Want a Neo Geo but confused as hell.

[camarotuner]

I never thought buying a system could get so oddly confusing. This is what I (vaguely) get. There is both a cartridge based system and a CD based system. The CD system was not an add-on like a Sega CD it was it's own system. So if I want a set, need both. But are these things region coded? What's the difference between AES and MVS? I found a MVS to AES converter, but still haven't figured out if Japanese carts play on a US system or vice versa. So...... little help?

Oh and the search engine is how I figured out what I figured out above. If there is a previous thread explaining all this, can someone link me to it? Thanks.

[CosmicMonkey]

MVS Arcade carts and AES Home Carts have no region coding. If you play a Japanese game on a US system, you'll get English language (and no blood).

There are only 5 games that are exclusive to the CD format. Otherwise all the CD games are the same as the MVS/AES games. The CD is missing a damn lot of games though, and games that did get released are sometimes slightly different from their cart based counterparts (like missing animation frames), due to the limitations of the CD system. CD games also have load times; I'll leave it at that, as I've only played a Neo CD once, maaaany years ago. But one plus point is that it's cheaper than the cart formats.

As for what system is good for you, it really does depend on cash. I'd personally recommend a cart system. A consolized MVS is more expensive to start with, but the games are cheaper. You can get a cheap AES off eBay, but then it depends on how much you want to spend on games. If you're happy with £175 on Garou, or £100 for Last Blade 2, than that's all good.

[Gamereviewgod]

MVS are the carts used in the actual arcade cabinets. No box art, just interchangeable carts. They won't play in the home consoles without a convertor.

AES are the home carts with boxes, manuals, etc. AES is generally more expensive.

Home carts will play in any region, in the language of the console. I.e., English cart will play in Japanese on a Japanese console.

[camarotuner]

So if I understand, basically assuming money is not an issue, i'd want an AES system. Plug in any game either from Japan or the US and viola, happy as a clam. Avoid the CD system since it's the same games on a crappier system (5 exclusive games ain't enough for me to bother). And... if I want to play a MVS game I need a converter. Did I get it all right? If so I'll be shopping for a AES system. Damn you guys know alot.

[BocoDragon]

If money was no option, I'd buy a cab :)

[Hawksmoor]

I wouldn't call the Neo CD "crappy". The majority of the best Neo games, IMHO, are available for the Neo CD, so it's not really that big of an issue. However, there are two different Neo CD units, one of which is single speed and you'd therefore want to avoid. The Neo CDZ is a bit faster and, as previously mentioned, a hell of a lot cheaper than an AES console or a converted MVS system.

Some of the excellent Neo games are ridiculously expensive in AES cart format or difficult to find in MVS. Some of the earlier Metal Slugs for the AES can run upwards of $500+. If I were you - and assuming you haven't played many Neo Geo games - I would download an emulator and some roms and try them out. I think you may find that a lot of the ones you end up liking are available on CD and for a fraction of the price of their cartridge counterparts.

[Anthony1]

Why hasn't somebody made some type of flash cart for the Neo-Geo AES? You would think that for the gamers that just want to play the games, a flash cart would be an awesome way to experience the Geo without going into the poorhouse. And the hardcore Neo lovers would have nothing to do with it, cause it's not the real deal. You would think Tototek or somebody would have made one by now.

[Jorpho]

Why hasn't somebody made some type of flash cart for the Neo-Geo AES? You would think that for the gamers that just want to play the games, a flash cart would be an awesome way to experience the Geo without going into the poorhouse. And the hardcore Neo lovers would have nothing to do with it, cause it's not the real deal. You would think Tototek or somebody would have made one by now.

Offhand, I'd say flash memory has only recently become cheap enough to make a flash cart of that size (that is, several hundred megabytes) feasible. And at this point I imagine demand for such a product would not quite be enough to warrant its production and manufacturing costs.

[PapaStu]

So if I understand, basically assuming money is not an issue, i'd want an AES system. Plug in any game either from Japan or the US and viola, happy as a clam. Avoid the CD system since it's the same games on a crappier system (5 exclusive games ain't enough for me to bother). And... if I want to play a MVS game I need a converter. Did I get it all right? If so I'll be shopping for a AES system. Damn you guys know alot.

I guess thats 'a' way to think.

If you've got FISTS full of dollars then going all AES is what you could do. However many of the most loved games, Metal Slug, Samurai Showdown and others in AES form can cost more than a pretty penny to own and thats Assuming you can even find them for sale in the first place since many of them are damn rare and highly sought after.

What many do is get an AES and then get an MVS converter and go to town. Getting the MVS copies for +/- $50 a pop is better than only getting one or two games, when at the same time you could have easily gotten 6 or 8 games or more.

You don't need a convertor to play MVS stuff, you can also go the Consolized MVS route or just buy/make your own Supergun.

When you do shop for AES stuff don't forget to watch out for conversion carts. Spending lots on those thinking they are AES is just bad news.

[XianXi]

MVS are the carts used in the actual arcade cabinets. No box art, just interchangeable carts. They won't play in the home consoles without a convertor.

