/vr/ - Retro Games

[Anonymous No.8668962]

Is the whole "try different weapons to determine the boss weakness" a genius game mechanic or a bad one?

[Anonymous No.8668963]

>>8668962
SUPER FIGHTING ROBOT

[Anonymous No.8668965]

I think it works out fine, most of the time there's a handful of robot masters in each game that have weaknesses that make sense, and the rest can be discovered with a little trial and error.
Or you can just brute force everything to death with the Buster or the Mega Buster going past 4.
OR just use the Power Adaptor in 6 and punch everything to death because that's awesome.

[Anonymous No.8668970]

>>8668963
I still find it really hard to comprehend that Mega Man is a robot.

[Anonymous No.8668972]

http://www.mmhp.net/
This is how I beat my Mega Man games

[Anonymous No.8668976]

given the fact that all bosses can be beaten with the base buster (save a few later into each game), it's pretty good for encouraging weapon experimentation at all points of the level. the only problems I've had with the weapon system is the encounters that absolutely require it (MM2 crash bomber, MM3 Top spin) and later games implementing spark mandrill syndrome for spectacle over challenge.

[Anonymous No.8668985]

If you reach a boss you can't beat with the buster, you've still practiced the level and can usually get back to the boss with relative ease to try a newly aquired weapon.
I think it's fun to try to theorize about weaknesses.
Usually it feels kind of like a big wall at first, but it's very satisfying once you're zipping through levels you know well and destroying bosses easily with new weapons as well as occasionally scraping out a win with the buster.

[Anonymous No.8668994]

I loved classic Mega Man but that was basically the worst part. Who the fuck would rather spend time in the menu instead of fighting the boss? Even when you get it right, stunlocking the boss or killing it in 2 hits isn't actually fun compared to a real fight with the buster. The end result is I spend way too much time using the basic bitch weapon because the other ones are either useless or overpowered. You never know what's going to deal 8 units and what's going to tink off.

I hear MM11 finally switched to a weapon wheel which should help a lot. I'll get it one of these days. I know later games let you cycle with L & R but every robot master you kill fucks up your tap numbering. Who's gonna memorize that shit but speedrunners?

[Anonymous No.8668996]

>>8668963
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFEBaAxO7W0

[Anonymous No.8668998]

>>8668994
>I'll get it one of these days
You should, they honestly did a great job

[Anonymous No.8669043]

>>8668996
i want to fug ruby spears Roll

[Anonymous No.8669060]

You don't NEED to know a boss's weakness (except for fringe cases), it just makes the fight much easier.
Either you figure it out, or you get good enough to do it with buster.

[Anonymous No.8669063]

>>8668976
>>8669060
Leaving aside wily castles, are there robot masters you can't beat with the buster? I get the dodging might be hard, but all are beatable right?

[Anonymous No.8669084]

>>8669043
Yes, non-loli Roll ftw

[Anonymous No.8669286]

>>8668970
if X is the first robot that can feel and make his own decisions, what was protoman's deal?

[Anonymous No.8669308]

Needs more responsiveness, what if the gameplay stopped for a second for a big dramatic cutscene type thing where the boss does a big reaction the first time you get the weakness right?

[Anonymous No.8669362]

I've always felt like the extra weapons should have had infinite ammo and been balanced around that.
you don't really use them in levels otherwise because you might need it for the boss.

[Anonymous No.8669374]

It takes like 10 seconds tops to find out which weapon is the boss weakness. Why are you even considering if something so easy to do is a problem? Fuck.

[Anonymous No.8669424]

>>8669374
only if you have them all from the start

[Anonymous No.8669431]

>>8669424
I guess. The real challenge is going X-Buster only.

[Anonymous No.8669456]

>>8669424
>>8669431
maybe that's why you have to fight all the robot masters again, now that you have all the powers, have fun and experiment

[Anonymous No.8669461]

I definitely think it's a bad mechanic. It's so powerful it feels like cheating and I always do buster only for the first fight of each boss because otherwise I will pretty much not interact with the boss at all and many will be dead within 5 seconds without me ever being at any risk of losing.

On the refights I'll use them because I've already beat them and I feel it's more sensible to use them there as it's just a boss rush where you're expected to already have everything and be able to beat them.

