The Neo Geo home game console first appeared in 1990 at an eye-opening price of $649.99. (And you thought the PS3 was expensive.) But in spite of the high price point and even higher price of the game cartridges (around $200 and up), the Neo Geo managed to survive until the last official gaming cartridge for the machine was produced in 2004.
But the Neo Geo, or at least the system’s games, will continue to live on as Nintendo has struck a deal with SNK, the manufacturers of the Neo Geo, to publish and re-release popular games on the Wii Virtual Console network this summer.
Ben Herman, President of SNK, said, "Nintendo basically came to us and wanted to include the Neo Geo on the Virtual Console which of course is very exciting for us…We’re planning for a limited number of games each month over the course of a year." He added, "We don’t want it to be sporadic with one game here, and two or three over the next few months. We really want to have a flow where there are a couple of games available each month, and we’ll keep adding to the library that way."
SNK must be keeping with the tradition of the system’s expensive costs, as he said, "We have 120 different Neo Geo titles… there’s plenty to select from… With NES at essentially $5 and Super NES at $8, we’ll be putting our games at just a little above the Super NES point."
[via CVG]
