The first time I saw Mega Man, I was at a friend’s house. He had just gotten an NES, and he was playing Mega Man 2. It was a long time ago, and I can still remember it like it was yesterday. I was transfixed. I instantly fell in love with the little blue robot we’ve all come to know and love. I honestly have no explanation for why. Mega Man was just awesome to me. And since then, I’ve gotten every Mega Man game I could get my hands on. Mega Man is a huge reason why I’m still into video games today. And it’s why the little blue robot will have a special place in my heart (and probably a part of my brain) forever.
As time has passed, Mega Man’s name has become almost interchangeable with the sort of gameplay that it offers. Even now, if you want a game that is going to test your mettle and reflexes to their limits, you can’t go wrong picking up one of the little blue bomber’s adventures. Just a few action games of its time can claim to have aged as gracefully, and of those, none can top Mega Man’s terrific blend of twitch and puzzle-platforming goodness. The series always tries something different or a little more daring than its immediate predecessors. Sometimes, change works better in some games than others, but regardless, somehow Capcom always finds a way to lure us back into Mega Man’s quirky, charming, and deceptively difficult world.
The saga of Mega Man, a video game icon, started in 1987 when Capcom issued the first game, Mega Man 1, on the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The brainchild of Mauru Akira and Inafune Keiji, Mega Man was originally a simple, one-tap platformer. What it did differently was all in the gameplay and character, with the blue bomber boy going up against nasty bosses called robot masters. When you beat one, you got its power, which was pretty cool. Games like this are why the NES sold over 62 million copies.
I still get a thrill over the revelation that the powers of the vanquished Robot Masters are there for the taking. It never gets old. Those bosses have particular vulnerabilities that can be optimized if you have just the right tool on your utility belt. And figuring out who is susceptible to what requires a would-be hero to do some puzzling. If the 1980s was a decade consumed by arcades, the coin-op DNA imprinted itself on this series as it grew up. Reward interfacing with this particular mechanic of Mega Man is a chunk of nonlinearity that encourages replaying and doing better in a dorky lab coat. In an era when the game industry was just beginning to emerge from the primordial 8-bit “soup” from which nonlinearity began to gain momentum, Mega Man’s NES debut was a masterstroke of game design that allowed players to choose with which boss they wanted to die in the game’s opening.
The iconic design of Mega Man was another thing that pushed the series forward. Throughout the games, he’s changed very little. His design is simple. He’s a little guy. And he runs left to right. He wears his blue armor. And his arm cannon and helmet are basically the biggest things about his design that “go anywhere and do anything” is virtually the only “real” thing about him in this fictional universe. He’s memorable, and he could be reduced to a symbol to lead not just one game but an enormous and successful series that has changed very few of the lead symbols and also has tried to change very little about itself throughout its seasons.
The original Mega Man’s success led to Mega Man 2, and many fans see it (and so do I) as one of the greatest games ever made. It’s certainly my favorite of the series and has really snappy controls, besides working as just an overall great action game. But as with all games, what fans remember most are the actual stages. After all, those are the areas where the action takes place, and those sequences of enemies and events are more or less seen as the core of the action’s identity. And as fans see it (and even I), Capcom not only delivered a fine set of stages once you got past the game’s initial 30-50-minute chassis of cutscenes (which were entirely absent from MM1), they also mixed things up just enough.
The Mega Man franchise expanded in many ways during its time on the NES. It was there that the series established many of the gameplay, narrative, and visual conventions that we still associate with it. Mega Man served as the basic framework for what was to come, and many of the ideas were carried over to the next five entries. Mega Man’s software DNA was passed down to his NES successors, and the games, through their iterative process, became more refined, narrative-driven, and just plain fun. All aided in the fleshing out of the Mega Man universe.
The series took a considerable turn with the release of Mega Man X in 1993 on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. Mega Man X felt like a new generation for the Blue Bomber. It took the original concept—using acquired weapons to defeat bosses and their armies—and placed it in a (then) near-future world where the Mega Man character was an advanced good-guy bot that practically everyone else in the story wanted to replicate. This wasn’t just a Mega Man platformer; it was a Mega Man platformer with weighty themes: freedom and its cost, artificial intelligence and its limits—real stakes in the offing.
The first time I played Mega Man X is imprinted in my memory. What really stood out to me were the amazing controls. That, coupled with the game’s physics, made me feel like I had the kind of direct influence over X’s movements that I hadn’t experienced since Super Mario Bros. On top of that, X kind of sizzled. His dash sliced through Maverick cronies like a hot electric knife in Outpost’s butter. The stages were way more interesting this time around too, and I was really struck by the variety of platforming experiences and hidden places to poke around in. On either side of the game’s exciting, non-paced (but satisfying) narrative lay both exhilarating and melancholy (still satisfying) moments that shared the same space with the original Mega Man series but were covered with a delicious Neo-Ostwald layer in series of events that felt both significant and “silly-good,” which turned out to be just the right ratio to ensure the game’s feeling of importance to the series by way of its heightening of series-behind-the-scenes drama.
