Is the NEO•GEO underrated for shoot-em-ups?

Massive Urethra Chode

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In my opinion, yes. Most people i know talk about the Sega Saturn, PC Engine/CD, Mega Drive, and perhaps the Dreamcast when it comes to shooters... and i even hear some say that the NEO•GEO lacks good shooters compared to other systems, but personally i disagree. Sure the neo library doesnt have a TON of them but the ones that are there are incredibly high quality in my opinion. Personally, my favorites are both Sonic Wings games, Strikers 1945 Plus, Twinkle Star Sprites, Ironclad, blazing Star, and pulstar. All top quality games! I havent played prehistoric isle 2 yet, but it looks really fun too. As far as gameplay goes, NEO•GEO shooters have been some of the most fun with TONS of replay value. What are your favorite neo shooters?

Even though the NEO•GEO has less shmups than the saturn, i find the fun factor of them to be a lot better than many saturn shooties.

Big example, sonic wings special (even in tate mode) is just less fun to me than sonic wings 2&3 on NEO•GEO. I like how the sonic wings games on neo use a horizontal monitor, but they dont feel cramped... they just feel like vertical shmups with a wider area to move. VERY well designed games IMO. The saturn sonic wings game has a SHIT soundtrack compared to the saturn version.


Random question: how did Strikers 1945 Plus end up at 684 MEGA POWER?!? where are all those megs going??? It’s way bigger than either pulstar or blazing star, yet it looks not much more advanced Than the sonic wings games! The explosions are crazy smooth though... maybe the coolest explosions i have ever seen in a 2D game :)

Is strikers the highest meg shmup on the neo?
 

Naika

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I hardly think about this given the Neo Geo's huge fighting game library, but that I agree that it is overlooked. Pulstar, Sonic Wings and even Ironclad come to mind for me. However, that's also coupled with other games like Ghost Pilots or Last Resort (a shooter which I still can't get into despite my attempts to try).
 
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Heinz

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Admittedly Last Resort is a great shooter but you can throw all of them away for NAM-1975.
 

Digmac

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I think it is. The first thing that comes to mind for people who don't know the platform as well is the overwhelming amount of fighting games. I do think that the Neo has a very nice selection of quality shmups which I greatly enjoy. Sonic Wings 3, Viewpoint, and Pulstar are my personal picks. I think the lack of ports to other platforms until recently hurt the popularity of Neo shmups outside of the Neo Geo community. (minus Viewpoint, TSS)
 

BlackaneseNiNjA

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I think it is. The first thing that comes to mind for people who don't know the platform as well is the overwhelming amount of fighting games. I do think that the Neo has a very nice selection of quality shmups which I greatly enjoy. Sonic Wings 3, Viewpoint, and Pulstar are my personal picks. I think the lack of ports to other platforms until recently hurt the popularity of Neo shmups outside of the Neo Geo community. (minus Viewpoint, TSS)

+1
Agreed on all points.
 

ballzdeepx

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Underrated, probably not however the standouts to me are
Last Resort
Blazing Star
Nam (if you can call it a shooter)
Strikers 1945 plus
Sonic wings 3

Pulstar, ASOII, and Viewpoint are amazing games that show off what's possible on the neo through different methods of dev application and difference of meg counts, but their difficulty is a huge barrier which ruins the fun. Sure they are all difficult but the standouts are fun enough to bring you back for more.
 

andsuchisdeath

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I've said something along these lines before, but I can't find the thread/post.

The shooting game catalogue COULD be viewed in two ways :

1. Neo Geo lens

2. Shooting game lens

If someone is looking for more games to play, or looking for more titles to enhance their Neo Geo collection, then I think there are plenty of shooters that check the boxes of "visually attractive", "challenging" and "fun".

If someone is just super into playing games within the genre, and hardware/format is irrelevant, then no, I don't think the shooters on the Neo are underrated. IMO there aren't many titles that represent innovation (mechanically) or display extraordinary hallmarks of developers that hadn't been represented with other titles on different hardware. IMO they don't really, for lack of a better phrase, "transcend" the hardware into a different stratosphere of relevance.

There are some exceptions as far as innovation goes (NMK with Zed Blade I guess), but yeah, I don't think Neo shooters are underrated. I think they're appropriately rated from a "shooting game lens", and If anything, they're overrated from a "Neo Geo lens". Most likely, if someone is going to shift their focus onto a Neo Geo shooter, it's because it's on the Neo Geo and there exists a certain bias looking to be satisfied.

Keep in mind, I very much enjoy a large portion of the neo shooter library, so this isn't secret code for saying "I don't like them".
 
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BlackaneseNiNjA

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I've said something along these lines before, but I can't find the thread/post.

The shooting game catalogue COULD be viewed in two ways :

1. Neo Geo lens

2. Shooting game lens

If someone is looking for more games to play, or looking for more titles to enhance their Neo Geo collection, then I think there are plenty of shooters that check the boxes of "visually attractive", "challenging" and "fun".

If someone is just super into playing games within the genre, and hardware/format is irrelevant, then no, I don't think the shooters on the Neo are underrated. IMO there aren't many titles that represent innovation (mechanically) or display extraordinary hallmarks of developers that hadn't been represented with other titles on different hardware. IMO they don't really, for lack of a better phrase, "transcend" the hardware into a different stratosphere of relevance.

