Was the Neo Geo CD Really That Bad?!?

[@giddra69]

Just want to say I'm glad you branched out from SEGA content. I loved your SEGA content, but I knew you had more range for other stuff. Really enjoying all of it!

[@SegaLordX]

I appreciate that! Thanks for the comment.

[@briantaylorcloe7725]

Saturn stuff will always be my favorite topic, but am always interested in NEC & SNK ... Look forward to some CDi roasts and 3DO RPG coverage as well ~

[@spaceghostcqc2137]

Yeah SLX has great presentation for retro game content, it's all welcome.

[@mulliganxable]

Same! Keep it fresh SLX!

[@LuciferHunter-kt7pm]

@@briantaylorcloe7725I mowed lawns all summer to buy a 3DO! Lol then the next summer I mowed again for the PlayStation. I really wish I kept my 3DO

[@registereduser]

When I was a youngster (late 80s then the 90s) the NG was this almost mythical thing, the privilege of those extremely well off and no plaything for me and the mere mortals I knew. No one I knew ever had one and based off the gaming magazines we had we all wanted one badly.

[@Cruor34]

To put it in perspective, my dad and most of the kids in my schools parents were all well off. I'd say the average family income for my school was at least 200k/year (in the 90s) and nobody had a Neo Geo, not even the spoiled kids. We had a kid who's dad owned a whole super market chain in NYC, even he didn't have it. It was a thing of myths, nobody was getting a $700 console when SNES and Genesis were like $150. I'm actually shocked by how many people in the comments either had it or had a friend with one.

[@chazmcdaniels6173]

you're in my age range and I share your sentiment. It's been fun trying these games on emulator (who can afford these systems even now!?!) and reminiscing with friends. Our hi-score sheet isn't the score you get for say Magician Lord but how much money (i.e. credits) did you spend to beat it as we had an arcade machine at a local gas station growing up.

[@AngryCalvin]

Yeah my jaw dropped seeing these games in the arcade. The fact the price WAS way too high is why I have collected these games digitally

[@sheppeyfishtales]

True 😎

[@Retro-Fez]

I turned 50 last month and am at long last the proud owner of a top loader neo geo cd console, i have 1 game am only waiting for my controller to arrive am really excited. Load times are nothing to me i grew up with spectrum 128k which took cassettes nearly 30 mins to load and you could die in minutes and start all over again ah great days

[@Pai3000]

Did you know that you did not have to reset the vomputer every time you died?

[@ThePoorMansRetroGameRoom]

That was one of the best, in-depth look at the NG CD I have ever seen. I just got the top loader and have been extremely pleased with it. I agree a 100% with your analysis.

[@SegaLordX]

Appreciate the comment and kind words. Thank you.

[@e.e.-tv1683]

I concur.

[@thomaselers7416]

I don't think the Neo Geo CD was bad at all, I just think it was considered "bad" when people compared its performance, to its relatively high price tag for that time. Great content as usual SLX, thanks very much.

[@tonberrymasta]

Thank you so much for this! I remember reading a magazine writer complaining about the "juggling monkeys" on the Neo CD way back when, but I never actually saw what it looked like live until now (when I asked people about the juggling monkeys, nobody knew what I was talking about). Now having seen this I can finally put my 30 year old curiosity about it to rest.

[@AnthonyRiddle]

Neo Geo sports games will always have a place in my heart. To this day they are still beautiful and play really dang good

[@waynesworld1655]

Baseball stars 2 is still my top 5 sports games of all time

[@caseyhayes4590]

For Soccer, Golf and Baseball it's hard to beat.

[@AnthonyRiddle]

@@caseyhayes4590 Especially Baseball. Between Super Baseball 2020 and Baseball Stars, it doesn’t get much better than that.

[@caseyhayes4590]

@@AnthonyRiddle yeah I play 2020 and Baseball Stars 2 all the time. I wish it had online play somehow because I’ve kind of mastered vs the AI.

[@AnthonyRiddle]

@@caseyhayes4590 can you teach me how to master it? I still strike out more than I hit and the cpu hits plenty of home-runs from my pitching

[@snkfan7506]

Excellent video! While I was in college, I got my Neo CD system in March 1999 directly from SNK of America. They were clearing them out right before they closed up shop here in the US. This was my first Neo Geo system. I paid around $229 (still have my invoice), and they gave me the choice of a free game, in which I picked Magician Lord. You are correct that the early titles run wonderfully on the console. Once they are loaded into RAM, it's great. The fighting games are dreadful, but, at the time, I didn't complain as I was a broke college student. It was the closest that I got to a real Neo Geo experience until I got my AES a couple of years later (followed by an MVS 1-slot board). But, I still have my CD system to this day. The only issue is that I've had to replace the lens a few times over the years.

[@jamesnelson5618]

What is your Favorite game you play on Neo Geo?

[@caseyhayes4590]

If it could've been 200-300ish 2x CDZ right form the start with a huge library of old (but great) games for $20-30 it might have got some US traction. It was tough for a small company. The Neo Geo Pocket color was amazing with pretty much all great games and also struggled. There's a reason smaller software oriented companies don't even try consoles anymore.

[@capcomfan82]

You had to go to private shops to get stuff like that. The only big box store i seen any neo geo anything was toys r us back in the early 90s. Nobody would have bought it here because they wouldn’t know it existed.

