Metal Slug X

When Metal Slug 2 was released in 1998 it was met with high praise from critics, gamers, and arcade operators alike. Even with its high praise, critics and gamers were quick to point out the game's crippling slowdown that would frequently crop up. According to developer interviews in Metal Slug: The Ultimate History, the culprit of the slowdown is over-ambition on the part of the development team as they tried to cram in as much as they could in just about every scene despite the game running on more efficient code than the original Metal Slug. While SNK had a bonafide hit on their hands, they knew they could do better. After absorbing Nazca (the developer) into SNK proper, the team was tasked with two projects: create Metal Slug 3 and fix Metal Slug 2. 

Work began in earnest on both projects with part of the team working on the third game in the series, and the other half retooling the second game using the more efficient code and engine created for the third game. When Metal Slug X was released in early 1999 fans were elated that SNK took the time to create a better, smoother, and more fleshed out version of the good but technically disappointing second game. Much like how Fatal Fury Special made Fatal Fury 2 somewhat obsolete, Metal Slug X is such an improvement over the second game that even to this day X is seen as the highlight of the entire series - including everything that came after it. That's no small feat considering almost every game in the mainline series was quite well received by critics and gamers alike. 

So, what makes Metal Slug X so special? Let's dig in.

The gameplay flow follows the first two games in the series with a set up of 5 main stages with a final sixth mission. The player controls one of four characters that have their own personality, but play generally the same across the board. Like in the previous games, A shoots, B jumps, and C is your grenade. You can shoot vertically, horizontally, and down when jumping - but multiple weapons can shoot diagonally as you change position as well. 

Each stage, or mission, sees our heroes in a different country or city leading to a large variety in locals. All stages have some sort of gimmick or vehicle that either gives you a boon or a setback depending on the challenge the developers wanted to present to the player. For example, the second stage, set in Egypt, has you fighting against mummies and mummy dogs who can turn you into a mummy as well. When in this state your speed, rate of fire, and jumping ability are greatly decreased - but it still produces plenty of laughs as you shamble around and turn into a pile of ribbons when you crouch. You can also turn "WOAH BIG" in most levels by eating food items. When in this overweight state your gun spread becomes wider, your shots become larger, and your grenades do more damage. The trade off is you do move a bit slower, but the added fire power makes up for the lack of speed. You also pop like a balloon if you die in this state. Seriously, the humor never stops in these games.

Making their debut in this game (or, Metal Slug 2 actually) is the Mars People - the alien race that is one of the more threatening antagonists in the series. When you first run into them they are fighting along side General Morden's army, but eventually they turn their backs on Morden when they are done with him and begin killing everything in sight. In the final, climatic battle, it is you AND Morden's army against the alien horde. It really is a sunning conclusion to a brilliant game. 

The overall difficulty is hard, but not insurmountable. I'd say it's harder overall than the first game, but it's not a quarter muncher like the third game. Until you get to the final mission where there are a few cheap deaths, you never feel like the game is unfair on normal difficulty. That said, once you wrap your head around the stage layouts, I guarantee you won't have any trouble getting to at least the 4th stage on one credit after a few days of practice. 

It's well known that Metal Slug X fixes the myriad of technical issues that plagued the second game, but many gamers aren't aware of the staggering amount of content that was added or changed to beef up the experience. 

Artwork Updates:

Like many other "special" versions of SNK games, the pixel art used in the backgrounds generally stayed the same but details and colors were greatly changed that give the environments a different mood. Rather than just setting the stages in the day or nighttime, more striking times of day were used, like dusk - right as the sun sets - that adds more depth and lighting effects to the already brilliant pixel art. Additionally, the general character sprite work got a bit of an update to smooth out some animations and add more detail here and there. The artistic updates to Metal Slug X sharpen and enhance the experience, but I wouldn't say it makes the second game look drab by any stretch of the imagination. Actually, some fans prefer the look of the second game over X. That said, I have more experience playing X, so I'm a bit biased in the art department. 

