Tag Archives: Ikari Warriors

Atari A to Z, Videos

Atari ST A to Z: Ikari Warriors

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SNK had some top-notch arcade hits throughout the ’80s and ’90s, and many of them came home in one form or another.

One great example wasΒ Ikari Warriors,Β which saw several different home ports over the years. The one we’re concerned with today is Elite’s Atari ST version, which remains surprisingly true to the arcade original despite lacking SNK’s iconic “loop lever” control scheme.

It’s a solid top-down run-and-gun that still holds its own well today, and back then it demonstrated that the ST was more than capable of providing a convincing “arcade at home” experience!

Find a full archive of all the Atari A to Z videos on the official site.

Essentials, One-Shots, SNK

SNK 40th Anniversary Collection: (Almost) Perfect Preservation

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As the years advance and old gaming hardware and media gets more expensive, harder to find and even more difficult to maintain, the matter of gaming preservation is of increasing importance.

I’ve previously talked about how emulation and ROM archives have an important role to play in all this — in spite of interference from certain quarters — but of arguably greater importance are companies’ own efforts to preserve their respective histories and portfolios.

I picked up theΒ SNK 40th Anniversary CollectionΒ for Nintendo Switch recently, and I’ll be covering the individual games in it over the next indefinite period of time in an “SNK Essentials” column (and perhaps some videos) — but today, I wanted to talk about this package as a whole, what it gets right, and what I wish it had done slightly better.

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Essentials, Neo Geo

Neo Geo Essentials: Shock Troopers

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“The eight soldiers get to attack the wicked terrorists!!”

So ran the promotional blurb on the arcade flyer for SNK’s Shock Troopers, a well-regarded installment in the Neo Geo library developed by Saurus and originally released in 1997 to both home- and arcade-based Neo Geo systems.

This is not by any means a unique setup for a video game, particularly an arcade title from the era, but what makes Shock Troopers truly special is its execution. And its presentation. And, well, everything.

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