[@Planag7]

Oh yeah I remember certain places you could special order them back in the day. And actually only recently that I find shops that actually had these CD games as well as neo Geo pocket things! Also had a turbo graphix game which I very rarely see.

[@roberto1519]

People wondered and I was one of them, why SNK, which was known as being a Company with state-of-the-art hardware and later, games that arguably left Capcom eating dust in the 2D front, released the NEO GEO Pocket, and while I don't hate the handheld or anything, it's debatable that it wasn't special in any meaningful way. I played the Game Gear in the early 90's and THAT was something else for the time, the original Game Boy has a good chunk of NEO GEO fighters like KOF 95, 96, Real Bout Fatal Fury Special and Samurai Shodown and they all play great considering the hardware, and they don't look that much inferior to what the NGP received much later, I'm talking about a 1989 device. While I understand SNK was in dire straights and they couldn't do better, people would expect, by SNK's standards in people's minds, maybe something a-la GBA. The simplified games play well enough and they are fun for what they are, but honestly, the 1990 Game Gear could do the same and even had TV. A 2 button, 8-bit like handheld by SNK in the late 90's, hard to believe it got though the planning stages.

[@videogameobsession]

I managed a Babbage's store in 1999, and we carried and promoted the Neo•Geo Pocket Color about as much as we could have. Being an owner of the AES since 1990 I personally tried my absolute best to sell people on the NGPC, but the lineup of games was just not what people were looking for. It had a tiny space of games sitting next to three walls of Game Boy and GBC boxes! In 1999 if it didn't have Pokémon on it they didn't want it. I managed to sell a handful of NGPC systems around holiday 1999, and most of them were returned after XMAS.

[@Boogie_the_cat]

Well, that's the problem with hindsight. Maybe they could have reduced the price, OR gone with a 2X CD drive, but not both. I know its shocking nowadays, but the price of a double speed drive compared to a single speed was about $75 more in 1995.

[@Chris-Courage]

I agree that the load times really aren't all that bad with most games. It's really just a number of the later released games that are larger in size that just drag while loading. Nowadays, the speed of the NeoSd Loader fixes those long load times for the larger games and even removes small breaks when music tracks change.

[@joesshows6793]

I disagree as I couldn’t stand the early CD roms due to their horrid loading. GameCube was my first disk based system and the load times on that system were almost nonexistent

[@roberto1519]

​@@joesshows6793 You are too young and in this case, it's not necessarily a compliment. The 128-bit era was a different beast entirely and the Xbox was the best hardware, stomping the GameCube, faster CPU, DVD and much more RAM. Yes the GameCube masked loadings, as did the PS2 and specially the Xbox which could run most games from the HDD as well. If you weren't too young, you would know hundreds of 32-bit era games also have virtually no loadings, not only those using expanded RAM carts on the Saturn, but normal CD games like Shining Force III and many more.

[@shaneb1982]

@@roberto1519 Totally agree with you and @turbografxfan has it correct with saying its really just the later 250Meg+ games that are a bit of a pain. But the NeoSD Loader fixes that AND you get the BEAUTIFUL CD Quality arranged soundtracks, like Last Blade 1/2, KOF 98/99, etc. @joesshows6793 not sure you comparing your 'First' disc based system in 2001 (Which was a DVD system) means you're able have anything constructive to say about the Neo Geo CD, you probably weren't even a twinkle in your dads eye yet. I know your generation is told youre special snowflakes, but you ain't.

[@joesshows6793]

@@roberto1519 I’m almost 50

[@roberto1519]

@@joesshows6793 ha! You're a young soul then!

[@HappyCodingZX]

Great video. For me the worst offender was The Last Blade 1 and especially 2. Brought back memories of loading games from cassette on 8-bit micros. On the plus side the console is quite easy to region mod and there is no copy protection at all, allowing you to try games out and test load times before you spend the big money on the originals.

[@FinalManaTrigger]

Don't forget, ont op of that bad loading times, that much of the animation was missing from the backgrounds too in those later titles. That's really what killed it for me.

[@llpBR]

A friend of mine had one. It was incredible, but loading was really hard as we were used to cartridge games

[@mr.nihilistic]

What about Sega CD?

[@llpBR]

@@mr.nihilistic well, i've never seen the sega cd working. The first experience I had with CDs was the Grolier Encyclopedia on the PC. I remember the loading time for the Hindenburg crash video it had. Even being on a very small resolution, it took like 20 minutes to play it. Those single speed drives were traumatic.

[@8bitsnkboy472]

This video perfectly encapsulates the Neo Geo CD experience, as does the systems logo - A bright, smiling, happy face beside a sad, blue and anguished looking face - That's the face you'll have, if you try to play something like the Last Blade on your NGCD!! I do LOVE my top-loader and it's served me well over the years. But my Neo Geo collection is firmly divided between VS fighting games on my AES system and everything else on NGCD, bar the odd bargain I've picked up on cartridge.

[@evenoddprime]

Editing/production. You 100% made the right call by actually including the actual entire load time for about half of those screens. Anyone can say “it’s a 6 or 10 second load time between each level/death.” But until you actually go through it, like in this video I don’t think people fully grasp the complaint until they experience it. If anyone feels like this is a gripe about the attention span or need for instant gratification by “a generation” so be it but I’m in this camp and guilty 🤚 as well. Excellent video. Subbed.

