Regarded as the franchise that put Neo Geo on the map, Metal Slug is king when it comes to gratuitous 2D side-scrolling shooting action. Unfortunately, Metal Slug cartridges typically fetch hundreds of dollars on Ebay, so most gamers will have to settle for this CD version (which doesn't come cheap either). Assuming the role of a Rambo-like cartoon character, you blast your way through hordes of soldiers and mechanical beasts while forging through war-torn streets, bustling Arabian markets, and mummy-infested tombs. With the exception of your default peashooter, weapons like shotguns and missile launchers are absolutely devastating. The action is relentless, the carnage is incredible, and an off-beat sense of humor pervades the whole affair. Should you catch a whiff of "mummy breath", you transform into a gun-toting mummy yourself. Consume too many food items and your solider becomes a slow, obese slob. Metal Slug 2 bears more than a passing resemblance to Metal Slug X (Playstation, 2001), and I'm a bit irked at how soldiers splatter white "blood" when shot (at least in this American version). The censorship seems all the more absurd when you consider all of the flying body parts. Metal Slug 2's eye candy is substantial, but it does tax processor at times, resulting in occasional slowdown. Load times also disrupt the action periodically, although they're not especially long. Humorous voices effects and a dramatic musical score accentuate the outstanding audio. Metal Slug 2 offers five continues which I found to be reasonable for the default skill level. You'd expect the two-player simultaneous mode to be even more fun, but it's really not due to the aforementioned slowdown and general on-screen confusion. The cartridge is not worth breaking your piggy bank for, but if you can obtain the CD for a reasonable price, Metal Slug 2's brand of nonstop mayhem will definitely not let you down. © Copyright 2006 The Video Game Critic.

It's best known for shooters and fighting games, but the Neo Geo also offers a sweet trio of overhead racers. Just as Overtop (1996) improved on Thrash Rally (1991), Neo DriftOut sets the bar even higher. Or so it would seem! The game is played over six tracks that include a scenic European raceway, a dusty African course, and a track completely encrusted with snow and ice. The roads twist and turn every which way, but the controls are up to the task. It's amazing how well these cars handle with a digital joystick. Power-slides feel second nature, and an auto-straighten feature prevents you from having to make slight adjustments on straight-aways. Once you get a feel for it, you'll be playing the game like a violin. Hazards like barrels and puddles just slow you down slightly, but hit a boulder and you may end up facing the wrong direction (gah!). There are no laps; you just race to the finish line. Prompts on the screen indicate upcoming turns and also clue you in on alternate routes. There are other cars but you're really just racing against the clock. Hit a car from behind and it's quickly pushed out of your way. DriftOut's graphics make fine use of scaling to zoom in on straight-aways and zoom out for wide turns. The tight camera reveals a highly detailed car, but it prevents you from viewing the scenery. In fact, you probably won't notice any scenery during the course of a race. Reach the finish before time expires and you advance to the next track. If you don't make it, the game still lets you finish out your run. A jazzy musical score plays throughout, but that commentator is a real drama queen. You'll bump against another car and he'll exclaim, "OH MY GOD!!" There are unlimited continues and your combined times make up your score. One area where Neo DriftOut is sorely lacking is the replay department. Once I finally beat the final Great Britain track (after about a dozen tries), I felt like I had seen all the game had to offer. © Copyright 2012 The Video Game Critic.

It's a big step up from Top Players Golf (Neo Geo, 1990), but I still think Neo Turf Masters should have been a lot better. The players look lifelike and tee off with digitized motion. The courses are bright and arcade-like, with well-defined fairways and nicely contoured greens. Occasionally you're treated to a gorgeous view like a waterfall backdrop. The game is fast moving. Just about everything you need to know is presented on the shot screen, yet it doesn't look cluttered. A small map on the right side lets you line up your shot without having to deal with separate map screens. The problem is, that thick line showing your current aim tends to obscure trees and small sand traps. That's kind of a big deal because the trees are like walls in this game. Once I even hit the shadow of a tree. There are two swing meters you hit in succession; one for power and one for accuracy. When in the rough, your accuracy sweet spot is so tiny, it's possible to flat-out miss your shot. Most of the time the ball comes off at a low trajectory and you don't get much roll. Fortunately you can apply dramatic hooks and slices to navigate around trees and sand traps. Close-up animations punctuate interesting shots like bounces off trees or skips across the water. Jazzy music plays in the background, and it has an effervescent, feel-good quality reminiscent of Sonic Adventure (Dreamcast, 1999). A cute Japanese woman chimes in with comments like "player one starts to strike back" and "it's on the gween!" The course designs could be better. They tend to be very narrow so even respectable shots can be ruled out-of-bounds. And how in the world can an area between the fairway and green be considered out-of-bounds?! You're forced to play very defensively, laying up whenever possible. I enjoyed the bright graphics and fast gameplay of Neo Turf Masters, but its unforgiving nature may convince you to settle for 9 holes. © Copyright 2015 The Video Game Critic.

