This is the game that explains to people why retro gamers exist, and why we all had such a good time in the arcade during the 90's. Many retro collections look quaint and play ever quainter (I know that's not a word, okay?), but this bunch still feels like it would as soon tear out your throat as loan you a quarter. The simple vector graphics of Atari or the 8-bit simplicity of early gaming systems like the NES are nothing more than distant cousins to the powerful Neo-Geo MVS system. The visual snap and relatively dynamic sound in these games will surprise some folks expecting that quaintness mentioned earlier. Almost all the games in SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1 make great conversation pieces if you're trying to impress upon someone the powerful evolution that gaming went through on its way to the modern, 3D games we know today. The first thing newcomers will notice is the speed. We've accepted a certain amount of slowdown in games for the sake of complexity; at the time these games were on the market, speed and responsive graphics were all-important. Nothing about 2D gaming every equated to a lower-quality experience, but remaining skeptics will have their doubts lifted after playing a few of these games. The old adage about things changing but staying the same is in effect here. What might look outdated by today's standards is arguably the pinnacle of 2D gaming. The 90's were a time when home videogaming consoles and 3D games were heating up, so SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1 was both the glory and the curtain-call for this style of design.

There are lots of hidden items and content in SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1 that you'll access by meeting certain thresholds in each game. Artwork, videos, and music from the games featured here can be unlocked along the way. This is a huge perk for fans and gives you something to work for that isn't just high scoring. Playing these games on Wii is great for featuring strong visuals and sound on a large screen, but the disk storage also allows all these nifty unlockables to be made available. As you might expect, the really excellent stuff can only be unlocked by accomplishing impossible feats in the game, so get your trigger finger ready for some practice.

There are sixteen games featured here, including one that must be unlocked. The general breakdown of titles falls into several categories. Fighting games were a Neo-Geo staple, so we have titles like Art of Fighting, Fatal Fury, and The King of Fighters '94. World Heroes is another in this category and happens to be the unlockable title. Similar in format but built with a focus on weapons and Asian swordfighting are two titles, Samurai Showdown and Sengoku. You'll also find Burning Fight, which is just a side-scrolling street brawl that falls somewhere between a shooter and a fighting game. Three excellent sports games are included, The Next Glory, Neo Turf Masters, and Baseball Stars 2. Battlefield shooting titles like Metal Slug and Shock Troopers are here, and other side-scrolling shooters include Magician Lord, Top Hunter, and Last Resort. The variety is incredible, although you will see a trend toward fighting or shooting titles and heavy focus on action gameplay.

There is two-player galore in SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1. The fighting games are obviously going to pit you against the other player, but there are plenty of opportunities for cooperative play as in a brawler like Burning Fight. The sports games remind me of sitting through some long afternoons and evenings playing against a friend or burning quarters in the arcade before these games were available to a home audience. Neo Turf Masters is a damn good golf game, rudimentary compared to the fantastic 3D versions we enjoy today, but still very playable by today's standards. The same is true of a game like Baseball Stars 2. Sports games have come a long way, and then they haven't really come very far at all in the sense that the rules haven't changed. The Neo-Geo sports games captured the excitement of action on the field; if they seem rudimentary, you're missing the point, because it's all about the competition. Metal Slug certainly earned a reputation for punishing gameplay coupled with action that kept you coming back for more punishment. Almost every twitchy title in this collection feels the same way. The fighting games are interesting points in history considering that 3D titles like Tekken were right around the corner. I can remember lining up in the arcade at college behind 20 people waiting to get on and fight; these were hugely popular and playable titles. The fast-moving action and hilariously diverse character lineup in any one game is magnified when you realize how much depth there is in this collection. It would have been nice to see more balance between the fighting games and other titles, but the goal seems to be for SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1 to represent flagship Neo-Geo titles. Most people associate the system with its fighting games, so it's easy to see the logic in the game selections.

Earning badges is a function of completing specific games or accomplishing objectives set out from the beginning. Once you've earned a certain number of badges, you'll be able to view special features and open up the locked game, World Heroes. Getting through to the end of most games will require more than a few continues, but it's always worth it to see the next outrageous boss, bad-guy variations, or level design. Not that the 90's were some kind of gaming renaissance, but those of us gathered around arcade cabinets were certainly obsessed. It's easy to capture that obsession playing SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1 when you find yourself coming up with excuses to just play that one level one more time, or try again to defeat that tricky boss. Most of the games include a checkpoint system that saves your last level as a reference so you can pick it up again later. This makes earning badges on completion of the game more realistic for less seasoned players. At least in the co-op games it helps quite a bit for two players to team up, and the second player can join on-the-fly. The only disappointment among all these accolades is the lack of meaningful online content or a connection to any online portal for the games. Scoreboards at least would have been great for bragging rights, and seemingly easy to include, so it's curious they were left out of this release.

Even with the ability to handicap or dial down the difficulty on these classics, it's impossible to ignore the heightened level of challenge here. Apart from the sports' titles, which were the closest thing to a casual game that arcades of the 90's had to offer, you'll need to have superior reflexes and patience to see the credits roll on SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1. Among the component parts, you'll find that the fighting games, when waging war against the CPU, are the most punishing. Mastering advanced moves, many of which you learn through unlocking move lists, is key to winning. The controls using the Classic Controller are tight enough to simulate the responsiveness the games had in the arcade. The heft of the arcade cabinet is missing, so if your play-style involved wrestling the machine and doing acrobatic button-mashing, you may have to make some adjustments to the Classic Controller. Using the Wii-mote for anything twitchy is a choice, and some titles support the Nunchuk for maximum flexibility. The gulf separating most of these titles from "games for new gamers" is pretty vast, but at least you're assured of replay value.

The control options help to make this a game that anyone can love. Wii-mote, Classic Controller, and Nunchuk are supported. For us the Classic Controller is a complete no-brainer considering the rolling, sweeping button movements required to initiate special attacks in the fighting games. If the Classic Controller wasn't modeled on the old fighting-game arcade cabinet layout, it's at least a good close second. Side-scrolling games like Last Resort or Metal Slug don't require special controls; for these you'll appreciate the simplicity of the Wii-mote, most likely. SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1 offers a nice option beyond just the choice of controller, where you can customize how the controller is set up, to assign certain attacks to one button or another. This can be done on a game-by-game basis, and if you really fall in love with a certain setup, you can modify the settings one time and apply them to all games. Within each game, there are submenus with options for difficulty settings (if available) and other tweaks to the game's presentation that may better suit your playing style. You can quickly look at the objectives for each game to see what you'll need to do to earn a medal, making it easy to open locked content. Well, easy to see how, if not easy to actually accomplish...

This is classic entertainment, grafted to a modern marvel of a home console from the days long past of arcade glory. It's not recommended for anyone that doesn't have the stomach for some super-challenging, twitchy gameplay. It is highly recommended for folks that experienced the great days of arcade fighting games in the 90's and want to reclaim some of that excitement in their living room. SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 1 won't recreate the dark, stuffy, cramped arcade or the piles of quarters on the Neo-Geo machine but if you close your eyes during a session of The King of Fighters '94, you might just be able to project yourself back in time. Like the dinosaurs, these games reigned supreme in days long past, before the living room became the new arcade experience.