A Bad Year to be a Mega Man Fan

2003 isn't Mega Man's year. Cell phone games can be interesting, but rarely have any depth into them beyond a 5 minute time waster, X continues a downward spiral and suddenly Battle Network starts churning out shit. The best game this year is Mega Man Zero 2 and a lot of people consider that a step down from Mega Man Zero. Let's get the miscellaneous crap that I can't give a proper review out of the way before we delve into the severely under developed Mega Man X7.

Rockman Bug Sweeper
If you've played Minesweeper on your PC, you've played this game. The difference is this one has some Mega Man graphics. What more can be said about Minesweeper? Is there really any place else that game can go?

Rockman Panic Fire
I'm not entirely sure what this one is. Perhaps a puzzle game where you have to find a route that avoids Fire Man to get to Dr. Wily. It sorta resembles Bomberman to me. And no, that's not a swastika in that picture, it's the other one... uh... Manji or whatever.

Rockman Slot
A bit self explanatory. Mega Man graphics over a virtual slot machine. Interesting tidbit related to major game companies and gambling, but you may not know that Konami actually has a line of slot machines. Don't get your hopes that the makers of Castlevania and Metal Gear Solid will be willing to return some of that money you've put into their company, the machine I played was so stingy I didn't when a penny back. Maybe a Mega Man slot machine would be kinder to me...

Mega Man Space Rescue
This game actually was released in the United States in 2007 for blackberry phones, but this is when it originally came out in Japan. You fly around in a Jet Pack and rescue astronauts. I don't have a blackberry, but if you do, have I got a link for you to download it right now, and guess what? It's free!

Mega Man's Rocket Christmas
Another game that made it over to the us. It's the same thing as space rescue, except Mega Man wears a Santa uniform and the astronauts are kids you give presents too. I don't know if this game is freeware or not but searching for it on the web showed a lot of different methods of distribution and I couldn't tell you how to pay for this game if you wanted to. Here's a link to a video though... wow, does that look boring.

Rockman DASH Golf
I'm sure the first thought you had when Mega Man Soccer came out was "why isn't this a golf game?!" What? You didn't? What about Legends? No? Well this is Mega Man Legends characters and Golf! On your cell phone! Wow... the Legends series really has fallen on hard times hasn't it?

Mega Man NT Warrior Advanced PET LCD Game
Yes, the US finally gets it's own LCD release since the Tiger Hand Held days. This is a little battle game where you stick in some battle chips that come with the thing to direct MegaMan.exe's attack. It features a multiplayer mode (good luck ever using that) and takes watch batteries. I guess you have to shake the stupid thing a lot to heal MegaMan or whatever. I don't own one, but gullible kids seem to like the game attached to it. This is really more of a display item for collectors though than a game, but you can still find this thing at various online shops such as amazon. Supplies are running out though so if wait around to long, it'll be gone for good... then again Battle Network is coming back, so maybe it'll get restocked? Be prepared, it's $30 to $40 for this thing.

Also of note, Mega Man and Mega Man 2 made their way to cell phones with a few minor changes mostly made to compensate for playing with a really shitty phone. If you absolutely have to have Mega Man with you every where you go, now you can I guess. Once again if you want to check out more images of these games, head over to Mechanical Maniacs.

Next up... ugh... Mega Man X7...