With a few hours of Mega Man 9 under my belt I’ve got to admit, this game is FREAKING HARD. I’ve played many games since the original Mega Man series was released on the NES and later on the SNES and nothing compares to Mega Man 9 in terms of sheer difficulty. This new franchise title looks and acts like the original with all the glitches, colors, bleeps and effects of the original games.
This game is much like chasing your kids around the yard, you forget how “old you are.” Mega Man 9 challenges reflexes, hand-eye coordination, patience and persistence. You are constantly awarded with death upon death and level restarts. Just when you think you’re getting close to a leader you’re actually just encountering a harder portion of the stage.
Between the start of a stage and the final boss you’ll encounter larger single-screen microbosses who challenge your patience and skills. As it turns out, I’ve got very little of both attributes. Upon defeating a little boss I am handed another like boss which is a little tougher. Upon defeating this slightly tougher boss (after many level restarts) I’m rewarded with yet another more difficult microboss.
Mega Man traditionally allows you to wonder all of the selectable stages out of the gate but each one gets easier as you build your characters weaponry. The trick is finding that “easy” level to get you to a boss, defeat said boss and acquire a weapon of mass awesomeness. Alas, I’ve done none of these.
You can find online video walk-throughs on the Internet which can give you tips for getting around the stages but the end result is the same: patience, persistence and accuracy. Mega Man 9 teaches you that nobody is a game master without consistent practice.
The first time through a stage is a destructive mess of failure. As you restart the stage over and over you’ll learn some of the tricks to getting you through the initial enemies without taking damage. You’ll build up your arsenal of tricks for hitting enemies before they’re on the screen and mashing the fire button to freedom… until you hit your first spike.
Spikes are the bane of the Mega Man character. Mega Man isn’t a fan of little pointy objects which result in instant death. You can hit the jump button quickly for shorter jumps and longer for bigger jumps; jumping technique is required to move you through spike infested levels.
You learn quickly to never turn your back on an enemy. Turn around, ever so slightly, and walk back on the side-scrolling screen and forward again will result in the rebirth of all enemies you’ve killed. This includes bomb wielding birds, rock tossing baddies and hells fury in the form of red and green cannons.
If you’re looking to discover all the ways you can possibly lose in a game, feel your inner child emotionally crushed under the weight of 8-bit bad asses, Mega Man 9 is the game for you. The achievements will make you laugh and the difficulty will invoke that old controller tossing nostalgia.
Mega Man 9 is a challenge. If you wish to take on this challenge and prove your 8-bit weight in the world of high resolution graphic fairy tales this may be the title for you!
Hey guys,
Just to finish off our little Vita debate. I finally understand why Jordan claims what he claims. See, I come to Vita not primarily for AAA, exclusive titles. I can play big titles on my PS3 and I have more than enough of them to last me a very long time. That’s why I don’t want to spend too much time playing PSN titles there if I can play them on the Vita, especially if they are cross-buy. That’s why I play games such as Soundshapes, Zen Pinball, Velocity Ultra or Quell Memento. This doesn’t mean that I didn’t enjoy Gravity Rush or Uncharted. I’m trying to Platinum NFS: Most Wanted and I’m also playing Rayman: Origins.
I travel a lot so I use my Vita often when I don’t have access to my PS3 and I’m really rarely bored with it. I agree, however, that if you only want to play big, exclusive titles, you might be disappointed.
P.S. I played the demo for Soul Sacrifice and it seemed neat. What was wrong with the rest of it?
@Android consoles
Meh… I really don’t know who the target for those devices is. If you’re a casual gamer than a 4-5″ smartphone screen is enough to play Fruit Ninja or Angry Birds or some other game. If you want a better experience, get a tablet – at least you will be able to use it for other things as well. I understand that it’s easier to release a game on those platforms than on PS3, Vita or XBox but I don’t think it’s worth it. The install base of the Android boxes won’t be big, people complain about the hardware… I think they’re trying to find a niche where there isn’t any.
