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Lance will forever be trapped in that statue.

This fan-game was cancelled, but the assets were released as consolation, and four stages were in a more-or-less completed state. You can play as Mega Man, Proto Man, or Bass, and while they have different play-styles, the pause menu and powers weren’t fully implemented. This means there’s no Rush Coil, Rush Jet, etc., despite split paths already having been worked into the levels (meaning you can’t actually go down those routes without altering them with the included level editor). Mega Man plays the same as he does in 5-8, so to make Proto Man more distinct, he can only have two shots on screen but can store 4 charged shots at once (though I think they’re weaker than Mega Man’s charged shot). Proto Man also has his shield, but it doesn’t work. Bass plays the same as he does in Megaman & Bass and 10 (and Mirai Kara no Chousensha): no charged shot and can’t shoot through walls, but can rapid-fire in 7 directions (not down) with 4 shots on screen at once.

Also, being a prototype, most levels just dead-end instead of allowing for progression. Plus, it’s possible for knockback to send you into solid tiles and get stuck, so remember that pushing F5 resets the game.

The intro stage (accessed by selecting New Game) does a good job of introducing the Metalls and Sniper Joes, but there’s a third enemy: a spider(?) bot. As soon as it comes on screen, it leaps half-way across the screen before it starts walking, and since it’s introduced in a flat room, you’ll likely get hit when you first encounter it. It also jumps when it reaches a wall or cliff, so I think it would’ve been better to remove their initial jump and introduce them in front of a pit so it’ll jump clear over new players when they stop to shoot it. This is one of those issues that I could see easily making it to the final product unaddressed, which is why it bothers me so much.

The stage select and other three stages can be accessed by selecting Load Game. There are more “levels” on the map, but most of them dead-end after 2-3 empty rooms.

Cleanse Woman’s stage appears to be the most complete out of the four: not only does it have exclusive enemies like underwater Metalls, Tellys, and an alternate Sniper Joe that shoots pink water at you (on top of damage, it turns you pink and induces ice physics for a few seconds before it wears off), but there’s even pre-boss dialogue, à la X4-X8 (and Megaman Zero 1-4). It’s also the only other stage those spider bots show up in, though their placement here is better at introducing them than the intro stage did. The level does a decent job of introducing the new Sniper Joe and have increasingly trickier setups with them, though the other enemies aren’t utilized as often. There is one room near the end where you can see the drop that’ll lead forward, but the screen scrolls a few units further than you can see from the last platform, so it made me think there’d be something past, and when I saw there wasn’t, I ended up on a collision course with a recently-spawned Telly (it was either that or fall into the spikes), so that was annoying.

Grime Man’s stage is built around waterfalls that’ll lower your jump height. Said waterfalls also flow off platforms, but unlike Mega Man IV, they won’t act like conveyor belts and push you (could be intentional, could’ve been something that would’ve been added in later). The stage gimmick is introduced pretty good by having single-tile-wide waterfalls fall into single-tile-wide gaps so that you’ll jump and see your jump height reduced, but won’t fall into the pit and die (though the Sniper Joe right after said pits might take away from that a bit). Beyond that, the stage just has Metalls, regular Sniper Joes, and platforming. Also, unlike the other levels that dead-end at the boss’s room, opening the boss gate sends you back to the beginning of the level.

Tome Woman’s stage could’ve rivaled Cleanse Woman’s stage for completeness; it has an exclusive enemy (the book bats), but they only show up in one room and the rest of the stage has no enemies at all. However, it does have Yoku Blocks and an original stage gimmick: wheel ladders. The grey wheel ladders will move while you’re climbing on them (stopping when you reach the top or jump off), and the orange ones keep moving as soon as you climb on them. My only issue with them is the first orange one is introduced right before a spike pit, so I ended up falling off and dying because I thought it’d stop when I reached the top like the grey ones did. The stage builds on them a bit with having you climb up/down to avoid spikes, though there’s also a few times where you’re just waiting for the ladder to reach its destination. The stage also introduces jump-through Yoku platforms, which I haven’t seen in another Mega Man game before (official or otherwise). There’s even a prototype boss at the end, though it just kinda stands still and shoots at you, and it dies just like a normal enemy after a few shots.

Overall, this game showed a lot of promise, and it’s too bad it ended up being cancelled. If you’re a fan of Mega Man games, I don’t see much reason not to check it out; it’s better than half the games I’ve posted about on this site. Then again, I still haven’t familiarized myself with the Mega Man Maker community, so everything here could’ve already been done better elsewhere.