SNK Neo Geo AES
| 4th Generation Competitors | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PC Engine | Megadrive | Super NES | Neo Geo CD | CDTV | Philips CDI | NEC SuperGrafx |
| Region | Release Date | Discontinued | Lifetime Sales |
|---|---|---|---|
| Japan | 1st Jul 1991 | 1997 | |
| North America | 1st Jul 1991 | 1997 | |
| Europe | NA | NA | NA |
SNK had a successful arcade platform in their MVS hardware, but they were feeling the pinch of a shrinking arcade and decided to increase profits by releasing a home version.
The AES was literally a boxed version of their arcade hardware with slight changes to the cartridge slot to stop people buying games from non home sources.
The benefit of this was some of the greatest visuals available in the home market and literally arcade perfect games, because they were taken directly from the arcade.
The downside was cost. The hardware was exceptionally expensive compared to other consoles and the games were even worse. This meant limited sales in the home.
SNK attempted to lower costs by releasing a CD based version of the AES, but even this was more expensive than the alternatives, plus the power advantage had largely been lost.
Specs |
|
|---|---|
| Processor | Motorola 68000 @ 12MHz, Zilog Z80 @ 4MHz |
| RAM | 64K + 64K Video Ram |
| ROM | 512K |
| Custom Chips | SNK LSPC2-A2 @ 24MHz |
| Video | 16 Bit 4,096 on screen from palette of 65,536 |
| Audio | Yamaha YM2610 4 FM Channels |
| Removable storage | PCMCIA SRAM Card |