@The Walking Dead. Way to spoil the game, guys 😉 I still haven’t played 400 days. I’ll probably get it right before season 2. Anyway, Clementine… I never had any doubt she will be in the second season. I only hope you’re not controlling here and she’s only a supporting character. !!SPOILERS!! It would be nice to come across her and the mysterious figures she saw at the end of the first season. Maybe she reacts according to what Lee taught her int he first season. Maybe she has her hair short, or she tries to shoot you. It’s not a bad idea to bring her back.
@BSG – It was my birthday last weekend and I got the BSG boardgame from my friends. We played it for the first time yesterday and it was a disappointing experience… I’ve heard so much good things about the game so my hopes were really high. I guess we shouldn’t have started playing it at 9pm (the game lasted until after midnight) after a hard day at work with people who have no idea what the game was about. It also probably didn’t help that I was a Cylon and was forced to reveal myself very early in the game. The tension went down rapidly. We’ll give it another go when the circumstances are better.
I never watched the show but I hear it has a significant following so the writer of the series must have done something write. An epic TPP (third-person perspective 😉 ) action-puzzle-RPG game, mixing Uncharted with Mass Effect would be nice.
@QOTW I mentioned FPP last week – I meant first person perspective. I have to stick to the olden goldies. To me, Blood was amazing. The gore, the enemies, the atmosphere. With all those pixels flying around I was able to see past them and immerse myself in the experience. And it was really scary. On top of that, there were tons of easter eggs. I remember one vividly – I was able to get to a room using some ventilation shafts. In the room was a bed stained with blood with air fresheners hanging from the ceiling. On the wall was written the word ‘Sloth’, referencing the movie Se7en. There were many, many more. Based on the immersion and atmosphere of the game, this has to be my favorite.
@First high profile Kickstarter suckage
As nice as budget consoles may sound, I agree with Pavel. No one needs them. It’s better to buy an android phone that plays android
games amongst other things rather than a console that just plays android games. Not to mention that most gamers (i.e. me) believe that
android games are not proper games and are aimed at people who enjoy touching things. Granted that a few android games may be good; most gamers would rather stick to mainstream consoles with their AAA titles.
@To infinity and straight into HD
Never played Star Control. But it sounds pretty good. I would love to play an HD remake. Although I am highly skeptical of HD remakes. The ones I played were pretty crap (God of War HD, Monster Hunter WiiU to name
a few horrible looking HD games). Furthermore, I am not sure how it would go down with modern gamers. An interesting topic to discuss is how games have been simplified over the years. Just compare Elder Scrolls: Morrowind to Skyrim. Or GTA III to GTA 4. I am concerned that a complicated (sounding) game like Star control can’t be released simply as an HD remake without being redone from ground up. On another note, Sega MegaDrive had
an epic Star Trek: Next Generation game which was effectively an Enterprise simulator. Tons of galaxies to explore; you could land on
and explore planets, participate in space battles and tweak every available setting of your ship. A very engrossing game as far as I remember.
@QOTW
I will split this question into two parts. Simply because it is very rare that an FPS has a good single player campaign and multiplayer
component simultaneously. My favourite multiplayer game was Battlefield: Bad Company 2. I have such fond memories of that game. Sunk hours into on-line battles. It’s revolutionary score system could force a group of unrelated people to work together as a team for a common goal. So far it is the only game that I have seen accomplish this. In terms of singleplayer campaign, I will have to go for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. And before I am stoned by angry mums and dads, I would
like to remind everyone that I grew up in the post-soviet Perestroika times and had no access to FPS games until 2005. Modern Warfare 2 was
one of the first games I played on a proper HD TV. The graphics was remarkable beyond words and the story was interesting. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. It was the first contemporary war shooter I ever played, so the genre was still fresh for me. Multiplayer was crap thou. Never really got into it.