The Military System (Operation Explanation, Ranking) – marching band snare and a single thudding bass kick drum signal the start of the album, snappy and motivating stuff. Astride this image is the tracklist, sporting 18 tracks in total at a running time of just over 44 minutes.įinally, the centre image of each side of the record features the Metal Slug either rolling over a smashed tank (side A) or standing tall, shining, and victorious (side B).

The rear of the album shows the four heroes peeking inside the main gun barrel of Metal Slug to see a small rodent impishly nesting and eating a snack. Tarma Roving’s cheeky grin is clearly a hint as to the aural gold contained on the waxy grooves therein. The cover art of the vinyl is very much the cover art from the game - with a white background and that familiar font in the top-left corner, featuring the four playable characters in front of the titular Metal Slug. The version I have is presented on a single 180g smoky grey vinyl that has a ‘gun smoke’ vibe to it - there is also an orange variant available. Released in 1999, Metal Slug X was an enhanced version of Metal Slug 2 and – being released in 1999 – has some awesome, AWESOME midi music. It’s a game I will always have a crack at when I pass one on my travels and only last year, I met up with a friend in Cardiff’s The Arcade Vaults and we completed the game – it was on free play, thank the lord – and it remains a blast of pure vintage arcade gold. I PUMPED 10p coins into Metal Slug whenever I was there, with its frantic on-screen action, awesome reload animations and the fact that it rewarded my personal penchant of hammering the fire button as speedily as I could by releasing a stream of handgun fire meant that it was one of the most compulsive arcade games I could play.

In once such place – Pontypridd Precinct – there was a record store called Rainbow Records and, at the back, tucked away in darkness shone Double Dragon, Aliens and Metal Slug. Growing up in the valleys of South Wales, there was never really a local arcade per se (the closest I can think of was a brief spell when a place called Top Ten Video opened in Cilfynydd and consisted of Mortal Kombat, Super Baseball 2020 and a horizontal shooter whose name evades me – the dude that ran that shop didn’t have a till he just kept all his money in a KFC bucket on the counter…it’s no longer trading) but instead, there were scattered machines around in chip shops, pubs and the like.

‘The iconic soundtrack from the legendary game Metal Slug X for the first time as a stand-alone release in vinyl format, for the 25th Anniversary of the legendary SNK game series! Go Peregrine Falcon Squads!’

Metal slug 2 stage 1 theme