cab playing the original Metal Slug. And that was the day I fell in love.

 

[lethalsilicong5]

You really should get more games for the NGPC (if you still have yours). It's a great little system.

I collect consoles, but at some point in my life, I misplaced the darn thing. Now I gotta buy a new one >< regrets!!

 

[Piwi]

My first Neo Geo game i ever played was Metal Slug back in 2000 :-) The bright colors and the sound was what attracted me to the game. I liked the console itself too, really the king of all home console systems.

 

[Erdmn]

My first Neo-Geo game had to have been Samurai Showdown in the arcade. Though I remember ages ago at Funcoland wanting an AES.

 

[Erdmn]

Hell yeah! What do parents know!?! That game I think is one of the most challenging platformers, next to Deadly Towers for the NES. It's so rewarding when you progress though. Magician Lord must have been a landmark quarter muncher back in the day!

Deadly Towers?! Wow that game made me want to hurt people.

 

[Neorebel]

Deadly Towers?! Wow that game made me want to hurt people.

Right! Not to derail the thread into off topic stuff, but let me take a minute to say, for some reason back when I was like 14 or something, my best friend and I were obsessed with Deadly Towers. One weekend, we basically did NOTHING but play that game for 3 days straight, taking turns when the other was frustrated, and we really did come close to beating it. Towards the end though, the amount of enemies and shit that fly at you going warp speed... not to mention INVISIBLE enemies, we gave up & were convinced it was near impossible to fully beat! Magician Lord is much more fun.

 

[bubba966]

Hey everyone,

I was just curious if you can recall the first Neo Geo game you actually saw/played.

I think the first Neo game I played was Magician lord in a big red. Not too much later I'd saved up enough to buy an AES Gold system and got Fatal Fury & King Of The Monsters with it. I'd played King Of The Monsters first as soon as I got it hooked up. I bought that back at the end of '91 when I was 14.

Years later once I turned 15 I actually worked and saved up to buy a used AES, Baseball Stars, Samurai Shodown, and World Heroes. I actually provided a tangible Neo Geo experience to kids in the neighborhood and it actually felt great to do it.

A few years later I sold it all to some older gentleman who promptly paid me asking price no questions asked. I sold my neo to put towards a new mountain bike just so I could get to work. Biggest regret of my life. I still see the bike at my parents house collecting dust when I visit.

Now I'm back considering a CMVS because I'll never be able to afford an AES.

Not too far off my old story. I'd bought mine new, and with the 2 carts. I never did get any more carts as they were too expensive being $250+ locally. In '93 (maybe '94) I made the mistake of selling my AES system and most every other console/game I owned to Funcoland. I'd not worked in a while and wanted some $ to do things with.

And I too have regretted selling my AES since then. For the last 20 years I've regretted it and wanted to pick up another one. I'm looking at getting an Omega CMVS more for practicality than anything else. Yeah, I could drop a lot more on a nice complete boxed AES Gold system like I used to have. But I'd not be able to have much left over for carts. So going MVS with an Omega seems like the way to go for now so I can at least play things. Then pick up an AES later when one comes along for the price/condition that works for me.

 

[Naika]

My first Neo-Geo game had to have been Samurai Showdown in the arcade. Though I remember ages ago at Funcoland wanting an AES.

My local arcade was one of the first in Chicago to have Samurai Showdown. I remember seeing it and I was in complete awe, and there were like 5 people huddled around it. There was nothing like it at the time and it was in the center of the arcade. Good times!

 

[MetalSludge]

They had a real arcade there attached to the Hotel with like 100 cabs, but the one that caught my attention was a big red 1 slot neo geo cab playing the original Metal Slug. And that was the day I fell in love.

Mmm...I had a similar ski lodge experience as a kid. On a scouting trip, we stayed at a place with a large arcade attached to the hotel. I only recall playing games like Joust though. Oddly, even to this day many such town arcades have mostly old classics instead of relatively modern games, or even Neo Geo stuff. Not sure why that is? Glad you got to do more than play Space Invaders at your ski experience.

