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!
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Monday, April 12, 2010
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
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
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.
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!
Friday, April 2, 2010
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!
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!
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