My personnal ideas for new Mega Man games.

[TechnoWolf]

So, I don't know if you guys remember but I kinda told you next time I will be writing stuff here it would be about the ideas I had for a new Mega Man.

 

 

Isn't not being a programmer / designer / writer / anything remotely insteresting a wonderful thing ? you can bitch on the internet without any problems at all.

Unless you're talking about Zoe Quinn on MN9 Official.

 

Spoiler

OHLOOK !!! TechnoWolf pulled a funny one lolololololololo

 

 

But tonight, I feel the will in me to share with you some of the ideas I had as far as the Mega Manverse is concerned. Note : it's only my ideas, I know there are plenty of fan game projects out there,

I know people already did their own list, and explained what they'd like to see, I am, of course, counting only what I thought of personnally.

 

 

 

===== Number 1 =====

 

 

Mega Man "11"; or as I like to call it : the last Mega Man of the "classic" era.

 

 

Let me start by stating that I'm not interested at all in a "retro 8 bit" style, I want to see Mega Man in HD, with a big look into the world he's living in. I want a game that take full advantage of the system it's on, with

flashy/cheesy intro for bosses, and rock/electro musics with real instruments and whatnot.

 

Gameplay-wise : it would reunite everything we know and love from the blue bomber : E-tanks, W-tanks, Rush-adaptor, Auto/Rightot's shop, Beat, Treble, and of course having Protoman & Bass playable from the get go, with their separate campaign. The game would have a classic 8 robot master formula (keep it for yourselves but I imagined one of them would have a name as stupid as "Katana Man"... I really have got no shame...)

 

Mega Man : Slide & Charge shot

 

Proto Man : 2x less resistent to impact than Mega Man ; Charge Shot (stronger than Mega Man's) & Slide, can also protect himself with his shield to block the attack (unless that's a big attack, mainly from a boss or something like that)

 

Bass : Dash, double jump, shoot in 8 directions, less powerful than both Mega Man & Proto Man, more resistant though.

 

Story : I remember telling about the end of it on the official but I'll do it here to. So, once again you would have an aging Dr. Wily, trying to take over the city, this time targetting especially the robots. He would have made his motives very clear from the start : the robots are evolving too fast for human society to comprehend & dominate them as he think they always should have done. Meaning, his new robot master are old programms that couldn't in any way think for themselves, making the hunt, for Mega Man & Proto Man especially, easier.

 

At the end of the Wily Castle, Mega Man is supposed to finally overcome the laws forbidding him to harm a human, and fire a semi charged blast on Wily. This whole thing comes out as a shock and is quickly relayed in the media, thanks to Dr. Wily's camera that has been filming Mega Man since he entered the castle. Mega Man, still under the shock of what he did, runs away and returns to Dr. Light, while Wily, severly wounded, crawls with his remaining forces to an underground laboratory.

 

Proto Man helps Dr. Light escape with Mega Man & Roll, before the police manages to break into Light's lab (in order to deactivate not only Mega Man but every robots made by Light), in order to "restore peace".

Bass, willing to "redeem" himself and (somehow) his creator for the things he's done to Dr. Light, decides to help Proto Man in that suicidal stand off against the police force. Both robots ends up dismantled and destroyed.

 

 

Dr. Light manages to get Mega Man & Roll to a secret lab of his, which he never told anybody of, and decides to shut both Mega Man & Roll "until things calm down" assuring them this is just a temporary situation and everything will go back to normal. Light knows two things, however :

 

1 - The situation will never "go back to normal"

2 - He, himself, hasn't much time left

 

So he decides to dismantle Mega Man and start a new build with an updated software he created himself, the armor his remastered, and even if it's not the same robot, he still affectionately calls his new & last prototype "Mega Man - Project : X"

 

As for Roll, I wasn't sure what to do with her, until I wondered "what if Light decided to give her another chance in life, in transfering most of her memories into a micro chip, he would implant in a perfect recreation of a human body that could age (making this one of the first "new generation robot", which could be an inspiration for the "new generation reploids" later in the series)...?" my only problem with this being "that does seem unfair to make her a "almost human" being while Mega Man gets to go to war again..." unfortunately, I never came to a satisfying answer for that, besides "Light thinks the world will always need someone ready to fight (for everlasting peace.......?)".

