This is a blog I've been waiting to do for a while and was requested once I did my Mega Man blog. Mega Man X is the best spin-off of the Mega Man series. I don't care if you don't think it's the best spin-off, it is, okay. Unless you can get 100 people to send me messages saying that there's another spin-off just as good or better than Mega Man X, I won't do a blog post about it. I might give them some honorable mentions just for the historical value of the series, but I'm not going to do a blog entry about that spin off unless the task above is completed.
Before:
Before Mega Man X, there was only the Mega Man games for the NES. With the release of the SNES in 1991, Capcom decided to release Mega Man games for the SNES originally calling them Super Mega Man.
Mega Man 5 was released for the NES a year after the release of the SNES with gamers anticipating the first Mega Man game for the SNES. Mega Man X was finally released for the SNES in January of 1994 with the release of Mega Man 6 soon after initially causing some confusion in the gamer community.
"Is that green robot there the karma chameleon?"
After:
The first installment of the series, Mega Man X, was released for the SNES in January of 1994. The game starts out in the year 21XX and the robot X was discovered by Dr. Cain in the ruins of Dr. Light's former robot research facility and with the help of X, Dr. Cain creates the first ever replicate android or Reploid was produced. A Reploid is meant to think, learn, grow, and feel like a human and soon Reploids were being mass produced.
Since Reploids have free will there are Reploids that cause crime. These Reploids are said to have "gone maverick" causing these robots to be referred to as Mavericks. The government had Dr. Cain form the police organization, the Maverick Hunters, to stop Maverick incidents. The Maverick Hunters help restore damage by the Mavericks and other do other jobs as needed.
For the leader of the Maverick Hunters, Sigma was built. Sigma had an advanced thought system and was built to not have the defects that other
Reploids have. Sigma later went maverick himself saying all humans are inferior and had all of his followers kill all humans. Zero, being the only Maverick Hunter left teams up with X to stop Sigma.
The game play is very similar to the original Mega Man games, but is meant to be more fast paced and harder than the Mega Man games. There are power-ups hat X gains that are hidden in the game and the most notable is the hadouken power-up. The bosses, instead of ending with man and are built by Dr. Wily, are based upon animals and are Maverick followers of Sigma.
"He gets his inspiration from Ryu."
The sequel to Mega Man X, Mega Man X2, was released for the SNES in December of 1994. The game is supposed to take place six months and thirteen days after Sigma's death. X became the leader of the Maverick Hunters and continues to fight the ongoing Maverick Rebellion. X had tracked the remaining Mavericks to a Reploid factory and fought them, but that wasn't the end.
Three Maverick leaders, Serges, Agile, and Violen form the X-hunters and take control of the North Pole. Between the time period of the two games, Serges collected the parts of Zero, who died in the previous game. The X-hunters contact the Maverick Hunters and taunt X with Zero's body which has been split into three pieces and the X-hunters hope this will lure X to them leading him to his demise.
The game play of Mega Man X2 is very similar to its predecessor with with some minor changes. The helmet upgrade allows you to detect hidden items and passages among other things.
"Who's the green biker dude?"
The last game in the series to be released on the SNES, Mega Man X3 was released in America January 4, 1996. The story of the game revolves around Dr. Doppler, a Reploid scientist. Thanks to the efforts of Dr. Doppler, he has prevented all the Mavericks from going crazy. The Reploids joined together to formed a society around their mentor called Doppler Town. As was well, until the former Mavericks reverted to their old ways. Doppler was blamed for the incident and X and Zero went out to contain a new threat.
After, X and Zero defeat Dr. Doppler, he realizes the damage he's done and says that Sigma is alive in the form of a computer virus and he corrupted to build a new body for Sigma. Then, X seeks out Sigma and after an intense battle, the Sigma Virus in its pure form chases X in attempt to possess him. After X finds himself at a dead end, two different endings may happen. In the main ending Zero loads the anti-virus on his sabre and rushes in just in time to save X causing Sigma to explode, taking out the lab as they evacuate. However, if Zero was injured during the game, Dr. Doppler would use his own body as the anti-virus and sacrifices himself for the greater good.
This is the first game where you can play as Zero and the last game to feature a password system as the saving device. After this game the series makes a switch in systems.
"Hooray for Zero!"