Many years ago, before they had bad voice acting in video games, there was equally poor text dialogue. Check out this riveting exchange between the two heroes of Ninja Combat: "That's the Ninja Tower isn't it?" "It's like a fortress isn't it?" "It looks more like a small hut to me!" "Let's go Joe!" "I'm ready pal!" If you think that was bad, wait until you play the game. This side-scrolling fighter tries to be a glorified Double Dragon, but it's just awful. The characters are large but cartoonish-looking and the backgrounds are woefully uninteresting. And why in the world are these ninjas wearing such loud, colorful clothes? They look idiotic! The default attack is throwing stars, but there are plenty of weapons lying around like nun-chucks, maces, and axes. Too bad they always get knocked out of your hand before you get a chance to use them! Fortunately there are also magic and running attacks at your disposal. Your foes are an odd mix of ninja warriors, cheerleader girls, and mini-werewolves (now available in bite size!). With so many thugs coming out of the woodwork, it's hard to tell what the heck's going on! You'll take more cheap hits than you can see coming, and although some of the bosses look really cool, they require an inordinate number of hits to destroy (a thousand I think). You can choose a new fighter before each stage, and when you defeat certain foes, they are added to your list of playable characters. While it's nice to have more characters, it's frustrating that these new fighters can't pick up and use weapons (for no reason I can surmise). Another thing I don't appreciate is having to face the same bosses over and over, three or four times. Enough already! The quality of the sound effects in Ninja Combat is also terrible, with muffled grunts and girls who scream "Help! Help!" nonstop. As aggravating as the one player mode is, the two-player mode is even more chaotic and senseless. Oh, and I'm not a big fan of unlimited continues - I think they pretty much suck. And Ninja Combat is one game where you'll be SORRY to have more continues! © Copyright 2003 The Video Game Critic.

Sometimes you need more than a garden-variety ninja. Sometimes you need a ninja specially trained as a commando who can also fire magic missiles from his hands. Ninja Commando attempts to fill that void. Actually, this plays more like a vertical shooter than your typical soldier-on-the-rampage game. As you journey through wilderness areas and well-fortified palaces, you'll unleash a torrent of missiles and lay waste to enemy soldiers and monsters foolish enough to stand in your way. With firepower this intense, the two-player simultaneous mode is almost ridiculous. Still, those who enjoy non-stop shooting and massive explosions will be enthralled. In addition to tapping the fire button like a madman, you can hit a somersault button to elude danger. A third button unleashes "ninja magic", inflicting heavy damage to everything on the screen. The bosses are mammoth, and I especially love the giant caveman who actually hurls his own henchmen at you! The death sequences are pretty lame however, as the bosses turn to static before fire engulfs the entire screen (huh?). In general the graphics are colorful and fun, with time-traveling stages that run the gamut from ancient Japan (samurai!) to prehistoric times (dinosaurs!) to ancient Egypt (mummies!). Hilarious cut-scenes depict an evil villain who bears a startling resemblance to Jon Voight. You'll also be treated to incomprehensible prose like, "You have defended the history from enemy" and "I have a feeling like something is going to happen." The weak audio tends to use the same "bleah!" sound effect for each slayed foe, and the musical score is equally forgettable. Unlimited continues are available, but if you want a real challenge, you should play on "easy" and forgo the continues. Ninja Commando has a certain disposable quality about it, but once you start blasting away, it can be mesmerizing. © Copyright 2006 The Video Game Critic.