 

One of the last thing I was seeing for the new Roll would be her awaking, several decades later, with a message from the Dr. Light (now gone) who would have send her somewhere else, where she'd be safe, telling her who she was and that she needed to live a happy life, far from battle, and etc... and, stay with me on this one, the clothes she would wake up in would be the same as Ciel from Mega Man Zero. That's right, I wanted to hint that Ciel would in fact be a descendant of Roll in her new "human like" body.

 

As for Dr. Wily, after reaching his underground lab, would activate his final project : the project Zero. Upon dying, he falls on his computer, who starts malfuntionning and release a gas formed virus that makes Wily's corpse. After that, the gas is quickly absorbed in Zero's blue gem (on his helmet). Wily's computer initiate then a countdown stating that Project Zero is now downloading datas, and will only be activated when the transfer is done, in approximately 100 years (why so long ? because Wily was absorbed himself, which creates a big data overload).

 

The game would close, while the "Project X" is opening his eyes for the first time upon his creator calling him "X" (cf : OVA The Day of Sigma)

 

 

So yeah, the last Mega Man game I was seeing in the classic era would be one that would give closure to the serie. I'm not really sure if it's makeable, since (especially the end) this would be a lot story driven and kinda depressing for a classic Mega Man game, but I guess we needed to start getting into the darker tone of the X series somewhere.

 

 

 

 

===== Number 2 ======

 

 

It may come as a shock for some of you, but I'm a big fan of the Maverick Hunter X game on the PSP. I think it's only problem is that it was on the PSP which nobody cared about. And I think Capcom would make millions releasing it HD with Achievements/Trophies on the next gen platforms.

 

That's why my second idea was actually two games : Mega Man Maverick Hunter X 2 & 3.

 

 

Now why exactly two games ? because I think the formula would tire up if there was any more remake in the X series. That is why Maverick Hunter X 2 would cover up Mega Man X 2 & 3, and Maverick Hunter X 3 would cover up X4 & X5.

 

 

Graphic : well, HD's the way to go. I mean I love it when a game hits retro style and plays on nostalgia, but this trend is kinda reaching the "been there done that" point with me. So, yeah, the best way you can serve it is by showing X & Zero looking great.

 

Gameplay : And Here I won't change much things :

 

X dashes, charge shots, gains power up from Dr. Light capsules

 

Zero dashes, double jump, swings his light saber

 

 

I was thinking about a system of shop for upgrades (more moves for Zero, side attacks for X, more strength for the basic attack, etc)

 

 

Storywise : Okay, that's always the point I give more thoughts into. As you all guessed by now, I'm stopping myself at X5, the ending as foreseen by Inafune. My point is not to "erase" X6 X7 & X8 from the storyline, but rather to open a new interpretation for them. At the very least, I didn't thought of including them in "my" timeline yet because, and I stand by that : both Zero & Sigma die at the end of Maverick Hunter X3. Here's the thing, we follow the same story than before, but characters from the game will be introduced way earlier. For example : we're introduce to Dr. Doppler (MMX3) at the beginning of MHX2, and help him in his "Utopia Project", that way we can see the rise & fall of the character. The Repliforce would be introduced in the middle of the "MMX3 part" of the game, so Zero and Iris could have time to develop a relationship (and yes, this is in the sole & despicable purpose of making you feel terrible for slaying her).

 

I was seeing some elements changed in the story, for example :

 

- The Repliforce never was manipulated by Sigma, but too idealistic and narrowminded to sort things out peacefully. In fact, Sigma would not even notice the opening until late in the game (like, right after the Final Weapon has launched), which would allow him to almost destroy the Earth.

 

- Vile comes back, but he's rebuild by the followers of Sigma from X2, not by Doppler. He tries to kill X several times but always fail. He doesn't die though, he runs away at the end of Maverick Hunter X 2.

 

- As I said, characters are introduced earlier than we should expect. So is Double, but he doesn't work for Sigma this time, he's a freelance bounty hunter that is recruted very late by Sigma (just before he fights X) because Sigma needs time to infiltrate the Final Weapon & reach the core before the Maverick Hunters. And guess who would be Double's partner ? none other than Dynamo, who after hearing about his companion's death, would try and "take revenge" (even though he doesn't take this whole story fully seriously) on X, and gets mixed up into the Eurasia Colony infection.

