Mega Man Turns 23!

It's December 17th, and 23 years ago today, a buggy, quirky, and excruciatingly hard game came out that started a franchise so overwhelmingly popular, that now even Capcom doesn't know how many damn games there are.

This year was pretty good for Mega Man. Mega Man 10 and Zero Collection came out, and Mega Man Universe, Mega Man Legends 3, and Rockman Online were all announced. This will be the first anniversary without Keiji Inafune, but his company is starting up, and I don't think the franchise is in any trouble without him either.

As for me, well I'm looking to establish some free time before I start another series of reviews. Believe it or not, working in the game industry is a REAL time sink. Sitting on my plate is Rockman.exe Beast, and the Mega Man movie, but there's no way I'm getting to any of that till next year.

Alright, I'm Excited

While I'm having nagging doubts and worrisome thoughts about Legends 3, and I've yet to see anything from Universe that looks to satiate me, I gotta say, I'm god damned excited about Rockman Online.

I'm glad to see some company actually put some effort into the Mega Man Franchise. Inafune basically admitted he was sick of working at Capcom, Capcom themselves have half-assed the series for quite a while, and even when the good games do come out, they're usually just good instead of exceptional.

I ask you where is Mega Man's push to the next generation? It's starting in Korea.



Granted, it's another cutscene trailer, but it has a hell of a lot more imagination and effort in it then what we've seen in a long time. But hey, the game itself is shaping up pretty awesomely too! TOO BAD THERE'S NO PLANS FOR IT IN THE US YET! ARRG!

Even so, Capcom Unit, the official Capcom blog site, is hyped up for it, so who knows what the future may hold. Here's a hint though, the authors at Capcom Unity's pull around the company is JACK SHIT.

Didn't See That One Coming

Kotaku is reporting that Inafune is out. At this point that takes the Mega Man franchise out of his hands for good at the end of the month. I gotta say I'm a bit surprised that he's calling it quits just as the one game he's been pushing to get made for years and years finally gets green-lighted.

Although the creator is being removed from the project, this may be a good thing in the end. If any franchise needs new blood in it, it's this one. This could be a chance for a young gun developer to take hold of the franchise and breath some new life into it.

I had my misgivings about Legends 3 ever since it was announced for a hand held. While that doesn't necessarily mean it'll be bad, or even not amazing, it seemed to me that Capcom was playing it safe trying to be the big game at the system launch amid the sea of crap that always hits at release date. It was as if they didn't trust that it was going to do well enough on its own.

Furthermore, this co-development by the fans thing is looking like a huge gimmick to me. I've always hated the "design by committee" approach to just about everything, because you either get an incredibly bland product, or a completely directionless product.

I guess it's okay so far, with just a series of contests between the developers with fans voting on the best works, but the more interaction the fans get, the more chances we could end up with Portal references or just flat out weird fan-fictiony interactions between the characters, particularly Mega Man, Roll and Tron.

With Inafune washing his hands of the franchise, and the reasons above, we could be up for a rocky start in the new era of Mega Man games. Something different and awesome could come out of this after a while though. Games are only good when the creator has a hold of them right?

Legends 3 In Developement

So I gotta say, I'm incredibly disappointed Capcom is continuing this series on another hand-held. The 3DS to me, looks pretty much like a big gimmick in the making, with more games coming out that focus on the graphics than the gameplay. It also sounds like limiting yourself so much when you've got to design a game for this little tiny screen instead of something out there for the consoles. I find it so frustrating that the only damn Mega Man games that come out on the consoles are essentially Mega Man 2 remakes, while the franchise continues to advance slowly on the hand-helds.

That said, the announcement finally got me to look at the 3DS, and at least from the screenshots I've seen, it looks like we've got the power of a gamecube coming to our hands in the least, which should be more than enough for this game. Sure, I just complained about games based on graphics, but I'd at least like to see the game advance past the Playstation 1 days. I don't need to see the individual hairs on the monkey's ass here, but the 3DS should make Legends 3 a pretty game.

With all my complaints about the game being on a hand held, it's hard to watch Inafune come out like this and not get excited.



You can feel the enthusiasm in his voice. You can see the excitement in his eyes as he stumbles over his words. And you can see that the man has been humbled by an audience that has basically given him the mandate, support, and opportunity, to create this game that's been ten years in the making.

Right now I'm not worried that Legends 3 will be a bad game. Inafune looks to be really fired up over this. I mean, he decided to break the news over Youtube and through Capcom's website. This is a relatively big news story in the games industry. Capcom could have easily sold this story to a magazine like Nintendo Power, or a website like IGN or GameSpot, but I don't think he could have waited any longer to get out there and say, "Hey guys, it's finally happening!"

Legends isn't particularly one of my favorite series in the franchise, but it has always been a fun series to play through. Having never seen a 3DS in action, and seeing Inafune as fired up as he is, I think it's very possible that Inafune decided to release this game on the 3DS as soon as it was given the green light.

Let's keep in mind that the series was far from incredible though when it came out, so lets not hype the game out to its grave. If Inafune wants to make his Magum Opus here, he has to surpass everything he's done so far and pour it all into this. He's been green-lighted by the fans, and now finally Capcom itself is on board, so lets wish him luck, and hope Legends 3 will be the pinnacle of the entire Mega Man franchise.

The Universe is a Bit Calmer

As more details come out about Mega Man Universe, my fears are being eased, slowly. While I still think the trailer is incredibly disappointing to look at, just knowing that custom characters, levels, and the like are going to feature different styles of play has slightly picked my interests back up into the title.

I really hope Capcom pumps as much juice into this game as possible though, because they really have a chance to get lazy and rely on user generated content, which would be a huge mistake if you ask me. Aside from the fact that millions of fan made levels are pure shit (just try Little Big Planet, or even Mega Man Powered Up), they're usually limited to the tools the developers give us to play with.

I personally, also don't feel like making my own levels. I'm not looking at a set of Legos, I'm looking at playing a Mega Man game. So please Capcom, don't skimp out on the professional content here.

As more news for this game comes out, I have a feeling I'll personally be more pleased and interested in playing it. I really want to see some other Mega Man protagonists make the cut here, at the very least X. If Capcom is smart though, they're going to play this slow and make the fans anticipate whats coming next.

Belated Zero Collections Review

There isn't a hell of a lot to add about this game that I haven't already said in my Zero 1, Zero 2, Zero 3, and Zero 4 reviews. The games for the most part are exactly the same, so I'm going to approach this review from a different angle. The question is, if you already own the entire Zero series, should you pick up Zero collections anyway?

If you look at the few things that are exclusive to Zero Collection, you won't really find much. The gameplay is exactly the same, the story is exactly the same (barring a few script alterations), and the games are for the most part the same. So what Zero collections has in its corner is Easy Mode, slightly customizable controls, and a gallery of new and old art. Inti Creates has also built in the E-Cards that were associated with Zero 3, but more on that in a moment.

Easy mode allows the player to venture through the series, one title after the other, playing with full upgrades for Zero. You get all the cyber elves, all the forms, and you take no penalties to your score for using them. This mode takes the challenge down from the Zero games to a very casual level, and it's not a bad way to spend an afternoon if you're not looking for too much of a challenge. Annoyingly, you can only have a single saved game of easy mode going on at a time, and you can't choose which title to start with. If you want to play Zero 3 on easy mode, but you haven't finished Zero 1 and 2, you're out of luck.

Aside from easy mode, the main games are all selectable from the start with very minor, if at all noticeable tweaks. The developers went out of their way to take any instance of the word "death" out of the script, and a few parts of the game have arranged music. I think there was a mini game or two removed (one of the multiplayer minigames unlocked after finishing one of the titles) and of course, you don't get the Z-Saber card for Battle Network 4.

