Metal Slug

Metal Slug is a series of run and gun games created by Nazca Corporation before merging with SNK in 1996 after the first installment. The franchise focuses on the Peregrine Falcon Squad, a small group of soldiers who fight against a rebel army, aliens, zombies, mummies and other forces intent on world domination.

List of video games

 * Metal Slug (1996)
 * Metal Slug 2 (1998)
 * Metal Slug X (1999)
 * Metal Slug 3 (2000)
 * Metal Slug 4 (2002)
 * Metal Slug 5 (2003)
 * Metal Slug 6 (2006)
 * Metal Slug 7 (2008)
 * Metal Slug XX (2009)

Plot
The games focus on the Regular Army force which are composed by Marco Rossi, Tarma Roving, Eri Kasamoto, and Fio Germi, to defeat severe threats towards the world, being the major threat, Donald Morden, leader of the Rebel Army, the main enemy of the Regular Army, and the main antagonist of the franchise.

Overall

 * 1) The pixelated graphics, especially the first games, aged extremely well, because of how well detailed they were. Not only the background stages, but the characters, weapons, vehicles, enemies, bosses, and most of all, the explosion and blood effects has A LOT of detail in them, also remembering that the first game was released on 1996, which is something that not even other SNK games like the The King of Fighters franchise, which the first one was released two years earlier before the first Metal Slug, had too much detail.
 * 2) They give you a very fun and challenging experience, having the Contra-Style gameplay, which the player must kill the enemies and bosses without taking damage, because if you getting hit by a enemy or a boss, you automatically die. This element, is the primary reason why the series is considered a masterpiece, and like Contra, was responsible for popularizing the Run 'n Gun genre.
 * 3) The POWs, (or Prisoners of War) can be very useful to the player. You will find them tied, yelling for help, if you manage to save them, they will thank you and offering an item that can be very useful, like a special weapon. Also, try to save many POWs you can find, since they will give the player a score bonus at the end of a mission.
 * 4) *Also, be careful to not die, because if you get killed by the enemies you will lose the points given by the POWs, and there is no way to get them back, making the gameplay more challenging.
 * 5) The game gives you lot of different special weapons during the gameplay by saving the POWs, or defeating the enemies, and every weapon has a different mechanic, giving the player some strategy to beat the enemies and bosses. Most of these weapons are very powerful and can destroy the enemies and the bosses with only a single shots. Here some notable examples:
 * 6) * Heavy Machine Gun: The most iconic special weapon in the franchise, and like a real-life machine gun, it shots multiple bullets in a short period of time.
 * 7) * Shotgun: Perfect to defeat the vehicle enemies and the Rebel Soldiers that appear in groups, since it kills them in one single shot (or in the case of the vehicle enemies, about three to five shots).
 * 8) * Flame Shot: As the name implies is a weapon that shots flames, that like the Shotgun can burn the enemies in one single shot.
 * 9) * Rocket Launcher: It is a weapon that fires multiple rockets, and while it is less powerful and effective compared to the previous ones, it still gives you a good advantage against infantry and lightly armored vehicles at close range.
 * 10) * The throwable weapons like the grenades and fire bombs also give a great damage to beat a large group of enemies and the bosses, and a good advantage if you don't have a special weapon.
 * 11) The Rebel Soldiers, the main enemies of the franchise, are cool to beat them, not only because of the large type of soldiers you encounter, but their voice effects are memorable and iconic in the franchise, like their death and yelling sounds. They also can give you some good laughs by their idle animations, like in Mission 3 in the first Metal Slug that if you destroy a wooden toilet house that appears during the gameplay, a shocked rebel soldier, that was using the toilet, will hide inside the toilet.
 * 12) * Another iconic group of enemies are the Martian People that appeared in most of the games in the franchise, which like the Rebel Soldiers, they are very cool to defeat them, and much more stronger than the Rebel Soldiers, and also having their own vehicle enemies, which are their UFOs. They also have a strangely cute design. They became so iconic, that one of the Martians appears as a playable character in the fighting game SVC Chaos: SNK vs. Capcom.
 * 13) Donald Morden is a good antagonist with a sympathetic backstory, as he was a good person but after his daughter and wife were killed, he went insane, turning him to a vengeful and angered person, and he always gives the player a threatning appearance in the games.