[@MrCoffeeMrRadar]

As someone who actually owned one when it came out yes and no. It was great to be able to buy my favorite NeoGeo games for a fraction of the cost compared to a cart. But that loading was real brutal, I laugh today when people complain they have to wait like 30secs for a screen to boat up. Gamers today really are spoiled compared to what we had to live through back in the day.

[@chrissymc886]

It's amazing that a PS5 has essentially zero load times. Could never have imagined it back in the day.

[@jamiec2023]

C64 tape drive enters the chat

[@DaveVoyles]

Exactly. I also have one, and the cost savings was the selling point for me.

[@Sinn0100]

I grew up during the 3rd and 4th generations. I know what you mean my friend. However...30 seconds of load time, ouch. I'm complaining after 8 seconds. Both our Series X and PS5 load almost instantaneously. I never in a million years though we would see a disc based system that is as fast as a cart system...crazy. ;)

[@rgm4646]

Aint that the truth. Back in the day we didnt even have internal SAVING on lots of games. You had a long a$ password that you better write down correctly or I just left the system on all day while I was at school (paused) lol

[@timecop808]

Sound sample memory: 1 MB

[@RetroMoments]

Woah the loading times are even worse than what I expected haha. Glad I have an AES! Great video as always!

[@Thor-Orion]

Depends on the game. The large vs fighters can be brutal.

[@Animated__Freak]

I LOVE the NeoGeo CD. It was the way I experienced a lot of these legendary arcade titles and the system holds a special spot in my heart. That being said, the load times can be ridiculous. A lot of people say it's because of the single speed CD drive. And that definitely doesn't help however it's a bit more complicated than that. The Neo Geo carts would have additional ram in them, something that became way more common in the later years of the hardware . The Neo Geo CD does have additional ram to make up for this but that just means more data has to be loaded before the game can start. Even the Sega Saturn (without the ram cart) and Playstation had to cut out frames of animation in order to play these games, in theory you should be able to do this on the NeoGeo CD to improve loading times, but then whats the point? Just get a Saturn or PlayStation.

[@pooksthepossum]

Glad to see this beast get a proper analysis. The good and the bad. As always, great video from SLX.

[@SegaLordX]

Much appreciated. Thank you.

[@roberto1519]

My older brother borrowed the NEO CD around 1995, I remember clearly we played at least 3 games, maybe more, two of them were Last Resort and King of Fighters '94. KOF 94 loads all battles at once, once both sides choose their teams, the loading begins and it's a loooooooong one. At least, after that the rounds flow like the cartridge release, but in the next team, there comes your coffee break again. One thing to keep in mind is that, at least in my eyes as a kid who was an arcade nut, and we were much more tolerable back then, these loadings weren't the end of the world like people make it seem today, CD technology was exciting at the time, games with more than one CD and loadings were seen as technology advancement, at least it seemed like it to most of us. You mention the NEOCD received the lesser portion of the KOF games, but it actually got KOF '94 up to '99, which was the last official SNK KOF, since 2000 onwards started the Playmore era, counting up to 2003, the NEO CD got 5 KOF titles. These are the ones that matter to me, though as even as a kid KOF 2000, 2001 and later iterations didn't feel the same to me.

[@JJKoester]

A cartoon monkey staring you in the eye and juggling just feels like they're adding insult to the injury of long load times.

[@jeffmccarthy9073]

I got a Neo Geo CD when they were unloading a bunch of "new old stock". The load times sent me straight into the MVS scene.

[@jeremygregorio7472]

But I think the problem was the price. $500 was way too much for the load times you were facing. I don't think neogeo hardware was ever designed to be cost reduced so I'm not sure they could have done anything.

[@nightstar11801]

Agreed

[@youuuuuuuuuuutube]

That's certainly because of the 7MB of RAM. At the time it was huge. The PSX that came out later had only 2MB of RAM, for reference.

[@johnjay6370]

@@youuuuuuuuuuutube Yep!!! Ram was a killer for cost, but the large Ram is what made the NeoGeo cd possible. Those NeoGeo Carts were HUGE just HUGE. Without Ram the games would not be possible, Sega CD only has 640k.. it was not until Dreamcast came out before home systems had more ram.

[@Americansikkunt]

Wtf?! $500???? That’s like $750 in today’s money….

[@krazyd0nut404]

@@Americansikkunt yea it’s like $1100 now. Also $500 could buy u a decent beater car in that day and it would get u around.

[@dtzero0]

I remember I almost imported a Neo Geo CD as a present from my mom for my 8th grade graduation. I then switched to 3DO. When I went to babbages on graduation day to get the 3DO, I switched at the last minute and purchased a Sega Saturn. I never regretted my purchase. I had some great times with my Saturn.

[@googleboughtmee]

Don't forget some games had the graphics cut slightly. Less animation frames, missing background elements. Also on the plus side Neo Turf Masters got an exclusive course.

[@harrymasonsm]

One thing i noticed about the memory limit Neo Geo CDz when compared to arcade was with kof 99. I actually saw for the first time that the arcade had more animation than what the Neo Cd was even capable of loading for 2 fighters. This might have been to reduce load times, but I'm not certain. Still overall i was happy with my Neo Geo CDz. I just wish it didnt break so now i have to place it at an angle just to keep it loading properly.

[@BERSERKERDEMON1]

does it accept burnt CD roms from a PC? (i mean for unrealesed games)

[@hanzobi1926]

Just installed a Furrtek SD loader this week in my NEO GEO CD and the load times are so very good now.

