There's pretty many good games. My favourites:
Metal Slug 3, Samurai Showdown 2 & 4,
Last Blade 2, League Bowling and Crossed Swords.
Even though some games are quite crappy (like Nam 1975 and Cyber Lip), they have still a feeling that's no longer in many games (especially nowadays).
The Neo Geo harware went neck and neck with other hardware that was much much newer and was still bale to hold its own.
Not many fighters that match up to Garou
http://img58.imageshack.us/img58/3462/gar5et6.jpg
Garou
Last Blade 1 and 2
KOF 98
Twinkle Star Sprites
Puzzle Bobble
Samurai Shodown 2
Metal Slug 1 and 3
Voltage Fighter Gowcaizer, because they made into anime & movie.
Money Puzzle/Idol Exchanger
Maximum score on solo is 64, but I can only reach 57. :(
Have you ever been to HK or mainland China?I did 3 times before.People still play like crazy KOF 2002 in arcades,they absolutely love it.And they almost not touch Tekken(you know the reasons,any of you can kick faster than Kazuya Mishima) :)
I agree with them,its the best Neogeo game ever.
At the arcade in downtown L.A. you can still find some hardcore fighting fans. The best competition I can find for street fighter 2 and the king of fighters are there. There is no challenge anywhere else.
Anyway, Neo Geo actually had the best graphics of all the arcades at the time. I remember loving to play Magician Lord, Nam1975, Sengoku(I think), the Fatal Fury series along with the early KoF 94,95, Super Sidekicks, Aero Fighters 3, NinjaCombat. Too many to remember.
I can't believe no one mentioned Pulstar yet... R-type on steroids!
All the above mentioned games are great also!
I wanted a Neo*Geo system so bad when I was kid.. When I finally got a real job a few years ago, I took my first paycheck and bought a full 4-slot cabinet from a local vending machine company for $400 along with a milk crate full of games.
One of the best gaming purchases I have ever done - even today with full emulation there is something fun during parties to go head-to-head with people with a real cabinet...
Blazing Star, Garou, KOF98, SVC Chaos, Nightmanre in the Dark, Shock Troopers...
Well yeah emulation no matter how good will never compare to playing on real hardware. Especially if the hardware is the cabinet itself. I wanted to put Pulstar up there on my list, but it I already had a couple games and the topic really said favorites. It's one of them but the others i listed I have more fond memories of. Hell yeah though Pulstar is a good game. I like it better than Blazing Star (which is also good).