 * 14) Lots of enemy variety and epic bosses, they are also very creative with their weaponry and design. Ranging from gigantic tanks, mechas to Martian motherships! The battles with the bosses are also mostly challenging and fun as well.
 * 15) The Slugs, which are the super vehicles the player encounter in the games, are very cool to use, each one has a unique mechanic and design, and can be extremely useful to beat the bosses faster. The Slugs are more tough when attacked by enemies, since they have much more health than the protagonist themselves, if the Slug is attacked three times, it will be destroyed, and if the player won't escape from the vehicle before exploding, they also die. Also, some slugs are very funny and over the top to use, like a camel Slug, an ostrich Slug, and and an elephant Slug.
 * 16) The soundtrack is great and every level BGM has a suitable theme, like the Mission 1 from Metal Slug 2 which the player takes place in Arabia, or the entire Metal Slug 5 soundtrack which uses a heavy metal theme to combine with the theme of the franchise. It would make you want to try to get it to your head or play the levels longer to listen to the music, or even go to YouTube and download the music on your computer, phone or tablet.
 * 17) The protagonists are very likeable and badass, like the main four characters, Marco Rossi, Tarma Roving, Eri Kasamoto and Fio Germi, since each one as a different personality, and abilities (pos-Metal Slug 6) in the franchise. They have became so iconic, that some of them appeared as cameos in other SNK games, like Marco in Neo-Geo Battle Coliseum as a playable character, and Fio in King of Fighters 2000 as Vanessa's Striker.
 * 18) Items like food, coins, jewelry, animals give the player some points, and like the POWs, they will contribute to the player in the final score after beating the games. For example, foods like watermelons, turkey, fishes, can give the player 100 to 1000 points.
 * 19) * Other type of items that appear very frequently and can be extremely useful towards the player are the ammo crates, that gives ammo for the equipped weapon the protagonist is using, and grenade crates, that gives more grenades for the protagonist.
 * 20) The controls are very basic and easy to memorize, but not only for the player, the Slugs controls are also not very difficult to memorize. The games (pre-Metal Slug 6) also give you a little tutorial before the first mission, about the controls, and how to use it, which was a very common mechanic in the SNK games and franchises like The King of Fighters, Fatal Fury, and Art of Fighting.
 * 21) A lot of different death animations, depending on how and who the player was killed. For example, if a rebel soldier kill the player with a knife, the player stumbles down and lays on the ground, or if the player is killed by fire, a well detailed animation of the protagonist being burned appears. Even the enemies get this treatment.
 * 22) Creative stages with detailed environments, they also have very smooth transitions to different areas in one stage. For example, the fifth stage of Metal Slug 2, goes from a city to subway tunnel then finally a sewage system.
 * 23) It has a lot of funny moments, like the ending of Metal Slug 4 where everyone is having a victory feast, with the characters having the obese transformation, or the ending of Metal Slug 2 where the table Donald Morden is strapped to falls over, with Morden still on it, his soldiers whimper upon seeing that and only then your character celebrates the end of the level.
 * 24) During the boss battles, if you aren't in a Slug, or only have the standard weapon, the game tries to help you defeat them by giving you a special weapon, and/or a grenade through POWs that appear after some time, or if you have to destroy a certain enemy or obstacle, like missiles.
 * 25) Every level has a destructible environment, which is very cool and badass to do in the games. It also reveal some secrets, like hidden POWs, weapons, and items, giving you much more points. For example, the fourth stage of Metal Slug 2, the city is full of destructible buildings that when destroyed by the player, gives a lot of food items, giving more points.
 * 26) The voice acting is great, and it is one of the main iconic elements of the franchise, like the main characters and soldiers' screaming and yelling sound effects, and the announcer voice when the mission is started and/or completed.
 * 27) Great replay value: You can play the games many times you want, and you will never be bored, mostly because of the dynamic, the challenging experience, and the great quantity of strategies these games can give to you.

