VISCO Collection Review (Switch eShop)

Unless you’re a Neo Geo diehard, Visco isn't as recognisable as Namco, Konami, Capcom, or the other big hitters they used to roll with in the early '90s arcade scene. And, although the company made strong impressions with the likes of Vasara, the majority of its work was for SNK’s Neo Geo hardware, as represented by the seven games in this collection.

Publisher PixelHeart, who acquired a license to at least part of Visco’s library, has been mining the company’s back catalogue with real vigour recently. It has published Ganryu 2 and Andro Dunos 2, both from independent developers, as well as releasing various ports, reproductions, and even a branded bartop arcade machine. This VISCO Collection, jointly published with QUByte Interactive, is either a culmination of sorts, or another brick in the wall; but, while there are a few unfortunate omissions in the library, it remains a solid and well-represented lineup.

First, let's cover each of the seven games in the collection with an overview before our impressions of the package as a whole.

Ninja platform action game Ganryu is a curious one. It’s pretty, colourful, and well-animated, but the controls are slightly stiff and take adjustment. A feudal period setting fused with early industrial affectations, you can slice and dice with your sword, slide attack and head stomp, and fire out a retractable claw that can cling to objects and swing you over gaps. What you can’t do is dash, which, when combined with the rather slow and abrupt movement of your player sprite, seems an odd oversight. Still, the stages are fairly nicely assembled and the bosses feature challenging attack patterns that feel rewarding to navigate. Ganryu is a nice production on the whole, although one that for whatever reason feels less suited to arcade than it does a home console.

One of Visco’s best-known titles, Andro Dunos is a smartly designed little shoot 'em up that, while not bringing the same kind of visual bombast as something like Blazing Star, stands tall with its weapon power-up system. Something of a play on the Thunder Force rotation, here you start with all available weapons as standard and grab pods to power them up. Expending chargeable super attacks and learning when to utilise your arsenal specifics is the meat of the game. Coupled with some interesting stage design, clean and colourful graphical stylings, and a peppy soundtrack, Andro Dunos is one of the package highlights. This version sensibly maps an optional autofire button, too, to avoid finger-tapping stress.

Moving on, imagine air hockey where the table is a futuristic urban environment and the pucks are human opponents, and that’s kind of how Flip Shot operates. Clearly inspired by Windjammers, you face off by deflecting a ball at the row of stars that form your opponent’s back wall, hoping to break it down and win the game by getting a shot through. Each character has pros and cons in speed and power, and wields a shield. With a perfectly timed button press you can deploy stronger rebounds and use the directional pad to add some curve. There are also special moves that can be triggered to try and slam home a victory, regulated by a power gauge.

Bang Bead appeared very late in the Neo Geo’s life cycle (2000) and was originally thought to only exist in prototype form, although a negligible number of European physical copies were eventually confirmed. A sequel to Flip Shot, it expands the character roster greatly, and adds a second, weaker laser wall to destroy behind your opponents initial defenses. It does away with the shield, which we sort of preferred, visually, and instead moves closer to Windjammers by just having you do precision deflections for powered-up returns. It’s a great expansion for players looking for more of the Flip Shot formula, and really good with two skilled opponents going head-to-head.

1999 shoot 'em up Captain Tomaday isn’t our favourite, but it does have some unique elements going for it. Its art style is kiddy in an early-learning kind of way, and although the backgrounds are excellent, the game doesn’t really scroll but rather has you stop at a series of static junctures, Galaga-style, and fend off waves of attackers. You play a flying tomato with machine gun fists, triggered independently across two buttons, saving the world from the Eggplant Aliens. With a range of 16 transformative power-up states with different properties, it’s got enough complex elements to make for a fun scoring challenge.

Switching from shooters to sports, there was a huge football arcade boom going on in the early '90s, many occupying pub corners for competitive income, and a whole host appearing on the Neo Geo hardware. Six of these are SNK’s own efforts, comprising the excellent Super Sidekicks triple, Ultimate 11, Road to Final Victory, and Soccer Brawl, a futuristic take on the sport.

Visco’s Goal! Goal! Goal! is comparatively simplistic, lacking the cutscenes and goal-scoring fanfare of its direct competition, yet remains a competent arcade kick-about for one or two players, with plenty of passing, lobbing, and shooting, and an opportunity for some nice one-twos and penalty shoot-out theatrics.

Finally, Neo Drift Out. The Drift Out series was a bonafide hit for Visco and this third entry for SNK’s hardware keeps the top-down isometric perspective, challenging you to race licensed rally cars around rough terrain with differing grip properties, looking for angle prompts, shortcuts, and teasing out pivot points based on your vehicle’s weight. It’s arcadey, not particularly in-depth, and brilliantly fun. It also offers two-player competitive action which can get pretty heated. It's a shame this is one of the only games unavailable for online play.

The Visco Collection’s menu presentation is a bit like Capcom's Arcade Stadium on a lesser budget. It has a similar glow, but operates in a simple 2D format with one static arcade machine cycling the different games on its screen. There are a few options in there for each game and a single CRT filter that does that thing of rolling scanlines, curved edges, and the odd simulated wobble. This may not be to everyone’s taste, but it’s actually rather well done. The sound is far too low on defaults but can be adjusted per game from the menu. Heads-up information for each title denotes their multiplayer options and online availability.

The latter is where this particular collection comes to the fore, offering online multiplayer in either co-op or versus for everything except Ganryu and Neo Drift Out. Unlike Capcom’s arcade collections, which dropped the ball in this regard, here you can globally match up to Flip Shot, Bang Bead, Andro Dunos, Captain Tomaday, and Goal! Goal! Goal! to your heart’s content, hugely increasing its appeal.

We should note that, since this game's release date was kept hush-hush, online servers weren't very busy or easy to test during the review period. We were told that rollback netcode isn't driving online play and there's no cross-play with this one, but we'll update this review with comments on online performance in due course.