Neo Geo Pocket Color: Arcading Gaming in Your Pocket?

When you think about mobile gaming in the 80s and 90s, you are more than likely going to be thinking about some version of the Nintendo Game Boy. Nintendo managed to dominate the handheld market, even with a number of competitors, many of whom had superior technical specifications. But no one was able to match the Game Boy’s market penetration, nor its extensive library of games that were backward-compatible with the entire Game Boy line (except for the last, the Game Boy Micro). Atari wasn’t able to dethrone them, nor was Sega. And any number of handhelds from smaller companies never even had a chance.

But, in October of 1998, arcade publisher SNK decided to throw its hat into the handheld ring. They were known in home arcade circles as the company that produced the most expensive home console of its time, which played the exact same games found in arcades because the hardware was nearly identical. They made further inroads into the home scene with the release of the Neo Geo CD system, which drastically reduced the entry cost over the original cartridge-based system.

Seeking to bring their arcade identity to the handheld market, SNK released the initial black-and-white Neo Geo Pocket in Japan. Focused on fighting, sports, and puzzle games, the initial release lineup consisted of titles such as King of Fighters R-1, Pocket Tennis, and Puzzle Link. Unfortunately, just a week before the Neo Geo Pocket’s release, Nintendo released its new Game Boy Color, which made the Pocket seem dated before it was even in gamers’ hands.

To their credit, SNK responded very quickly, and in March of 1999, just six short months after the original release, it debuted the Neo Geo Pocket Color. This system sported a reflective color TFT screen and full backward compatibility with the original black-and-white games.

The NGPC featured some truly amazing portable versions of SNK’s biggest arcade franchises, including Samurai Shodown, King of Fighters, Fatal Fury, Metal Slug, and Puzzle Bobble. They made the smart decision not to simply try to squeeze the arcade title into a portable screen, as many other publishers had done on both the Game Boy and Sega’s Game Gear. They fully embraced the unique advantages of their portable hardware and reengineered the titles into portable versions that, for the most part, exist only on this system.

SNK also managed to get a couple of third parties on board with the portable, with the release of Mega Man: Battle and Fighters, two versions of the card battler SNK vs. Capcom: Card Fighter’s Clash, and the “VS” series fighter SNK vs. Capcom: Match of the Millennium. They even scored an exclusive game starring Sega’s mascot, Sonic, with Sonic the Hedgehog: Pocket Adventures.

In June 1999, the Neo Geo Pocket Color was finally released to the North American market, finding retail space in stores like Toys “R” Us, Electronics Boutique, Software Etc., and Babbage’s. While it was never able to match the success of Nintendo’s devices in the West, it did offer a unique alternative that many gamers were willing to give a chance.

The specs of the NGPC were impressive. Its main CPU was a Toshiba TLCS-900/H 16-bit processor at 6.144 MHz, with a Z80 used for sound. The reflective TFT-format LCD had a 160×152 resolution, a 4,096-color palette, and 146 simultaneous colors. SNK also claimed roughly 40 hours of battery life from two AA batteries, which was excellent for a color handheld of the period, and between 10 and 20 hours more than the Game Boy Color on the same number of batteries.

Probably the most unique feature of the Pocket, and the one thing that most of us remember and long to appear on subsequent handhelds, was the control scheme. It featured a control stick, two action buttons, and an option button that was repurposed in many ways in different games, from simply pausing the game to selecting weapons. That sounds pretty standard, but the miniature control stick was truly unique. It utilized a series of four microswitches that provided a vers satisfying “click” when you moved the stick in any direction. The controller was particularly well-suited to the fighting games that appeared on the system, with special moves remarkably easy to pull off, especially compared to the inferior d-pad controls of other handheld consoles.

The system accumulated a total library of 82 games released in Japan, including the 9 titles initially released for the black-and-white system. Of the 73 Color titles, 31 were released in the North American market. Fortunately, the system was not region-locked, so gamers could play Japanese imports without technical issues. Games such as Cool Boarders Pocket and Fantastic Night Dreams: Cotton depended very little on knowledge of Japanese to navigate and were easy for non-Japanese speakers to pick up and play, while the extensive range of RPG and simulation titles released in Japan remained largely out of reach.

Interestingly, while many will assume that Nintendo and, more importantly, Pokémon, were responsible for the eventual failure of the New Geo Pocket Color, that was only part of it. Yes, unfortunately, SNK launched a monochrome system at exactly the wrong time, on the heels of the Game Boy Color’s release. Even with the relatively quick turnaround in releasing the color iteration of the hardware, they had already lost significant momentum in the marketplace to Nintendo. But even by 2000, the system was showing progress, with titles being shown as late as the 2000 E3 Showcase. SNK knew they wouldn’t be able to knock Nintendo out of the top spot, but they were satisfied with the market share they had captured by then.

Unfortunately, SNK’s corporate situation was deteriorating. Japanese pachinko manufacturer Aruze acquired SNK in January 2000, largely for its intellectual property, and they gave little support to SNK’s video game business. Aruze subsequently shut down SNK’s operations outside Japan, cutting off the Western NGPC business just as it was beginning to develop retail traction. In June of 2000, US and Canadian distribution of the system and games was officially shut down. Retailers quickly liquidated remaining stock. SNK Japan released titles until 2001, when the system was officially retired.

Like many failed handheld consoles of the 80s and 90s, the New Geo Pocket Color lives on in the used marketplace. Mod kits exist that let you add rechargeable batteries, USB-C power, and even a fully lit IPS color screen to your system, giving it a truly modern feel while still retaining what makes it a classic system: the games and the controls. If you’re not able to get hold of a used system and games, you are still able to experience many of the best of these games with the two NGPC game collections that were released for the Nintendo Switch and Windows.

I love this system. I managed to snag one shortly after it was released in North America, and I was really rooting for it, especially having seen my previous favorite handheld, the Atari Lynx, fail miserably. Unfortunately, success was not in the cards, but it still holds an honored place in my personal collection.