Mega Man X4 was released for the PlayStation and the Sega Saturn in September of 1997. There are two different story lines to the game. There's Zero's story line and X's story line both complete with horribly dubbed, full motion video cutscenes and on screen text. After the third defeat of the Maverick robot Sigma, Dr. Cain starts the initiative to create another Reploid army to aid the Maverick Hunters called Repliforce. Repliforce is a very strict regime led by General and his second-in-command, Colonel. Six Months after the creation of the group, Cain Labs finds the methods of Repliforce ineffective and potentially dangerous in the Maverick situation. To make things worse, General has been meeting with a "mysterious figure" who plots the Hunters' demise, saying that they are a threat to the jurisdiction of the Maverick Hunters. All hell breaks loose when the floating city, Sky Lagoon, crashes to the ground onto the city below it. The game starts where either X or Zero are sent to find the possible causes of the disaster only to become entangled in a struggle against Sigma to save the world, again.
Mega Man X4 is very similar to its predecessors on the SNES, but with minor changes. This is the first game in the series to feature Iris, Colonel's sister. The graphics of the game are improved, but the game is still in its original 2D platformer style. Mega Man X4 also features sounds that are added to the character when they attack, like grunts.
"Which one should I play as, awesome or awesomer."
The next installment of the series, Mega Man X5 was released for the PlayStation January 31, 2001. Sigma, who's been revived again by an awful story line, researches the origin and design of Zero and discovers how to unlock Zero's true power, hopefully killing X in the process, which he won't. Sigma attacks the Maverick Hunters intending to lose. Once he does, he spreads the Maverick virus across the Earth, causing mayhem. Meanwhile, a Reploid mercenary awesomely named Dynamo is hired by Sigma to make Eurasia, a space colony, to crash into Earth and the Hunters only have sixteen hours to stop it.
To stop Eurasia from crashing into the Earth, the Hunters have two options. The first option is to fire a cannon called the Enigma at Eurasia vaporizing it. If the Enigma shot fails, which is randomly done by the game, the second option is to pilot a space shuttle into the colony, destroying it. To increase their chances, Zero and X get dispatched to get the parts for the two devices which are coincidentally guarded by eight robot masters and X and Zero must defeat them to receive the parts.
The Enigma is less likely to succeed compared to the shuttle assuming that all the parts are collected. If the Enigma shot succeeds or fails, a new virus will appear on Earth, appearing as the Sigma virus combining with leftover pieces of the colony. If the Enigma or the space shuttle succeeds, X and Zero will hunt for the cause of the virus. If the Enigma shot or the shuttle fails or time runs out, the colony crashes into Earth nearly destroying it and Zero will go Maverick.
In both cases, once the virus' location has been discovered, the Hunters investigate. X and Zero go into a weird underground fortress. In the bizarre fortress, X and Zero cross paths, where mistrust and suspicion leads to battle between our heroes. After the duel, the story changes slightly. If Zero went Maverick, he would sacrifice himself leaving X to fight Sigma alone. If Zero didn't go Maverick, Zero saves X and himself from Sigma and they both are able to fight him.
There are three possible endings to the game. If Zero went Maverick, X beats Sigma but is damaged. A mysterious figure, a hologram of Dr. Light, heals him, but erases all of his memories of Zero. X is then seen three years later with X talking to two hunters and Douglas, Signas, and Alia talking about X's memories of Zero being erased.
If Zero didn't go Maverick, Sigma destroys the Maverick Hunters' base after his defeat. X attemps to save Zero but is taken down by Sigma having both of our heroes damaged in the process. Zero manages to get a final blow on Sigma, causing the endings to diverge. If Zero destroys Sigma, he realizes his true purpose in life before dying. If X defeated Sigma, the true ending happens, he receives Zero's sabre and continues to fight as a Maverick Hunter.
The gameplay of Mega Man X5 is basically the same as it's predecessor, but features the the "Black Zero" armor for Zero if Zero reaches the hologram of Dr. Light first.
"Yay! A back-up plan! If I knew about this earlier I would've kept playing."
The last Mega Man X game to be released for the PlayStation, Mega Man X6 was released for the PlayStation on December 4, 2001. The game begins three weeks after the last game, where Zero has been missing and has been presumed dead. The Earth's surface has also been rendered uninhabitable. A Maverick named the Zero Nightmare, a purely evil Maverick, has been causing havoc all across the Reploid world. X, curious about the Maverick and angered by the use of Zero's name in vain, seeks out the Maverick.
After defeating the Zero nightmare, X finds out Zero is alive recovering from the damage he sustained in the last game. Once Zero has been recovered, they seek out the creator of the Zero Nightmare.
