Neo
Introduction
The Neo*Geo is a video game system by SNK, and has been released somewhere around 1991 in two flavours:
• Neo*Geo MVS (Multi Video System) – For the Arcades
• Neo*Geo Home System
Unfortunately, there are all sorts of great games to play, but many of them are proprietary to only one particular system. Of course you could get, keep, maintain, and collect games for all of the different types of consoles. But unless you have lots of money and time, you cannot have everything you might like in the video game world. Sometimes finding a special great game for an old system is rather like collecting film posters. The posters for much older films are far harder to come by than the movie posters for new films. Who knows, in another 50 years those old video games along with the even older, but in good repair console may be worth a lot of money that will be paid by some passionate collector of video games. So stay on your toes. Certain vintage film posters goes for thousands of dollars. Surely you have had a console that you loved, when a friend mentions a brand new game he is playing that sounds so fun you just have to try it. Disappointment may follow when you find out the game is not offered on your particular console. It is nearly impossible to realistically enjoy all of your favorites without an emulator at your disposal. Give it a try.
These both make use of cartridges as the medium for the software. The Neo*Geo was so special for the fact that the hardware was very advanced for the days when it was released (and it still is – 2D wise) – hence the motto, ‘The Future is Now’. The games for the MVS and the home system where absolutely identical, when SNK said they wanted to give the punters arcade perfect games, they didn’t cut any corners. Unfortunately it was not all so fine and dandy, because of the hefty price tags concerning the Neo*Geo Home System. When it was first released, the machine cost around the $600 mark, and the games came in at a heavy $250. The fact that the MVS was so simple to operate, had great titles, and lots of them, it did very well in the arcades, and it is still doing well.
On the other hand, the home system never really took off, due to the hefty price tags; only a very selected consumer market was reached. Actually, this is what pushed me to sell my Neo*Geo home console and buy an MVS instead. I do not know if the the Neo*Geo Home System is still in production (I guess it is not), but it still gets a game released for it every now and then. Unfortunately the heavy price tags on the game remains, and it goes immediately up as SNK do a very small number of cartridges. (Excerpt from Neo Geo Shock)
On another note. This one time while I was playing my Neo Geo Home System, my neighbor, Fisherman Bob, was in a pretty serious boating accident. A New Orleans maritime lawyer got him the compensation he needed. While in recovery we played arcade games all day! I actually think it helped him heal faster by distracting him from his misery. So arcade games possibly have health benefits!