[Anonymous No.8669463]

>>8668962
i hit them once or twice with the special weapon if its their weakness and then finish them with the P shooter because as >>8669374 said it makes the fight too one sided i.e. metal fucking man

[Anonymous No.8669464]

>>8669461
The thing about the refights is that your weapon energy has often been drained by the preceding wily castle.

[Anonymous No.8669484]

>>8669286
It doesn't make a lot of sense. It was pretty much just a plot device to justify calling X uniquely advanced.

[Anonymous No.8669491]

>>8669431
Once the charge was introduced in 4 that becomes the most efficient way to play the game outside of boss weaknesses. There are maybe two or three spots where weapons are useful in the stages across all of 4-6. Mega Man X1 reverses it and has a ton of weapon use but mostly because all the weapons are absurdly good and its generally harder than MM5 and 6 were.

[Anonymous No.8669509]

>>8669286
I figure Protoman never does anything he wasn't designed to do. Light set his AI to "son" and now he's an edgy distant teen. Mission accomplished. Same reason Bass can give his old man the middle finger. He was programmed to be the very best at all costs, so whenever Wily threatens his position he flips his fin-headed shit. Garbage in, garbage out.

None of that requires setting their own goals. For all his heroism Mega Man can't decide "You know what? FUCK humanity", despite rock operas to the contrary. He's physically incapable of putting a lemon through Wily's skull in the (properly translated) ending of MM7: that would be outside his parameters.

X has no parameters.

[Anonymous No.8669513]

>>8668962
It gives you more ways to play the game, and lets you choose your difficulty setting in a logical way that you can adapt per each situation. I think it's a smart design.

[Anonymous No.8669521]

>>8669509
>For all his heroism Mega Man can't decide "You know what? FUCK humanity", despite rock operas to the contrary. He's physically incapable of putting a lemon through Wily's skull in the (properly translated) ending of MM7
People say this but the "properly translated" version just has Mega Man pause at Wily's statement. It has the vibe of a person struggling with the decision. There's no indication he wasn't still going to do it if something more pressing hadn't interrupted them.

[Anonymous No.8669605]

>>8669063
I suck with a moderate few, but I feel with enough practice I would be able to get their patterns down. Ain't doing that shit without save states, though, ESPECIALLY with ring man.

[Anonymous No.8669613]

>>8669286
Protoman's broken and prioritizing his self-preservation to a ridiculous degree, which may involve disobeying human orders.
X on the other hand can obey orders even when he doesn't agree and can disobey orders when he knows they're not sound.

[Anonymous No.8669643]

>>>/vg/374205582
Hey check out /mmg/ some time if you want

[Anonymous No.8669652]

>>8668962
Megaman was the game that made me realize i don't like Capcom, it's just not for me.

[Anonymous No.8669660]

>TRIAL AND ERROR

[Anonymous No.8669694]

>>8668962
i think it's pretty cool overall but what sucks about it is how you have to save your weapons for em, makes it feel like i have to rarely use them outside that.

[Anonymous No.8669802]

>>8669063
They're all beatable but some are harder than others. I still have trouble with Fire Man, Quick Man, Air Man, and Needle Man with buster.

[Anonymous No.8670371]

>>8669802
Needle man is fucking cancer

[Anonymous No.8670380]

>>8669308
A lot of them do have obvious tells. Chill Penguin has a unique burning animation, Spark Mandrill gets frozen solid, Armored Armadillo loses his shell, etc.

[Anonymous No.8670437]

>>8669084
put down the head megayman

[Anonymous No.8670441]

its an ok mechanic, maybe leans towards bad because it makes the fight piss easy

[Anonymous No.8670545]

>>8669286
Plot Twist: Protoman IS X and he finally gets his scarf back in Command Mission

[Anonymous No.8671063]

>>8668962
It was a great gimmick that gave the series some identity.

One thing I do wonder though is how MM as a franchise would have been like if he could shoot the buster in 4 or 8 directions rather than just left and right.

[Anonymous No.8671096]

>>8668962
Depends if the majority of weapons feel good and useful in stages as well. (Games that do it well: 1, 4, 7, 9, 11)
Having weapons as pure boss killers is incredibly boring.
>>8669521
https://youtu.be/ySU9zjAQVKo
He stops charging his buster, at least.

