By Christian Nutt and Justin Speer

In 1987 Capcom introduced what would prove to be one of its most popular characters worldwide - and despite what has been universally called the ugliest box art of all time, Mega Man began to catch on in the US, whose game market is decidedly different from Japan's. At the same time, Rockman was slipping onto Famicom systems in Japan - same blue underpants as Mega Man's but sporting a different name and a more attractive, or perhaps more marketable, cover. A robot built to fight for justice, Mega Man stood for intense, original action platforming on the Nintendo Entertainment System. True to form, Capcom has milked this series for all it's worth; it's a great one - and the company's most important pre-Street Fighter property.

In 1987 the NES was a hot commodity, and consumers flocked to the console in droves. Capcom, as a developer, was already prolific with the system and had a crop of excellent games (Ghosts 'n' Goblins, Trojan) under its belt by the time it released Mega Man. Victimized by arguably unattractive interpretive artwork (a fate that persisted for years to come), the game was a sort of low-key success. The true breakthrough would come with Mega Man 2.


Mega Man recently celebrated his 15th anniversary, and the Blue Bomber is showing no signs of giving up the fight for everlasting peace. Though the classic Mega Man line lies dormant, for now, the mega mythos continues to expand with a seventh game in the Mega Man X series, the now established alternate-reality Mega Man Battle Network titles on the Game Boy Advance, and the budding X-related spin-off series Mega Man Zero.

Join us as we take a look back at the myriad games of the Mega Man legacy, some of which, unfortunately, stayed in Japan and some of which, unfortunately, did not. The bulk of Mega Man's games were good, a few were great, and some we'd rather not discuss at length. There's still one thing they have in common--each is a part of Mega Man history.
Mega Man
(Rockman in Japan)
System: NES (Famicom), Reissued 1999 PlayStation
Released 1987

The Basics
In 1987, Capcom introduced a game to its lineup with an uninspired title and totally appalling box art. It wasn't a huge success. Mega Man, the tale of a boy robot forged by Dr. Thomas Light to end the plague of rebelling construction robots liberated and controlled by his renegade assistant, Dr. Wily, opened up an interesting can of worms for Capcom. The largely nonlinear gameplay and the innovative idea of stealing the weapons of defeated bosses were what earmarked this series for longevity. Later we learned that the boring title and lackluster art were workarounds to the peculiar title of the Japanese original Rockman and the then-taboo anime-style artwork that adorned its cover. And now you understand why Guts Man isn't called Rockman!

Gameplay
You dropped your google-eyed hero into any one of six stages of your choice - Bomb Man, Fire Man, Ice Man, Guts Man, Elec Man, or Cut Man. They didn't really have to come up with totally unique stage names the first time out, as the series was new in the first place, and the characters were just then being introduced. (Further down we'll examine the developer's creativity and where it eventually failed. For now, content yourself with the basic gameplay elements.) After you vanquished the six bosses (perhaps with the elecbeam pause trick, a cheat for massive damage particularly effectual on large bosses) you gained access to the Dr. Wily levels, wherein you had to kill the bosses again (get used to it), huge, nasty and slowdown-ridden blob enemies, and finally come down hard on Dr. Wily himself. Of course, he escaped the grasp of justice in time for a sequel.
The ending contained the classic paradox that sent the world of modern philosophy on its head - "Fight, Mega Man! For everlasting peace!"

The Bosses and Weapons
Welcome to the magic of Mega Man. When you killed bosses, you gained their power - although sometimes that power was shrunk and weakened to fit into Mega Man's little gun. Each boss was weak against a certain other boss's weapon - though the distribution of power was not always completely logical. Of course, that logic became meaningless in the later games in the series. After all, what would you expect Skull Man to be weak against? Let's just enjoy those early, simpler days with their simpler weapons.
This time around you went up against Bomb Man, who gave you bombs (obviously); Fire Man, who gave you a fire beam; Ice Man, who had his little ice shards; Guts Man, who had the ability to hurl large rocks (which you had to find littered about the levels); Elec Man, who had an electric beam, which, besides being powerful, also had a bug which centered around it, pausing and un-pausing the game repeatedly; and Cut Man, with his scissors-blades. In addition, you picked up the magnet step, which let you place platforms that you could jump on.