No box art?

I have these:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/201/468060519_0e8b28278e.jpg

Of course these inserts and custom boxes were made by the Neo Geo community.

Honestly go with a (CMVS) Consolized MVS system, it will save you a lot of headaches and money problems.

This is a picture of my old CMVS which is made of aluminum:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/139/343408425_be4d7d3964.jpg

And this is my current one which is obviously wood:

http://img89.imageshack.us/img89/7647/cmvs1hw9.jpg

[Gentlegamer]

Of course these inserts and custom boxes were made by the Neo Geo community.You ought to get the cover artists to submit them over at www.thecoverproject.net

[XianXi]

You ought to get the cover artists to submit them over at www.thecoverproject.net

We submitted all our covers to www.southtown-homebrew.com which is a site my friend owns. There is covers for Neo Geo, Atomiwave, PGM, STV and others.

[Sweater Fish Deluxe]

If money was no option, I'd buy a cab :)
That's what you do is *SPACE* is no concern. MVS cabs really are pretty cheap these days if you just what a standard 4-slot upright.


Why hasn't somebody made some type of flash cart for the Neo-Geo AES? You would think that for the gamers that just want to play the games, a flash cart would be an awesome way to experience the Geo without going into the poorhouse. And the hardcore Neo lovers would have nothing to do with it, cause it's not the real deal. You would think Tototek or somebody would have made one by now.
I believe NeoFlash have plans to release one. Of course, I don't recommend buying NeoFlash products since those guys are assholes and their stuff is shoddy, but they're the only ones who do stuff that far out.

Emulation is another option, of course. That's what I use. Either Neo CD on the Dreamcast (which also has excellent ports of a lot of the later games that didn't get CD releases) or MVS on my laptop with TV out.


...word is bondage...

[XianXi]

Plus not to mention the Neo uses 2 PCBs in their carts which is a lot trickier to use with a flash cart as certain data has to go to a certain PCB.

If the Neo used a single PCB in their carts a flash cart would have come out a long time ago, plus there really is no market for a flash cart.

[RyoGeo]

I think, short of a cabinet, a consolized MVS is the way to go as well.

I've been through a number of Neo Geo pieces of hardware, and I have been happiest by far with my MVS. In my case, I bought a 4 slot, big red cabinet that I am sure you are all familiar with. Cabinet aside, all the advantages of MVS have already been stated: cheap carts, ease of availability and CHEAP CARTS!

Seriously, you can pay like $50'ish for Mark of the Woves in MVS format or hundreds for the Home System cart. seems easy. The ony real reason to go with the home system would be to do so as a collector. I still have quite a few home carts (maybe 40 or more) but they are stuffed in a box somewhere. For my MVS carts, I've got MANY more of those, spent MUCH less on them and am able to play what would be insanely expensive to play on the home system for a pittance.

For example, I was able to snag a copy of Ninja Masters for MVS for like $30. Expect to pay over $500 for the Japanese version and hundreds more for the English version of the home system cart. Just one example of many.

Oh, and as for the various CD options, having been a former owner of 2 of the three variations, I would suggest skipping that altogether. The very first version (rare) looks a lot like the original Sega CD: a front loading machine. I think those were collectors items before they were even released. Then came the ver. 2 Neo CD. I had one of these. As someone has said, any fighting games that were anywhere near animation intensive dropped frames and in some cases even whole background elements. This is to say nothing of the load times. The Neo CD was a single speed machine and the loads were 40+ seconds in many cases when a new character needed to load for, say, King of Fighters. Avoid.

After some time, there was made available the Neo CDZ. This machine also utilized a single speed drive but due to optimized caching, loaded games much faster. You were still waiting a bit, but not nearly as long. And for the doubters out there, I actually had a Neo CD and a CDZ at the same time and timed the loads of KoF 95. The CDZ did not cut load times in half, but it was darn near and when you're going from say 40 seconds to maybe 23, it was big difference when you consider it's for every character that needs to load between rounds. Anyway . . .

The danger with the CDZ is, well, it was not a well manufactured machine. While I never had a problem with mine while I owned it, they were prone to breaking down a lot. Short answer: avoid.

One other thing, the way region stuff worked on the Neo was always based on the console itself rather than the cart. The carts were exactly the same. The Bios of the actual system determined, for example, whether you would have green blood in Samurai Shodown II (north american Bios) or red blood (Japanese Bios). As such, there is a dude on the 'net that has devised the "UniBios" chip. On an MVS board, the Bios chips is socketed! One simply orders a Unibios chip that allows you to choose you region and even has built in cheat codes, pop it inot your mother board and SHAZAM! you have a hacked system that plays the way you want, from North American Home, to Japanese home, to European to Arcade. All with a nifty GUI accessed using the joysticks.

Well that was a lot of non-focused info, but if you have more questions, feel free to ask. I used to be, and still technically am, a moderator on the Neo-Geo.com forums, so I was eyeballs deep in Neo for quite some time. should you choose to go over there, be sure and wear a flame retardant suite. It can get hot over there fast. :)