Metal Slug 2 Overclocked Neo Geo MVS Retro Arcade Nazca Shooter

In this video is a demo of an overclocked Neo Geo MVS System.

Metal Slug 2 is a great game but it's plagued by immense slowdown. This is due to the game logic being updated twice per cycle and the graphics events only once per cycle. Not the slow speed chips that were used when making the game cart as we once thought. This problem was fixed when SNK made Metal Slug X. If you overclock MSX then difference isn't even noticeable at 16mhz since the game was optimized.

In the first part of the video is the game at stock speed which is 12mhz. You will notice off the bat that the title screen itself exhibits slowdown problems.

In the second part of the video is the game at 16mhz, a big jump over 12mhz. You will notice off the bat that the title screen moves faster than it did at 12mhz. During the game you will also notice that it took me less actual time to get from A to B compared to the 12mhz speed. You will also notice that even at 16mhz there is still some slowdown, this is due to the chips hitting max speed allowed so there is a ceiling sometimes in overclocking certain games.

Overclocking Guide for AES (Can be used for MVS):
http://www.jamma-nation-x.com/jammax/tutorials.html?show=aesoc

Category:

Gaming

Tags:

• SNK
• MVS
• Neo
• geo
• metal
• slug
• demon
• front
• nazca
• AES
• CD
• Shooter
• Action

[getpagesize]

How did you perform this hack? Replace the 12 MHz crystal with a 16 MHz? Anything else?

[SupremeJudge]

I kept the stock and put a switch instead to flip between both speeds.

[dbozan99]

So does this mean that if you were to get a pirate copy of MS2 it would most likely have faster chips and probably run smoother?

[SupremeJudge]

I looked further into the issue and it turns out that SNK programed MS2 incorrectly. Apparently the graphics and game logic are at different refresh rates. Game logic is at 30 fps while graphics are at 60 fps meaning game logic was updating twice every cycle while the graphics were trying to catch up.

[karadanianoI]

mame emulates the neo geo slowdowns, but you can overclock the neo-geo emulated cpu and the games plays perfectly

[dbozan99]

Wow, that's a pretty big fail on their part, especially because MS is such a popular game...

O well....at least it's still playable...I just got MS for the Saturn and it's got quite a slowdown too but I'm perfectly fine with that. (even though the Saturn is such a 2d freak... If it were ported better, the Saturn would be easily be able to run it, and have CPU power to spare...)

[SupremeJudge]

One thing they could have done as well was change the game logic to 30fps instead of 60fps. But I haven't confirmed that yet. So if that was true then that would be the problem, the sprites are going at 60fps but the game logic is updating at 30 fps.

[alecjahn]

Definitely sounds like a quick switch I'll need to add. *starts ordering parts*

[mooney12345678910]

dude your the best

[SupremeJudge]

Yes. On the Neo usually you will see the spinning Neo Geo intro is messed up looking. On some older games like Fatal Fury 2 there are some graphical glitches.