SNK are a video game software/hardware company based in Japan and the company has some history to it. SNK were also the creator of the Neo Geo console family.

A fair amount of time has since passed and those classic SNK games have being released onto the Nintendo Switch with a 40th Anniversary Edition. This title launches with 14 classic games from the 80’s and 90’s, but there are more to come in early December 2018 as a free update. Two of the coming soon titles won’t be apart of this update instead you’ll manually download them from the Nintendo store for free.

SNK isn’t a company I know a great deal about, I simply know they were the dudes who made Neo Geo, but when it comes to titles of their games I know only one or two.

Games at launch

1.Tank Iron
2. Alpha Mission
3. Vanguard
4. TNK III
5. Street Smart
6. P.O.W.
7. Crystalis
8. Psycho Soldier
9. Prehistoric Isle
10. Athena
11. Ikari Warriors 1,2,3
12. Guerrilla War

Games coming soon

1. Munch Mobile
2. Fantasy
3. Chopper
4. Time Soldiers
5. Sasuke vs Commander
6. Bermuda Triangle
7. Paddle Mania
8. Ozma Wars
9. Beast Busters
10. World Wars
11. SAR: Search and Rescue

There are so many different types of games that’ll have you running around shooting guns, cruising around in tanks or even flying spaceships. Controls are a mixture of Y, B, A, X buttons, some even rely on the triggers and of course the left stick will move you around. I played each game for a decent amount of time and controls were good and very responsive on both docked and handheld modes. As for if these are easy games to play all depends on the game. I found none to be difficult but some have difficulty settings while others replace difficulty by giving the player lives instead.

Back in the days of these titles some released on consoles while some were only on arcade machines and this collection gives players the best of both worlds, giving you the choice or playing either version and to top that off, both American and Japanese versions are playable as well and every game will allow you to save your progress too.

Other neat extras are included too such as game soundtracks, guidebooks and other cool things about SNK from 1979-1990, all which can be found in the Museum section of the main menu. I want to also note that Nintendo doesn’t have achievements or trophies, however playing this 40th Anniversary Edition gives in game achievements for you to unlock.

These aren’t remastered games but whatever was done to have them run on the Switch was done and they look as they did in the time they originally released in the 80’s and 90’s. Now I can’t speak for the yet to be released games but I can only assume they receive the same treatment.

These are old games, the days before 55” flat screens so the aspect ratio isn’t like it is nowadays. I thought great, these games will be awesome to play in handheld mode, but that excitement was shot down. Playing in handheld mode gives some viewing modes that of landscape and two portrait modes and both portrait modes were just dreadful. Sure, maybe I’m just a moron or the intended way was to have the Switch laying down and detaching both joycons to play in portrait view, but to me that’s just an awkward way to play.

My preferred mode was docked on my big tv and all games were in gorgeous 1080p. The fact handheld mode gives you the player a tiny square that’s surrounded by a still image of which ever game your playing just disappointed me, but what did I expect. The experience is better when docked because everything is so much bigger.

Having 20+ games once all are released is a good number of classic games that’ll have you playing for hours. Older generation of gamers will know of SNK very well and this might just give them a reason to relive their childhoods.

Written by: MKAU Gaming