NeoGeo Pocket - Overlooked or Overhyped?

[Honey_Ogre]

I don't often hear people discussing the NeoGeo Pocket / Color handhelds anymore. I've had mine for several years and it still stands as one of my all-time favorites. Between well known titles like SNK Gals Fighters, SvC Card Fighter's Clash, and Fantastic Night Dreams Cotton as well as deeper cuts like Dark Arms, Biomotor Unitron, and Ganbare Neo Poke-kun -- The visual styling across most of the console's titles are unique and charming and I think the NGP deserves a little more attention.

 

[Waffles's iconWaffles]

I'd put it in the same category as the WonderSwan Color: beautiful console, but vastly overlooked.

 

[Honey_Ogre]

I'd put it in the same category as the WonderSwan Color: beautiful console, but vastly overlooked.

Oh totally! Dicing Knight is one of my favorite handheld games period

 

[DunkeyKong]

Definitely good but unfortunately not that well known outside of Japan like Wonderswan
It does have a quite good game like the Metal Slug (1st and 2nd mission) and Sonic The Hedgehog: Pocket Adventure

 

[Don Patch]

I... have a vague recollection of seeing it in stores about a bajillion years back.
Never had the actual doodad itself, but when I plopped CFW on my 3DS I played through a few NGPC games.
Sonic and SNK vs. Capcom.
A lot of fun for sure.

 

[Sayo]

The original non-color unit? Certainly overhyped, it had a stronger processor than the GB but it really didn't offer anything to make it stand out, as for the NGP Color, now thats a fairly overlooked little handheld that came out to a Nintendo dominated market with a seriously lacking catalog mostly comprised of admittedly fun fighting games and some other arcade conversions.

 

[Spike's iconSpike]

I have never seen one, or know anyone who did.
I think NeoGeo bit more than they could chew.
Distribution and promotion wasn't really there, third party developers didn't support it either.
Still the pixel art looks awesome and SNK really came through giving people a reason to get one, it just wasn't enough.

 

[dejiko]

best portable fighting games i ever played are on the neo geo pocket, i wish i owned one in real life!

 

[RetroLaw]

Bought one, only got one game, they were hard to find where I live.

Tried out more games thanks to emulation, I'd say it's a fine system but far behind other handhelds.

 

[JPC]

Bought one, only got one game, they were hard to find where I live.

Tried out more games thanks to emulation, I'd say it's a fine system but far behind other handhelds.

T'as essayé Faselei! ? Excellent jeux de stratégie avec un style unique de déplacement et un bon petit scénario.

 

[RageBurner]

I feel it's mostly an undervalued system. It has its share of great and awful games of course, but I feel the good ones are really good.

 

[RetroLaw]

T'as essayé Faselei! ? Excellent jeux de stratégie avec un style unique de déplacement et un bon petit scénario.

Sur emulateur, jamais vu en mag celui-là ?

 

[elehayyme]

This one is very overlooked and it isn't very common to see 'em out in the wild. The pixel art was lovely but there were some stinkers for titles on there. Granted, there were some nice ones too.

We had one here (I think we still do) but the poor battery cover is missing in action.

 

[Somnia]

Super overlooked! Systems like the NGPC, Wonderswan Color and Dreamcast always amaze me because despite only getting 2-3 years of prime time as a console they managed to build up absurdly quality libraries that would compete with or trounce many successful systems when the same timeframe is compared. The first time I met a buddy of mine he had come through with one when I was working at a local game store. It was slow so he let me play SNK vs Capcom and Sonic Pocket Adventure on it and I was immediately hooked. Had never heard of the system prior and snagged one off of Ebay. I've loved it dearly ever since!

Side note but if you want a dope NGPC inspired fighting game I recommend snagging Pocket Rumble on PC or Switch (dunno if it is on anything else). The devs would demo it at various fighting game events I'd go to back in the mid-2010s and it was always a blast! Still boot it up for an arcade run or to play some games with my other friend who loves it from time to time.

 

[kingflip]

I'd put it in the same category as the WonderSwan Color: beautiful console, but vastly overlooked.

This on so many levels it was overlooked and had stiff competion from Nintendo

 

[Bakuma1997]

Have its games in my DSi, most of them are vaporwave crabs but the few ones i got are goated

 

[hazys]

Neat little system. The library's a bit limited if you're not into handheld fighting games, but the ones it had were good.

 

[kanesha]

nobody's gonna mention the mini arcade stick? to those of you who are blessed with this marvel of engineering - how can you ever touch a filthy dpad again after experiencing the bliss of the second best 8 directional control?!

 

[RetroLaw]

how can you ever touch a filthy dpad again after experiencing the bliss of the second best 8 directional control?!

Hours of therapy and a bit of weed.

 

[Egg (McMuffin) Man]

I have one of these. Unfortunately the games are hard to find but I've been meaning to branch out and try more. So far I have only played Sonic, Rockman, and Metal Slug. Sonic and Rockman were both great, Metal Slug was ok. I have Gals Fighters, King of Fighters R2, and the SNK vs Capcom card game but I haven't had a chance to play any of those yet unfortunately.

 

[Stingy Perry Stingy Perry]

I believe they botched the promotion on this one because if they didn’t the Neo Geo Pocket would’ve rivaled the big N’s handhelds.

 

[Ezri_Muldoon]

It's a great system that has a surprising amount of its library available in English, Sega adjacent games such as Sonic & Evolution are great for Dreamcast nerds.
Dive Alert, Faselei!, Biomotor Unitron & Ogre Battle show its real strengths as a handheld RPG/Narrative gaming machine back when the majority of Gameboy titles were still deep in NES/Arcade "story is secondary to gameplay" design philosophy.
Heck not even classic Pokemon & its derivatives were known for their storytelling prowess.

And all of SNK's first party titles show that was a proto GBA in terms of Multiplayer action (albeit mostly fighting) and graphically impressive action platformers.

That said... The Wonderswan has a much more interesting library if you grew up with Foxkids or are a weeb.
And the Wonderswan has/had a larger homebrew community as a result.
They're both niche handheld that broke somewhat into the west in their own ways, kinda feel like a comparison is unavoidable yet whether you buy one or the other would come down to your preference when looking at their libraries.

I will die on the hill that the NGPC is the best looking handheld ever released lol

 

[bjork]

vaporwave crabs

what does this mean

Anyway, cool little system. I have one with maybe 10 games? Cardfighter's Clash is great and the port of Neo Turf Masters is really pretty great.

 

[Bakuma1997]

what does this mean

Anyway, cool little system. I have one with maybe 10 games? Cardfighter's Clash is great and the port of Neo Turf Masters is really pretty great.

*Shovelware
Sorry, mixed the terms

 

[bjork]

*Shovelware
Sorry, mixed the terms

Oh okay! I thought it was some new slang all the kids were using or something, heh