Sunday, May 24, 2020

Neo-Geo Mini, Take Two

Yeah, I know Pac-Man just celebrated his fortieth anniversary, and I want to talk about it, really! But not right now. I haven't gathered my thoughts on the subject yet.

In the meantime, I'd like to talk a bit about the Neo-Geo Mini. Opinions on the pint-sized system range from "eh, it gets the job done" to "they were charging $120 for THIS?!," but thanks to the efforts of a handful of hackers, it's getting better. A guy named Shinrukus has been singularly dedicated to the device, crafting new firmware builds which expand the system's library of games. Not to be outdone, another hacker named hy-lo is working on the option to select a BIOS, restoring the blood in Metal Slug and eliminating the four credit limit in other games. (Back in the far-flung year of 1992, you'd buy a Neo-Geo game for two hundred dollars, and you get a dollar's worth of credits to play it. Gee, sale of the century there.)

The brass ring, of course, is eliminating the pixel smearing in the Neo-Geo Mini's HDMI output. Hy-lo claims that this is feasible, but may require "weeks to months" of reverse engineering. If you're not that patient, you could always buy the Neo-Geo Arcade Pro Stick for around a hundred dollars, which never had the problem in the first place. Personally speaking, I've got way too many joysticks already. I just got rid of a joystick... I don't need more freaking joysticks! I'll just wait for whatever solution these guys have to offer, whenever it's available.

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