Metal Slug 1

 * 1) The announcer voice is great to listen and probably the best announcer in the entire series, especially when he said "Mission X, START!", or the name of the weapons, even though he only appears in the first two games.
 * 2) Allen O'Neil is a very badass boss, and beating him without getting killed is very challenging. His introduction was so iconic that he later returned on the next games of the series (with the exception of Metal Slug 6).
 * 3) * His quotes also are cool, giving him the intimidating personality like "Come on, Boy!", "You're Mincemeat!" and "See you in hell...!"
 * 4) The credits scene: It's shows a Rebel Soldier throwing a paper plane while passing in a lot of dead soldiers that died in each level in the game. This ending is not only very sad, but also shows the reality of how terrible a war can be.
 * 5) *In a moment, a girl called Satiko Suzuki appears crying for her lover (which is implied to be a Rebel Soldier) that died during the war, which is a reference of how someone really close to a soldier can be devastated for his death.
 * 6) *If you beat the game with 2-Players Mode, the credits will change to a more heartwarming ending with the Rebel Soldiers alive, and an injured Donald Morden, the main antagonist of the franchise, receiving the paper plane while looking in the starry sky.

Metal Slug 2

 * 1) You can play with other characters besides Marco, like Tarma (who was only playable in the 2-Player Mode in the first game), Eri and Fio, giving more variety to the player, and making the game less repetitive and more enjoyable.
 * 2) It introduces two new POWs, which they will receive a bigger score when you finish a level, if you manage to save them:
 * 3) *Hyakutaro Ichimonji, a 2nd Lieutenant disguised in a POW is a good ally who launches projectiles on enemies. While he doesn't die if a enemy approach him, he will stop following and run off screen if you die.
 * 4) *Rumi Aikawa is a supply sergeant with a backpack, which when hit by the player's weapon, it will drop some items. But remember, if you shoot Rumi's backpack and don't approach her, the game won't consider her as a saved POW.
 * 5) New enemies are also introduced:
 * 6) *The mummies in the second stage, attack the player with a poisonous breath move, (or in the case of a white mummy, a poisonous bomb) that transforms you into a mummy.
 * 7) *The Martians are the most iconic ones in the game, and are much more stronger than the soldiers to the point that the soldiers team up with you to defeat them. Their attacks consist of firing several orange projectiles that move slowly and home towards the player, and depending on their color skin, these projectiles can be very difficult to avoid.
 * 8) If you acquire a lot of food items, your character will becomes obese, which increases the player's firepower but slows down their movement speed. The design and animation of the characters being obese are also very funny.
 * 9) Some new stronger weapons were also introduced:
 * 10) *Laser Gun: It is one of the most coolest weapons in Metal Slug 2, probably the most powerful weapon in the entire series, as being capable of eviscerate even the strongest bosses in the game.
 * 11) *Fire Bomb: These special grenades are simple glass bottles filled with flammable liquids, which are very useful toward large groups of soldiers, however they are not effective toward vehicles.

Metal Slug X

 * 1) The new announcer, while he is not memorable as the previous one, does a great job saying the iconic quotes of the franchise. He later returns on the next games of the series, until Metal Slug 5.
 * 2) *Despite having a new announcer, the famous "Thank You" sound effect is still from the previous announcer, which was a good idea, since this quote was very iconic in the franchise.
 * 3) New powerful weapons were featured in this remake version:
 * 4) *Enemy Chaser: This weapon sends rockets that track down enemies regardless where they are, making this weapon very useful against enemy groups.
 * 5) *Iron Lizard: This weapon fires a missile car that travels on ground and explodes when contacted by a enemy, very powerful against vehicles.
 * 6) *Super Grenade: This weapon fires a highly explosive shell that travels straight forward and causes a massive explosion on impact, like the Laser Gun, it is one of the most powerful weapons to use against enemies.
 * 7) *Drop Shot: This weapons fires landmines that will bounce and explode on contact of enemies.
 * 8) *Stone: As the name suggests, it is a grenade weapon that throws stones instead of grenades.
 * 9) While the graphics and gameplay are still the same, this remake fixed several bugs, minimized some slowdowns that had on the original game, and even some sound effects and soundtracks were improved.