[@samhain1914]

I got this on release then the cdz. Your reviews are top notch. Very well done!

[@Konuvis]

Ah the early CD consoles. I never had a Neo Geo CD but I remember the load times for Blood Omen on PSX were rough.

[@darktetsuya]

I'd heard the load times were pretty bad on NGCD (especially the 1st gen systems) but I know some games had a trade-off like maybe a re-arranged soundtrack or an extra bonus, like Neo Turf Masters has a new harder exclusive course not found on the arcade/MVS versions.

[@chrismaddock5790]

The sad truth is, most of those polygon games (not all, mind, just most) from the 90's haven't aged that well in terms of visuals, whilst 2-d sprite-based games that were often overlooked by gamers in favour of the polygon releases have actually aged beautifully, both in gameplay AND in visuals.

[@joaocardoletto]

This perception is changing, people are starting to see 32 bit 3d graphics as an aesthetic choice, it looks interesting on indie games, especially horror.

[@Thor-Orion]

I agree with him though, there is a LOT of bad early 3-D. The “aesthetic choice” of 32 bit 3-D made by modern devs is “choosing” to make their games look like the best of the 3-D from that era, when the majority of 3-D from that era looked like slop.

[@joaocardoletto]

@@Thor-Orion For sure, they are inspired but way more refined.

[@Nelbroth]

If Neo Geo's home debut was a competitively priced CD system from the start, I probably would've bought it, load times be damned. Playing affordable arcade-perfect ports back when they were still relevant would've been too good to pass up. Unfortunately, it turned out to be a case of "too little too late."

[@teddym2808]

NeoGeo is my favourite retro system of all time, so the recent episode on that and now the CD is all very exciting to me, thank you.

[@TeknoRiderF1RE]

As someone who invested in a CDZ, it is a great system but I would suggest you make your research on the games you want to play before buying. If all you want is early NG titles and stuff like Windjammers and Metal Slug 1/2, a CD is okay, but for heavier titles like KOFs, Last Blade etc a CDZ is a better investment as load times are roughly divided by 2, to the point where they (mostly) aren't a nuisance except in the heaviest titles. It's more expensive but remember you can burn the games.

[@ZarlorMercenary]

I actually preferred the chip based music in some cases, but the exclusive extra course for the CD version of Neo Turf Masters was awesome. Also maybe one day there will be an English translation of that CD exclusive Samurai Showdown RPG.

[@mmpsp693]

I just checked today, they are still working on it!

[@bigshorty4855]

​@@mmpsp693the Samurai shodown rpg? Seriously? Awesome. Some guy on neo geo forums had it almost finished bit didn't finish and release it. He just was cockteasing his creation. I'll definitely burn it onto a cd if it's ever released in English.

[@fordf150]

Good work on the video, appreciate the time you took on testing all the games!

[@goralski21]

Another issue was Art of Fighting 3: the cd version had smaller sprites than the MVS/AES version. I guess the neo geo cd ram was adequate for most games coming from the MVS, but not enough for Art of Fighting 3

[@DanielG-w5g]

I have owned a NGCD and for those that complain about loading times, know nothing. As a child, I grew up in the era of Apple II's, Commodore..etc. I have used a Commodore 64 with a data cassette and floppy drive. Some load times were 1-2 mins but others took up 20-30 mins. Plus, you had to flip the disks or tapes in the process. If your had an error loading the game that timer would need to start again. So from where I stand, NGCD load times are not bad at all.

[@StriderVM]

The Neo Geo CD has potential. It was just kind of too late. Because people became enamoured with polygons. If it was released in 1993, maybe it would have been accepted better?

[@cabbusses]

I once tried to see if i could clear every challenge in NeoGeo CD Special, but i got fed up with the loading times by the time i got to level 8 on the soccer game

[@hugo-garcia]

On the next years with PlayStation and Saturn many clever programmers created tricks to reduce loading times. This was something new at the time so developers haven't yet figure out a way to overcome this problem. Even today there are still new tricks on game engines to improve load times

[@mukiex4413]

If I recall correctly from magazines back in the day, the Neo Geo CD had 56 megabits of RAM. So that definitely plays into your observation about cart size.

[@herbaldragonX]

the load screens.. such a 90's feel to em :)

[@jeremygregorio7472]

They should have put a cartridge ports on it so they could add ram like this Saturn

[@BasementBrothers]

The cartridge memory bus costs money too. The system already had more ram than other consoles at the time, giving it the hefty price tag.

[@_TheElMan]

It speaks to the quality of SLX that I watch a video about loading times haha. I think a lot of it was down to lack of optimisation. As CD tech was so new at the time, they seemed not to tailor the games and just dump the ROM in sections (simplified explanation I know)

[@MKKTeam]

Lord! I LOVED this episode! Idk if you are aware of the NeoCD emu for Dreamcast? It has decent compatibility, and most of the games run 100% speed. I did some tests videos back then, and it even works with the original disks!

[@Llukario]

Awesome video! I never knew about the neo geo CD! The controller looks different and I saw 8 bit do did a similar one. I was wondering if the neo geo controller was an arcade accurate controller? Great video SLX!