This search takes our heroes to a lead researcher named Gate in his lab. After X beats Gate in combat, he tells X that he has rebuilt Sigma. Sigma then kills Gate and fights X, and like always X defeats Sigma in battle.
This game is different from its predecessors because it puts emphasis on saving other Reploids. Instead of getting one-ups for saving Reploids, you receive power-ups that can be permanently equipped to the character. The amount of power-ups that can be equipped is based on the players rank.
"Thank god for one ending and not a billion different ones."
The first Mega Man X game to be released on the PlayStation 2 and the first game to feature Axl, Mega Man X7 was released for the PlayStation 2 on October 14, 2003. After the previous Maverick conflict the world begins to rebuild, but like always, the Maverick problem still continues. As a new crime wave hits, X is conflicted with problems that have plagued him since he joined the Maverick Hunters. Unable to find answers, X drops his roll from the Maverick Hunters to play a more strategic roll. With X's roll left empty, many groups have formed to fill the void. One of the most notable groups is the "Red Alert Syndicate", growing so large that they are now a dominant force. Red Alert is similar to Repliforce, but mainly consists of vigilantes. The group claims to hunt Mavericks, but apparently they do more than hunting Mavericks. Axl, a Red Alert member, has had enough of the groups "killing" and leaves Red Alert. The groups leader, Red, is angered by this and goes out of his way to get Axl back.
Axl is chased by a mechaniloid to bring him back to Red Alert, and the chase wreaks so much havok that Zero is sent to investigate. After taking down the mechaniloid, Axl is taken into custody by Zero at Hunter HQ. After this ordeal, Red challenges the Hunters. He will release some of the Mavericks Red Alert has in captivity and whoever defeats the most gets Axl. Zero goes into action immediately, and out of remorse, Axl wants to prove he can be a Maverick Hunter. X stays behind, trying to find a peaceful solution to what he thinks is a pointless conflict. Eventually X decides that he is the quickest way to end this battle and joins in. Alia later finds the location of Red Alert's base and inside is a newly built Sigma, no surprise. Sigma is defeated and X promotes Axl to an official Maverick Hunter.
This game is very strange because its the only game in the series to not have X as a playable character at the beginning of the game. The only way to unlock X is to save 64 Reploids or beat the 8 robot masters. Also, this is the only game in the series to have 3D graphics combined with 2D gameplay.
"Cool! Giant Turtles! I call shotgun!"
The most recent installment in the Mega Man X series is Mega Man X8 and it was released for the PlayStation 2 on December 7, 2004. The story continues with the rebellions of the Mavericks continuing with seemingly no possible end. To escape from these battles, mankind has built an elevator to take equipment and supplies to the moon in order to expand their horizons. This project is named the "Jakob Project" and the Reploid, Lumine, is put in charge of it. Another part of the project is sending a more advanced generation of Reploids to the moon to work on the project. The New Generation Reploids use DNA to change form according to task, making them the perfect workers. Axl, as revealed in Mega Man X7, was built as a prototype for the New Generation Reploids. These Reploids also have built-in subroutines to prevents them from going Maverick.
Everything runs smoothly, until Vile is somehow resurrected and kidnaps Lumine for no apparent reason and it's up to the Maverick Hunters to rescue him, but they don't know that Sigma has returned again for the umpteenth fucking time. Contained in every copy of the New Generation Reploid's DNA database is Sigma's DNA, allowing the "Maverick proof" Reploids to actually go Maverick. Sigma wants to destroy the old generation of Reploids and replace them with a the New Generation Reploids. Once Sigma is defeated, Lumine continues the operation by attempting to kill the Maverick Hunters. After a dramatic battle, Lumine is defeated. However, when Axl walks over to the defeated Lumine's body, he is shocked as a tentacle pops out and damages the crystal on his head. Once our heroes head back down to Earth, Zero wonders if Sigma is gone for good, X wonders if he is truly obsolete, and Axl lays unconscious, with a small fragment of crystal shard glowing.
Gameplay of the game isn't very innovative to the series in any way. The only major change is the feature letting you to shoot Axl's gun in all directions.
"Hold on a sec, I just need to fan myself down."
There are many other games that relate to the Mega Man X series such as Mega Man Xtreme or Mega Man Maverick Hunter X, and also many spin-offs like Mega Man Zero or Mega Man Legends, but these are most notable games in the franchise. The series has come a very long way from it's classic 2D SNES look to the 3D visualizations in the most recent games and hopefully Mega Man X8 isn't the last game of the franchise as hopes of a Mega Man X9 will be coming soon.
"Cross your fingers or I'll shoot you!"