Japanese Version
In Japan, Mega Man was known as Rockman. While the Japanese game's name may not make a lot of sense note that Rockman was made out of Rock. He served as the household robot that Dr. Light had created to sweep up after the good doctor's messes.
Although it was a victim of low-key presentation, Mega Man was a winner in gameplay. The series was true innovation that slipped through the cracks, as competition was fierce, and tons and tons of NES games were coming out. As would become Capcom's policy with the series for the next couple of generations, the artwork and main character's name was changed as the long spate of cultural isolationism pioneered by the friendly folks at the US divisions of your favorite Japanese developers took hold. It would be ten years before a Mega Man title appeared in the States sporting original artwork..

Mega Man II
(Rockman 2: The Enigma of Dr. Wily in Japan)
System: NES (Famicom), Reissued 1999 PlayStation
Released 1987

The Basics
Mega Man came into his birthright in this, the second title in the series. Unlike the first title, Mega Man II was wildly popular and earned the accolades of the mass consumer. Instead of facing a mere six robot bosses, Mega Man faced eight - which became the series standard. The next important innovation was the addition of passwords, which let you re-enter the game at a later date without starting from scratch. There were also three upgrade items from Dr. Light to augment Rock's powers. Add in the excellent music and the distinctive graphical style that surrounded the game - including portraits of the bosses - and the amazingly huge dragon in Dr. Wily stage 1, and we can assume that Capcom intended to make Mega Man its star.

Gameplay
First, select between normal and difficult mode and then pick a boss - the order you play them in can be important. Make sure to start with Metal Man because he's easy and his blades are absurdly useful. In fact, you can smack down most of the bosses with these blades, especially if you've chosen normal mode. Then, make your way around trouncing bosses and collecting weapons and items. Those huge wolves in Wood Man's stage look really nice, don't they? After you defeat all eight, Dr. Wily shows up again. Play through a few more stages, revanquish the henchmen, and off you go to fight... an alien?

The Weapons and Bosses
The Metal Blade is probably the best weapon in the entire series. The rest of them aren't bad either - the Mega Man bosses aren't even lame - yet. Bubble Man is kind of sad, challengewise, but he's made up for by his stage's superlative tune. When you defeat him you'll get the Bubble Lead, which rhymes with "need," not "head."
You weren't trying to poison the evil robots this time. You tackled Metal Man and his saw blades, Bubble Man and his bubbles, Heat Man and his chargeable "atomic fire," Flash Man, who will let you stop time, Quick Man, whose boomerangs were lethal, Air Man and his baby tornadoes, Crash Man and his bombs, and Wood Man and the leaf shield - a very useful rotating circle of protection.

Japanese Version
Rockman picked up a subtitle in this version - a convention that would be maintained throughout the series and has not been carried over to the US games even to this day. The game was otherwise the same, except that Crash Man was known as Clash Man in Japan (and one can't help but wonder why they bothered - both are kind of silly and both are real words), and there was no choice of modes in the Japanese game. It turned out that normal mode was an easy mode and difficult mode was the only way to play in the original version. Things changed a lot since those days, with this situation being reversed in Metal Gear Solid.

Final Thoughts
Capcom had a huge hit on its hands with this title. Taking the ideas laid down in the first game and refining them, the company came up with an excellent and imaginative game - with some shining spots in graphics and music to help it along. It's one of the true NES classics.

Mega Man III
(Rockman 3: Dr. Wily's Time to Die!? in Japan)
System: NES (Famicom), Reissued 1999 PlayStation
Released 1990

The Basics
Capcom decided to take everything that was Mega Man and polish it until it positively shone - Mega Man III was quite possibly the pinnacle of the series. Not only did Capcom manage to come up with some great bosses and excellent music, developers managed to give you a pretty long experience in this game. This game marked the debut of the mysterious Proto Man - Mega Man's brother. With Rock's canine pal, Rush, and the new handy-dandy slide move, and you had respectable innovations. OK, maybe Top Man wasn't the best idea, but this game held serious flair. If you're going to nit-pick, there are some titles coming up that are much more deserving of your scorn. In the end, this was a top-notch game.