Metal Slug 3

 * 1) In most of the missions, there are forking paths for the player to choose from. Each path has their own obstacles, enemies and environment. For example, in the first mission, there is three paths that can lead you to the boss, one of them leads you to an underwater level with a lot of aquatic enemies, like giant crabs, and submarines.
 * 2) It has now new environment levels in the game, and each one has their own enemies, equipment, and slugs. For example, the final mission consist of flying environment in most of the gameplay, as the player will have to deal with a lot of flying enemies like parachute Rebel Soldiers and planes.
 * 3) * Still speaking about the final mission, it also has a space environment level, when the player, in a spaceship slug, have to defeat the Martians and their UFOs. The player also have to avoid getting hit by small and big meteors.
 * 4) If you get hit by a zombie, you will turn into a zombie. While it looks like a bad thing, the zombified version character has a blood vomit attack that is very powerful against enemies but cannot jump very high.
 * 5) *Also, the player is immune to any attacks from the rebel soldiers (except the zombified soldiers).
 * 6) Two new POWs were added:
 * 7) *The first one is Utan, a chimp armed with a MAC-11 machine-pistol, and like Hyakutaro Ichimonji, he helps you against the Rebel Soldiers and gives you a big bonus score at the the end of the mission.
 * 8) *The other one is The President, a rare POW who also gives you a high bonus score at the the end of the mission, when rescued. He also calls his two bodyguards to give an iten for you.
 * 9) The Final Mission: It is considered to be the best, longest and most challenging missions yet in the entire series. Given a tons of different setting with a variety of boss fights with some being the old ones that were callbacks to the previous games and even going into different locations in each area.

Metal Slug 4

 * 1) It was introduced a new weapon, which is the Double Heavy Machine Guns, a rare special weapon obviously much stronger than the standard Heavy Machine Gun, being able to defeat vehicle enemies and even bosses more quickly.
 * 2) Some of the new Slugs are the vehicles used by the soldiers:
 * 3) *The M-15A Bradley is a rocket shooting vehicle equipped with powerful rocket shots, that are very useful against the helicopter vehicles.
 * 4) *The Metal Crow is a light tank equipped with high speed missiles and a blade-covered shield that protects the vehicle for being attacked, and also shreds the soldiers.
 * 5) The Slugs are more strong in this game, because they now take four hits instead of three to be destroyed, which is a good advantage to handle Rebel Soldier groups and vehicles.
 * 6) If you get hit by a bullet from a scientist's rifle, the player will transform to a monkey. However, like the zombie transformation, it has some good advantages, for example, the player can jump very high, and you can also grab and climb across rails along the ceiling to fire down on enemies, and vehicles.
 * 7) *The transformation also gives you a machine gun that has infinite ammo, making this transformation, alongside the grab and climb ability, very useful to avoid getting hit by soldiers and vehicles.

Metal Slug 5

 * 1) After the criticism of the previous game about the reused assets, Metal Slug 5 brought a lot of new backgrounds, sprites and unique bosses to make this game more original. Some features of the previous game also were removed or changed, like Tarma and Eri being returned as playable characters.
 * 2) It doesn't have overused enemies that appeared in the previous games, like the zombies, mummies and the Martians, making the game less monotonous by adding different and original enemies, which are the Ptolemaic Army.
 * 3) * Speaking of the Ptolemaic Army, while not memorable as the Rebel Infantry, they are pretty interesting villains, and their designs are very cool and give the player a well threatening appearance, like the Special Forces who are soldiers with black jumpsuits and gas masks.
 * 4) The Slug Gunner is probably the most badass and powerful Slug in the Metal Slug series. The design is like the SV-001 slug, but with arms and legs on it, and it fires a machine gun, a chassis-mounted cannon, and can punch enemies with a close-combat exploding pile bunker.
 * 5) *The Ptolemaic Army's slugs and units also have a very cool and badass design resembling the Rebel Infantry vehicles, especially the units which are very similar to the Slug Gunner, not to mention that is very fun to defeat the Ptolemaic Army's slugs and units using the Slug Gunner.
 * 6) You can perform a slide-dash by pressing the jump button while crouching, which is a very useful move to avoid multiple attacks, like the Avatar of Evil's energy spheres.
 * 7) The Avatar of Evil, which is the final boss of this game, has a threatening and well detailed design, especially during its sprite animations. It is also one of biggest, if not the biggest boss ever created in the series.

