Welcome to another edition of Playing With Power. The review article that looks at all things Nintendo Entertainment System. And welcome dear reader to the 2nd week of Mega May, where we celebrate a whole month of Blue Bomber with four reviews of classic Mega Man games. And this week is definitely a long awaited one, that’s for sure. To say that this game is beloved would definitely be an understatement. It was not just the game that made Mega Man a legend, but is one of the most beloved titles on the great grey box. But does it truly live up to the hype? Let’s find out with this week’s review of Mega Man 2.
YEAR OF RELEASE: 1988
PUBLISHER: Capcom
GENRE: Action Platformer
While Mega Man 1 was a sleeper hit, it wasn’t as successful as initially hoped, and certainly not enough to warrant an imemdiate sequel. But Capcom still greenlighted the project provided that the Rockman team worked on other games as well. The game took all of three to four months to develop. Many things that were initially removed from Mega Man 1 due to limited cart space for the time were added to Mega Man 2, while they still stuck to the initial elements of the original title. The Rockman team would even go “interactive”, and ask fans for submissions for robot masters and enemies in the game, and would receive a stunning 8370 boss designs.
Mega Man 2 was released in December of 1988 in Japan, and early 1989 in North America. This time though, Mega Man 2 wouldn’t be a sleeper hit, but a massive success. Thanks to the word of mouth from MM1, along with more publications being around like the then just born Nintendo Power (which it would don the cover of), Mega Man 2 would make bank with over 1.5 million copies sold, the best selling game in the entire series. It is often credited as the game that truly made the franchise a reality, as well as being one of the major games to solidify Capcom as a brand to be reckoned with. And with the success of the game came success for the character. Mega Mania hit big, with books, handheld Tiger games, toys, you name it. Mega Man would even get a starring role in the Captain N cartoon. But we’ll talk about that for a later review.
Mega Man has become a sensation with massive praise. But is that praise justified? Let’s go further.
COVER STORY
After the horrendous first box art, this one is a definite step up. But not without its issues. First off, once again Mega Man is holding a gun instead of using his arm canon. Characters still look a tad too realistic, and I dunno if that guy on the left is Dr. Wily, or Dr. Light, but it’s always bugged me. That aside, it’s still a far more eye pleasing box than the previous one, and I’m a sucker for that purple border, which I love more than the older Capcom covers for sure. So, with Mega Man 2’s box art being so solid, clearly Europe got a better box right? Well…
What the hell happened here? We go from super bad ass artwork on the original box to this monstrosity. Mega Man looks like a lame silver robot with a dildo arm cannon, and it’s just really not pleasing to the eyes at all. But despite that, I still think it’s a million times better than the US MM1 box.
STORY
It seems that the defeat in the first Mega Man wasn’t enough to keep Dr. Wily down. Wily creates eight evil robot masters, and sends them out to cause panic and destruction in his attempt at world domination. Once again Dr. Light sends Mega Man to save the day. But can the Blue Bomber stop the evil Dr’s schemes?
MEGA MEMORIES FROM CM WATERS
As a favor to a good friend of mine, I have invited CM Waters to share his thoughts on these classic titles. You can check some of Chris’ work over on his Watersfall Industries blog. So without further ado, here’s his thoughts on Mega Man 2.
“If the formula used for the original Mega Man was the groundwork of what would become a great gaming series, then Mega Man 2 is a major improvement over it. Which is pretty impressive as the game was made while the people who worked on it were working on other games.
Everything that the original Mega Man did right, they tweaked to improve, and everything it did wrong they fixed to make it better. The result of that was a much more balanced game than the original title, and the game that would help Mega Man to become a household name in the gaming world, and a success story that has had numerous titles and spin offs.
While I am a fan of the original Mega Man, this game I do have to admit is more fun. Maybe it’s because of the easier difficulty, or some of the more expansive bosses and such, but things here make it easy to see why when people reminisce about the Mega Man series, it’s usually THIS game that they talk about (or its sequel, but we’ll get to that next time around).
