SNK Classic Inserts

[Capitalistix]

As someone who was mystified and knew very little details about the AES when the games were in current production, since I got into the system I’ve had a few questions regarding the artwork.
What year did SNK transition away from “classic” style inserts or start referring to that very conservative uniform style as such for their releases? Also when they started releasing games with full/varied cover art did they immediately start offering “classic” inserts? Or was in some later response to a reaction from fans who wanted a uniform look on their shelves?

Lastly was anything similar offered/done in the Japanese market or was that purely an SNK US thing alone?

 

[city41]

Classic inserts were only for US releases. I could be wrong but I believe only the neo store had them for sale.

They started around metal slug 4.

Ms4, kof2001, 2002, 2003 and ms5 got classic inserts. Ms4 and ms5 also got a classic cart labels.

I bought my 2002 off eBay and noticed the classic insert just peaking out on the edges. So when it arrived, sure enough it had both inserts.

I also picked up the ms4 classic insert and label for a song when the neo store was clearing out its extra inventory. Nowadays I imagine it would be pretty pricey.

 

[city41]

Oh yeah, Rage of the Dragons got one too.

You can see most of them by searching for them on Google limited to neostore.com

and found the neostore's page on them as a whole

Classic Edition

 

[Capitalistix]

Wow, that is so cool. So it was a request that was honored by SNKP themselves. They really were like no other dev/publisher back then. That's so neat to me. I also had no idea that it was just those 6 titles, always seemed like there would have been more. I feel like id seen Garou with one? Maybe that was a counterfeit/aftermarket job. Thank you for all that info City!

 

[city41]

I feel like id seen Garou with one?

There are counterfeit Garou classic inserts out there.

But Garou's real US insert is classic-ish. Classic enough for me anyway.

 

[max 330 megafartz]

I find it funny…. These classic inserts are secondary…… but they’re supposedly not funny…… almost like they were printed after the fact…. Like another Dion and his buddy…

 

[kernow]

God US carts look awful

 

[Geddon_jt]

These inserts were made by SNK at Shawn's request because the inserts they were making for games, with the awful big block text on the side, looked bad compared to the rest of the library (and of course, the red stripe on Slug 4 and 5 didn't match the blue of the others). The only catch was SNK required them to only be sold with new games, they could not be sold individually. When the classic inserts came out certain games had already sold out. So the only way to get some of them would be to buy a new game that was in stock and get a classic insert for something else. Making it pretty damn hard to get the entire set of 6.

 

[city41]

He ended up selling most of them individually. I'm guessing in the end they were less popular than expected. For example here's kof2002

NeoStore.com - The King of Fighters 2002 classic insert

A Neo-Geo website featuring The King of Fighters 2002 classic insert and other excellent NeoGeo English AES at the NeoStore!

www.neostore.com

 

[Viewpoint]

Honestly I think Japanese Mega Drive art boxes are amazing.

 

[kernow]

Cool opinion bro

 

[Viewpoint]

Cool opinion bro

I mean, Overall like you said, I'm not too fond of the american versions of the inserts since they're cropped a bit. It's the same with Japanese Megadrive games where the insert fills out the whole case. It just gives a better impression overall to me.

 

[Tarma]

Classic inserts for classic goobs.

 

[deez_nutz]

The only thing uglier than the classic inserts are the US dogtag games.

Bigger, badder, better…oof. So tacky, cheapens the whole aesthetic/brand.

It’d be like if Sega slapped a “Genesis does what Nintendon’t” label on every single fucking Genesis game box.

 

[city41]

Yeah I've always hated the dog tags myself. Thankfully Europe had better taste.

 

[Neo Alec]

The only thing uglier than the classic inserts are the US dogtag games.

Bigger, badder, better…oof. So tacky, cheapens the whole aesthetic/brand.

It’d be like if Sega slapped a “Genesis does what Nintendon’t” label on every single fucking Genesis game box.

I get the nostalgia feels for that stuff. It's just the way things were done back then. It probably worked too.

 

[max 330 megafartz]

I personally only collected snk-g mvs carts and dogtag aes when i ever had neo geo home console or candy cabs. Sorry yall are fagtarded.

 

[Evan]

To me they just don't look right for the newer games. The later games kinda have that more cheapo arcade feel.

 

[Alphabet]

Classic insert or the platinum version like PlayStation 2.