Gameplay
Mega Man III had the same setup as that of the last Mega Man game - although Dr. Light has whipped up a canine pal to assist you this time. This game marked the debut of Rush, Rock's dog, and in this title you used him to traverse the various obstacles in your path. It was a good idea to start with Top Man - his pattern was easy, his weapon was "effective" against Shadow Man, and it's Shadow Man's weapon you really wanted. Shadow blades were as close to metal blades as the designers could get without being totally cheap. The great thing about this game was that you got to play through four bonus stages and fight the bosses from Mega Man II over again - and this time, they weren't the wimps Capcom USA had made them last time around. Add on top of that the eight normal stages and a Wily stage or three and we had a goodly sized game here. However, some players made use of a particularly absurd glitch that would cause Mega Man to become invulnerable. If you held the second-player gamepad to the right, then jumped into a pit, Mega Man would lose all his health and become impervious to damage. Not very honorable, but if you were having trouble beating some of the bosses, you could take the easy way out with this bug.

The Weapons and Bosses
Top Man's topspin had to be the silliest thing ever. Mega Man could now whirl like a top! As you can imagine, it was totally ineffectual except against the big, bad boss (Shadow Man) and, of course, the last boss. Funny how these things work. That's right, Mega Man! Hurl yourself at that huge robot head with your nemesis inside! It'll only take one taste of your spinning prowess to knock him for a loop! Otherwise, we had a decent amount of variety. Things hadn't gotten lame - yet.
In Mega Man III, we got Snake Man, who looked cool but whose little snakes weren't that useful; Gemini Man, whose beams were powerful but hard to aim; Needle Man and his needles; Spark Man and his balls of electricity; Hard Man and the hard punch, a flying fist; Top Man and his dainty spin; Shadow Man and his shuriken; and Magnet Man's magnets, which flew at metallic opponents.

Japanese Version
Ah, yes. The naming conventions of Capcom USA continued to erode the careful themes of the original creators. Blues (to go with Rock and Roll) became Proto Man. It's not a terribly creative name, but neither is "Mega Man." Otherwise, the game was left to its own devices.
Final Thoughts
Again, Capcom brought its immense resources and talent to bear and released another NES classic. Mega Man III was the beginning of the end - various forces would drive the series downward and into the base clay. That's the future - for now, enjoy the fruit of Capcom's labor - its most popular series. The pinnacle of its NES effort - Mega Man III.

Mega Man IV
(Rockman 4: A New Evil Ambition! in Japan)
System: NES (Famicom), Reissued 1999 PlayStation
Released 1991

The Basics
Now, with this title, Capcom did something that annoyed people and would continue to annoy them for several years - the company let Mega Man stay put on the NES, where the cash lay, instead of graduating him to the SNES. The SNES was still fairly young when Mega Man IV hit the shelves - but here we saw the last, real, meaty game to wear the moniker for a good long time. While it never really got to the level of II or III, it was certainly not a complete slouch - although this was where innovation began to run sour. The innovations in this title included a chargeable Mega Buster, the requirement that you go back into levels to find random, hidden stuff (a play mechanic that would later dominate the X series), and the hollow storyline charade involving Dr. Cossack- as it unsurprisingly turned out, Dr. Wily is pulling the strings.

Gameplay
You know the drill. Pick a boss, get his weapon, kill another boss, get his weapon, rinse, repeat. Due to the mediocrity of some of the bosses (Pharaoh Man? Dust Man?) the path to glory is even less clear on this outing. Nobody's got an amazingly useful weapon, so the gameplay is simply trial and error - no other considerations. Toad Man's a wimp, so start with him and move onward.


The Weapons and Bosses
Toad Man could make it rain; Bright Man stopped time and let you shoot; Pharaoh Man duplicated the heat gun from the second game; Ring Man's rings acted as boomerangs; Dust Man threw garbage at the enemies; Skull Man's shield was a variation on Wood Man's; Dive Man's homing missiles were pretty useful; and Drill Man's bombs broke some walls.

Japanese Version
Nothing to note here. Capcom was playing it safe by messing with the US version as little as possible in those days. Do remember that Flip-Top's name was really Eddie, however. Amusingly enough, Capcom did admit during the game's opening that Mega Man's real name was Rock, but the company managed to forget it ever did that soon enough.

Final Thoughts
While it was a bit premature to say this game was the beginning of the end, the series began to show its age with this title. Developers were flocking to the SNES - a move Capcom didn't take with this series for several more years. Mega Man fans were left floundering on an old system, and Capcom's more talented staff began to work on its Super Nintendo projects. Hence, the deterioration of the series.