 

- Places like "Repliforce City" (I was intending on changing the name), Eurasia, and other cities and locations would have been announced earlier too.

 

 

Endgame : So, Sigma runs away after his defeat on the final weapon and decides to launch a massive attack (as fan of the band as he can be) using the virus he found in the laboratory where Zero was discovered. Also, yes, I'm keeping one thing from the previous MMX game the first Maverick Hunter X game didn't : Zero & Sigma fought, and the Maverick virus came into contact with Sigma very early in the story, but it did not infect him, as Sigma was a very strong host. Instead, it openned a channel of communication between Sigma and....... Dr. Wily.

 

Here's time for the revelations : So those who watched the OVA Day of Sigma (go do it if you haven't, it's on YouTube............. DO IT ! ARE YOU DOING IT ??!!!  DO IT NOW !! ........ Okay....

there's spoilers coming !) know that Sigma didn't go crazy but tried to put everyone in danger to push X to the border of his power (and sanity) so he could show the Reploids race its new step in evolution. That wasn't entirely true (at least in my retcon.... no, seriously, this reason is plain stupid, there was one hundred better ways to do that, Sigma). Our beloved bald Reploid also had a talk with that "weird ghost scientist" he always saw appearing when he was alone (and, if you really wish to push the questionning this far : yes Sigma got examined, but no trace of anything was detected... Wily was hidden, and well hidden). Wily revealed Sigma that not only pushing X to the border of his potential would make the Reploids evolve, but also, why letting X have the spotlight when he doesn't even know what he's doing, when it's so much better to just kill him when you got the key to evolution in front of your eyes, and don't need anyone anymore. This was of course a lie, Dr. Wily's hatred for Dr. Light wouldn't find peace if X, Dr. Light's last creation was to be left alive, and wanted X destroyed.

 

As you all know, the irony of this situation will make Zero perish while X remains mortally wounded. X would be repaired by the power of Dr. Light (who survived the same way Wily did), and who hints that he's a cyber elf prototype, and that there are also data on this hidden somewhere. As Dr. Wily used all of his power to create the battle body Sigma will fight in what we know as the end of Mega Man X5, Dr. Light uses his remaining power (which he's been using each time to upgrade X) to rebuild X. This time, though, Light disappears for good. Just like Wily.

 

You know the end : X ends up alone, helps in the reconstruction of the earth, defeat the remaining Mavericks, and builds a city where "everlasting peace shall prevail" (and yes, that's the motto of the city), which he names Arcadia (I insist : Arcadia).

 

 

============ Idea number 3 =========

 

 

So, by now, you know I like Maverick Hunter X. But there's someone I seem to have forgotten who also was in this game. Well, I told you what became of him but not how did things end for him. And yes, I'm talking about Vile.

 

And so my next idea was : Mega Man : Vile.

 

 

Graphics : read above

 

Gameplay : I was fine with how Vile handled in Maverick Hunter X, also I think we could have gone deeper in his system. Also, some other upgrades might have been nice, a system of salvaging mechaniloids to find parts and stuff to equip (I always saw Vile as a good mechanician).

 

 

Story : There's nothing much I've got on this idea, the only thing I can tell you is that it was happening 50 years after Maverick Hunter X 3 (which is X5), so 50 years before Mega Man Zero. Arcadia has been knowing an era of peace and prosperity, but things are about to change. While Mavericks seem to be something of the past, there is still the problem of mechaniloids and reploids becoming more & more abundent and energy consumming. X is still present in this time, but doesn't fight anymore since he's too busy with politics and everything. So... yeah... X has become a politician and doesn't have his X-buster anymore. (One thing I think important to mention : I always thought there should be a Mega Man X episode retconning the whole Dark Elf part of the Mega Man Zero saga, making X the only one who sealed the Dark Elf and defeated Omega, I was never sure what to do with Zero & Omega, though..... still, I like the idea of Zero's original body being stolen by Weil and being held inside Omega).

 

Anyway, what happens is that, Vile recognizes X, doesn't accept this whole situation, and sees the beginning of "retirement" for old Reploids, while X is slowly trying to cover that up (note : X really isn't in control of much things at this point, as the power is in the hands of human bureaucrats, who don't see much in robots other than "servants", and in X nothing much than "someone they might have use of if troubles show up").