I enjoy overhead racing games, and Overtop may be the king of them. Games with tilted perspectives are nothing new, but few have the camera pulled in this close. The cars and scenery are so rich with detail, they look almost digitized. Overtop makes Thrash Rally (Neo Geo, 1991) look like 16-bit material. Instead of offering a series of tracks, there's one long course that winds through villages, deserts, snowy ridges, resorts, and ends in a city park. I like this format. There tend to be a lot of straightaways which lend themselves to high speeds and power slides. You can select between several vehicles, and that red Ferrari looks pretty sweet until you realize how much of the track is off-road. The controls are responsive and it's easy to stay on the road. Pressing the brake lets you turn on a dime, and it never takes long to get back up to speed. You leave the starting line with three other vehicles, but your real opponent is the clock. The diverse scenery looks great - what you can see of it. Since the camera is pulled in tight you only get a modest sense of your surroundings. Destructible items on the side of the track include pylons, hay bales, and exploding barrels. After each track segment you reach a checkpoint and additional time is added ("Let's Go Next Stage!"). The track layout is always the same, but you'll stumble upon shortcuts and alternate routes. It's even possible to drive off a pier and putt-putt through the water, although not recommended. Your goal is to complete the track in the shortest time, but simply reaching the end before time expires is nearly impossible in normal mode. Overtop doesn't break new ground but it does elevate overhead racing to a new level with its tight controls and sweet eye candy. © Copyright 2012 The Video Game Critic.

While perusing a list of Neo Geo games on a web site "Prehistoric Isle 2" caught my eye. A quick search led me to some footage of this game which absolutely blew me away. It's a rapid-fire shooter that pits helicopters against dinosaurs - a match made in heaven! With giant, angry reptiles on the rampage in urban and tropical locations, it's just like Jurassic Park - only without the bratty kids. The opening stage is set in a city at night, and some of the scenery looks nearly photo-realistic. The rotating point-of-view effects produce a harrowing perspective far beyond what I thought the system was capable of. I was intent on aquiring this game, but discovered it was only available as an MVS cartridge (designed for the Neo Geo arcade machines). After a little digging I discovered that a MVS-to-AES converter was available. It was pricey as hell, but it opened up a whole new realm of Neo Geo MVS games for me to collect and review. Eventually I landed my own copy of Prehistoric Isle 2, and the gameplay did not disappoint. The rapid-fire shooting action is intense and the crumbling scenery makes for a wild ride. You often have the opportunity to pick up waving human survivors, and this adds some humor and creates a nice risk-versus-reward dynamic. The later stages aren't as spectacular as the city, but the ruins, forests, and volcanoes are still easy on the eyes. I should also mention that this game is very educational. Did you know that dinosaurs could fire missiles? Also, when defeated, they tend to explode into a fireball! I love science. I'm really glad I didn't live in prehistoric times because dinosaurs made a lot of loud screeching noises which would have irritated me to no end. Prehistoric Isle 2 has flown low on the radar over the years, but with its fast action and amazing eye candy, it's probably my favorite Neo Geo shooter. © Copyright 2011 The Video Game Critic.

This awesome shooter is one of those "holy grail" titles that'll cost you an arm and a leg just to get it on CD. But it may be worth the investment, because Pulstar is possibly the Neo Geo's most challenging and graphically impressive shooter. Its fascinating stages take you through mechanical space stations, slimy underworlds, and fiery planet surfaces, and each is meticulously detailed. The quality of the explosions is incredible - far beyond anything I've seen in other Neo Geo shooters. Some of the monsters that crawl across the screen are nearly photo-realistic, and the bosses are a joy to behold. The first boss is a slimy little octopus-like creature that surrounds itself with metal debris, and then morphs the whole thing into a giant killer machine - wow. Besides its top-notch visuals, Pulstar's other claim to fame is its difficulty. The word "insurmountable" comes to mind. The Video Game Critic doesn't usually like his games this hard, but at least you can choose to start on any of the first four stages. There are unlimited continues, and you don't have to restart a stage from the very beginning when you continue, thank goodness. The control scheme is quite unique. Simply tapping the fire button is not enough to kill most enemies, but you can hold it to "charge" you shots. A second option is to tap the fire button super-fast, which increases the range and intensity of your shots. Although this can be hard on your wrist, certain power-ups seem to make this easier. Pulstar's audio is also noteworthy. The music is has a soothing, new age sound that's a nice break from the standard fare, and the crystal clear sound effects really grabbed my attention. Each stage is introduced with a full motion video (FMV) clip, but these 3D-rendered cut scenes are hardly impressive by today's standards and definitely not worth the load time, so turn them off using the options menu. The option menu also lets you select from one of eight skill levels. Despite its difficult nature, Pulstar is an awesome shooter. Its graphics and sound really elevate the Neo Geo to the next level. © Copyright 2004 The Video Game Critic.