[@shiningphantasy1393]

The main benefits of the Neo-Geo CD was in the case of a few select games the outstanding arranged CD quality OST's which would really elevate the package, and in a few cases like the Metal Slug games and Neo Turf Masters there was extra content not found in the cartridge. It would have been nice to see more of this as many of the games were straight ports with some of them having the illustrated and burdensome loading times. As the games became bigger and more ambitious some other compromises were being made such as lost frames of animation and sprite sizes having to be diminished from the cartridge versions. Had they tried to make the really big games on the Neo Geo CD like Garou: MOTW the downsizing would have become increasingly noticeable. But there are a smattering of exclusives like Crossed Swords 2, Samurai Showdown RPG, and Ironclad. It's easy to see why the console didn't move units; for one I could barely find one in stores. Only the small specialty places would carry it for sale. The system was also a tweener with the Neo-Geo not having the new product generation excitement of the Saturn, PSX, and the upcoming "Ultra 64". The imbalance of genres hurt the sales also; mainly twitch arcade games and one-on-one fighters; nothing wrong with those but consumers also want great platformers, role-playing games, more realistic sports games, and all of the other options out there, so at best the platform could only be a second console for those with the extra funds to invest.

[@DoobieDoctor5000]

Here's an anecdote that may be food for thought: Neo Geo visibility was low in the home market for someone like me, whose parents were plagued with financial difficulty. They spoiled us, sure, but we got the standard NES, SNES, Genesis, Sega CD, Saturn (but NOT PSX until much later), and N64. By the time Gamecube and PS2 were out I was an adult. Neo Geo was well-known for being an insanely expensive console with insanely expensive games. It was something I definitely wanted (especially since I adored their arcade games so much), but always felt out-of-reach to the point where I wouldn't even dare ask my parents to get it for me. As a result, it was left on my visibility backburner, to the point where I didn't even know the Neo Geo CD existed until I watched this video today. Same can be said for Turbo GrafX/Turbo CD, though I found out about the Turbo CD a couple years ago. On top of all of this, the way Sega handled Sega CD, if I HAD heard about the Neo Geo CD, I would have assumed it was an extension to the Neo Geo, which again was forever deemed out-of-reach. So from my perspective, there are probably more potential customers in my base just because there are more people struggling with money than not. Even the games we had we saw as expensive. Making it more expensive than that made it seem like some sort of ultra-luxurious item. This was reinforced by the fact that people who we knew that owned Neo Geo or Turbo Grafx were always the kids of some sort of business owner.

[@briantaylorcloe7725]

Wonderful comment! I also have a similar gaming upbringing .... Someone in sixth grade told us on the playground about having a NeoGeo and a 3DO and a CDi (didn't believe it at all, but I don't think anyone wanted to call out the scary classmate... LoL) Read briefly about the NeoCD in the back of gaming mags, in those mail•order lists that you basically need to use a magnifying glass on .... Disregarded it as a TurboDuo/ MegaCD type of add-on as you did ... Would mos def love to have one of these, with a nice collection featuring some RPGs, sports and action titles ~

[@Choralone422]

The Neo Geo CD was not bad but it should have had a 2x CD-ROM from the very start. Plus, it was released so late in the US the Playstation with its 2X CD-ROM already had a massive lead and was riding the wave of 3D games. Had the Neo Geo CD been released in late 93 or early 94 it would have done so much better IMO.

[@johnjay6370]

As awesome as the neogeo was , it was to weak to compete with even the 3do. It needed to come out at the latest early 1993 and with a 2x CD rom for 299. It could not run a game like doom, but Wolfenstein should have been possible, but barely. NEC should have teamed up with SNK and ported BONK and other games, but with huge upgrades.. what made the Neogeo so powerful was not just its gpu, it was also its RAM Size and addressing ability. Ram was still expensive in the earlt/mid 90s. Neogeo games even looked and ran better on the neo gel over the saturn without the 4mb ram expansion ...

[@youuuuuuuuuuutube]

Even the Amiga CD-32 released in 1993 had a 2X CD-ROM drive. There is really no excuse for having only 1X in 1994.

[@johnjay6370]

@@youuuuuuuuuuutube Yep! and it was 400 in the states! Sega Saturn was 299.

[@SomeOrangeCat]

Ah good! Some content about a system I haven't heard a lot about.

[@joesshows6793]

Good stuff. I say you were being very generous with being able to deal with the loading. It was literally why I went N64. I just couldn’t deal with the nonsense loading. I mean there is even a pause for many seconds before the loading screen shows up! A load screen before the load screen. And we didn’t get to see this initial load time would could be 1-2min!!!

[@ZOMBGiEFart]

My buddy picked up a Neo Geo CD circa 1997 or 98 and played the hell out of it. We mainly played Samurai Showdown 2 and King of Fighters 96. The load times were annoying for sure, in KoF we got around it usually by playing mirror matches, if you already had loaded the characters prior, it would load much faster. The biggest problem with the system was their decision to make the optical drive a single speed cd-rom, by then we had 2x if not higher. Despite the problems, we enjoyed it but it didn't last long. Playing on the Saturn with Ram Cart expansions made the games arcade perfect for the most part.

[@profholt82]

It is worth noting that the CD version of Neo Turf Masters includes the exclusive Scottish course which was not found on the arcade or home cart.

[@piccolo1976]

Always loved the look of the first console with its textured top surface and shinny NeoGeo CD badge, looked like a solid piece of SNK machinery worthy to the AES. Bought one back in 2001 but it always used to reset to the consoles title screen after an hour or so of play and I never did find out why. The pads were also a bit ropey! Nice review of this system.