In addition, the extra X and Y buttons are mappable to whatever other button on the controller you want them to emulate. This makes the game a bit more widely, compared to playing it on a Gameboy Advance, or through the GBA slot on a DS.

Lastly are the mod cards. In Japan for Rockman Zero 3, Capcom released cards for the e-reader peripheral. These cards add mostly aesthetic changes to Zero 3, with the occasional power up and new character, but they don't change anything too important. In Zero Collections, you can unlock a deck of these cards after you finish one of the four titles. You can apply these cards straight from the main menu.

There is also a gallery showing off various artwork on the bottom screen. You unlock these pictures through normal gameplay. A majority of them are old concept pictures that have been floating around forever, but it's still a nice touch.

With all the new features out of the way, I'll return to my original question. Should you buy this game if you already own the GBA series. It really depends on if any of the above additions appeal to you, or if you just want quick access to the whole series through your DS. However, if you don't own any single game of the series, collections is a must have for the Mega Man fan, and you should give it a shot if you thought the series was too hard to get into as well.

There really isn't any reason to hunt down the GBA copies over the collection either. Aside from maybe some idiotic puritanical devotion to seeing Harpuia say "kill me" instead of "finish me." But remember that what you see with Zero collections is what you get. Don't expect to unlock Misadventures of Tron Bonne or something if you finish all the games. Luckily in this collection's case, that's certainly more than enough.

My Mega Man Universe

For all we know, Mega Man Universe could still turn up awesome. It's a possibility anyway, but I can't say my hopes are up for the moment. Right now we know the biggest draw Capcom is pushing for this game is the ability to play as other characters, with enough footage of three different re-skinned Mega Mans, all sharing the same moves and abilities. But we've also got to assume some characters will play different at least, being as touted as Ryu is in all over the trailers. If we ignore the characters who are simply reskins, we could be possibly sitting on something here.

I'd like to share with you for a moment my vision of Mega Man Universe. You turn on the game and are presented with a few scenarios at the screen select. Story Mode, Custom Mode, Challenge Mode, and maybe a few others after some thought put into it.

I'll get to the others in a minute, but for now, lets go with custom mode. A character selection screen pops up, but instead of being robot masters, this time it's for characters the player can choose. In it exists a huge cast of Mega Man characters spanning nearly 25 years of games. We can choose a character, and then we're given the option to choose a game. One of the games from over the years, of any of the series.

Well it'd be ludicrous to have Capcom to recreate each game with new characters and jam pack it all into this game, so instead, this mode choose from some of the best moments of a given series. We set ourselves to a randomly assigned game and suddenly we end up with something like this...
Or how about we fiddle with the options a bit more, and get something like this?
Suddenly we've opened up a whole new world of possibilities! How would you like to relive some of the best Mega Man moments, with the character cards shuffled a bit? Wouldn't be awesome to go back to say... X5, and for the X versus Zero showdown, instead we're playing as say... Bass?

How about running a digger scenario from Legends with Geo and Sonia? Let's get real ridiculous and face the final boss of Zero 4 with a servbot! How about taking 8-bit classic Mega Man, and putting him in his level 7 and 8 games? How about we can walk into this thing, and have it randomly choose the characters and setup for us, so we can be surprised by the constant different gameplay.
Why stop there even? Why not celebrate all of Capcom with us? Have Dante show up in Mega Man Star Force, play as the bionic commando Mega Man 2, and since Frank West already has the X-Buster, why not let us play a level of Dead Rising as X?

Going through story mode should be something akin to the story mode of Super Smash Brothers Brawl. A big, nonsensical epic tale of Dr. Wily working with Sigma and Dr. Wiel to really screw up the space time continuum. All of our Mega characters work together, and the player unlocks new characters as we go along!

Challenge mode sets us up in preplanned unusual scenarios, like using Tron's Gustav to beat up Chill Penguin or something, or buster dueling Mega Man Juno with Mega Man classic. Completing these, and in fact, completing a large list of scenarios, unlocks more characters, more levels, and more modes.

Imagine a Wario-Ware style mode, where the player quickly shuffles through random setups and goals. I really see potential in celebrating the blue bomber this way, and I think going this route would encourage new fans to seek out some of the other games! Mega Man Powered Up proved to me that Mega Man can be fun as hell with new characters, so lets see Mega Man Universe really push the envelope with this, instead of being another rehashed Mega Man 2!

The Mega Man Universe Trailer

Alright, so we got our first look at the new Mega Man Universe trailer. I think it's fair to be disappointed by the footage, and even skeptical of the upcoming title, and that's because what's in the trailer isn't innovation, it's just homage.

Let's get a few things straight. There's no way I could possibly argue that I'm not an over-interested fan in the series, to put it lightly. When the game comes out, I won't hesitate to buy it and play it no matter how bad it is. I've got a Mega Man collection that nearly includes every US released game, and at this point, what difference is $10-$50 going to make for a new one? I don't believe there's any special kind of integrity or wholesomeness that comes with sticking to the series, any more than being some sort of intellectual connoisseur that avoids mediocre to bad games. It's a stupid hobby, and I feel like continuing it because I get a satisfaction out of it, and more power to the people who skip this game if it turns out to be a big pile of rehashed shit that it's leading us to believe so far.

So Mega Man stars in another 2D platformer, but this time with modern ugly graphics, and extra playable characters that nobody really asked for. The trailer hovers around Mega Man 2 styled enemies and levels, and I get the impression this is the game Inafune wants to live up to Mega Man 2. To put it bluntly, I believe Inafune is jerking off to a fan fest of his Magum Opus.

I'd like to quote Yahtzee from Zero Punctuation, who I believe sums up my thoughts exactly.

Fans create sequels that hold up the predecessors as something to live up to, rather than something to improve upon. And that's not the right mindset to take. If you're not going to try to be better, what's the point? To give something to all the other fans? They won't appreciate it. The more fan-oriented an installment becomes, the more holes they find to pick in it. Some kind of Un-fan-ny Valley effect, perhaps. But give it to someone who isn't a fan and they'll force it to change, and evolve. The fans will like it even less, but frankly, fuck 'em.

Inafune is looking more and more like a fan of his own work everyday, and while there's still a chance something special is going to come out of this, the trailer doesn't get me excited. So the game looks like Mega Man 2... so what? I have Mega Man 2 and have played it already. So the game lets you play as Ryu and Arthur. So what? I didn't buy Street Fighter IV or Super Ghouls n Ghost because I didn't give two shits about playing either of those games, give me some better reasons to play these characters besides a big Capcom circle jerk.

We're reaching another stagnating point of Mega Man's career, and that frankly just sucks. Why can't we have a real new innovative Mega Man game? Why can't we have brand new graphics, an amazing new innovative gameplay, and maybe even an interesting story? Why isn't Mega Man coming out with new games like Mario Galaxy, or Metroid Prime, or other games that try to push the series forward? Even Sonic the Hedgehog, with his terrible array of shitty games is at least trying different things!

The biggest step towards anything different this series ever took was with Battle Network and Star Force, and now we've been reduced to re-releasing those games while we go re-hash a 22 year old formula to play it safe. Is this game going to suck? It's still to early to say, but which trailer excites you more?

This gameplay trailer of the same old shit

More Mega Man Universe Info

or this fully animated cutscene trailer of somewhere the series has never been?

I know next to nothing about either of these games, but I know my interest is at least sparked with Rockman Online.

Battle Network 5: Double Team DS Addendum

A little more than half a year ago, I reviewed Battle Network 5 for the Gameboy Advance. I had finished both Team Protoman and Team Colonel, but I pretty much phoned in Double Team DS. I had assumed the game was largely unchanged with a few graphical additions and some new music. While this is mostly true, the game does feature a few new gameplay additions as well, which I neglected to mention. There isn't enough there to review the entire game over again, as the story, graphics, and level design is mostly unchanged, but I felt like pointing out some of the changes and how they affect my impressions of the game.