Metal Slug 6

 * 1) Besides the original team (Marco, Tarma, Eri and Fio), two new playable characters are introduced in the game, which are Ralf Jones and Clark Still from The King of Fighters and Ikari Warriors franchises (both games developed by SNK).
 * 2) *It is also the first game to have six playable characters.
 * 3) Each playable character has now their own unique abilities, giving the player some variety and good advantages when playing by each character:
 * 4) * Marco Rossi's default weapon has twice the ordinary strength.
 * 5) * Tarma Roving's durability and the effects of power-ups are doubled while riding in a Slug.
 * 6) * Eri Kasamoto receives twice as many grenades upon starting or resupplying.
 * 7) * Fio Germi begins each mission with the Heavy Machine Gun and her weapon supply is also increased by 50%.
 * 8) * Ralf Jones' melee attack speed is doubled, at the expense of weapon and grenade supplies being halved. He also can take two hits, instead of one before losing a life.
 * 9) * Clark Still's Super Argentine Backbreaker which used, enemies are eliminated and he receives a temporary invincibility boost.
 * 10) You can now handle two special weapons at the same time. The player can switch between the two weapons, or simply put them both away to use the default weapon, to only use them stronger enemies, like the vehicles and bosses.
 * 11) The martians are now your allies in the final mission, and like the POWs, they will give you an item when saved by you. One of them even help you defeat the Invaders, the new enemies of the game, by using its UFO.
 * 12) * Also, the way they salute you is very cute.

Metal Slug 7

 * 1) Two new weapons are introduced:
 * 2) *Thunder Shot: It is weapon that fires blue lightning that homes in onto the enemies, and like the Flame Shot and the Shotgun, it is very useful toward a large group of enemies.
 * 3) *Zantetsu "Z" Sword: A sword melee weapon, that is a stronger version of the knife that imbues a melee attack with large waves of energy, powerful enough to destroy armored vehicles.
 * 4) The Slug Gigant is one of the badass Slugs in Metal Slug 7, not only by its design, but the attacks are also very powerful, like its Wave Cannon that can eliminate soldiers and vehicles. It can also handle six hits before being destroyed.
 * 5) * Not to mention that the battle between you and Allen O'Neil, who is in Rebel Gigant, is very cool and challenging.
 * 6) The Combat School is well improved compared to their previous ones in Metal Slug 1, 2/X and 6, which gives a lot of challenges and task for the player, like rescuing POWs, and collecting itens, giving the player a rank (S, A, B, and C), depending on their performance.
 * 7) *You also can chat with Cynthia, the instructor of the Combat School. If you manage to earn a great rank in the challenges, she will fall in love with you and if the player reaches the General of the Army (GA) rank, the player can choose to marry Cynthia, or become her drill instructor.

Metal Slug XX

 * 1) The graphics were drastically improved compared to the original game, having much more detail, like the previous games. In reality, the player can change the aspect ratio of the screen, which can be on 4:3, Wide, or Clear screen.
 * 2) Leona Heidern from The King of Fighters appears as a DLC Character (which is very worthy to buy, as it costs only $0.99) in this game, and she has a lot of abilities:
 * 3) * Her Special Action is the Moon Slasher, which can eliminate the enemies and vehicles very easy, and is more powerful than the grenades.
 * 4) * She still keeps her weapons upon death, and she only loses them when she loses all of her lives, and continuing with her.
 * 5) * She has 20% more weapon ammo and grenades.
 * 6) It has infinite continues to all difficulties, which makes the game more well balanced in terms of difficulty, even on the Hard mode.