Mega Man V
(Rockman 5: Blues' Trap!? in Japan)
System: NES (Famicom), Reissued 1999 PlayStation
Released 1992

The Basics
While Capcom had been transitioning itself onto the SNES with great success, it left its once-key series behind and released its biggest game ever, Street Fighter II, that year on Nintendo's 16-bit machine, the SNES. Mega Man V tried really hard, sporting excellent graphics for the NES and some good tunes, but wacky bosses and the market's shift toward the SNES didn't do much to help it. Still, this game saw the introduction of Rock's friend and helper, Beat, a small mechanical bird.

Gameplay
Ho-hum. Sad to say, Mega Man was wearing thin in the area of innovation this time around. There were letters hidden in the stages that spelled out "MEGA MAN V." Once collected, they let you summon the almighty power of the bird, Beat. He was actually pretty cool, but it was a bit of a pain to get all those letters.

The Weapons and Bosses
The aforementioned Beat was a powerful addition to your arsenal but also a pain in the neck to get hold of - the standard weapons you received from Mega Man V's bosses included: Star Man's star crash, a skull shield rip-off; Gravity Man's gravity hold, which reversed gravity; Gyro Man's gyro attack, a gun with limited control; Crystal Man's crystal eye, a ball-type weapon; Napalm Man's napalm bomb; Stone Man's power stone, a Dreamcast fighting game ... wait, no, it was a gun with rotating projectiles; Charge Man's charge kick, which turned your slide deadly; and Wave Man's water wave, a ground-based projectile.
Japanese Version
Besides the fact that you were picking up ROCKMAN V tokens instead of MEGAMAN V tokens, not much to take note of.

Final Thoughts
Capcom put some work into this one, but the real problem was that the aging NES just wasn't holding consumer interest. It was a good game, but gamers were abandoning the NES in droves. Perhaps that's why Mega Man VI (the last NES title in the series) met its own weird fate. But that's for later. For now, try to savor this underappreciated and fairly rare title.

Mega Man VI
(Rockman 6: The Biggest Battle in History!! in Japan)
System: NES (Famicom), Reissued 1999 PlayStation
Released 1993

The Basics
The 16-bit wars were in full swing in 1993 - TurboGrafx had fallen (discontinued late in the year) and Sega and Nintendo were competing with titles like Sonic 3 and Star Fox. But Capcom was so committed to the SNES that after low sales of Mega Man V, it chose not to release this game in the US. Nintendo stepped in and published Mega Man VI in the States.

Gameplay
It's hard to come up with something original to say about the gameplay when Capcom wasn't really coming up with anything original to do in the Mega Man VI game - the largest (and most annoying) innovation was that the levels included both a fake boss and a real boss. Beating the fake boss would not clear the level. You had to beat the real boss to pass. Also, now, not only was Rush your canine companion, but he could also attach himself to you as a powerful suit of armor. Isn't that weird?

The Weapons and Bosses
From the second game on, Mega Man bosses had been the product of design contests offered by Capcom of Japan through Nintendo Power magazine. This time, two of the bosses, Knight Man and Wind Man, were designed by North Americans. Daniel Vallie - a Canadian - designed Knight Man, and Michael Leader - an American - designed Wind Man. The rest of the bosses were of Japanese design. Flame Man, possibly Fire Man's little brother, netted you the fire blast, which melted ice. Blizzard Man, a distant cousin of Ice Man, gave you the blizzard attack. Plant Man brought you a new version of the popular "shield"-type weapon. Tomahawk Man (yes, Tomahawk Man) gave you the silver tomahawk. Yamato Man, a fiercely patriotic Japanese robot, relinquished the Yamato spear. Knight Man gave you another more traditional weapon, the knight chain. Centaur Man (and isn't a centaur just a Horse Man?) gave you the centaur flash - another time stopper. Wind Man provided the wind storm.
Japanese Version
Again, Capcom (or Nintendo) chose to leave well enough alone, transferring the game from Japan to the States intact.

Final Thoughts
The NES was basically dead and buried at this point. Of course, Capcom was about to address this with Mega Man X, but it would be a while before the original series made it to SNES. Mega Man VI was the final NES adventure - and also the cheesiest. If you're looking for mega-laughs, you might want to try this one out.





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