There are some exceptions as far as innovation goes (NMK with Zed Blade I guess), but yeah, I don't think Neo shooters are underrated. I think they're appropriately rated from a "shooting game lens", and If anything, they're overrated from a "Neo Geo lens". Most likely, if someone is going to shift their focus onto a Neo Geo shooter, it's because it's on the Neo Geo and there exists a certain bias looking to be satisfied.

Keep in mind, I very much enjoy a large portion of the neo shooter library, so this isn't secret code for saying "I don't like them".

This is a fair point about perspective, ASID. The teams at SNK spent most of their talent pushing the fighting game genre during it’s boom in the 90’s. Had they spent more time in the shooter genre perhaps we could have seen more mechanics innovation from SNK in the genre.

Admittedly, after their work on Last Resort, the notable shooters on the system were all third party really. Aicom/Yumekobo, Video System, Psikyo, NMK, etc

As a side note ASID: As a fellow enthusiast who spends a lot of time goofing off in the “lab”, keep the infinite combo vids coming on your channel :buttrock: When you come back to the neo on your channel, Double Dragon juggles get addictive lol
 
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oliverclaude

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Neo's STG library is well recognized I think, but its uniqueness is underrated: ASOII's complex power-up system, the innovative "Force" variants in Last Resort and Pulstar, Blazing Star's various scoring mechanics, Viewpoint's unexpected Zaxxon heritage and last but not least Twinkle Star Sprite's genre defining gameplay.
 

xb74

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Neo - A small collection of decent shmups though it lacks depth in this genre when I measure against the yardstick of the Saturn.
 

Neo Alec

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I think Viewpoint, Last Resort and Pulstar all already get the recognition they deserve. You can't fault the shooter selection on the Neo, considering the size of the library. It's just that there were better arcade shooters elsewhere (other arcade boards, Saturn), and a better selection or console shooters on other consoles (PC Engine, Mega Drive).
 

kingcuckmelon1

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Compared to the number of fighting games, the Neo's library looks like there are few shooters. but there are some crackers in there. The two standouts for me are Viewpoint and Last Resort.
 
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Viewpoint and Nam are ok. Twinkle star is amazing if you have a friend who can also play it well.

I feel all your video games threads are some kind of “accept me” bait.
 

2D_mastur

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As aside note ASID: As a fellow enthusiast who spends a lot of time goofing off in the “lab”, keep the infinite combo vids coming on your channel :buttrock: When you come back to the neo on your channel, Double Dragon juggles get addictive lol

What's his YT channel?
 

GohanX

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I'd say they're overrated, actually. There are plenty of good shooters, not many great ones. Most of the games would be forgotten to the general gaming public if they weren't on Neo.
 

MetalSlugVet

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I would say most Neo geo enthusiasts know there are great shoot em ups to be had. I am happy with ngdev team, due to their efforts we have a couple more quality shoot em ups to choose from.

I think Aero fighters 2 is my favorite Neo Geo game I own. I can’t wait to buy sonic wings 3 one of these days...
 

Massive Urethra Chode

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I think Aero fighters 2 is my favorite Neo Geo game I own. I can’t wait to buy sonic wings 3 one of these days...

Do you collect AES or MVS?


Both sonic wings games are actually so far my favorite NEO•GEO games of all time. I cant pick which one is better!

I think a cool project idea would be to make a dedicated Aero Fighters 2&3 western style cab... basically a neo geo cabinet with a two slot board, and the side art and marquee would be artwork from both games... 2 artwork on the left side and 3 artwork on the right side.. would be a sick arcade machine.. give the control panel only two buttons for each player since that’s all it uses :P
 

andsuchisdeath

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This is a fair point about perspective, ASID. The teams at SNK spent most of their talent pushing the fighting game genre during it’s boom in the 90’s. Had they spent more time in the shooter genre perhaps we could have seen more mechanics innovation from SNK in the genre.

Admittedly, after their work on Last Resort, the notable shooters on the system were all third party really. Aicom/Yumekobo, Video System, Psikyo, NMK, etc

These are good points too. As far as SNK spending their focus on fighting games, it's not surprising. Any new title released in the genre at the time was likely received as a big deal since the fighting game genre was still in it's infancy/prime. The same couldn't be said for shooters of course. I'd imagine SNK wanted to ride that wave as being the leaders of the SF II alternative as hard as they could. That's not to say the STG genre had no where to evolve to by then (obviously), but as we all know starting in March of 1991, the arcade landscape changed with SF II, and SNK had the opportunity to seize all of this new ground to break...or to be the earliest/most aggressive company to profit off of mimicking a "trend" (whichever way you choose to look at it).

Also, thanks for the props. I am aware of the potential of Double Dragon's insanity! I've just never gotten the hang of it, nor have I put in the time. Part of my reservation is that I only own the Playstation port, and I'm just not familiar enough with the game to determine whether or not that version is worth learning on.

@oliverclaude, Yes, Twinkle Star Sprites has to be the most innovative shooter on the Neo. Not sure how that slipped my mind...
 
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