Guns-n-Shit:

Even more weapons and vehicles were added to Metal Slug X that give the player more variety through the 6 main stages. The Iron Lizard (a ground crawling rocket missile on wheels), Drop Shot (a bouncing bomb), Enemy Chaser (homing missile), Super Grenades, Stones, and super versions of some weapons like the Laser, Flameshot, Rocket Launcher, and Heavy Machine Gun were also added to give the player more options when shooting baddies. The developers also added the Metal Slug - R, which is a golden colored version of the titular tank that is faster, can jump higher, and packs more fire power than the standard Slug. The MS-R is only available in Mission 3 toward the end of the stage where you have a choice between it and the Slug Flyer. Pro-Tip: Go for the MS-R.  

Audio Updates:

Not resting on their laurels, the sound team at SNK took this opportunity to flesh out the soundtrack with additional instruments and small updates to the composition of most tracks to help make the aural experience more full and rich. Along with the updates to the soundtrack, the announcer's voice overs were entirely redone with higher quality samples and even more voice clips.

Other Updates:

Item, weapon, and vehicle placements were changed in every level, and each level has a larger variety of items to collect. Most of the added items are food related which you need to collect to become "WOAH BIG!" Actually, because of this you have the chance to become Big in levels 3-6 leading to not only add more humor throughout your adventure, but also some much needed extra fire-power in the tougher spots in the back half of the game. The Mummy form is till only relegated to the second level, though. New environmental hazards were added, and more explosions and pyrotechnics were also sprinkled around the levels to add more bombast and flair. More enemies were added to each level as well, and a few of the bosses were changed or moved around to even out the difficulty. Another welcome addition is the awesome concept art that plays behind the credits screen after beating the game, replacing the plain black background in the second game.

Overall, Metal Slug X is the definitive version of Metal Slug 2 - and in this gamer's eyes, the definitive Metal Slug experience. It's fun, wacky, and difficult but not mind-numbingly so. While not a radically different game than the second game, the added features, reworked level designs, and much better performance overall gives gamers a more pleasing experience. 

Like all Metal Slug games on the Neo-Geo AES, Metal Slug X is prohibitively expensive for 99.99% of gamers. A complete in box copy of either the Japanese or US edition runs a staggering $6000 on the very low end to as high as $8000 at the time of this writing in in 2023. Metal Slug X is one of the few Neo games that cannot be easily converted due to an Altera Max chip that is tied to the game board for security reasons. Also, because of this chip, the game is not compatible with some MVS adapters (some do work, though) on AES. You can land on a "good deal" if you're patient, but even a "good deal" on an AES copy of any Metal Slug game is the difference of a few hundred dollars and will still cost you thousands each. 

Thankfully, there are a myriad of other ways to play it. As with most other Neo releases, the MVS version is quite affordable comparatively - sitting around the $150 mark. The modern Arcade Archives release is a safe bet with solid emulation for $8, while the game is also included on all of SNK's mini console variants. You can also play it on one of the many Metal Slug compilations that have come out over the years. 

The only port I would recommend staying far, far away from is the Playstation 1 port. On top of all the cut animation, loading, and slowdown that plagues that version, the crouching melee (knife) attack animation was completely removed which forces your character to stand and swing your knife when you're close to an enemy. Because you are forced to stand in this scenario means that a stray enemy bullet can get you, whereas in all other version you stay crouching (as you should). You could also grab a reproduction from NCI or the NeoOldStore for a few hundred dollars if you really want a physical copy of this game but aren't made of money. Additionally, you can also get combo repro carts that have the entire Metal Slug series included. I have heard that the multi-game carts have glitches and may not work with all revisions of the AES hardware due to power issues. That said, I've never tried either reproduction solution, so I can't speak to that myself. 

As an aside: Metal Slug 2, along with a few other Metal Slug games, has a hacked version that was released by fan modders called Metal Slug 2 Plus. This edition tweaks some of the code to make the game a bit smoother overall to play, but it does not remove all the slowdown that plagued the original release. Some modern fans prefer this hacked version of Metal Slug 2 over Metal Slug X, but I am not one of them. Metal Slug X received numerous other updates and extras that, in this gamer's eyes, still make X the definitive version of Metal Slug 2. I'll also most likely never release a full review of Metal Slug 2 due to owning a copy of Metal Slug X and not wanting to shell out the ludicrous amount of money in the current, inflated retro-game market for what I feel is a redundant game.