The biggest change to Battle Network 5 is the addition of Team Navi's and the Party Customizer. Early on in the game, ProtoMan and Chaud (or Baryl and Colonel) hand you a new device hooked on to Lan's homepage that allows him to add another Navi to his PET. This allows you to call upon other navi's aid during combat, or switch to them altogether. Navis come in all shapes and sizes, and you'll unlock them as you progress normally. Your team members have special abilities, such as ProtoMan jumping in to attack with a wide sword every now and again, and Gyro man using the Fan chip during combat.

Most of the abilities are pretty useless, but you'll find something you want out of the available choices, and being able to switch to another navi with full HP when MegaMan's in a jam is really helpful, especially when fighting somebody like Bass. Occasionally they'll get in your way and screw up combos and what not, but you can turn them off at any time. This whole ability certainly pulls back some of the tedium of wandering around, but it doesn't work in dungeons or liberation missions.

In addition to this, you can also obtain an item from the NumberMan trader that allows you to switch two team navi's from the different versions in the middle of a liberation mission. That means if you'd rather have ShadowMan over GyroMan, or KnightMan over MagnetMan, it's as easy as selecting a menu option.

Other changes include a few extra character portraits, some shoe horned DS minigames, bonuses for slotting into the gameboy advance other Battle Network games, and a tie in with Boktai. None of these things are very interesting, though the extra portraits were appreciated.

All and all though, it does little to alleviate the major problem with Battle Network 5, the limited folder options. You're just plain stuck with a pretty bad folder the whole way through the game, without a hell of a lot you can do without sacrificing power or versatility. You really have to play any Battle Network game except 4 to understand how precious having a wide range of chips is to one of these games.

In addition to this, you can't even trade chips between versions on the same DS! Talk about killing a selling point! Double Team DS is certainly more enjoyable than the gameboy advance versions, but the game overall is still a big turd on the whole series.

Mega Man NT Warrior vs. Rockman.exe

In various circles of "anime purists" I have consistently seen a meme spread among fans of Rockman.exe that the American Dub butchered the series. Is this what happened? Only by watching both shows can anyone really determine that, and having done just that myself, I'm going to have to remind folks that Rockman.exe wasn't that fine of a cut of beef to begin with.

Now to be fair, there are plenty of scenes in the show, and some other distinct changes that the dub made in strange ways, but a good portion of it comes down to nit-picking in my opinion. Far too many people have put the original show on a pedestal, when it just isn't that great a show in the original audio or the dub. So let's knock the original show down a few pegs, and maybe prop the dub up a little with a point by point comparison!

The Story

For what it's worth, each episode is nearly identical plot wise, with nearly no deviation. It does happen often enough to be noticeable if you've seen both shows though, in the form of a few cut scenes, changed dialog, or just different effects used. The biggest deviation I can think of that actually changes how the plot looks would be from the episode, "Don't Mess With Mama Zap!"
The episode in the original show has Count Zap in a drunken stupor, literally drinking out of the bottle, and ends with the possibility that either something magical happened, or Zap was hallucinating, as he confirms his mother has been dead for quite some time. This can be inferred in the dub version as well, but only if you're catching the subtle hints left in from the original. Either way it's still a weird episode.

Another change goes into Gauss's character, particularly in the episode, "Working for Grave." In the dub, Gauss is shown to highly respect Dr. Wily, but in the original show, he's flat out obsessed with him, and a cross dresser.
As I said, most story changes to the show are pretty minor, and very few of them give different or new context to the situation at hand. In most cases when something is different, the dub will add tons of lines of dialog from characters speaking off screen. I've pointed out continuously that characters in the dub speak ridiculously fast about certain things, and this problem is absent in the original. In fact, sometimes the original doesn't have the characters speaking enough, leaving the situation more confusing than mysterious.

A good number of cases I find the dub pulls off individual scenes better than the original, and other times, the original is just better. The shows are mostly identical, but the changes really do go scene to scene. I personally don't see a distinct winner here.

The Characters
The biggest change is not what the characters say, but how they say it, and Mega Man and Lan are quite different from Rockman and Netto. Well, actually, Lan is mostly the same, Brad Swailey's voice just isn't as convincing at being a young kid as Higa Kumiko, the Japanese voice actress. Netto's voice carries more innocence to it, and in a lot of ways makes the character more believable in some of the childish shit he pulls. If there was anything I wish the dub had done, it would be that it should have made an effort to make Lan sound his age.
When it comes to Rockman vs Mega Man, this call is a bit tougher. Frankly, Andrew Francis is a great Mega Man. His voice gives Mega Man a mature sound, without being too old. It feels right. Character wise, Mega Man's dialog has been altered to give him a bit of a bite to him, with a few cocky lines and a trash talking attitude, this Mega Man harks back to the Ruby-Spears character, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Akiko Kimura's portrayal is a lot more traditional. Rockman is much more serious, earnest, and good natured. This is the Mega Man character you know from the Battle Network games, and if there is any reason to watch both versions of the show, this is it. This is the most significant change, the attitude of the titular character. I think it works both ways if you ask me, though Rockman's portrayal may be only significant to me because of the games I've played. Someone who is just watching the show could take either character as a preference I suppose.

Most of the characters are exactly the same, but the voice actors decided to add a little something to them in the dub. Masa's Texan behavior, and Mr. Match's Scottish accent come to mind, and while not everyone likes these traits, I always found them endearing. Masa's dub voice actor in particular adds so much great dialog to an already well written character, that I just have to prefer him over the original, and the same goes for Mr. Match. I have to say, there maybe some English speaking bias here, because I simply don't know enough Japanese to pick up the nuances and dialects like a native speaker. Perhaps those characters are just as endearing over there if you know what to listen for.

Although Count Zap in the original speaks a lot of really badly broken English, with his catchphrase being "GOAD DAM MIT!" I'm guessing he's supposed to be an American or British character, but he sounds to ridiculous for me in a bad way in the original. If you'll recall, Count Zap is one of my favorites in the dub.

The rest of the cast has such minor changes it's hardly worth bringing up, although Ice Man sounds like a little kid instead of a 40 year old chain smoker, and I prefer Chaud's dub voice actor to the original. This maybe influenced heavily by my speaking English, but I have to say on average, I enjoy the character from the dub a bit better.

The Music

Japan is huge on creating a certain type of theme songs for their shows, and Rockman.exe opens up with a big ballade about fighting with your friendly net navi to solve mysteries and stuff. It's a pretty catchy tune, and if you've played Network Transmission, you've heard it before.

NT Warrior goes with a techno beat as the main theme, and while not as lyrical, it fits the world of all these computer age situations. When either of the main themes start up, Mega Man is generally turning the battle around, and it's time to start cheering!

As for the rest of the tracks, neither show uses more than about 10 total, and many times I felt the original show's selection seemed off in a number of places. Music in editing is as much timing as it is the music, and I simply feel that the dub's timing is much better.

The Cut Content

I speculated a long time ago that many of the episodes that were cut for the dub were done so for the sake of censorship. Just watching the original show, there are lots of language censorship in just about every episode, at least according to the fan translation I watched.