And trouble DOES show up when Vile decides to make an uprise in the city of Arcadia, going his own usual way : shoot & destroy first, ask questions later.

 

At the end of the game I wanted to have a final showdown between Vile & X, in which Vile would have finally defeated X, calling him a sell-out, and everything else you can imagine him calling X.

 

Of course, that's when X ends up disappearing from the public & political life of Arcadia, and that's where the energy crisis strikes big time, which the human government will try to confront for some decades until they finally adopt a project in which a Copy of X shall be created, that will help understand robots, while keeping the humans interests priority 1. You all know what comes next.

 

 

 

================ Idea 4 ==============

 

 

A full reboot of Mega Man X.

 

 

You may remember there was a cancelled project of a Mega Man X reboot, which was a FPS. Well that's kind of like that. There are some elements from this game I didn't like though :

 

 

=> X's face looked like a generic human face on a screen. I think there are two way you can approach this :

 

1) You make a complete robot without any human part whatsoever, which is an utter betrayal of Inafune's views on robots (having most of the good guys show their eyes and/or face, like Proto Man, Mega Man, since that was showing their human side, and thus their soul ; while other characters such as Vile or, yes, Sigma, had no or barely human face).

 

2) You made a human in the body of a robot.

 

Both of this approaches have been done & worked on so there's no point for originality anyway, but here are my thoughts :

 

If you take the first approach, this will be a robot that is gonna learn the value of human life, that everything can't be explained by straight out cold logic, and sometimes, situation calls for a more understanding

and forgiving judgement.

 

If you take the second approach, this is gonna become a character kinda like Spartan-117 from Halo. See, what made the duo Master Chief/Cortana so great in the Halo franchise is that Master Chief is a human trained to be a machine, and Cortana is a machine programmed to think like a human. One thing that I found interesting in Halo 4, but they never went anywhere with it, is that, despite all their efforts, both these characters are called back to their nature : Cortana, as human as she'd like to be, remains a smart A.I which only has 7 to 8 years to live before going insane and finally dying. And Master Chief, as unsensitive and "machine" as he was trained to be, remains a human being with feelings, and the loss of his companion & friend does hurt him.

 

All that aside, if you keep it subtle, you can have a X being a humanlike robot that never wants to look at his human side, but will be called back to his nature.

 

 

=> I don't like the X-buster, this gotta change into a more "buster" like weapon, even if it gotta look cool and edgy, and even if it must fire like a shotgun / rifle / sniper

 

=> as much as I like the design of the armor, it still ressembles too much Iron Man's suit, needs a bit of work but we're on something there.

 

 

Gameplay : So it's a FPS, you know what that means : GUNS !

 

X-buster has several modes :

 

=> Gun mode

=> Rapid Fire mode

=> Sniper mode

=> Power mode (shotgun : low range, powerful)

=> Fully elemental mode (flame/ice thrower, electric ray, etc...)

 

 

X salvages parts from regular enemies to upgrade his weapons, armor, etc.

 

Each boss gives X a new element (or a new equipement that would make him progress into the game... you know where I'm going with this, don't you ?), he can equip it with any of his buster modes, or he can 

fire it alone for full elemental damage (some enemies might be easier to kill this way).

 

I was hoping for a "dash" kinda like system, allowing X to dodge attacks, or advancing faster, allowing him to jump further. Also, he should be able to grab a ledge to mount on higher grounds.

 

As you can see, a lot of this comes from Metroid Prime, and yeah, I know the FPS project that got cancelled was developped by people that were responsible for Metroid Prime. So, yeah, also that : this game

would rather be a Metroidvania, without a boss select screen, but still allowing you to proceed to a specific era instead of another, allowing you to "choose" which boss you would fight first.

 

 

Story :

 

So I know the former project was about being a trilogy where X would become too dangerous at the end, Zero would show up and kick its ass.