[Anonymous No.8671118]

>>8668962
alternative weapons are a crutch for bad gamers

you haven't really beaten megaman unless you clear it with only the default blaster

[Anonymous No.8671183]

>>8671063
>One thing I do wonder though is how MM as a franchise would have been like if he could shoot the buster in 4 or 8 directions rather than just left and right.
Well then you would get Megaman and Bass silly.

[Anonymous No.8671186]

>>8668994
It was NES man they only really had two buttons to work with with maybe four if they used start and select for something but they had to get creative for that. Games such as Castlevania tried to get even more creative with its up + attack input. In hindsight some shoulder buttons for the NES pad would have done wonders.

[Anonymous No.8671193]

>>8671183
Bass is caca I mean more like its Mega Man himself that can attack in different directions and he can move while doing it similar to say Metal Slug, Alien Hominid, Metroid or Contra. Never liked that game something about it felt off and Bass wasn't appealing at all to me.

[Anonymous No.8671246]

>>8668962
I feel like Capcom's intention was for you to just use whatever weapon you felt like using and if you discovered the boss's weakness, great. I don't think they intended for you to try everything until you find the weakness, then clown them before the boss music can even loop.

Of course this has always been the case with Megaman and Capcom has to know by now, so I don't know why they'd keep doing it. It's not a satisfying puzzle to figure out because it just requires you go through a list like anyone can do. There's no logic to it in the vast majority of cases.

Hence, I don't think that was their intention.

[Anonymous No.8671280]

>>8668962

It's probably the best they could come up with in the late 80's

[Anonymous No.8671338]

>>8668962
If you think it's bad, then you're a fucking retard.

[Anonymous No.8671361]

>>8671118
a crutch is when a game lets you work at something that gives you a buffer in the case of imperfect play. if anything is a crutch in megaman it's stockpiling e-tanks. sub-weapons are meant to be used as leverage against enemies that are otherwise awkward to line up with a regular shot, and bosses that would otherwise be grindy.

the sub-weapons are the point of the game, this is why the (japanese) boxes and manuals have such a heavy focus on the bosses and weapons. it was never meant to be a tie-your-arm-behind-your-back game, it's meant as a "cool powers smorgasbord" type thing. that you missed this is simply a testament to how desultory the series' development was

[Anonymous No.8671364]

>>8671361
They are a crutch. They let you completely ignore the boss patterns and just mash A to win.

[Anonymous No.8671403]

>>8669286
Why is it that Mega Man could get away with exploring much darker themes, plotlines, and characters in later entries, whereas Sonic the Hedgehog was roundly mocked for doing the same thing?

[Anonymous No.8671535]

>>8668962
Its a good concept that can be implemented poorly or fantastically.
What gets me the most is if any kid was able to find the correct weapon for each boss without reading it on a magazine

[Anonymous No.8671536]

>>8671403
Is this a joke? It's like that time Bugs Bunny and Alvin and the Chipmunks got together with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to talk about how bad marijuana is. Of course the end result is hilariously bad. It's the wrong characters sending the wrong message and only the wrong writers would attempt it.

It's why there's an X series in the first place. You can't just take Megs and the rest of his goofy cartoon family and plop them in a desolate world scarred by robot race war without losing something. You have to change some variables to make it work.

[Anonymous No.8671539]

>>8671536
fuck I responded to pasta. pwned, I guess

[Anonymous No.8671552]

>>8671403
not this again

[Anonymous No.8671959]

>>8671364
this is just how exploiting weaknesses works, that's the fun part. you get to feel satisfied solving a very minor "puzzle" figuring out which weapon does the trick and get to feel powerful. this is literally the only noteworthy thing about mm, taking them out of it makes it a very boilerplate NES platform game with poor control.

[Anonymous No.8672649]

>>8671403
Mega Man explored these aspects in separate series with generations between them, Sonic games take place more-or-less one after the other, leading to whiplash going from Adventure->Heroes->Shadow

[Anonymous No.8672806]

>>8668970
Why? He's just like Astro Boy

[Anonymous No.8672969]

>>8671959
Based, but even the minor puzzle gives out a huge reward for the harder part of a stage.

[Anonymous No.8672978]

>>8668972
So you cheat? Then you haven't beaten the game.