[@megagrey]

This is why I come to this channel. I always assumed NeoGeo CD was yet another add-on, not a standalone system, and never heard about any controversy surrounding it. You learn so much from channels like this.

[@sonnyandreotte5721]

That intro Never gets Old.

[@Ultimatewario89]

SNK should have released a Neo-Geo Duo that could play both CD games and AES cartridges

[@BasementBrothers]

I think I just felt my wallet die.

[@FinalManaTrigger]

The loading times were brutal on some later titles, but that wasn't the deal breaker for me... what really hurt the system was that it didn't have enough ram to fully load in all of the graphics of the stages for games like Ninja Master's and Last Blade 1/2. Most or all of the background animation was missing those games and it really hurt them in my eyes. Otherwise the system was great for older/smaller titles.

[@alexojideagu]

Yes many are forgetting it wasn't just load times, but they had to cut some animation to further reduce load times, which also damaged its appeal.

[@bigshorty4855]

Along with the load times, the biggest flaw of the system. As someone who still owns the cdz completely agreed.

[@TheMrCHELL]

Art of Fighting 3 CD had problems with the zoom, making the characters smaller.

[@SoftBank47]

I won a Neo Geo CD controller off Yahoo Auctions, and I regularly get on my knees and beg for SNK to re-release that controller with microswitches. They’ve made recreations before, but not with the microswitches.

[@brendanroberts1310]

That's one of the reasons I didn't get the mini.

[@cartmann94]

As a funfact, the arranged CD soundtrack of most NGCD games became the de facto soundtrack of their ports to the PS1 and the Sega Saturn.

[@theconsolekiller7113]

Great video. Emulation somewhat fixes this issue with the ability to fast forward during loading screens.

[@GustavoBhr]

Not only it fixes but there’s an option to completely skip load screens! I rather playing NGCD versions of few games because the rearranged OST.

[@theconsolekiller7113]

@@GustavoBhr Very nice. Only messed with NGCD a few times on emulation, as I beat alot of the games in different forms. Emulation is amazing though. I got into making a dedicated emulation machine probably back in 1999 or 2000. Sold my retro games and consoles and embraced it back then. It just keeps getting better. Rearranged OST sounds nice. Good shit. Would have blown my fuckin balls off back then to own a Neo Geo (cart vers). Would have never been able to get any games though, ha ha.

[@stonerdemon]

Loading times aside, damn the NeoGeo consoles were so beautiful. Even the cheaper, final model of the NeoGeo CD looks so classy and well built.

[@starpier]

Useful in-depth analysis! I was guessing it had something to do with the size on disc, now I have a confirmation. Still it is not a trivial task these days to get a top loader or a CD-Z unit here in Europe or even to find a working one in Japan, it is a more sensible option to simply buy those games from digital stores.

[@10p6]

At that time NGCD should have had a 68020 / 68030 in it, that way it could have done some much faster decompression whilst staying compatible. Also, they should have used Streaming CD audio for Music in the game, as that would have saved a tiny bit of loading time too, not forgetting a double speed CD drive.

[@maroon9273]

Definitely should've add on the cdz model.

[@sabishiihito]

I planned to get a summer job in '95 so I could save up and buy a Neo-Geo CD system (I was in high school at the time). My mom was like "Just because you get a job doesn't mean you can spend your money just how you want" so there went that plan. Never did end up getting one with all the good ports of Neo-Geo games that ended up coming out for other consoles.

[@EricJacobusOfficial]

From the wiki: The CD system's 56 Mbit / 7 MB of RAM was split accordingly: 68000 program memory: 2 MB Fix layer memory: 128 KB Graphics memory: 4 MB Sound sample memory: 1 MB Z80 program memory: 64 kB VRAM: 512Kb (For graphics attributes) SRAM: 2 KB (For high scores / general save data) So games over 56 mbits had to be reloaded. Most likely they were just loading graphics. For for a title with huge graphics, even if it were only 70-100 megabits, you'd still have to load the entire 4 MB (32 megabits) of graphics each time. Since single speed drives read at 1.229 megabits per second, that's about 25 seconds to entirely refresh the 32 megabits of graphics data. To refresh all 56 megabits of ram, that's a brutal 45.6 seconds. And that's just linear read time. If you're pulling different parts of the disc, there's also the search time. Fighting games have a variety of sound samples for the characters so you're basically refreshing everything for every fight. Why it would have to reload every round... I don't understand. I guess that's just the program data...? I'm thinking back now to the Sega CD which had a pitiful 6 megabits of ram. I remember Willy Beamish having ungodly load times, when it should have technically only taken 5 swconds. There was probably an art to spacing the data out in smart ways on the discs, which Beamish didn't seem to do properly. Rise of the Dragon, released the same year, has maybe 1/4 the load times. Wonder what happened there... Whatever the case, I wonder how much time SNK devoted to economizing load times in the NGCD.

[@mdsuave13]

I knew one guy that had it when we were in middle school... This was back when it was new. Nobody had the money for them. Compared to a cartridge system, all CD systems took forever to load up back in the day.