However, I am comfortable in saying that my speculation was mostly wrong, and these episodes were cut because they are by far the most boring pieces of trash I've ever seen involving Mega Man. Every cut episode is awful, absolutely awful. The only thing you miss from any of the cut episodes is a line about how glad Lan is the have Mega Man back after he is resurrected. That's IT! These episodes are on the lowest rungs of the totem pole for quality, especially the episode involving the introduction to that abomination to 3D animation, Aki.
In a show that's already rimming with continuity errors, stilted animation, and absolutely retarded dialog, that was in the script long before they headed overseas, making episodes as bad as "Take Me Out to the Ball Game," must of took an excruciating amount of effort. It's so awful. I find it hard to fault the dub for cutting some of the stuff they do, considering they didn't want the show to end up canceled.

Final Thoughts

I've never been particularly kind to XEBEC for this show, but I think Rockman.exe gave them the experience they needed to make Star Force as good as it was. When the show was shipped to the US, I think only the most retarded of Japanophile fanboys could seriously make an argument about how the dub ruined the show. The dub isn't perfect, but the main show isn't all that special either. Just cause Mega Man is in it, doesn't mean it's as worthy of the admiration it has.

If you enjoyed the dub, check out the original show for a slightly different take on Mega Man himself. If you didn't enjoy it, Rockman.exe isn't going to convert you by any means.

Catching Up

We'll I've been uncharacteristically swamped with work as of late, and unfortunately it just hasn't left me much time for Mega Man games and posts on this blog. Trust me, I have my eye on Mega Man Universe, whatever Inafune promised is coming around the corner, the Battle Network and Star Force books, and even the now fully translated Rockman.EXE Beast.

My time has just been swallowed up, but I'm pretty comfortable in allowing a decent time frame to pass before reviewing a new game like Mega Man Zero Collections anyway. My reviews are far from "The Last Word," on the subject before anyone makes a purchase, so I'll take my time with the game and enjoy it and give it time to find its place in my collection. A review is forthcoming, but since I haven't had much time to play the game, I'm not satisfied that I have enough knowledge of the game to review it just yet.

Over the past few weeks though, I did manage to catch some of the translated Rockman.exe every so often, and I now feel I have enough knowledge of the series to make a comparison to the dub, Mega Man NT Warrior. The review is on its way in just a few minutes.

On the chopping block

There's been a fair amount of Mega Man news lately and I think it's worth sharing my thoughts on some things.

First, Capcom community leader, Seth Killian leaks that there are some cool ideas heading our way in the Mega Man department. Speculation doesn't go on for very long before a patent hits the US Patent Office for Mega Man Universe.

The fans reactions vary all over the place with even more speculation, ranging from "I'll never buy this crap again," to, "I'm so excited I can't breathe anymore!" Without anything to go on, everyone begins digging hard to find out what's up with Mega Man Universe. Is it a new series? Is it a new type of game? Does it take place somewhere else? How does it tie into the rest of the franchise?

While this is going on, a Korean game surfaces, Mega Man Online. The details aren't very laid out just yet, but it appears to be a 2D Side Scrolling MMO, starring X and Zero. This game so far is only slated for Asian markets, excluding Japan. Is this Mega Man Universe? The words "Universe" and "MMO" certainly go together, but would Capcom file a US Patent for a game that currently has no plans to be released states side?

Capcom is asking about potential US interest in the title right now, but there aren't any plans yet. It has me wondering... could Mega Man Universe be something else? I guess they could be going with an early plan B and it could be, but you'd think if that was the case, they'd put "X" in the title at least. Interesting note, a few weeks before Mega Man Online surfaced, Inafune said X9 would not be the next X game. Was this cause he already knew this game was on the way.

While this rolls around, the Mega Man fan movie is finally completed, to mixed, but generally positive reviews among the fans. I haven't seen it yet, but it's on my todo list.

Udon meanwhile announces they'll be translating a Battle Network art book, similar to the Mega Man Complete Works, slated for November, which has me pretty excited!
And finally, released Tuesday was the Zero Collection for DS, which I have always considered the strongest series in the franchise.
What a hell of a lot of news huh?

We should get a lot of answers in a few days at the Japanese Summer World Hobby Fair, which has been a decent send off for new Mega Man games the past few years. My initial thoughts were that Mega Man Universe might be the name of the US release for Operation Shooting Star, but this idea isn't a new "rad concept" but more of the same, if anything. I'm also skeptical that Mega Man Online is Universe, for the reasons listed above, plus the fact that the game is being done by a team outside of Capcom, meaning that the Star Force/Battle Network team should be free to be working on something. But of course, that means if Mega Man Universe isn't Mega Man Online, then just what the hell is it? I guess we'll just have to wait and see, but I suspect we'll know in a week or two.
As for me, I've been doing a few things here and there. First off, I've been watching a Fan Sub of Rockman.exe, and have seen some notable difference of which I have a small post planned for in the future. In addition to this, I'm thinking about reviewing Battle Network 5 Double Team, as I recently played it a bit more extensively, and think it is different enough from the initial release of the game to cover more than I originally thought. Zero Collections is on my list of things to buy this week as well, so expect a review on that in the future, and possibly a review on the Mega Man fan movie.

And I'm on break

While I will never tire of Mega Man, I am getting some pretty heavy fatigue with this whole writing thing. The last few reviews have taken forever to do, because I'm dividing my time up differently. It's just as well, because I don't really have much more to say about Mega Man for the time being.

I'm not a big fan of comic books or mangas (and they're expensive enough as it is to get a hold of them) so I won't be heading that direction with Mega Man reviews. I don't really collect toys either, and while I wouldn't mind having some cool Mega Man figures, what would I really say about them?

This isn't a news site, and I have no interest in tracking down every piece of merchandise with Mega Man's face on it. Fan content and games don't hold my interest either (although a few choice items stand out), so for now, I'm out of Mega Man stuff to review. We've got Zero collection slated for summer, and I'll be on that one for sure, but I don't have anything in the que, so to speak.

I've thought about some other projects, such as the Sonic series, Castlevania, or Maximum Doom, but I'm not quite ready to get back into the mood of daily posts, so for now, I'm on hiatus. I'll probably work on fixing up the posts so they look less retarded (no promises!), but I'll be doing that at my own leisurely pace.

I've been doing these reviews for myself, but I've always written as if an audience was reading. While I don't have many readers, checking my stats lately shows I've been getting more and more returning hits as of late that are actually looking at something other than my cache of screenshots, or my poor use of vulgar language stringed together with certain characters names (Christ, why is everyone so obsessed with what's under Mayl's skirt!? SHE'S 11 and a CARTOON!).

Anyway, if you're perusing the posts, feel free to leave a comment. I won't always respond if there isn't much content in your post, but I do read them all. Don't hesitate to post corrections, errors, or general feedback. And if you think the quality of any of the articles is poor, which you'd be right, don't hesitate to let me know.

Mega Man's been a whole hell of a lot of fun to me these past 22 years, and here's hoping he's still fun 50 more years from now!

Mega Man 10: Threat From Outer Space!!

When I started reviewing Mega Man games several months back, it was a leisurely way to escape my own problems for a little bit, and articulate just why I love this whole franchise, starting from the original Blue Bomber, all the way to Mega Man Star Force, and hitting all points in between. After running out of games, I hit up the several cartoon series until I had nothing left to review. With all the sequels, spin-offs, and remakes in this franchise, I find it fitting that my last review (for now) comes back to the roots of the series.

I initially expressed my fears with the series continuing on in 8-bit, stating that I felt the series would become stagnant again. I've always felt that Mega Man has fallen behind the other gaming icons of his day, such as Mario, Link, and Sonic, and, while I don't think Mega Man has anything to prove, I find it sad that he has yet to have a real Next-Gen console game that utilizes the capabilities of any of the systems.

That is a complaint with the series as a whole though, more than anything, and doesn't affect my review so much of the individual game. The game itself is good, higher quality than most Mega Man titles, and it could be the start of something great for the franchise.