[Anonymous No.8673049]

>>8671118

>>8671361
>it was never meant to be a tie-your-arm-behind-your-back game
Sticking to the buster isn't even that much of a handicap, aside from taking longer to kill the bosses. Most of the Robot Master stages are designed to accomodate players who picked it as their first level, so you're really just using the default, jack-of-all-trades weapon that takes slightly longer to destroy enemies.

[Anonymous No.8673294]

>>8669431
what real challenge lol, every enemy is balanced to the buster. using underpowered special weapons takes more skill

[Anonymous No.8673323]

>>8668962
I never watched this Mega Man cartoon... is that X talking to Rock?

[Anonymous No.8673325]

>>8673294
>using underpowered special weapons
You mean shooting one lemon for chip damage instead of a charged shot, like the fucking buster already does?

[Anonymous No.8673382]

>>8668962
I think it's a good mechanic but it lacks versatility and variety. Gaining new powers and using them on bosses to deal more damage is a good way to encourage experimentation in the player rather than simply having them stick with the standard mega buster. It's a cool way to demonstrate that megaman is getting stronger by beating more robot masters while also rewarding the player with good play by using the boss's weakness, furthermore it encourages replayability to figure out what's the most optimal route to beating the game. However, the issue is that alternative weapons doesn't really come up to be useful in during stages themselves, unless it's something like a shield weapon to prevent damage or the metal blades being a mega buster replacement weapon, the player almost never finds a need to used them in the stages. As a result, you never really have an opportunity to experiment in the levels because you either need to save ammo for the boss or the weapon is just ineffective in regular play. I feel like the X, Zero and ZX games does the boss weapon mechanics better because a couple of the weapons does offer movement abilities to help gain access to new parts of the levels, and as a result, the weapons feel more like an upgrade to your abilities instead of only being useful in boss fights

[Anonymous No.8673437]

>>8671403
because mega man is actually cool and not furry shit

[Anonymous No.8673450]

>>8673323
Yes

[Anonymous No.8673512]

>>8671403
There's a few reasons for this, firstly, is as >>8672649 said, megaman has several seperate series. So while some like megaman X or Zero can explore darker and more mature themes. Classic Megaman extremely rarely covers darker topics, I can only think of that weird Super adventure rockman that covers more darker themes and even then, it doesn't come close to what X or the Zero series explores. Whereas, Sonic only has the one series, Sure sonic has different eras but it's not clearly as defined as a whole seperate series of games. So while, Classic Sonic never gets involved in darker themes unless it's some weird spin off game like the bad endings for knuckle's chaotic and the 8-bit version of sonic 2. The Dreamcast era and Modern era has less defined boundaries, thus leading to tonal inconsistency. Sega can't decide to whether the series is dark or not, you get the comedy stories of sonic colours, lost world and heroes but it then conflicts with adventure 2, sonic forces, 06' and shadow the hedgehog.
Secondly, Most people can take megaman more seriously than sonic, more people can suspend their disbelief and accept a more serious story with a robot character than a serious story about a blue hedgehog who runs fasts, crack jokes in every other sentence he makes and has a million gay friends.
This is also partially because, megaman quality of games and story writing is more consistently better than sonic's games and its story writing. It's only occasionally, is a megaman game very bad like X7 or Battle Network 4 or has an objectively bad plot, whereas, Sonic where it's more 50:50 in terms of what games are actually good and thus it's more easy to mock when sega tries to be serious with him, and sometimes you get shit stories like Sonic 06 and Shadow

[Anonymous No.8673527]

>>8673512
>>8672649
>>8673437
You're replying to pasta btw

[Anonymous No.8673604]

>>8669509
>>8669521
>>8671096
Does anyone else think that Mega Man 7's ending was just out of place altogether? MM7 seemed so fun and light-hearted up until literally the very end. Even the credits segment had a heavy tone.
Had Wily really done so much as to make Mega Man contemplate executing him? Dr. Wily's plans and creations always seem to have so much levity and camp. Inafune disliked Wily destroying human-piloted choppers in Super Adventure, implying that Wily normally doesn't hurt humans. He corrupts a lot of robots and forces Mega Man to destroy a lot of robots (which MM has felt guilt over), but they're just that: robots.
But now that I'm writing this post and actually thinking about it, several MM games have opening sequences where explosions are rocking dense cities. People had to have died from that, right? Even the city in MM7 was all fucked up. Were these all just robot cities or something?
But regardless, there's been several games since 7, and as far as I know, Mega Man never threatens Wily's life ever again. Just seems so dark and out-of-place.