 

You know I've only heard of the project last year, while this idea of a FPS always was in my head for a longer time. But I never knew what I would do with Zero... one thing's sure : I wanted this reboot's story to be a lot darker, and really adult. Not just "add more insults" adult, I wanted it too be dialogue heavy, touch on themes straight out of Asimov's laws of robotics, the connection between the human mind and the avatar (I had another theory in which X was a robot controlled by a human remotely, a human who would become more & more obsessed with X), the synergy of man & machine (still : the man becoming one with the machine), the dependance of the two species on each other (who depends of who : they of us or us of they ?), I was wondering if it couldn't be nice to touch on the theme of savage capitalism & industrialization in a human society that, thanks to the new discoveries with robotics, had overcome financial crisis and was entering a new but insane golden age, where consumming never was higher and where minds are completely weakenned & consummed by their neverending desires (still on consumerism, living plenty).

 

I wanted to show a society divided between the industrialized, where there was work, nice suburbs with "decent" people, and the center of the cities, over saturated with pollution, the poor being completely chased into the sewers.

 

 

My big problem here is I never found a way to conclude this story. I realized too late my universe had become too similar to that of Deus Ex Human Revolution so I never really thought about it again. Still, I thought it might be interesting to share that with you.

 

 

 

 

 

========== Idea 5 =======

 

 

A Mega Man STR

 

 

I reassure you : no story on this one. I would have seen a campaign, but don't know what to tell about.

 

Gameplay : close to Warcraft III to be honest : two races  : humans & reploids. Some heroes (like in warcraft III) : you know who for the reploids, and some new faces for the humans.

 

Story : The only thought I gave it was that it was technically supposed to happen either between Mega Man Zero & ZX (the battle between the humans & reploids and the remaining humans supporting the Neo Arcadia regime)

 

 

 

========= Idea 6 ========

 

 

A fighting game. Really. Why the hell not ?

 

 

So you take Mega Man & Mega Man X, you take the characters, the robots masters, the mavericks : and fight.

 

 

Gameplay : as a big fan of Power Stone 2 on the Dreamcast, I think a 4 players tournament fighters with arena like stages, bosses, items. With a shop that allows customisation of characters, item creation... so really, Power Stone & Super Smash Bros put in a blender..... and with Mega Man characters.

 

Story : Dr. Wily opened a portal somehow, every one got sucked into it, the different locations are recreated, and it's race to the exit.

 

.... D'you really need a story for such a game ?

 

 

 

 

========== Idea 7 ===========

 

 

Mega Man X Command Mission 2.

 

 

Graphics : One of the biggest problem with this game, aside from its soundtrack that just was dreadful, is the fact that you don't get to explore much. Most of the locations are bases, and even the Giga City is a tower. What we'd need would be real cities, some other locations like forests, jungles, beaches, platforms established on the sea, undersea complexes (in which you SEE that you're underwater), etc...

 

 

Gameplay : I'd take the same kind of gameplay, and would make some changes here and there, in order to make the combat more fast paced (still keep the meter & initiative system, so the player has the time to plan his strategy). Also, more side quests, more area to discover, more weapons & specs.

 

Story : ........ I don't know. One thing for sure is that : RPGs by their nature are long, so it would be a good opportunity to give more in depth with the world surrounding X. Also, familiar characters like Alia, Douglas, Signas, and why not Dynamo (who could be a playable character, you never know) should have more developement. As for the plot... eh. the force ? never thought of it.

 

 

 

 

And I guess I'll stop here, it's already a long text to read, I know many of you are fan of the Legends serie, which are adventure games mostly, but I never got into them. If I do however, and get some ideas of what Capcom could do with Mega Man, I will share them here.

 

 

Sorry there's no TL;DR here, guys, can't really make one on this, I think.

 

Toodles.

[TheCloudyEye]

I have wanted to say something about your ideas, but, well, this is just too damn long. Only have a few thoughts about idea #1 thus far:

- I know the whole "retro" thing is getting old, but I just feel that Mega Man looks much better in 8-bit compare to anything else. IMO he looked terrible in MM7 and 8. Interestingly, to me X always look rather ugly in anything less than 32-bit.

- I don't really like the idea of MM killing Dr. Wily. It feels too dark and doesn't fit his character. And I just can't imagine Bass fighting for anything other than himself. If there is a scenario where Bass get turned into scrap metal, it would be in a fight with Zero to establish that he is the most powerful robot ever.

 

That's all for now. I'll share more thoughts later.