Gaming History You Should Know – NEO-GEO Land September 4, 2023

Okay, I know its not a Sunday, but the US is currently celebrating a three-day holiday weekend, so for a lot of people in my home country it might as well be a Sunday. Here at GameXcess.net, we miss the classic arcade. The lights, the sounds, and the cyberpunk aesthetic was a great way to kill time on a boring day. Arcades featured games that either could not be played at home or feature the best looking versions of the games that COULD be played at home. Today, we’re going to be talking about a chain of arcades you may not be familiar with.

Did you know that SEGA was not the only company to open a chain of successful arcades in their home nation of Japan? Many of you fans of the King of Fighters franchise will remember an in-game location called NEO-GEO Land. It was a sprawling arcade, the perfect background for a one-on-one street match. You may have played the original assumed it was just a cool-looking callback to the game’s developers, SNK, and their arcade machine the NEO-GEO. Today, I’m here to tell you that it wasn’t just a callback, it was real.

Welcome back to Gaming History You Should Know, where we highlight some of the best independently produced content on the history of gaming. Today, we’ll be talking about NEO-GEO Land, an arcade franchise most gamers may have assumed only existed in a video game, but was indeed very very real.

We’re going to take a look at the YouTube Channel NeoGeoNow, which has made INCREDIBLE videos about the history of SNK. In this video, he takes a LITERAL trip down memory lane where he highlights the past locations of SNK’s headquarters, and the special businesses that opened across the street. King of Fighters fans will be VERY familiar with this area. Let’s take a look!

Over the years there have been many attempts to resurrect NEO-GEO Land in Japan. Some of it may have been due to Japan’s nostalgia for SNK, or it may have just been an attempt for the current owners of SNK to meet the country’s heavy demand for SNK merchandise. Let’s take a look at a video done by Mad Panic Gaming, where he visits one of these pop up shops.

Seriously, can one of these open up in the US? Please? Heck, you don’t even have to open up a physical shop, just open a website with shipping to the US, it’ll make a killing among the SNK fans here.

Gaming History You Should Know – Neo-Geo Pocket July 30, 2023

It’s Sunday! Time for another Gaming History You Should Know, where we highlight some of the best independently created content about the history of video games. You may have noticed we’ve become a bit obsessed with the company SNK recently, but even as newly-minted King of Fighters converts we were shocked to discover there was a story about the company even we did not know about until earlier this week.

If you were a kid in the 90s and were going on a road trip with your family you likely brought a Nintendo Game Boy or SEGA Game Gear with you. Within a pretty quick amount of time, Nintendo solidified the Game Boy as the definitive portable console throughout the 90s. However, despite what Nintendo would have you believe, other companies were offering portable handheld consoles. One of those companies was SNK.

What can we say about SNK’s Neo-Geo? Sporting graphical capabilities beyond what was possible with existing consoles (and a hefty price to go along with it) the Neo-Geo is fondly remembered by arcade gamers of the early-to-mid 90s. However, I had no idea at the height of the arcade platform’s popularity, SNK released a Neo-Geo handheld, the Neo-Geo Pocket!

The Neo-Geo Pocket flew so far under the radar, we didn’t even mention it in our history series on the Video Game Handheld War. In truth, it was because at the time we had no idea it ever released in the US!

YouTube Channel Lady Decade, who is a fantastic reference for Neo-Geo history, released a great documentary on the Neo-Geo Pocket and its color successor. You may even recognize some of the games that came for the platform including ports of King of Fighters, Samurai Showdown and even Sonic The Hedgehog! Give it a watch!

Gaming History You Should Know – Milo April 23, 2023

It’s Sunday. Welcome back to an all-new Gaming History You Should Know, where we highlight some of the best independently produced content on the history of gaming from across the web. Today, we’re going to be talking about a subject from our recent past.

One of the first major gaming news event this website reported on was the announcement of Project Natal, which eventually became known as the Xbox Kinect, at E3 2010. A decade later, we understand the Kinect as being a motion control camera capable of offering simple gesture based controls in conjunction with offering an extra way to have Skype conversations. However, when it was first announced, Microsoft was invested in pushing Project Natal as this magical device that could do so many things (including things it absolutely could not do).

To push that narrative, Game God Peter Molyneux took the stage of the Microsoft E3 2010 and demoed Milo. Milo, as we later discovered, was a technical demo video which featured an actress interacting with a virtual boy. They were able to hold a conversation, he was able to read out drawings she presented him, and she was even able to manipulate the game environment with her body. The public went crazy for it and it made major news, even by mainstream organizations.

