Welcome to another edition of Retro Corner and we return back to the NES with Mega Man II. The sequel is often hailed as the most favorable Mega Man title and it's among the best of the console. It also a game that took the Blue Bomber into stardom giving us another character to look forward to on the consoles. The theme is about Dr. Wily seeking revenge after Mega Man stopped his evil plan to conquer the world. After his defeat, Wily has built eight new Robot Masters of his own so he can counter the Blue Bomber. Rock (his real name) sets out to stop Wily and defeat each Robot Master to bring peace once again. Gameplay The overall design saw some improvements from the original game, and there's also a new feature included. Of course, there is the level select screen where you pick your stage in a typical Mega Man fashion. Not many games during the 80s had this feature so easily and the only way to choose a stage is through cheats. The stages include Metal Man, Bubble Man, Heat Man, Flash Man, Crash Man, Air Man, Wood Man, and Quick Man. The challenges got built around the levels' themes just as it is in Air Man stage with floating platforms hovering between large gaps of the sky. Another example is from Bubble Man with the water having a gravity effect and Metal Man with the factory convey belts. These environmental challenges made you consider how you were going to face each one. The enemies added to these areas would reflect the levels' challenges as you ventured further. Depending on whom you picked first to face, each enemy played to the strengths of their environments. Wood Man included bunnies, enormous fire-breathing dogs and gorillas. Air Man would have flying type enemies from wind robots to those that stood on a platform throwing thunder bolts. It provided numerous unique challenges to overcome between the variety of baddies and he environmental obstacles. Of course, every time a boss gets defeated the player gains their abilities and acts like a power up. That was one of the key elements that made the Blue Bomber stand out and it's not very often you could use a boss's power. Another staple feature is using a previous boss's power against another to beat them as a weakness. It's a mechanic that helped me get into the series since this was the only game I could face a boss with their key weakness. Harnessing these powers was also needed to get passed some of the obstacles along the levels. With Time Stopper it can halt those fire beams from the Quick Man stage, and Crash Bomber can blow up wall barriers to get through. A new feature that also helped in several ways was the Items 1 - 3. They basically let Rock get to a place he can't reach (Items 1 and 2) by creating platforms. The Item 3 which is a jet can get Rock quickly across gaps and acts like the Rush of the gameplay. As you noticed Rush isn't here and he doesn't appear as a staple mechanic until the third entry. These items were nice additions and represented a big improvement of the bridge item in the original. Speaking of fixed issues from the first entry, Mega Man doesn't drop like dead weight off a platform anymore. They obviously took notes from the program mistakes previously as no longer did I have to worry about walking to close to an edge. The sequel did see improvements from its predecessor, but I still did discover some problems. The pattern blocks are back in their usual annoyance. The one in Heat Man Stage was downright ridiculous as you had to remember the pattern above a stream of lava spanning a few screens. The blocks only give the player a short time to remember where they will appear so it forces them to react quickly. The boss's weakness was a little unbalanced as Flash Man, Metal Man, Bubble Man and Wood Man were weak against the Metal Blade. So what was the point of getting Atomic Flame if it doesn't really work on a boss made from wood? What is the logic behind Metal Man and even Flash Man being weak against the Metal Blade? Even Time Stopper is rather useless against Quick Man and the player has to use it at the right time. The final Wily stage shouldn't have gotten designed in a cryptic manner as it's never mentioned you need the Bubble Lead to beat him. The gameplay had some minor hiccups but it also had many issues fixed and built further on its better mechanics. Rating: 9.1/10 Graphics/Presentation The thing about the Mega Man NES titles is how iconic their graphics are during that generation. The graphic style gets reused again which isn't all that surprising. These games have that nostalgic feeling to them and it helped Rock's sprite stand out the most. The levels had a variety of themes from underwater to even various factories of fire and steel as well as the woods. The environments came off lively this time and truly matched the theme they represented. The best ones came from Wood Man, Air Man and Metal Man because of the enemy types and backgrounds. On the subject of that, the second game boasted another feature as there are several animated backgrounds now. Not many NES titles had this feature as most of them from the 80s usually used a single still image. Capcom went the extra mile here as waterfalls, lava boiling, clouds gleaming and the wind blowing really added to these environments. The robot designs represented an improvement and almost none had a generic concept. The original always seemed to have that problem as some of the robots got recycled multiple times. Capcom didn't stop there as they added more to the presentation with an intro. The opening is truly iconic by explaining the events of the last game as music pays while the screen slowly scrolls up along a building. Then you see Mega Man standing on a roof of the building with his helmet off as his hair blows in the wind. That doesn't get anymore iconic as that and then the title appears with the intro theme playing dominantly. The soundtrack saw some improvement with each track sounding catchy. The best ones were from Air Man, Bubble Man, Wood Man, Metal Man, the boss battle theme, and Wily Stages 1 and 2. The first game had this repetitive sound to most of the songs as seen from the Guts Man stage and Wily boss theme. These areas always made you feel pumped up and would prompt me to stop everything that I came across. Another thing about the music is it's so amazing even a brand group called The Megas made rock versions of those same songs. In fact, they have written the first three games and yes they also have lyrics. The last tidbit to bring up is the ending of Rock walking down a road. It gave me a sense that Mega Man had heavy thoughts of going on this quest to stop Wily. The song used here made it evident this was presumably the case. I also love the shot of a country side being shown as his helmet was left on the grass. Rating: 9.0/10 Features/Content As it was in the original, there are many options to how the player wants to complete the game. You can start at Metal Man or Heat Man and even use the Mega Buster as your sole weapon of choice. By designing this option helps create replay value and giving you many ways of completing this game. That is what made this series on the NES so special and you didn't need to play on a set path like it was in Mario. Another thing Capcom included was a password system that wasn't in the first game. For once, someone gets it through their thick skulls to not use the threaded 16 letter password. Instead of letters or numbers, its uses a grind format where dots will appear on the layout. That was the biggest problem with most NES titles and for some reason I don't understand why these studios thought it worked. Despite how good Metroid and Kid Icarus came out, Nintendo still thought using such a long password system was a good concept. Nevertheless, it was a lot better and more accessible than any password system on the NES. Of course, Capcom could've done more like add a hard mode but then again this game is already challenging. It was naturally a step in the right direction for the series as this company learned from their earlier mistakes. Rating: 8.5/10 Final Rating Capcom nailed it once again, and they were able to improve on many features from the first entry. The gameplay got freshened out as there were better enemies and diverse levels that played to their theme's strength. The player also needed the boss's power they obtained to help them overcome the challenges at times. The graphics have aged beautifully as it's something that rarely happens with most NES games. Every so often all a studio really needs is a fantastic art style for their games to age well. The Mega Man NES titles have constantly fallen into that area and they don't even need a powerful console to achieve it. The presentation had a combined iconic intro and an amazing soundtrack put above its predecessor in many ways. Of course, each track is essentially starting to show its age, I mean after all the program was using an 8-bit sound chip. However, the music is often considered the best of the NES for its memorable tunes. The password feature finally had more thought put into instead of using a ridiculous 16 letter system. A grid system with dots helped record a play through on paper as most studios rarely made this easy for us. Mega Man II was a broad step in the right direction, and this studio would only tweak this formula for years to come. Gameplay: 9.1/10 Graphics/Presentation: 9.0/10 Features/Content: 8.5/10 Final Rating: 8.8/10 Great
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Retro Gamer has over 25 years of gaming experience and played many classics since the Golden Age. She has been an avid fan since the day the NES graced her life and changed it forever.
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