I will say though, out of all the Mega Man games, this one has my favorite song not only out of the entire series, but in my eyes out of all 8-Bit Gaming: Dr. Wily’s Castle Level 1 and 2. That song, and its various remixes, is IMO the pinnacle of Mega Man music to me.
…excuse me, I have to go listen to it again. Take it away, Ray!”
GAMEPLAY
Mega Man 2 is a one player action Platformer. Once again you control Mega Man as you go from level to level, defeat the robot master, take their power, and finally face off with Dr. Wily at the end of the game. The game’s controls remain the same from Mega Man 2. D-Pad moves Mega Man, A jumps, and B fires the weapon of choice. Pause will open up the menu where you can switch items on the fly.
The game is broken into two difficulties, one being normal, and the other being difficult. In actuality, the Difficult mode is the real Japanese difficulty. This was around the time that there was growing concern that the American Market was unable to cope with such challenging games, so they would either release games with dumbed down difficulty, or just change the game entirely to something else (AKA Super Mario Bros 2). Mega Man 2 is the only one of the original games to have more than one difficulty.
This time around Mega Man squares off with eight Robot Masters as opposed to the previous game’s six. These enemies are:
Metal Man: This master of metal lurks in a factory level. After dealing with all the conveyor belts and falling spiked weights, you face Metal Man, who jumps around and fires saw blades at you. He can be the easiest boss of the game. So easy in fact that he can be defeated with his own weapon with one hit in the rematch. Beating him gets you the Metal Blade, which we’ll get into later.
FLASH MAN: This blue and white robot fires a basic blaster shot, and jumps around. But his major weapon is the Flash Stopper, a tool which can freeze everything in place for a limited amount of time. He can be easily quelled by the Metal Blade, and his weapon when collected will freeze everything while draining the energy quite quickly.
WOOD MAN: Lurking in a forest area is Wood Man, one of the stranger creations of ol’ Doc Wily. Seriously, who builds a robot out of wood, and has him use leaves as a weapon? After beating him, you get his Wood Shield, a spinning shield of leaves that will shoot in any direction you press on the D-Pad.
AIR MAN: This burly bot with a fan for a mouth lives in the sky. He shoots a barrage of miniature tornadoes at Mega Man. Once you dodge them, and use your wood shield, you’ll get his Air Shooter, which fires three tornadoes in a upper diagonal pattern. Interestingly enough, the manual for Mega Man 2 actually has a 2-page guide on how to beat Air Man.
BUBBLE MAN: Lurking in the underwater depths is a frogman robot known as Bubble Man. He’ll shoot bubbles that can damage you, not to mention his level is littered with roof spikes that Mega Man can easily get decimated by. Once beaten, you get his Bubble Lead, a rather weak bubble that is only really useful in one part of the game.
CRASH MAN: Crash Man’s level is a high area with dozens of ladders to climb, and plenty of enemies to face including spinning robot heads, and robot birds dropping eggs. Once you get through the chaos, you’ll face Crash Man, who bounces about dropping bombs. Once defeated, you get Crash Bombs, which will let you blow up certain walls.
QUICK MAN: A red ninja robot with a yellow boomerang on his head, Quick Man lives up to his name. He runs and jumps incredibly fast, and can wear you down quick, as well as firing boomerangs at you. Defeating him earns you his quick boomerangs, which fire powerful boomerangs at enemies.
HEAT MAN: And rounding out the elite eight is Heat Man, a robot that looks like a giant lighter. He shoots fire balls at you, and will do a fired up charge at you when hit. You get the Atomic Fire for defeating him, which will shoot a fireball that will cause a small flame tower.
Once all eight masters are defeated, you will once again have to traverse through Dr. Wily’s fortress, facing off with many of the enemies from previous levels, along with using your newly acquired weapons to help you advance to face off with Dr. Wily. You’ll also face dangerous new bosses including a giant GutsMan bulldozer, and a massive dragon that will chase after you, and finally start shooting fire at you.