New Features

• Play as Mega Man, Proto Man, or Bass (DLC), in three (slightly) separate stories.
• A difficulty select which changes the game quite significantly for all three options.
• Returning from Mega Man Powered Up, Challenge Mode.
• Save and watch replays of your best times, or check out the ranked leader boards videos.

Story
Okay, now I know Inafune knows these stories are just a load of junk. I'm serious, when asked about Mega Man 10's story in that online broadcast a while back, he basically said, "what story?" So yes, Mega Man 10's story is pretty silly, and it honestly could be the plot of one of the Ruby-Spears episodes.

One day, Roll gets sick with flu like symptoms. She's been infected with a virus that makes robots sick, and they've dubbed the virus, Roboenza. The virus soon spreads, and starts causing robots to go out of control and wreak havoc.

Dr. Wily shows up at Dr. Light's lab after having been attacked by one of the robots. Wily's been working on a cure, and has created a machine to help him, but it was stolen by the robots. Mega Man runs off to get back the machine, and Proto Man offers to help him along the way.

From here, you can choose who you want to play as, Mega Man, Proto Man, or Bass (if you've downloaded him), and the story changes slightly depending who you pick. I'm talking like a few sentences at most, hardly anything to get excited about. Even Mega Man and Bass had more variety in the story.

Anyway, surprise surprise, it turns out Dr. Wily was behind everything! After defeating Wily, he's rushed to the hospital with a fever. He escapes from there, but leaves behind the cure to Roboenza.

Aesthetics
Inafune is the type of artist that likes to do more with less. Like a painter who's canvass is a business card, Inafune has restricted Mega Man 10's color pallet back down to 8-bit. Of course, Mega Man 10's graphical prowess is a joke, hardly utilizes any of the consoles to their full potential, but Mega Man just looks at home in his limited color values.

I'd gauge this game aesthetically superior to Mega Man 9, as most of the environments have a lot more detail. By comparison, Mega Man 9's environments were a bit empty. Mega Man 10 transports the player to an icy plain, to a psychotic highway, to a sports arena. Every inch of space is used up appropriately, and there is a great deal to look at. The game is big on some small details too, like the met hat sitting on top of a building in the credits, the addition of Tango and Reggae sprites, and just the overall feel of the game in general.

The bosses are pretty ridiculous looking, and I get the feeling creating these robot masters is getting harder and harder. As stupid as Sheep Man is, you can almost hear the developers snickering to themselves with each bolt of electricity he sends at you. If anything, it's Pump Man that wins the award for stupidest looking robot master, as he literally jiggles the back of his head to attack you.

However, some robot masters made a reappearance in this title, a couple with brand new 8-bit sprites! Wily's first stage is by far the highlight of the game for this reason. I was a bit disappointed with Bass's new sprites however, as I think the Neo Geo sprites of Bass just look better, but this is a minor complaint. Overall, Mega Man 10 surprises you at every turn and gives you something to look at on every screen.

Sound
Mega Man 10 hits the batting average in the music department this time around, which is always good, but far from the home runs of Mega Man 2, X, ZX, or Star Force. The title screen music is pretty good, and the majority of the games tracks are pretty mellow for a Mega Man title. I really wish they were more memorable and kick ass like some of the other games, and I'm not a big fan of the introduction music, but otherwise it's a decent soundtrack. As far as sound effects go, nothing you haven't heard a million times before.

Design
At first, I wasn't too impressed with Mega Man 10. It was better than a good chunk of Mega Man games, but it didn't hit all the right spots in terms of fun that Mega Man 9 did. For example, in Mega Man 9, you're hit with a great deal of new platforming gimmicks and enemies, from the rotating platforms in Tornado Man's stage, to the swinging pendulums in Jewel Man's stage.

Mega Man 10 starts out pretty standard in my mind, sticking with the tired and true type of level design, rather than laying on the gimmicks. However, Mega Man 10 is easily much harder than Mega Man 9, because it doesn't rely on those cheap tricks. More often then not, the stages are designed around wearing you down, while the instant death spots are pretty obvious to avoid with some timing.

Mega Man 10 makes you think about how to beat each screen based on the enemy layout, where as Mega Man 9, you could pretty much just blow through everything with the right weapon. This time around, the weapons are a little more balanced, and require the player to think on the proper application of the weapon to make use of it. Interestingly, most of the weapons are actually pretty weak with a head on direct shot, but quite powerful when you use them right.

Figuring this out can be tough, so it helps that a lot that players are able to upload videos of their best times through a stage directly through the game. Take note of these players techniques, and you'll discover some very cool things, like riding Wheel Cutter up walls, or the weapon switch trick with solar blaze. It's at this point, I began to see the depth of the design of the game start to break the surface.

This game really functions more methodically than other Mega Man games, and each screen presents a sort of puzzle to get through it. Running and gunning won't work this time around, and even after you've beaten the game a few times around, it'll require you to make choices about how you'd like to proceed. For instance, Triple Blade is easily the best weapon in the game, especially against minibosses, but it has the most difficult pitfall sections. You could wait until after you've gotten Rush Jet to get past it, but by then, the utility of Triple Blade might be gone.

Enemy setup aside, I found most of the stages pretty bland, but a few kick ass. Commando Man and Nitro Man's stages are fun, and Wily 1 is probably the best stage ever made in a Mega Man game! (You fight 1 robot from each of the previous nine games!) The levels that I thought were bland, however, instantly became much more memorable in Hard Mode, which is damn near impossible to beat. It's easily harder than Mega Man and Bass, and it adds so much to the game in terms of replayability. The first time a boss hit me with a new attack in hard mode, my reaction was "HOLY SHIT!"

Rounding out hard mode is easy mode, good for beginner and younger players, like my 7 year old cousin. It's a joke to anyone whose experienced in Mega Man games, but hopefully this mode will bring in a new generation of players. Proto Man and Bass also offer their own unique styles of play, giving you quite a chunk of game to see.

Mega Man 10 pumps out some extras as well, as challenges and achievements have returned. The standard "Beat the game in such and such time," and "don't get hit," achievements are there, but now the game has added a multitude of little scenarios to complete, ala Mega Man Powered Up. The scenarios are fun and give you a chance to practice on some of those pain in the ass bosses.

Also returning is time attack, but with a twist. The DLC for the game lets you download new stages with the Mega Man Killers, Enker, Ballade, and Punk, and beating these stages grants you the robot master's weapon as well, even for the main game! How cool is that? Unfortunately, you can't run the time attack with Proto Man or Bass as of yet, which sucks pretty heavily. What's the deal here Capcom?

Between Mega Man 9 and 10, I'd say 9 is the better game, because I enjoyed the platforming much more, but 10 is just barely behind it in terms of quality, and I won't at all be surprised to see people prefer this one over all the others.

Playability
I played my copy on the Nintendo Wii, and had a major problem with accidentally pushing the weapon switch buttons during normal game play. Maybe I just have fat fingers though. I doubt this is a problem for 360 and PS3 owners, and if you own one of the classic controller add ons for the Wii, this would probably eliminate that problem.

The characters all control smoothly, though I found Proto Man's ability to block shots with his shield cumbersome, as it only works when he jumps, and it isn't very reliable. The other playability issue comes from the weapons, which take some time to learn to use properly, particularly Thunder Wool, which is almost entirely useless if pulled off wrong, and difficult to use at that. Frankly, I've resorted to just forgetting about the damn thing against Pump Man.

Extras

• My personal boss order so far is: Chill Man, Nitro Man, Commando Man, Blade Man, Strike Man, Sheep Man, Pump Man, Solar Man.
• Wheel Cutter goes up walls, and is just too fun to use EVERYWHERE!
• It is possible to Rush Jet across the pits in Blade Man's stage, although it can be a perilous journey.
• If you have trouble, check out the replays posted in the ranking charts of other player's attempts, or post some yourself!
• Defeating a Mega Man Killer in time attack will net you his weapon for the main game as well!