 

[MetalSludge]

My local arcade was one of the first in Chicago to have Samurai Showdown. I remember seeing it and I was in complete awe, and there were like 5 people huddled around it. There was nothing like it at the time and it was in the center of the arcade. Good times!

Although I was playing on a 3DO system version, the first Neo game I put serious time into was the Samurai Shodown game. It's easy to forget just how that game screamed Quality! at the time in a way not just any game did. It was just so much fun and had me putting aside my fascination with the developments of polygons and texture mapping and such for a while.

 

[Boredom]

It was either KOF '94 or Puzzle Bobble in a Big Red sometime in 1995.

 

[comicstar100]

Well being born in 89 I don't remember seeing any of this stuff as it was first released. But the first time I ever played a neo geo game was Sengoku in the arcade. Loved it from the first moment I saw it, switching between being a guy fighting on the street to a samurai was and still is a ton of fun. Recently I picked up Neo Geo classics vol 1 for PS2 and got to play all these amazing games. After that I fell in love with Neo Geo and decided I wanted to start collecting then saw the price tag on the consoles and games. Haven't been able to afford to start the collection yet, but I have my Neo Geo collection on PS2 for the time being to give me my SNK fix.

 

[Randomsense]

From what I recall my first Neo Geo play/sighting was Magician Lord on a Big Red. I spent much of my early years in arcades and I think I might have run across it in a mall arcade. I remember being intrigued by the character design and the visuals.

 

[GohanX]

My first game was at a bowling alley. SF2 was just getting popular but it wasn't my thing, to many buttons, it was to complicated. I saw this red cab at the bowling alley, south a fighting game with 3 buttons! None other than Fatal Fury! I think I beat Duck as King and got beaten by Michael Max. Good times!

Over the years my parent would go bowling almost every Saturday night, and they usually had the latest games in the big red, up through about 94. Without those bowling alleys I'm not sure I'd have a Neo today.

 

[famicommander]

There was an MVS in an arcade at one of the malls around town when I was a kid. It was the late 90s but the only game it had was Art of Fighting.

I was a SEGA kid growing up and I played various ports of Neo Geo games on Genesis, Saturn, and Dreamcast but I didn't play on an actual Neo Geo until I bought a Pocket Color six or seven years ago. First game was Sonic Pocket Adventure as I'm a big Sonic fan. I later got a Neo Geo CD and my MVS. I believe my first Neo Geo CD game was Samurai Shodown (which I already had on 3DO), and my first MVS game was definitely Art of Fighting.

 

[alby13]

I remember clearly now that in Los Angeles there was a video rental store that had Street Fighter 2 and next door there was a Mexican restaurant that had Mortal Kombat and Samurai Shodown

Epic trio of arcade fighters

now i finally own my own arcade machine, neo geo mvs, and samurai shodown cart so happy

i remember metal slug as one of my very first neo-geo experiences. very epic, and i own one of those too.

 

[mehguy]

metal slug was my first.

 

[whitey]

Flint, Michigan - Tilt Arcade in the Genesse Valley mall in '91 or '92. They had a 4 slot right next to Street fighter 2 that had Nam 75, Fatal Fury, King of the Monsters and Magician Lord

 

[Darknb]

There was a shitty pizza place here I would got to and my grandparents would give me quarters to go play the arcade machines out front. The place had some great games I think one of the Strikers games and the Simpsons Beat em Up. Then one day they were both gone and in it's place was Samurai Showdown (the first one). I was blown away by how brutal the fighting was and how intense the music and background art was. First time I played I picked Nakoruru cause I thought controlling a hawk was cool. Beat the first dude. Next up is Kyoshiro, guy beats me til my face turns red and in the second round cuts me in half. I was stunned. I actually felt really sick after that, I was young and religious at the time.

It couldn't keep me away though I asked for the game that Christmas and my mom had found a copy for my genny I also already had the gameboy port of kof '95, but I didn't realize at the time it was a port at all, nevermind that it was a neo geo game originally.

 

[BLEAGH]

There was a shitty pizza place...

First Neo game I played was Art of Fighting though I didn't know it was a Neo Geo title until much later. Metal Slug was the first time I said 'hey, a Neo Geo!' Both at shitty pizza places lol!