[@mjdf122]

The Neo Geo And Neo Geo CD Are Awesome Poweful Amazing Looking Back Then And Now People Should Show More Love For The Turbo Grafx Neo Geo And 3DO Thank You For All Your Work Sega Lord X

[@Yuuretsu]

Glad to see this get coverage on your channel. I used to own one about a decade ago. The combination of long and frequent load times for the bigger fighting games and the system lacking many AES top titles meant I never really grew in love with it and sold it a few years ago. Those controllers with micro switches were a stroke of genius though and I wish other consoles at the time would have had similar controllers available for their arcade conversions.

[@64-Bit-Gamer]

I really enjoyed this episode. I was curious about the Neo Geo CD, but never owned one. I reckon the negative pr was one reason why Nintendo stuck with carts for the N64.

[@GamerGee]

20:11 they were going to do a blazing star cd with cinematic bios and all but it got cut. We never got a 44khz stereo soundtrack either. The cd is straight console audio.

[@aquamich129]

Thanks for the SNK content. I had the neo cd Z in France and the loading was twice faster as the normal neo cd. Which for some games makes it acceptable. KOF remains a pain. You should do ccontent around PS1/PS2/Saturn 2D games which are quite related to 16 bit era!

[@speedyink]

I love my Neo Geo CD still. There's a lot of great games that play great, and even the ones that don't (certain fighting games), you COULD really deal if you were dedicated enough. Some great fighters still got around it though, "Breakers" is a great looking, highly animated game that's really not bad for load time

[@VictorCaro]

There is an ode for some models and it helps load times noticeably. It even let's you keep the cd drive active. Sure, this means nothing towards the system fron launch until a could of years back, but makes a huge difference now with loading times as well as homebrew.

[@Bubsy_Mods]

When I first had the Neo Geo CD top loading unit and when I saw the loading screen I was like what the heck, but once witnessing the Neo Geo games at home and listening to the arrange tracks of each stage and level or round whether Art of Fighting 2 to King of Fighters Fatal Fury Special King of the Monsters 2 and I could go on, it was really a treat. Unfortunately the company made mistakes they should have included a two times or four times speed optical drive but unfortunately that's how the system went down. If they released the CDZ in '94 I think it would have done better. But now I have all the Neo Geo CD games on my PSP on the go I could turn on the loading screens or turn it off and instantly play the games with no hiccups😊 Man it's unbelievable how times have changed.

[@greenkoopa]

If you have stone-like patience for the 1st gen of disc based consoles/addons then you can enjoy it. I've never played a neo geo cd but i play a sega cd model 2 and its fine. I wish they made more rpgs

[@LaurenGlenn]

Nowadays, you can get a CD-ROM/Bluray/DVD drive that can rip a CD in a couple of minutes. Even in the late 90s, you could get 40x CD-ROM drives for PC because if you went much faster, the discs would often explode in the drive... but video game systems were typically 1x, 2x drives...

[@MrBroken030]

Playing the neo geo cd on mister with 4x disc read speed is a treat! Love the cd audio quality soundtracks, they really add to the cinematic feel of games like Samurai Shodown or Last Blade 2.

[@gamblerfls]

I bought a Neo Geo CD early 1995, I used to play KOF a lot in the arcades. KOF'94 had only one loading for all characters. What impressed me the most was the sound quality, they remastered almost all tracks and it was way ahead of its time. What people call "arranged" these days were actually the NGCD version of the tracks. But when KOF'95 was released the NGCD quickly went downhill, the loading time in every round was almost unbearable. But what really killed the Neo Geo CD, and every other existing console by that time, was the Playstation aka PSX. Sony really took over the whole market specially because Nintendo did the mistake of releasing the N64 with cartridges. The PSX was so huge and it was the real start of the 3D era, ending up killing the arcade houses as well.

[@CarlosXPhone]

I almost bought this, too. I was used to CD tech, but I was like many, who was occupied with N64 and PSX. Sad, SNK couldn't catch a break after arcades died.

[@nimascolari1508]

I had one of every console and still do. This was underrated. Remember the Ps1 having a space invader type game to help you keep busy while it loaded?

[@thebizzle413]

Should have added CD sounds during the loading screens. Such nostalgia.

[@bluedragon219123]

As someone who grew up with a PSOne loading is something I know well and can deal with but from people who grew up, or only played, with Cartridge Systems the instant loading was something they were used to and having to wait, even a few seconds, was a downgrade. Still Great Job! :)

[@cajunotaku3256]

I just paid $650 for a CDZ, and it was money well spent. It loads so much faster than my regular Neo Geo CD. It’s such an underrated console.

[@brendanroberts1310]

You could get a AES for less than that or a consolised mvs but if you already had a decent game library I suppose it would make sense.

[@cajunotaku3256]

@@brendanroberts1310 I have a huge Neo Geo CD collection though. I can’t afford to buy AES carts. MVS carts are a little more reasonable though. I may get a consolized MVS someday.

[@Ish0tJR]

Great video. It wasn’t just long load times, once games like KOF 97 came along they had to actually cut frames of animation to get some of those later games to work. I think most if not all the Saturn ports were based on the Neo Geo CD versions and not the AES/MVS versions because the Saturn ports are missing the same frames.

[@SegaLordX]

Fortunately that didn't happen with very many games. Only the very late stuff.