Mega Man 10 didn't disappoint, and I keep finding new things to like about it. I'm really liking the community aspect that's starting to come together around Mega Man with the leaderboards and rankings. Mega Man 10 has a lot of polish and features Mega Man 9 didn't have, and while I still think Mega Man 9 was better, I'm liking the direction 10 is taking the series. Yeah, I still wish we had a real Next-Gen title, but at least Inafune is finding new ways to play with the old style.

Rockman.exe Program of Light and Dark

While I'd like to review Stream, Beast and Beast+, unfortunately those series lack complete subtitled translations as of yet. However, there is one last Mega Man cartoon which did get translated, a movie rather. This 50 minute movie from the Mega Man NT Warrior universe puts a final cap on the Dr. Regal saga, and retells the events of Battle Network 5... with quite a liberal use of creative license. For now, this will be my final Mega Man cartoon review.

A bit of background, Program of Light and Dark takes place sometime during the Stream series. Stream followed a story where cross-fusion became a bit more prevalent amongst the cast, and Lan and MegaMan ended up having to deal with a being from outer space named Duo, with the help of a new mysterious Navi named Colonel, whose mysterious operator hides his identity from Lan. Anyway, Bass decides he wants to take MegaMan's ultimate program (the junk from the end of the second season of NT Warrior) to make him self the ultimate navi. He attacks MegaMan a bit, then gets banished to the undernet by Duo's helper, Slur. Fast forward to the movie...

Plot Synopsis
We open up with some sort of cross-over between Rockman.Exe and some other anime series about card battling or some shit. Maybe this was part of a double feature or something. Anyway, once the movie begins proper, Bass is floating around the undernet when suddenly a giant monster thing appears. Then huge laser things start moving around the Earth and absorbing building and people and stuff, and forming strange glyphs in the landscape.

Lan and his friends are at an amusement park while this is going on, NetBattling to the Stream opening theme of "Be Somewhere," and he suddenly gets a call from his dad to go put a stop to it by blowing up some huge server or something at a building called TRINITY. As MegaMan arrives in the server to destroy it, Bass shows up and starts fighting him. Colonel also shows up in the nick of time to help out MegaMan, and distracts Bass while MegaMan blasts at the server.
It's not good enough though, because the strange entity of energy sucks up the data anyway and the monster Bass ran into shows up, who Bass identifies as Nebula Grey. The big laser beams show up again and start sucking up the city, along with all of Lan's friends. Lan is momentarily depressed when his dad picks him up, and tells him he has a plan how to get everyone back.

So basically these lasers aren't killing people, but actually the remains of a program called Spectrum, which is the combination of two programs by Tadashi Hikari (Lan's Grandfather) and Dr. Wily. Essentially, it makes it so people can materialize in the cyberworld, but the project got canceled when Dr. Wily went to work for the Netopian Army.

Anyway, apparently Nebula Grey was hidden in the program, and is trying to suck up the real world into the cyber world. MegaMan wonders if he's strong enough to stop it, and asks Lan if maybe they should give Bass MegaMan's ultimate program to stop it.
Just then, Dr. Regal appears out of nowhere, apparently having survived getting blown the fuck up in Axess. When LaserMan was taken out, his data was sent to the cyberworld, and Regal went with him. Then, Dr. Regal had enough time to find out about Nebula Grey, and grow a pretty wicked goatee. Anyway, he's fused with Nebula Grey and plans to take over the world, but in order to do that, he needs to kidnap Lan's father for some sort of access code with Tadashi Hikari's program. They teleport away, so Lan meets up with Chaud and Raika to form a plan.
Using Chaud's connections with the Netopian army, Chaud learns the location of base where Dr. Wily's program is stored, and presumably where Dr. Regal has taken Lan's father. Raika, Chaud, and Lan all Cross-Fuse with a SciLab dimensional area around the island and attack. They're surrounded by laser shooting mechs, which Raika and Chaud hold off, while Lan looks for his father.

Then Regal activates Spectrum, using the codes found in Dr. Hikari's fucking iris, and this somehow causes a temporal rift in time, which sends Baryl (Colonel's operator) to the future, and he rescues Lan from certain doom. They find the capsule where spectrum is functioning, and Jack MegaMan and Colonel in to stop it. Colonel holds off security while MegaMan goes to deal with Regal, who is jacked inside the machine.
Nebula Grey is starting to materialize in the real world, but luckily, Bass shows up to help fight him off, apparently pissed that Regal manipulated him somehow... I guess? MegaMan and Bass are strong, but not enough to stop Regal, who starts absorbing them in Nebula Grey. MegaMan figures his only hope is to give Bass his Ultimate Program to stop Nebula Grey, even if it means MegaMan's deletion.
Bass is all too happy to oblige MegaMan's request and begins absorbing his ultimate program... but wait a second, it looks like MegaMan is actually taking over Bass's ultimate program! MegaMan fuses with Bass into a Bass DoubleSoul, and then uses his new power to destroy Nebula Grey, and Dr. Regal once and for all.

The process of the Earth turning into the cyberworld stops, and the world is saved. But uh-oh! Regal was a load-bearing villain, and the whole island is blowing up! Also, MegaMan is too weak to escape and Lan can't jack him out. Bass breaks the DoubleSoul Cross-Fusion, and MegaMan is able to jack out while Bass is absorbed in the blast and presumed dead (he's not). Baryl returns to the past, and Lan and his team are picked up by the Net Police as the credits roll.

Critique
If you understood any of that, please explain it to me, because this whole fucking story is beyond comprehension, and is so convoluted and confusing, I can't really say if it's good or bad. This story makes no fucking sense, and I'm speaking as someone who actually is up on the Mega Man canon. Imagine if you were someone that didn't know Mega Man too well, this would be complete drivel to you! Stream isn't necessary to watch before seeing this movie, because it won't make it any less confusing. The plot is just a broken mess.

That aside, the animation, artwork, and music are all top notch. This is what you would expect from a bigger budget movie, and MegaMan has never looked better in this high quality. We also got to see a lot more of Bass in a role much less retarded than his previous ones, which is always a plus, and he actually fought MegaMan this time. This is definitely an eye candy event.

I did like that they cleverly threw away Lan's friends for most of the movie to keep the plot more action focused, because if you had any time to think about the plot, you wouldn't be looking at all the pretty animation. There's a lot of clever effects here, and I especially like the mosaic ending effect.

It's been a while since I've watched a subtitled episode of Rockman.exe, but there's quite a noticeable change of tone between the two shows. MegaMan and Lan both sound much younger, which I think works to their advantage some what, and the musical choices are completely different. The cross-fusion music in particular, which became sort of the theme of the Japanese show feels off when it's used, but it is catchy.

For as stupid as the plot is, I'm glad I watched the movie at the end of it. It looks nice, and as a Mega Man fan, I enjoyed it. I can't say I'd recommend this to anyone besides Mega Man fans, as I was lost enough knowing what was going on. I'd probably hate this movie any other way, but you can't deny the animation is good. I think Star Force carries on this level of quality with its animation in a lot of episodes though, with less of the retarded plot nonsense. As a Mega Man fan, I rate the movie a thumbs up.

Rating: Thumbs up!