The Mega Man universe has grown beyond the core titles and the X series with the introduction of certain side stories and alternate takes on the same premise. While the classic series was very much an “action platformer,” Capcom wasn’t content to simply stick to the tried and true, unfailingly delivering something we’d seen before. In the crazy realm of variety, both Mega Man Legends and Mega Man Battle Network proved to be more akin to action RPGs with exploration elements, the former title even going so far as to play from a three-dimensional perspective. Mega Man Star Force took this very premise, Mega Man in an action RPG and ran with it, delivering not one, not two, but three interstellar titles!
Countless developers and game designers have been inspired by Mega Man; some are even outright imitators.
As a result, the beloved Capcom franchise is a cornerstone of a genre-in-game that has yet to go out of style or cede its ground to another genre. Whereas in the late 2000s, first-person shooters began to crowd out and take over great swathes of what was once a more diversely populated landscape of games, the platformer genre, for one, has yet to yield a still-standing amount of commercial real estate to rival genres.
Mega Man’s most profound influence is its focus on exactness and expertise. This primary emphasis is likely the biggest impact the Mega Man series has had on the platforming genre. Mega Man is all about tight controls, and the way those mechanics create the need for the player to fully master the game’s multitude of movie set possibilities.
The design of this and other significant games from the series (and there’s really only one of them that textually assures the player that they don’t have to actually master the game’s mechanics, so I won’t bother mentioning it here) is centered around the sort of hyper-demanding level.
The Mega Man series has had a profound effect on the video game industry, and it extends far beyond the simple premise of its gameplay mechanics. This influence can also be seen in the world of video game character and overall art design. One can point to the series’ vibrant and colorful art style, or to its huge cast of pretty awesome and memorable characters. But perhaps where the obvious influence of the series can be most felt is in the arena of video game world design.
Mega Man’s enduring musical aspect deserves a standing ovation. The series has the perfect gaming soundtrack: catchy, lighthearted, diverse, almost never tiresome, and a unique blend of made-on-purpose tunes that come across as meticulously designed by highly underrated yet maniacally devoted to their craft practitioners like Takashi Tateishi, Manami Matsumae, and Yasuaki Fujita. Listening to the whine of the NES almost has a therapeutic effect. However, what might have been hard to endure for long listening sessions (screw you, Bubble Man) likely pushed the intense blending of frenetic gaming sessions and almost never amiss in setting the mood in the precise manner that the composers intended for those moments to be played.
Upon thinking about my many personal Mega Man moments, it is evident that my overall gaming experience has been greatly affected by this series. Amongst those who forayed with me into the Mega Man series on the NES and the SNES either on their own or at my house are some who are not dedicated gamers. Nevertheless, even these have spent many, many hours with my brother or me being either completely captivated (incessantly playing and progressing) or extremely frustrated (swearing, leaving, and then returning hours or days later) by various Mega Man games.
At this time, such a mighty victory in a single level or over an extremely difficult boss elicits thunderous applause and “Woo-hoos!” from my brother and makes the two of us feel as though we’ve conquered an army.
The characters and plots of the series have left an indelible impact. Among them, Mega Man stands out. His is a story of justice served and determination that doesn’t quit, the kind of plot that can light a fire inside someone. The world swirling around this steadfast star of a video game franchise, too, can’t be forgotten. Its imagery has seared its colors into my memories more than anything I can recall watching on TV as a child.
The Mega Man franchise continues to change and add new titles. What I’m most interested in is where Mega Man himself will go next. Mega Man 11, an innovative delight that mixes old and new gameplay like no other game in the franchise, showed that Mega Man can still hold his own in today’s gaming world. And it’s not just the Blue Bomber himself that’s keeping the legacy alive; fans of the Mega Man series have always been a, um, mega part of what makes those games special. I truly believe their passion (and Capcom’s passion) will keep the series going strong.
The Mega Man series is innovative, influential, and has an appeal that seemingly cannot die. Although many people accuse it of having a plot that ranges from the simple to the simply nonsensical, that isn’t really why anyone plays a Mega Man game, so it’s free from the burden of having to demonstrate narrative artistry. What “makes” a Mega Man game is that it is a beautifully-designed and beautifully-implemented action platformer, and in that, it has no equal.
