When you’re brought up in a seaside town, you take certain things for granted. Things you perhaps shouldn’t. The smell of the sea, the feel of sand between your feet and the homely, omnipresent sound of seagulls going about their business. Another, slightly less obvious, one might be the quality of the arcades: seaside towns had considerably better amusements than anywhere else. It makes sense we suppose. People came to the sea to be amused, and there are few more amusing places for a kid in the late-Eighties/ early-Nineties than a late-Eighties/early- Nineties arcade. Don’t worry folks, we’re not going to start lamenting the demise of the seaside holiday industry – or anything else come to that – we’re here to celebrate. It is, after all, Metal Slug’s tenth anniversary.

How did it survive though? Because Metal Slug got it so, so, very right. Many of the games we found in our arcades were utter dross, and those that weren’t would be unlikely to stand the test of time, even if you do have a retro bent. Metal Slug was, to many at least, the best thing to have come from SNK’s almost unending production line of arcade titles at the time. It had the perfect mix of humour, twitch gameplay and old fashioned coinguzzling joy, making us remember those days with steamy-eyed nostalgia.

And it’s still got it where it counts. Freeing a scraggly, bearded POW for a thousand points, a flash of his boxer shorts and a big grin – from both player and sprite – manages to elicit a smile, the sight of an unoccupied slug ensures a scrabbly race to be the first in it, and each boss betters the one before. For what it does, Metal Slug Anthology is the best game on the market.

Bundled onto the disc are six versions, some shorter than others, but all as great as the next. If you like Metal Slug, and you have a buddy to share the experience as well as 48-hours of fast food and fizzy pop, you’ll find one of the best gaming weekends around. It’ll keep you going for a fair while, as many of the versions have multiple paths, and easily warrant a second, third and forth play-through. Even if you don’t fancy extended sessions, it’s still a handy title to have around as, like we said, it’s the best the genre has to offer. At this time in its life it’s nice to see that retro quality holds up well against all the low-rent licences and kiddie titles. We suggest you keep an eye out for this one.

Tom Leclerc