From the Vault columnist. Grew up feeding quarters to the Ms. Pac-Man machine at his uncle's pizza place; still owns his childhood SNES and every Nintendo Power he ever begged his mother for. Writes the retrospectives and the hidden-gem hunts.
Choutetsu Brikin’ger: the horizontal shooter SNK built only for the disc — branching routes, a mech you can punch with, and graphics that argue the CD deserved exclusives of this calibre all along.
SNK’s Bakumatsu elegy: the weapon fighter as period drama, with Power and Speed styles, deflects, and the most painterly art of the 16-bit era — in a late, large conversion the CD carries with surprising grace.
Nazca’s other masterpiece: four courses, six golfers, three-click swing perfection and the most quotable commentary in sports games — complete on CD, with the Japan-only course mystery intact.
Data East’s frantic balloon-popping puzzler at its purest: grab, sort, detonate — a tiny, fast game the CD loads in a blink and a versus mode that ruins friendships beautifully.
Data East’s flying-disc masterpiece — the greatest head-to-head arcade sports game ever made — in a conversion so light on loading that the disc might as well be a cartridge.
Sammy’s diagonal masterpiece: Zaxxon grown up into a pre-rendered, techno-scored trial of positioning — an early, compact game that the CD hardware carries effortlessly.
Irem DNA rendered in pre-rendered glory: the most beautiful shooter on the system and one of the hardest — and on CD, blessedly, a conversion that keeps every pixel and adds a symphony.
The definitive early Fatal Fury: Fatal Fury 2’s engine perfected, the roster ballooned to fifteen plus Ryo Sakazaki as the dream-match guest — and a small enough footprint to shine on CD.
Widely held the finest weapon fighter ever made — and, because its sprites fit the RAM, one of the Neo Geo CD’s happiest conversions: complete, gorgeous, and crowned with an arranged score.
The year KOF became KOF: editable teams, the Orochi saga ignites, and Iori Yagami debuts — in a CD conversion whose per-round loading is the tax on an otherwise superb port.