[Anonymous No.8673652]

>>8668962
The game was built with it in mind because of the stupid ass Japanese line of thinking of "Dude our character is Rock so what if Rock-Paper-Scissors haha", and it works pretty well. You're free to play whatever levels you want in any order, and you're either rewarded or punished depending on what items and weapons you've gained thus far. Obviously you could just look up progression charts and be a little cheating fuck with the level order, but not everybody does that and pre-internet days it wasn't so readily available to the average kid.
Personally though I've never felt the boss weapons affect the level's actually difficulty that much, that stuff is useless in the face of shit like JUMP JUMP SLIDE SLIDE or keeping track of blink block patterns. It just makes bosses faster to kill.

[Anonymous No.8673690]

>>8671246
Ideally, the special weapon is good to use on the boss because it's the most effective against their attack pattern and it doing more damage is just a bonus. 9 and 10 specifically are good at this. Chill Spikes stopping Nitro Man as he rides across the stage, Commando Bomb or whatever hitting Blade Man on the walls, Sheep Man's weapon going above Pump Man, etc.

[Anonymous No.8673821]

>>8668962
The episode with megaman x was pure insanity. Vile and spark mandrill go back in time to steal some special metal so that sigma can sell it to fund his war against the mavrick hunters. it's such a preposterous motive and everyone blows up walls instead of walking through doors.

[Anonymous No.8673828]

>>8673821
Mega Man X was a destructive doofus, too. It was clearly a backdoor pilot for a possible Mega Man X cartoon but there's no way that version of X could have carried a series unless it were a comedy.

[Anonymous No.8673830]

>>8673604
Agreed. It'd be like if Mario threatened to kill Bowser at the end of Super Mario World. The tone flips on a dime.

[Anonymous No.8673870]

>>8669802
quick man and needle man just kick your ass until you can barely do it, >>8671364
yeah if you dont use them on stages

[Anonymous No.8673895]

EVEN NOW THERE'S HOPE FOR MAN

[Anonymous No.8675136]

>>8671403
You say that as if people don't make fun of Mega Man games too.

[Anonymous No.8675156]

>>8675136
>This pic again
The plot is fine, it's the burger localization that sucked ass.

[Anonymous No.8675161]

Taken on its own I'd call it a bad mechanic as it adds very little except a little bit of busywork and sunk cost at the beginning of a fight on a first playthrough. But it's iconic and can it really be that bad if it helps define a (once) strong franchise?

In any event it's never been offensive; it's just kind of there.

[Anonymous No.8675171]

I'd argue it adds to the fun. It's a race against time to find out the boss weakness before he kills you, going through plans until you find something that works and then begin your counterattack.

[Anonymous No.8675258]

>>8669491
The x games are concidered to be harder ? I always thought the dash and the wall jumps made it easier

[Anonymous No.8675280]

>>8671535
I was able to figure it out as a kidbut i coild never beat willy's castle stages because my dpad fingering skills werent as good back then, now a days i can beat al the megaman games with no problem

[Anonymous No.8675285]

>>8675258
I think 5/6 were just on the easier side. With the exception of Plant Man's stage.

[Anonymous No.8676270]

>>8668962
It's a great concept, but it's ruined in mega man due to bad controls and awful level design/enemy placement etc.

[Anonymous No.8676739]

>>8669063 Every single robot master takes damage from (and therefore can be killed from) your regular buster. There are a few with specific RNG patterns that can't be dodged or planned around, but those are rare
>one of Air Man's tornado formations
>Quick Man starting with two short hops firing boomerangs at point blank in the corner
>... that might actually be it
>>8669802 Fire is one of the easiest ones, if you avoid firing and simply chase after him. Needle is also straight-forward projectile-leading, sliding away from the first set of needles, and towards the second set.

[Anonymous No.8677135]

>>8672806
Even with that really gay outfit he "wore", I always thought Astro Boy was cooler than Mega Man.

[Anonymous No.8677240]

>>8671096
>that gameplay
I don't think I've ever seen someone this bad at megaman games still manage to beat one before