Hamster Corporation Celebrates 400 Arcade Archives Titles On Switch

I really need to get back into buying these Arcade Archives games. Love me some arcade goodness - so many great memories in the arcade back in the day.

It's been a good source of retro games for Switch, kind of shocked me there's that many now. I wish Sega had been half that industrious with Sega Ages.

Hamster, I Need some other Neo Geo ones😬

I'm hoping they can land an IP like classic Pitfall! from Activision.

Hamster is doing such amazing work. Switch is a one stop Time Machine in part to their efforts.

@Solomon_Rambling For $3,200 plus tax, you can own them all.

I do think they are premium priced. However, I would feel better if I knew for sure that these digital purchases would continue forward to future consoles.

that escalated quickly

That’s way more than I thought. Has the related article at the bottom about which are the best ACA games been updated?

I’m so excited to see Rainbow Islands available! This was one of my absolute favourites in the Amiga 500 back in the day. Even just hearing the music in that video has been such a nostalgia trip.

Would be great to see Hamster doing Arcade Archives for Popeye and Qbert.

@DwaynesGames

At least they...(too rarely granted)...go on sale for half price. And their Neo Geo games too.

A sale would be a good way to celebrate.

BTW, I'd love for them to touch on Atomiswave games, if possible.

@MirrorFate2 @MontyCircus My impression is that Hamster does not directly control the temporary discounts. Many of the games have never been discounted. And it is usually a single dev/publisher offering a sale on games that they have the rights to, like Taito.

@BlueKnight07 yeah, they really need to make Afterburner and the Golden Axe duology available

Keep up the great work!

I'm up to about 130 so far.
Ouch. That's a decent holiday.

I have no idea how many of these I own, but I sure wish one of them was one of the Parodius games!

They should make a collection of them and put them on a single cartridge.

I love Hamster's preservation efforts. They're the closest thing we have to a Virtual Console on Switch.

I find it funny that, for the longest time, before the NES NSO app was released, Hamster's "Vs. Super Mario Bros" was the only 2D Mario on the whole Switch. It was a bestseller on the Switch eShop, and the fact it was doing so well made me hopeful that it would convince Nintendo to release VC games on the eShop again.... but yeah, of course we got NSO instead.

@sanderev And it would cost the same as ten Switches to buy.

Hmmmm

It is a shame Arcade archives is the closest thing to virtual console on switch. I hope Switch successor has virtual console, because when I have the choice between renting or not buying I choose option three.

I’ve got more than a few of these. Bring on Operation Wolf and Mysterious Stones: Dr Kick in Adventure!

@Zanzox It seems most of the SNK published Neo Geo games are released. The ones missing including the Technos games, Hudson/Konami games, and Visco games which got published by Qubyte.

@PKDuckman I Hope to see svc Chaos for example, SNK published the svc for neogeo pocket but not the real deal😔

I’d love to see them make the jump into the 1990’s. Ridge Racer, Cyber Sled, Soul Edge, Time Killers (awful game, but I have nostalgia for it)….

Praying for Chase HQ series xxx

I have about 15 games. I have Metal Slug, Double Dragon, a couple shooters and some Nintendo games I bought in the first and so far only sale.

What the heck is wrong with that Rainbow Islands tune? I remember it as "Somewhere over the rainbow".

The Arcade Archives I own are the Nintendo ones, VS. Castlevania, City Connection, Qix, King & Balloon and both Tetris: The Grand Master games as well as Real Bout Fatal Fury 1 and 2 and The King of Fighters 97, 2000, 2001, 2002 and 2003. Many of the NEOGEO ones were bought on sales.

I really don't have a future plan, but I'll try to at least get most of Namco's games (specifically those not available in Namco Museum Arcade Pac and Pac-Man Museum+) and complete the Fatal Fury and King of Fighters collections.

Hopefully one day we also get SNK vs Capcom Chaos. We got the NEOGEO Pocket Color game, but not the Arcade one? Why?
I know it's not as good as the Capcom vs. SNK ones, but still.

@Aneira
That's why it's changed.

@120frames-please
Given they've just ported Mystic Warriors, I can't see Parodius remaining MIA much longer.

Rainbow Islands is brilliant game but the music is changed (no doubt for licensing) which is such a shame. The original tune for the game is special. A tune from my childhood.

@Moistnado
i remember a couple of years or so ago hamster filed a trademark for "console archives" though iirc nothing came of it.

would have been awesome to see since as mentioned in other comments sections ive always loved seeing classic games made available to buy on modern systems and loved the virtual console (and psn,s PSone classics line)

also as mentioned in other topic i found the way legacy content was handled on switch incredibly frustrating due to no option to actually buy/keep the games, it also felt doubly unfortunate that the whole Ubisoft "gamers should feel comfortable with not owning their games" thing happened right around the time that there was a bunch of hype regarding golden sun hitting NSO.

while digital has its flaws it definitely has more safety nets than service based stuff since for example people can still play (and download) the virtual console games they bought long after the service ended (iirc you can still do it on wii)

I did pick up a few of these arcade archives games and really enjoyed how many options they had.

Thanks But I'll Keep Only Six ACA.

@Aneira
Yeah I remember it as a somewhere over the rainbow but tweaked enough to sound a bit off lol.

Afterr @ Carrib mentioned it I had to watch the vid but it sounded like nothing I remembered.