And that's it for the Mega Man cartoons. I'd love to do Stream, Beast, and Beast + some day, but I won't touch them until an English subtitled release comes out. Beast is almost done, but that group updates slower than the continental drift, and Stream has been on indefinite hold by so many groups so many times. Right now there is a group working on subtitling the original audio for Axess, and they plan to do Stream and the others, but they just started and I wouldn't count on seeing that done to completion anytime soon, even within five years. Face it, fan projects suck with time tables, and there is surprizingly a lot of drama amongst self important subbers, so with that little egotistical trait they all seem to share, I wouldn't count on ever seeing me review any of the next few series. All well, at least I mostly enjoyed what time I had with Lan and MegaMan.
Next up, the last review (for a while) for Mega Man. The new game, Mega Man 10!

Axess: Dr. Regal's Rampage

This is it folks, the final episode of the American Dub of Rockman.Exe, Mega Man NT Warrior. It's the season finale to Axess, a season the departed from jumping into networks, and instead went for merging characters together to make super heroes. Whether you thought the show was better or worse for it, Time-Warner killed it. So how did the show go out?

Plot Synopsis
Of course, things are pretty bad. Dimensional area covering the whole world, millions of NetNavi's trapped and being messed up, and ShadeMan running amok! Oh hey, Dr. Regal just cross-fused and instantly killed ShadeMan! Well at least the darkloids are out of the picture.

Except now, Dr. Regal has decided to have his master plan come to fruition. Cross-Fused with LaserMan using a lot of Dark Synchro chips, Regal increases his size to tower over sky-scrapers, and being destroying DenTech city! Not only that, but apparently there are other giant LaserMan's all over the world doing the same thing!

Everyone retreats back to SciLab for the time being. The goal is to take out Regal's tower, which is powering up the dimensional area across the Earth. If that goes down, Regal's cross-fusion should break. The power source is in the center of the tower, and using a series of deus ex machina information, fake techno-babble, and some just straight up bullshit, Dr. Hikari knows that there's some ultra firewall thing blocking their NetNavis from attacking, but he also knows what to do to get around it, maybe.

In any case, Regal is heading to SciLab, so Lan tries to stall for time by Cross-Fusing with MegaMan. He loads up five DoubleSouls, giving him Cross-Fused DoubleSoul Ultra Power Extraordinaire Super Duper! (Yeah, I made up most of that...) Even with this extra power, Lan can only really annoy Dr. Regal. Chaud awakens ProtoMan and runs to help out Lan, whose been exhausted so much, he can't even move.

Chaud continues to stall for time while Lan struggles about, unable to get to his feet. Raika meanwhile has arrived at the scene to deal with the power source and firewall. He's enlisted the help of the rest of the cast (Mayl, Tory, Dex, Yai, Shuko, Higsby) to deal with the viruses guarding it. Everyone jacks in, and then we roll the stock attack animations, oh yay? Also joining the fight are JunkMan, ThunderMan, and BubbleMan (looking for revenge for ShadeMan).

While this happens, Chaud is thrown down hard by Regal, and taken out of the fight. Regal continues advancing on SciLab, which futilely tries to protect itself with it's own dimensional area. Regal breaks through, and it looks like everyone is done for!

But wait! All the millions of NetNavis who have been captured begin cheering for Lan and MegaMan. In an act of true anime cliched fashion, they transfer all of their power to Lan's cross-fusion, and he goes super saiyan. His power levels (whatever the hell those are), are so high, they blow up Mr. Famous's computer. Lan gets up, and then puts the beat down on Dr. Regal, all without Battlechips or his Mega Buster. He just straight up beats the shit out of him with his hands and feet!

With Regal on the ropes, Lan fires a charged shot, just as SearchMan destroys the dimensional area generator. Regal gets blasted and lets out a villainous "Nooooooo!" and blows up. The dimensional area collapses, and everyone enjoys a party under the meteor shower. Regal is missing, but ah, who cares right? Just look at the size of that meteor! Oh yeah, and BubbleMan gives back Rush.

Then Ms. Yuri turns out to be alive looking at it, and says some ominous words while looking at the meteor. NOT THAT IT MATTERS! The show is dead, sorry folks!

Critique
As far as ridiculous goes, this episode pretty much tops the entire series. Like a finale, it's big big big, and if you've ever seen any anime, this is about as standard anime as you can get. There's a lot of things wrong with this episode, particularly with every scene involving Dr. Hikari, but the whole package is wrapped up nice enough to keep you from dwelling on it.

You've got all the major players of the season showing up, the big bad guys plan starting up, and all hope being lost until the main character fucks the villains up. The music is in the right spots, the animation is mostly well done, and the ending is satisfactory, if a little hamfisted. It's about what you'd want, and the setup for stream is too minor to really bring it into a lot of focus. There's really no reason to miss this episode.

Rating: Thumbs up!

And that's the end of Axess, and the entire dub. The show was never picked up after that, and later Mega Man dubs would also be completed mishandled by Time-Warner (see Mega Man Star Force). Time-Warner must have felt this series was such a disaster, it never even came out on dvd... ouch.

Axess has it's moments, but I feel it's inferior to the original series due to the complete tonal shift of the show. The break away from the Battle Network style, while still trying to keep a semblance of the original source story, disconnected the show for me. As a whole, I'd still say Axess is worth watching if you're a Mega Man fan, or even if you enjoyed NT Warrior, but I don't know how to gauge it against the other shows that were running at the time.

In Japan however, Rockman.Exe would continue for quite awhile, and transition into Star Force after that, without a break between seasons mind you. The show would continue with Stream, Beast, and Beast +, but after Stream, the show took some noticeable hits. The seasons were shorter, and then the time slot was cut in half. Last I heard though, the show is still airing in syndication over there.

As far as the US is concerned though, I wouldn't count on ever seeing the other seasons continued. In all likely hood, Time-Warner still owns the rights to airing Mega Man related media on television, and they have a history of not working with it. Viz Media did comment as recently as last year that something might happen with the NT Warrior series, but as to what is only speculation. In all likely hood, it'll be the dvd release of Axess, or if we're lucky, subtitles of the original shows, continued on to the episodes we didn't see.

Rebooting the show just isn't going to happen. Aside from the cast having moved on, the only people who care about the show are few and far between. First, you need to be a Mega Man fan, then you need to be a Battle Network fan, then you need to be a fan of the show. That's quite a niche audience if you ask me.

Even the idea of the dvd release is skeptical if Battle Network doesn't have some sort of renewed interest. Capcom is pushing for this with Operation Shooting Star, but if that doesn't hit the states, we're pretty much in the position we're at now. Without renewed interest from a new generation of fans, we're just not going to see more MegaMan.exe in the states.

Is there hope for those of us who don't speak Japanese but still want to see the rest of the show? Yes, and I'll detail that in my very last Mega Man cartoon post, coming up next!

Axess: Dark Vs. Dark

Plot Synopsis
Chaud and ProtoMan are in need of a rest, but a band-aid is good enough for Lan. He'll need his strength, cause shit is about to hit the fan.

Dr. Regal and LaserMan have started to gather millions of NetNavi's with those UFO things from the second episode, and are powering up something big: a dimensional area generator large enough to cover the entire world!

In the meantime, ShadeMan has decided to capture Rush and convert him into his own synchro chip so he can enter the human world without a dimensional area. He goes off in search of Regal, after blowing up a few bits of SciLab. Since ShadeMan isn't exactly using discretion in what he destroys, Lan and MegaMan try to stop him with some dimensional areas of their own.

Lan is still no match for ShadeMan, as ShadeMan breaks his Cross-Fusion. Just as Lan is about ot meet his maker, Regal challenges ShadeMan at the top of his tower. The two have a stand off as the episode comes to a close.

Critique
About what you would expect for the second to last episode of Axess. Lots of buildup for the finale, though it feels like the dubbers cut out a few things, mostly with regards to Lan's injuries. That does little to affect the overall feel of the episode though.