[@ahok1937]

What's the best version of the game for you? I don't know a lot about it, but i always assumed the Neo Geo CD to be better because of the music

[@cax1175]

I picked up a Front Loading Neo Geo CD in Japan and really enjoy it. Yeah, it has some load times but most aren't too horrible. Plus the NGCD controller is amazing

[@anglo-saxonconnor817]

Not bad just not needed by the time it came out. For people who only want to play Neo Geo games and nothing else the neo Geo cd system and the games are much cheaper than Neo Geo System and the cartridges. But for people who want to play everything the 32 bit systems have already been released and can have good translation and ports of Neo Geo games already. Lastly 2d games doesn't have much time left anymore by the time mid 90s approaches. 3d technology progress is extremely fast during that time and 3d games are replacing 2d games everywhere to the point that not just 2d game systems are obsolete by that time, it even kill off the entire arcade industry worldwide by the time 2000 AD arrives.

[@discinfiltrator]

I definitely think is the best way to experience Neo Turf Masters, because of the extra modes and the Scotland course

[@gabrieltouw6034]

Upmost respect for keeping it up all these years wouldn't want to lose another good youtuber like we did with CGR and the undertow

[@brianduncan4868]

I owned a Neo-Geo CD top loader. I bought it off Ebay with a few games (don't remember all the games except for Samurai Showdown 2, & Fatal Fury 3) in 2004. Some games had animation cuts from the AES/MVS versions (Ninja Masters was the most egregious in my experience). I didn't really mind the loading times for most games because I was used to loading times with the Sega CD, Playstation, & Saturn. The only game that I owned where the loading times bothered me, was The Last Blade. I never got The Last Blade 2 on the Neo-Geo CD, because I already had it on the Dreamcast, but I remember doing the research, & hearing the load times for The Last Blade 2 were so long you could make yourself a sandwich during the load times. If the load times were worse than what I experienced with The Last Blade, I could believe that. Overall, I liked the Neo-Geo CD. Purists say the games on it are "Ports" because of the animation cuts, load times, & CD music rearrangements (I prefer the CD rearrangements). The animation cuts did make me feel like I wasn't get the complete arcade experience at home (which was the calling card of Neo-Geo). But I didn't regret my purchase at all. I loved receiving my Neo-Geo CD games when they arrived via mail when I was collecting games for the system. It was a valiant attempt by SNK, but they made a major mistake by not implementing a double speed CD drive.

[@rancid_]

Was there any reason to play the fighting games on neo CD over the cartridges though if you are emulating? Since the arcades were based on the cartridge systems, I assume not. Would love to see a comparison video between the two!

[@SegaLordX]

Some games had different soundtracks and some extra content you may enjoy in the CD versions. Outside of that, the cartridges are the way to go.

[@bigshorty4855]

Art galleries, training, survival mode, etc. For example, the survival mode with the balloons popping out after combos that's in last blade 2 and motw, was first on rb2. The aes/mvs versions don't have survival mode

[@elementox123x]

Excellent video. Art of Fighting 3 (even with a sensational special edition with Robert's coin), had big losses in the size of the sprites and a few frames less in the animations. These changes could be an indication of what other games would have, such as KoF 99 onwards if the console continued to receive AES games.

[@TheBigExclusive]

Nice work. Will you do a video on the Neo Geo CDZ to see the difference in load speed?

[@DavideNastri]

Neo geo cd was and is awesome. Today you can install a neo SD loader (by the genius Furrtek) and you can REALLY enjoy neo geo cd awesomeness keeping the original CD working but also having sd card with blazing fast loading speeds and whole library. Laser bear industries offers perfect fix for the original gamepad too, what a time to be alive!

[@kojiroh30]

The NeoGeo CD had some exclusive titles - Samurai Shodown RPG being the most famous(while it also had PS and SS versions, the NGC version is considered best with its contents). so just like any other game consoles, its exclusivity should be the reason why you buy the system. if you're just into Arcade games made for the MVS, there are so many other options with cheaper and better load time experiences.

[@Unholy_Louie]

Not a single word about the absolutely EPIC micro switch controllers is CRIMINAL dude :P Come on! But eh, still a great video :D I wouldn't have invested in one without those puppies. In fact, I bought some quite a few years before getting the actual console, and still use them with an adapter for emulation to this day! The OG AES sticks were cool for the time, but their weight and build quality mean that there are better options that will still keep the authentic feel. But the controllers were unique, and still are since there is only a single modern example that can compare to it. Also, the consoles are cool design-wise. I got the top loader because I didn't want issues like I still get with my Sega CD model 1. It looks better than the CD-Z imho (which isn't worth the price difference nowadays, especially if you plan to add an SD card reader). This new non invasive mod is great, since nothing is removed from the console. You can still play your CDs just fine on top of using an SD card for the games that load too much (it's not that common for similar mods to keep BOTH internals and shell intact like that).

[@SegaLordX]

I mentioned the microswitches.

[@humanhouse2426]

It’s pretty sad that all the arranged red book music hasn’t been ported to other systems - every time a neogeo game gets ported, they always have the MVS music

[@shiondubois7142]

I had one, the music was awesome, could never play cartridge after hearing that.

[@PixelsNcreatureS]

I had a really weird experience with the NGCD (CDZ) I was excited to own it, I love SNK Games, but games I really wanted didn't come out for it.. And the CD Audio I would like as an audio soundtrack but not in game. Lol, I know that's weird.. I sold it all and now have a NeoGeo Arcade Cabinet (because even AES didn't have every title)

[@michaelmercury1297]

As a kid in the ninety's I always wanted a Neo Geo. It was too expensive though.