Overall

 * 1) While intentional, the difficulty of the games can be very frustrating for some players, especially if they want to beat the game without dying.
 * 2) As mentioned in WTR#3 in the overall session, if you die during a level, you will lose all the points given by the POWs, and this can happen every time for first-time players.
 * 3) The soldiers can be very annoying in large groups, especially the ones who use bazookas and grenades being the worst offender in this case.
 * 4) Most of the Slugs are difficult to control, mostly because they are much more slower to move, jump, and to turn around to left and right.
 * 5) The pistol, which is default weapon of the player, is very useless towards bosses, as it takes way too long to defeat them only by the weapon.
 * 6) The story is basically the same in every Metal Slug game, which is the main protagonists have to defeat several enemies that want to conquer the world, which can be very repetitive overtime.

Metal Slug 1

 * 1) It is very short, compared with the next games, you can beat around 30 minutes, if you manage to beat without getting killed.
 * 2) You can't play with Tarma in 1-Player Mode, he is only playable in 2-Player Mode.

Metal Slug 2

 * 1) The subway level in mission 5 is very frustrating, since you have to destroy four trains and they are very strong, unless you have the Laser Gun or the Heavy Machine Gun, and a good quantity of grenades.
 * 2) The UFO Martians are very annoying in the final boss battle, because they constantly appear and fire single laser shots at you. To make matters worse, they appear around three or four at once, making you focus to kill they instead of the boss.

Metal Slug X

 * 1) Despite being a remaster of the previous game, it's basically the same game with only new weapons and enemies.
 * 2) Some weapons are very useless like the Drop Shot and Stones, who are not strong enough to beat the enemies, especially compared to other weapons.

Metal Slug 3

 * 1) You can't use any special weapon when you are a zombie, and you can still die if you get hit by another zombie.
 * 2) The Sasquatch are a nuisance in mission 2, because their attack consists of encasing the player in snow and clubbing them with a bone.
 * 3) Utan is a very useless ally, compared to Hyakutaro Ichimonji, because the chimp rarely attacks the enemies, and he mostly sleeps and does nothing during the gameplay.

Metal Slug 4

 * 1) Tarma and Eri aren't playable in this game, and were downgraded to NPCs. Instead, Trevor Spacey and Nadia Cassel, two new characters, replaced them. However, many fans expressed disappointment over the new characters, making SNK bring back Tarma and Eri as playable characters in the fifth game, and making the first and only game to have Trevor and Nadia to appear in the franchise, since they never appeared or mentioned in the next games (except the spin-offs).
 * 2) Some fans considered this game to be the weakest of the franchise, mostly because it reuses some assets from the previous games and doesn’t do much to enhance the game or innovate it, making it less original than the others.
 * 3) The "Metallish" combo system is considered very confusing. Not all of the time the player will earn medals, and the combo fever stops when a player goes into a Slug. This mechanic was removed in the fifth game.
 * 4) Like the zombie transformation, the player can't use any special weapons when you are a monkey.

Metal Slug 5

 * 1) mh:crappygames:Rushing game development: The game was originally being developed by Noise Factory, and was almost nearing completion. However SNK took over the development and revamped the game completely, but were forced to rush it in order to begin development of Metal Slug 6. This lead to many content being cut from the final game such as a giant turtle boss and the Ptolemaic leader on the final stage, another special POW, and additional sub areas that were to appear in stages 3 and 5.
 * 2) *The removal of the Ptolemaic leader leaves a vital plot element in the game unresolved: a cutscene plays in the final release that is supposed to show the origin of the Ptolmaic leader but because that character never appears again due to being unfinished. This ends up not completely resolving this plotline and as a result, the potential leader is forgotten right away and replaced by a demonic entity in the final stage.
 * 3) As a result of this, the general level design and boss battles feel lacking: bosses do not change up their patterns, level design being very basic and short (noticeable in stages 2, 4 and 5). Its also comparetively short than the other games with only 5 total stages.
 * 4) While most of the sprites of this game are original, it still has some recycled sprites from the previous games, like the Ptolemaic Army soldiers which uses the same sprites of the Rebel Soldiers.