I'm a bit miffed about the whole Rush Synchro chip thing. Rush gets introduced to do something no one else can, but we go along with it for a joke, and they never take it seriously. Well jokes on us, because now it's a major plot element. All well, whatever.

This is a satisfactory episode, but the real question is, are you ready for not only the season finale, but the series finale of Mega Man NT Warrior?

Rating: Thumbs up!

Axess: ProtoMan Returns

Plot Synopsis
SciLab finally has completed their own dimensional area generator, which presumably doesn't run off the souls of NetNavis, and they've also managed to complete the vaccine chip, a battlechip designed to reverse the effects of Dark Chips. With everything in place, it's time to get ProtoMan back.

The cast lay a trap for ProtoMan, knowing he'll show up to destroy SciLab's dimensional area generator for Nebula to retain their advantage. They lure ProtoMan out there, then trap him inside with Lan, who will use his Cross-Fusion to plant the vaccine chip on ProtoMan. Chaud also manages to sneak into the dimensional area before it goes up.

The plan works, almost, but the Dark Chip is regenerated in ProtoMan, and apparently much stronger than a normal chip. ProtoMan blasts Lan, but Lan and MegaMan take the shot dead on, trying to absorb ProtoMan's dark aura. Lan continually suffers the beating, draining off as much energy as he can. Chaud joins the frey, as he jumps straight into ProtoMan and Cross-Fuses with him. Now Lan has to deal with a dark chip corrupted Chaud, as Chaud and ProtoMan duke it out in their combined mind.

Memories have been sealed away in ProtoMan, from earlier times of Chaud and his past. ProtoMan tries to fight back against it, but Chaud is persistent. Chaud even takes direct blasts from ProtoMan, which phase him, but don't keep him down. Chaud gets close enough to ProtoMan, and hugs him, telling ProtoMan that, "no matter how dark your heart has become, you'll always be my NetNavi." This, combined with Lan draining more of ProtoMan's dark aura destroys the dark chip, and ProtoMan becomes free of it's grasp.

ProtoMan is back, although completely exhausted, along with everyone else, especially Lan, who is pretty fucked up from the ordeal. ProtoMan musters some strength to apologize and thank Chaud for saving him. Chaud thinks it's time for a vacation.

Critique
Some episodes in an anime are more anime than others. This episode is definitely a 10 on the anime scale. If you're not exactly sure what I mean, you might consider cutting down your anime intake just a bit. But lets not hold that against the episode. Let's also not hold the title, which is the fucking 5th episode to be titled "Soandso Returns," because at least this time it makes some contextual sense.

This episode doesn't really go out of it's way to make a hell of a lot of sense, but it doesn't dwell on anything like the last train wreck of an episode, and for once, the dimensional area doesn't look like ass. This is one of the key episodes of the season, so you would expect a bit of a higher quality for it than normal, and I think it delivers what it promises. Yeah, it goes off on the power of friendship trope a lot, but that's pretty standard for Battle Network in general. This is a good episode to watch though, and it brings resolution to the biggest story arc of Axess.

Let us bow our heads in a moment of silence though, for the loss of Evil ProtoMan. I've prepared a eulogy..., Ahem...

I knew Proto Man as that asshole in Mega Man 3, who would annoyingly get in my way between Shadow Man, Hard Man, and Magnet Man. I would forgive him though, for he had sunglasses and a scarf, which made him look at least three times cooler than Mega Man, and style matters quite a bit.

In Mega Man 5, Proto Man would stand with his trade mark smirk among eight new worthless robot masters. This Proto Man would turn out to be a phony, but the sentiment remained the same. In Mega Man 7, Proto Man thought it necessary to attack us in Shade Man's stage for the hell of it, but at least he gave us a present.

Proto Man then took his evilness to the next level in the Ruby-Spears production of Mega Man. Proto Man cast away his moral ambiguity for a more conspicuous stance, "being the bad guy is awesome." From his creation of just randomly smashing shit for the hell of it, to attempting to blast Abraham Lincoln, Proto Man reveled in his new found love for doing the wrong thing.

He had a soft spot though, he always tried to convince Mega Man to, "join the bad side bro." And Mega Man would one day reveal, that even Proto Man's awesomeness would not go unnoticed by him. "The truth is, I've always really wanted a brother relationship with you, Proto Man."

And who wouldn't? How many of us can say we've had a brother half as cool as Proto Man, even if he was evil? ProtoMan.Exe would then take stints in the Battle Network series, acting more like an asshole than straight up evil, but the corruption of the Dark Chip would bring back that smugness we all know and love to the role, delivering such memorable lines as, "Chaud, you mean nothing to me!"

Eventually, ProtoMan would cast aside his evil ways, and even actively help Mega Man as recently as Mega Man 10, and that's a damn shame. Evil Proto Man, we hardly knew ye, but at least we still got Bass... for now...

Rating: Thumbs up!

Axess: Ms. Yuri's Mission

Plot Synopsis
Ms. Yuri is out shopping one day when she runs into...umm... whats his face... cross-fusion guy? Oh, it's right on the tip of my tongue... oh yeah, Misaki. Mr. Unforgettable himself tries to arrest her, but she manages to elude him. In doing so, she runs into Ms. Mari, who is confused, and scared, and possibly grouchy, and wants to know if Ms. Yuri is her long lost sister. Misaki catches up, and Ms. Yuri then gets hit by a bus. Well, so far the episode is going fantastic!

Good thing we've got 15 minutes of exposition coming up to ruin it! Here's the gist, Ms. Mari had a sister, Ms. Yuri, who was in a plane crash with their father when a meteorite hit the plane. They never found there bodies. Ms. Yuri continues the story, by infecting the plot with the cancer that is growing on the Mega Man franchise, Duo. Sigh...

Duo is some extra terrestrial being, who turned Ms. Yuri into Wolverine for some reason, and also did something to Dr. Regal or whatever, and then they were raised by Dr. Wily. I really can't believe this is some how stupider than the actual plot of Battle Network 4, which is abysmally stupid to begin with.

Anyway, Ms. Yuri escapes for a bit, and Dr. Regal gives her a dark synchro-chip and tells her to assassinate Ms. Mari to prove her loyalty. She agrees, then hijacks Misaki's car with him in it, and tracks down Ms. Mari. She gets Ms. Mari at gunpoi... excuse me, "Neural Disruptor Point", but hesitates to fire. Misaki tries to grab her, but she throws him off, and cross-fuses with SpikeMan. Lan cross-fuses with MegaMan to try and stop her.

Impatient, ProtoMan shows up and demands Ms. Yuri finish her mission. Ms. Yuri can't do it, so ProtoMan goes to strike Ms. Mari. Ms. Yuri blocks the attack, so ProtoMan strikes her, breaking her cross-fusion. He hits a sonic-boom onto the bridge, causing both Misaki and Ms. Yuri to fall off into the drink. Ms. Mari screams "Nooooooo!" as we hear a news report announce that the two people who fell off the bridge have yet to be found.

Critique
You almost have a good episode here. Really you do. In fact, cut out about 15 minutes of this episode, and it's a winner. But Duo tends to kill everything he touches, and this episode just happens to be one of those things. I hope you like characters talking on and on and on about nonsense, then reiterating all of those points, because that's the majority of this episode.

Oh, and it had such a good build up too. Yuri tasked with killing her sister, her escape from police custody, the cross-fusion thing. Oh it could have been great! Instead, it's YAP YAP YAP YAP YAP!

There are elements that make this episode worth watching, that I won't deny, but most of this episode's baggage is a setup for Stream more than a finale for Axess, so these retarded plot points won't ever come to fruition in the dub anyway. You're almost better off not watching this episode to save yourself the frustration of how dumb the show gets. Sigh, and it was such a good idea too...

Rating: Thumbs down.