With the eyes of the world on the game after that E3 reveal, people were excited to see more. However, we really didn’t hear too much about Milo in the gaming space. It didn’t preview at E3 2011, and by the time a final Kinect peripheral was ready for previews, it was clear it was not as capable a device as Microsoft originally promised. The last time I remember anyone talking about it was hearing a reference to it at E3 2011 from the team who worked on the Kinect Fable title had also worked on Milo. Sadly, I couldn’t get them to tell me how he was doing when I asked.

So what happened to Milo? YouTube channel slow start produced this television quality document detailing the known history of the project, and looks into the question of WAS THIS REALLY MEANT TO BE A GAME? Watch and find out!

Gaming History You Should Know – Do Amiibo Work at Super Nintendo World January 29, 2023

Super Nintendo World is about to open at Universal Studios Hollywood and people are already coming back with videos about their experiences. It looks absolutely incredible.

As we saw with Universal Studios Japan, the new Hollywood Super Nintendo World will feature interactive components for guests to manipulate based upon an exclusive piece of merchandise called a Power Up Band. This Band, when linked with the Universal Studios Hollywood App, will allow you to keep track of your in-park activities. The Band even includes Amiibo functionality that can even work with the Nintendo Switch (depending on what character band you purchase).

So if the Power Up Band is an Amiibo, does that mean that Amiibos could work in Super Nintendo World? A freaking genius, who I’ve known better by his internet title of Spazz Master of the YouTube Channel Theme Snark, decided to conduct an experiment while visiting Super Nintendo World at Universal Studios Hollywood.

Gaming History You Should Know – History of Mortal Kombat Commercials November 6, 2022

Happy Sunday, welcome back to Gaming History You Should Know, where we highlight some of the best documentaries across the web that discusses game history. In 1991, Mortal Kombat released onto arcades across the country and completely swept gamers away with its combination of photo-realistic sprites and violent fatalities. Many sequels and spin offs would follow and thirty years later the franchise is still going strong.

Starting in the mid-90s, Midway produced home console ports of the original arcade games. These ports would honestly sell themselves based on the goodwill of the original arcade experiences, but Midway would still put an incredible amount of money into producing some unique television commercials for them. How wild were they? YouTube Channel ScorePN produced this great video looking back on them. Check it out!

Mortal Kombat games are out now on multiple platforms.

Gaming History You Should Know – The Year of Luigi October 23, 2022

Welcome back to a new Gaming History You Should Know, where we highlight some of the best independently produced game history content from across the web. 2013 was a turning point year for Nintendo. It marked the beginning of the first full year the 3DS and Wii U were on the market together. Pokemania was about to begin its second renaissance with the announcement of the Generation VI games, Pokémon X and Pokémon Y, and a certain character that was always in his brother’s shadow was about to step out in a big way.

2013 was officially Nintendo’s Year of Luigi. It started with the launch of the incredible Luigi’s Mansion Dark Moon for the 3DS, and continued with more games like Dr. Luigi U and New Super Luigi U. I would be there for all of it, and I remember it playing a huge role in cementing my love for Nintendo games. However, the YouTube Channel Jonii did a fantastic chronicle of the whole year and brought up some things that even I missed out on. If you’re a fan of Nintendo history you should give this a watch.

Gaming History You Should Know – Video Game Animatronics September 18, 2022

Hope you all are enjoying your Sunday. Welcome back to Gaming History You Should Know, where we highlight some of the best independently created history videos across the web on a variety of gaming sources. As a lover of theme parks, I know there can be nothing more immersive to see in a theme park ride than a great animatronic. If you’re unaware of the concept, an anamorphic is essentially a preprogrammed robot designed to resemble a real-life character. Due to the cost and difficulty required to create them, animatronics typically appear in theme park rides and attractions. The first known example was Walt Disney’s recreation of President Lincoln for the 1964 World’s Fair. Currently, the best animatronic I can think of in operation is the one of Rocket Raccoon in Guardians of the Galaxy Mission Breakout at Disney’s California Adventure. That said, the to-scale King Kong Universal Studios Florida made for the defunct Kongfrontation ride holds a special place in my heart.

The guys over at Fastpass Facts, which is a great reference for theme park animatronic history, did a great video on the known history of animatronics of characters made famous in video games. Let’s take a look!