Metal Slug 6

 * 1) Some iconic sound effects were changed in this game, which lacks the humour and charisma the franchise has:
 * 2) * The Rebel Soldiers' iconic voice effects is the biggest offender in this case as their new voices sound absolutely nothing like their original counterparts. And the screaming effects also look very forced and cringeworthy.
 * 3) * The POWs' "Thank You" voice effect, was also changed, to a elderly and rough voice to combine to their looks, which is also very forced and cringeworthy.
 * 4) Compared to previous games, the new backgrounds feel a step down. The 3d almost realistic backgrounds are slightly off with the 2d sprites.
 * 5) One of the new weapons, Zantetsu "Z" Sword, can only be used 10 times, and despite being one of the most powerful weapons in the game to kill a large number of enemies, and vehicles, it is simply useless compared to other weapons like the Shotgun, which can be used more than 10 times.

Metal Slug 7

 * 1) The final boss is very frustrating to beat, because it will take a lot of time, and if you don't have a Shotgun, a Heavy Machine Gun, a good quantity of grenades, and beat it before the time runs out, you will die and lose all the rescue POWs' points.
 * 2) The graphics are somewhat of a downgrade compared to the previous games, but this is may be blamed on Nintendo DS screen resolution.

Metal Slug XX

 * 1) Like Metal Slug X, it doesn't bring anything original, having only some content from the previous games like the martians returning as enemies again.
 * 2) The new announcer voice is very bland and forced, and doesn't have the same impact like the previous announcers.

Reception
The games received generally positive reviews by fans, and mixed to positive reviews by critics, mostly because of the unfair difficulty and the one-hit deaths, however, many praised the graphics and the enjoyable gameplay. The first game received a large positive feedback upon its initial release, and its considered the seventh most-popular arcade game at the time according of Game Machine. In GameFAQs, the first Metal Slug has around 4 stars on the Arcade version. NintendoLife gave the game 8 out of 10 stars. HowLongToBeat gave a 82% rating on Arcade version. It was also included in the 2010 book "1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die".

As for the sequels and remakes, they also received generally mixed to positive reviews by users. For example, HowLongToBeat gave Metal Slug 2, to 6 a 75% to 85% rating on the Arcade version    , a 72% rating on Metal Slug 7 and a 70% rating on Metal Slug XX.

Legacy
Alongside the main games, the franchise spawned several spin-offs such as Metal Slug Advance for Game Boy Advance, mh:crappygames:Metal Slug Attack for iOS and Android mobile devices and Metal Slug 3D for PlayStation 2. Several characters have appeared in other SNK games like Marco Rossi, the mascot and one of the main protagonists of the franchise, appeared as a playable character in the fighting game NeoGeo Battle Coliseum, or the Martian enemy from the second game appears as a playable character in SVC Chaos: SNK vs. Capcom. Like Contra, the franchise was very important for popularizing the Run 'n Gun genre, and thanks for the franchise, a lot of games were developed having similar mechanics of the franchise, like Alien Hominid, Commando: Steel Disaster and Mercenary Kings.

Game Tips

 * 1) Don't waste your grenades on soldiers, use them only for the vehicle enemies and bosses to defeat them quickly.
 * 2) If your Slug is about to be damaged, exit in your Slug before it happens and enter it again, this is very useful for bosses.

Metal Slug 1
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Metal Slug 2
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Metal Slug X
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Metal Slug 3
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Metal Slug 4
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Metal Slug 5
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Metal Slug 6
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Metal Slug 7
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Metal Slug XX
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Miscellaneous
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Trivia

 * The original version of the first Metal Slug would be a very different game, with two main protagonists who are very different from Marco and Tarma, and the entire gameplay would only be played on the Metal Slug vehicle, without any pedestrian gameplay.
 * In Metal Slug 2, the scene when an airplane destroys the alien mothership's laser in the ending, is very similar of the 1996 movie mh:greatestmovies:Independence Day, when Russell Casse sacrifices himself destroying the alien mothership's, saving the world.