While the core gameplay mechanics of Mega Man 2 are the same as the first game, there are several new features that make this game an overall better experience. First off is the addition of E tanks. These blue cans can be found in certain stages. Once you select one of the cans from your pause menu, it will automatically fill up your health. You can store four of these at a time, and by the end there is an abundance of them, so you don’t have to worry too much about running out.
Also added to the game are three items you get by beating certian robot masters. These Items, similar to the Magnet Beam from the last game can help you access through some of the tougher areas in the game. Item 1 is a platform that flies straight up for a short time period. You can fire three of at a time. Item 2 is a rocket sled that will fly straight forward at a solid speed. And Item 3 is a bouncing platform that can stick to walls and go up and down. Good for more tricky spots in the game.
And the biggest addition to the gameplay was the addition of passwords. No longer did the player have to beat the game in one sitting. At the end of each level, you are presented a 5 X 5 grid with p orbs in certain places. This is a pretty simple thing to remember, and is far less of a hassle than some of the other methods of passwords that most games were going under at the time.
The weapons seem to be far more useful in this game, especially the metal blade. It works like your arm cannon, only you can shoot in all eight directions. Plus, it’s a far more powerful tool than the original arm cannon, and can destroy almost any enemy far quicker, as well as destroy certain enemies that the arm cannon can’t. Not to mention it takes the least amount of energy to use, meaning you will more than likely not be rid of it by the time you find more energy to refill its meter. Not to mention, it is the weakness to more than one robot master, making it even more essential to get early on.
Other than those, the other things fixed were some far better damage balance, some neat ideas like the ability to jump higher underwater, and fixing the issue I mentioned in Mega Man 1 with still taking damage on spikes or lava despite the damage invincibility. This time, you have a better chance to escape peril if you’ve been damaged before taking the fall. The only thing removed from Mega Man 1 was the point system, but since it was so useless, it wasn’t missed.
POWER TIP
Okay, while this tip doesn’t exactly help your gaming experience, it’s still a funny little easter egg. At the select screen, before selecting what robot master to face off against, hold A+B and press start. At the robot master intro screen, instead of stars flying by, there will be little birds. Again, this doesn’t change the game in any way, but it’s still pretty neat.
GRAPHICS
This game has fantastic graphics, and looks far better than the original game. It pushes the limits of the cartridge for the time, and is colorful and vibrant. The levels are all designed wonderfully, and the sprites are once again amazing. This is a definite step up in quality.
MUSIC
I’ll just say one thing… WILY STAGE 1!
Okay, this deserves far more than just that mention.
This game may just have the greatest soundtrack on the entire NES. Dead serious. Every level tune is catchy and epic, giving off the feel of adventure and action. The songs have been remixed, reused, rearranged, given countless tributes to, and are among the most legendary tracks in8-bit history, and a vast improvement in terms of quality from the last game (not saying that soundtrack was bad though). This is a must listen soundtrack to anyone getting into classic gaming, or just likes video game music in general.
My personal favorites from the soundtrack include Bubble Man, Flash Man, and Wood Man. But of course, as mentioned before the most infamous is Wily Stage 1. An NES song that, like The Moon in Ducktales is often considered the best 8 bit tune of all time. I personally think it’s a bit overrated since there are far better songs in my opinion, but there’s no denying how great a tune it is.
OVERALL THOUGHTS
Mega Man 2 is one of the greatest video games ever. It takes everything that Mega Man 1 brought to the table and improved vastly on. Gameplay, control, graphics, and especially music are all improved, not to mention the fun factor. Mega Man 2 just feels like a far more fun game to play. It has literally no flaws at all. It’s pretty obvious that this is a must-own game on the NES, or whatever console you can find it on.
RANKING: #2
While I love the game though, for personal reasons, it doesn’t take my #1 spot in rankings. You’ll find out why next week when Mega May continues with Mega Man 3
