¶ Technical data
- Manufacturer: SNK
- Year of release: 1998
- CPU: Toshiba TLCS-900H (16-bit) @ 6.144 MHz
- Sound CPU: Zilog Z80 @ 3.072 MHz
- RAM: 12 KB
- Screen: 2.7" monochrome LCD, 160x152, 8 shades of grey
- Sound: 3 channels plus noise, mono speaker
- Power: 2 AA batteries
- Media: cartridge
- Controller: mandatory
¶ Presentation
The Neo-Geo Pocket is SNK's first handheld console, launched in Japan on 28 October 1998. It carries the Neo-Geo identity into a pocket format, with a clear focus on fighting games and arcade sports titles.
Its hardware signature is the microswitched mini-stick: instead of a conventional D-pad, a small clicky stick that offers remarkable precision for fighting game inputs. That control remains one of the most praised features of the machine, and was carried over unchanged to the colour version.
The monochrome model had an extremely short career. Facing the Game Boy Color, SNK reacted within months and released the Neo-Geo Pocket Color as early as March 1999, backward compatible, which immediately superseded the black and white model. The monochrome Neo-Geo Pocket was only sold in Japan and has just a handful of titles — including King of Fighters R-1 and Samurai Shodown! — nearly all of them re-released later in colour.
The Neo-Geo Pocket Color is a separate system on Recalbox: it has its own roms folder and its own documentation page. Colour games do not go here.
¶ Emulators
Emulator availability per board:
| Emulator | RPI3/RPI02W | RPI4/400 | RPI5/500 | OGA/OGS/RG351 | PC | RG353 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Libretro Mednafen_NGP | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Libretro RACE | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| Libretro FBNeo | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
The Neo-Geo Pocket is available on every board supported by Recalbox.
Mednafen_NGP is the default emulator: it is the most accurate, it supports softpatching (an .ips or .bps patch placed next to the rom is applied automatically) and CRT video modes. RACE is a lighter alternative, historically designed for low-power machines, without softpatching or CRT support. FBNeo only covers the titles included in its romsets and expects unrenamed .zip files.
Netplay is not available with any of these emulators. RetroAchievements are supported on this system.
¶ Roms
Put your games in:
/recalbox/share/roms/ngp/
Supported extensions per emulator:
| Emulator | Extensions |
|---|---|
| Mednafen_NGP | .ngp .npc .zip .7z |
| RACE | .ngp .npc .zip .7z |
| FBNeo | .zip .7z |
Roms in No-Intro format are strongly recommended. The
.ngpextension is for monochrome games and.npcfor colour ones: the latter belong to the Neo-Geo Pocket Color system, which has its own roms folder.