Still doesnt beat my fav Taito tune from Bubble Bobble

Congratulations Hamster! 🎉 🎈 🎊
I love what they’re doing and tune in from time to time for their Arcade Archiver stream on YouTube where they feature their release each week. It’s all in Japanese, but well worth watching if you’re a student of the language and love old arcade games. 😊

Really, I should do a better job supporting Hamster, as I’ve only bought 9 titles so far.
In order of playtime:
1. Assault (Namco)
2. Donkey Kong (Nintendo)
3. Frogger (Konami)
4. Dark Adventure (Konami)
5. Donkey Kong Jr. (Nintendo)
6. Darius (Taito)
7. Crime Fighters (Konami)
8. The Legend of Valkyrie (Namco)
9. Double Dragon (Technos Japan)

The list would be much longer if Hamster was a little more generous with sales - I have 29 titles waiting in my wish list!

I often wish Hamster could add Western-developed games (Midway, etc) to their repertoire, but it’s just a pipe dream. Really, their accomplishments are amazing enough already, considering all the corporate red tape and greed out there.

I did buy my favorites. DK 1-3. Moon Patrol. Qix. I think I got Crazy Climber 1 & 2 on sale.

It is surprising that this is the first time you could buy the actual Donkey Kong ROMs. And I really like that Hamster includes multiple ROMs when there are regional differences. I prefer playing the Japanese Donkey Kong where you get all four levels in order from the beginning.

@FishyS The Namco and Capcom bundles are much better deals. I haven’t checked the math recently, but I think they are about $2 a title.

I have the Namco collection and some of the Capcom games digitally, So I may just be renting them if they don’t carry forward to the next console.

I think I got the Namco collection at half price, but it is available physically too.

Please complete the NeoGeo lineup this time, I want all 148 NeoGeo MVS games on Switch so I had the complete NG library there. SNK also need to release Samurai Shodown RPG for Switch, that game already got a English fan translation, if they are planning to make a new Samurai Shodown RPG for modern consoles then they need to give us the old one first.

Congrats Hamster! Here’s to many more!🎉

After checking I'm surprised I've only got 4 on Switch:
Mario Bros
Sunset riders
Bubble Bobble
Rainbow Islands
but loads more on my wishlist

that’s crazy! I own 77 of these titles! a big thank you to Hamster for bringing all these classic arcade games back and for letting me relive the good old 80’s and 90’s of my childhood!

still waiting on two more games in particular…

Kung Fu Master
Rastan

(fingers crossed 🤞)

Would be nice if they added a credit system for all these games. E.g. pay a £1 and each game is 10p to play (maybe a bit more for slightly newer ones).

@Mgalens NSO+ Expansion pack generally means that you are better off getting a Miyoo, Anbernic, retroid pocket or hacked 3DS to play old Nintendo games. The technical difficulty of using a legal backup of what you already own, is preferable to renting something you already own. I would rather buy a game twice than fiddle with extracting ROMs from cartridges, and that's why virtual console was the best way to combat piracy. That's why steam are doing so well against piracy, people would rather pay, a reasonable price, for something they own and will most likely run on their future devices, than mess with things on the internet that probably contain viruses. Resetting virtual console on Wii U and 3DS was pretty much theft, which is probably why they didn't reset it on Switch, but made people rent. I'm sure it was a choice of allowing accounts to roll over, so people could play what they bought before, reset virtual console for a third time and probably face legal action from fair trading regulators, or stop selling the games altogether. So Nintendo chose the most anti-consumer option that wouldn't see them end up in court.

That's good... But! There's still some (NEO•GEO) games are missing, so, we need them all! Double Dragon fighting game, for example.
@Serpenterror Wow! That's cool.

These games are fine in general, albeit quite expensive. I love Metal Slug Anthology for Wii, which retailed for 30 dollars. If you download all 7 games for Switch you will spend 8 a piece, for a whopping 56 dollars total, which is much higher than the inflation in the time period.

Didn’t they say they had 800 titles lined up way back? If this is true I can’t imagine what else could be coming as we’re only halfway there! But if they could pick up old Sega titles that would be cool. I’d ask for Atari Games/Midway Games but that’s a pipe dream as all those classics are owed by Warner Brothers who doesn’t do a damn thing with them! I probably have close to 200 Hamster games. Anyway GREAT JOB HAMSTER! I am forever grateful!! How about some Xbox love??

I have 9 of these games on my Switch

I do love the series as an arcade head. But for this price they could include some more content: cabinets' pics, posters, leaflets, etc. Also, their frontend layout is very basic. Would like to see something more easy on the eye.

and maybe 100 good ones.

@Bydlak 10000000000000% agree, very lazy

@NintendoBMA I'm hoping for exactly the same, along with Ms. Pac-Man.

400... great work, Hamster. I've gotten some childhood favorites myself:

Mario Bros.
Donkey Kong 1-3
VS. Super Mario Bros.
Moon Patrol
Pole Position I and II
Track & Field (looking forward to II)
Frogger
Elevator Action
VS. Wrecking Crew
Sky Skipper
Burger Time
Kangaroo
Double Dragon I and II
Bosconian

These are on my wishlist:

Rainbow Islands
Mystic Warriors
Aero Fighters
Growl
Strato Fighter
Splatter House
Megablast
Metal Black
Hopping Mappy
Orius
USAAF Mustang
Space Cruiser
Vendetta
Crime Fighters
Cybattler
Rush'n Attack
Zero Team
64th. Street
Lightning Fighters
P-47
In the Hunt

I'd love to still see Double Dragon 3, Q*Bert, Ms. Pac-Man, and Rampage just to name a few, but I know there's a lot of red tape for most of those.