Nothing brings back more gaming memories from my childhood than Mega Man. From the awful cover art to the addictive gameplay, the series was a hallmark for NES action titles back in the early 90's. In fact, conquering Mega Man 2 and 3 represents a large part of the gaming pride I had as a kid.
Fast forward to 2008.
Capcom releases Mega Man 9, a throwback in every way to the older Mega Man titles on NES. Gone is the Mega Buster shot and the slide. Gone is the next-gen sheen, replaced with 4-color sprites ripped right out of the early 1990's, and deliberately added sprite flicker/slowdown. Gone is the sanity of late 2-D platformers (SotN, New Super Mario Bros. etc.), replaced with "conveniently" respawning enemies, spikes, bottomless pits, and disappearing block puzzles over said spikes and bottomless pits. The difficulty is amped up so much in this release that in my 2 hours with the game so far (trying out the different stages), I have yet to be able to make it to a single robot master. I feel for all the TVs that will soon be shattered by incoming controller projectiles...the amount of sheer frustration this game has the potential to generate is maddening.
To give you an idea of how maddening this was, I present to you a stream of consciousness during an attempted playthrough of Splash Woman's stage (supposedly the easiest in the game), inspired by the Angry Video Game Nerd:
"Ok, GameFAQs said Splash Woman should be taken down first - who am I to argue? Splash Woman it is. Hey, this interface looks a lot like MM3's selection screen. Too bad it's not 480p, maybe I should have waited for the 360 version."
"Splash Woman. Here we go. Let's get it on!"
"Hmm...low resolution mermaid. How original. Love the old school music, though. I wonder what the stage will look like."
"Water. Nice fake light effects - ha ha. Go figure. Okay, walking right, walking right..."
"Bombs. Jump over the...WTF?! They home in?"
*MegaMan gets hit*
"Damn. Shoot 'em instead?"
*MegaMan shoots and the MegaBuster shots bounce off*
"Crap! What a way to start the stage, half my life bar's gone. Screw this, just take the hits, get past 'em, and drop into the hole."
*Drops into the hole, next screen*
"Next screen. Robo-octopus firing shots of ink at me. Yet again, shots bouncing off. Gotta shoot it in the head. 3 shots and he's down, but now I'm colored black from getting hit with the ink... doesn't seem to do anything, so oh well."
"Ok, few more enemies, couple of jumps... ooh, a bolt guarded by another octopus. Take this, octopussy! 3 shots...and he's down. Leap over the hole, grab the bolt...YOINK. Drop in...next screen!"
*Drops into the hole. Spikes halfway down, falls right into them and dies*
"....What?! Seriously?! SERIOUSLY?! Mega-ASS!"
*Starts over at the beginning*
"FUCK!!! I forgot - no checkpoints until halfway through each stage...this is almost too old school for its own good. Back to the bombs...easier to avoid this time."
*Navigates to the previous point, dodging the spikes*
"HA, take THAT! YEAHH BOYYYYEEEEEEE!"
"Veering left...more spikes - but easier to avoid this time...reminds me of the Doc Robot stages from MM3. I don't remember them being this hard, though..."
*next screen, jets creating bubbles of different sizes that float up the screen*
"Oh, GREAT. I know where this is going...have to hop on the bubbles..."
*hops on a small one and it breaks*
"Ok, I get it. Small ones break, large ones don't. So ride the large one up...probably into a huge wall of spikes..."
*rides up the screen*
"Completely empty next screen, no spikes! Shocking..."
*squid comes out of left side of screen and knocks MegaMan off bubble*
"SHIT. Damn squid. Ok. Dodge the squid next time."
*Navigates up 2 screens on the bubbles, narrowly missing a last-second sniping squid from the left side of the screen*
"Hah, another squid, right at the end! Very clever, Capcom. Next!"
*A few screens later, there's a moving platform puzzle with platforms coming out of the walls moving right and left and then disappearing*
"Ugh. Now it's getting ugly. First take care of that robot... HA! GOTCHA! Now jump on the platforms...and .... wow, that wasn't so bad."
"How much you wanna bet there will be another puzzle with these damn blocks combined with spikes or bottomless pits?"
*the next screen does indeed have such a puzzle*
"Spikes for 500, Alex."
"Looks like I need to time my jumps exactly right this time. Okay, see the pattern. Get across the spikes, make it to the platform on the left."
*hops successfully onto solid platform, only to get bumped off by a moving platform that comes out of the wall immediately after landing, lands on the spikes and dies*
"ASS! Why am I NOT surprised..."
"AAARGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH! Ok, that's it, I need a beer."
*Yes, I actually went to the fridge and got a Rolling Rock at this point, left over when a friend bought some for a party last month*
"Oh, look, I get to start over from the bubbles. That's OK, I guess..."
*back to the second block screen*
"FUCK this. Alright puppy, time to earn your keep...Rush Coil, do your thing. Let's get over to the left side of the platform, call the doggy, hop up...and...."
*misses the ladder, not high enough...and another death-by-spiking*
"GOD DAMN IT!!!!!!! FUCKING PUPPY PIECE OF SHIT!!!!"
*Game Over*
"I'll never play this piece of crap game...EVER EVER AGAIN."
Okay, maybe I'm over-exaggerating. I will play the game again - maybe I'm just a glutton for punishment.
I mentioned both MM2 and MM3 at the beginning of this review. Now, I know, for a _FACT_, that both of those games were not nearly as cheap as MM9 - not by a longshot. How do I know? As recently as 3 years ago I went back and beat them both again on the Mega Man Anniversary Collection for PS2. And although my retro gaming skills were a little rough at the time, I had nowhere near as many deaths on those games as I have experienced with 2 hours... 2 HOURS...of MM9.
Maybe it's for the best - I mean, I do notice myself getting better with each attempt...something I like to call Ninja Gaiden syndrome. A game will continually make you its bitch and you come back for more and more - improving your skill just a little each time - until the obstacles that once proved insurmountable are nothing to you.
Hopefully I have the patience for this...otherwise, I'd better start looking for a new TV and Wiimote, just in case my Mega-rage gets the better of me.
1 comment:
Regarding MM9, do you think that this level of difficulty was the designed intention? This is, after all, a game that will only be bought by hardened, seasoned NES addicts. It looks like too much ass to be bought en masse by newer core gamers. So was their intent to make a game that, while not technically longer than any Mega Man game, a game in which the difficulty level ramps up the playing time?
Or, is it that the difficulty has been notched slightly up, and your recent breezes through MM2 and MM3 partly because, despite time, you could ride them like a bicycle?
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