Where do I start NEO GEO fighting games?

I recently began playing “SNK 40th Anniversary” on switch and was completely taken aback by how much I love many of the games and how it’s delivered in a tightly woven package designed to give you a deeper understanding of the developer and the arcade scene at the time. Being someone who was born in 1989, I definitely have fond memories of going to the aracades as a kid, but were already on the decline here in the the United States and being so young I never had gotten the chance to really dig deep into the fighting genre having also not many friends who cared for fighting games.

I want to continue this kick with SNK, as my fascination hasn’t ended with the “40th” release. The switch is currently my only console I own, but with the plethora of NEO GEO games ported to it having most of the system’s best games within a download of my grasp is enticing. But I don’t know where to start and having understanding that most of SNK’s games run together theme and story wise, where would the most accessible entries be for me as someone who wants to get into those games but also doesn’t have the deepest understanding of fighting games save for a handful of them I have played over the years. Thanks for any info you can give me.

Well, which games from the 40th anniversary do you really like or don't like as much?

Keep in mind this was 90s (?) storytelling: You don't need to have played Samurai Shodown 1 to follow 2 and so forth. Just play something that looks fun

But on an even less helpful note: I would strongly suggest not going for Switch for these. Even if you don't want an arcade stick, you REALLY don't want to be regularly doing the various motions on the switch cross. A d-pad mod helps a bit (and I love mine), but the ergonomics of the joycons themselves tend to be fairly shit

And to go even LESS helpful: If your interest is just to get into fighting games, I would actually skip Neogeo for now. Don't get me wrong, I STILL play way too much Garou. But the best way to get into fighting games is to actually go modern and take advantage of the really cool tutorials that are out there. I pretty much am obsessed with Under Night because its tutorial is so ridiculously in-depth.

And once you have the basics and can reason with fighting games it will be a lot easier to drop in and out of the various SNK games.

Samurai Shodown 2

King of Fighters '98

Last Blade

Any of the ACA collection is good (but maybe skip World Heroes...). Fair warning though, there's a reason why there's an entire concept named after SNK Bosses in fighting games: https://www.giantbomb.com/snk-boss-syndrome/3015-2788/.

Also, to follow up on @gundato's suggestion: don't play it on the regular joycons. Get a Pro controller, or something like it.

Garou: Mark of the wolves

KOF '98

Samurai Showdown 2

...that's a good start

To me the Three best neogeo fighting games are

King of Fighters 2002

Real Bout Fatal Fury 2

Garou: Mark Of the Wolves

To me these are the three games that hold up the best that the system ever released. Alternatively something like SNK vs Capcom 2 might be a good way to introduce yourself to some of those characters as well