Megaman 8

One of the best Megaman games ever made! Why? Click to find out!!!!!

Everyone knows who Megaman is. Everyone knows how great the games are. That's all you need to know. Buy MegaMan 8. Good bye! (review is thrown into fireplace for being ridiculously short and undetailed) Fine, I'll tell you about the game. Megaman is a robot built by Dr. Light. Originally meant for peaceful applications (which makes you wonder why his only power is energy blasts and stealing weapons), things went horribly wrong (name one game where they invented anything that turned out okay). Dr. Light's partner Dr. Wily betrayed him and tried to take over the world with most of their robots. Megaman remained loyal to Dr. Light and set off to fight Wily. 7 defeats (and one actual capture) later Megaman 8 starts. 

THE STORY: The game starts out in outer space. Two giant blobs of energy are fighting. After a defeat the skull shaped one (skulls are universal symbols of evil apparently) crashes into Earth. We then cut to Megaman fighting his rival Bass. He gets a call from Elmer Fudd, er, Dr. Light (more on that later) and abandons his battle to investigate a crash on an island. There he finds out Dr. Wily has obtained the evil energy. Wily decides the safest place to keep the energy is in the hands of his robots (even though Megaman has destroyed 54 similar ones) and Megaman sets out to stop Wily. 

THE GAMEPLAY: Like all the Megaman games, MM8 is an action platformer. Megaman makes his way through levels filled with robot enemies, floating platforms, and the most powerful weapon known to video game, spikes. Megaman's signature gameplay element has always been getting the weapon of the bosses you defeat. MM8 of course carries on this tradition, with 8 bosses who's name ends with ''Man'' just waiting to have their weapons stolen. You get to pick the order you fight the man bosses in (kind of, you start with four choices and can't fight the others until you've defeated the first four) as always, and bosses can be made much easier by using the weapon they're weak against on them (Wily really should stop making his robots weak against each other). 

The levels are well designed, with plentiful enemies and platforms to jump across, plus variety with mini game like segments (riding Megaman's robot dog Rush like a jet in a 2D shooter, snow boarding). The levels mostly avoid cheap instant death areas (although a few of the later levels have areas problematic in that field), and give you many opportunities to interact with them (hooks you can use a special weapon to swing on). 

The bosses are some of the better Megaman ones (quite an improvement over MM7, which featured bosses such as Junk Man and Spring Man). Some are a little cliched (Frost Man, over half the Megaman games have ice themed bosses), but some are interesting (hovering Astro Man, two headed Search Man, Japanese bird demon Tengu Man). The boss fights are well done, with most of the bosses managing to prevent something of a challenge even if you posess the weapon they're weak against (although some are too hard if you don't). 

A problem many people have with the Megaman series is similarity between the games. MM8 shouldn't particularly upset in that area. The levels, although sometimes reusing themes, have many new elements in them. There is also added replay in the bolts you can find. Unlike previous Megamans where bolts were currency you could get infinite amounts of by replaying levels and killing enemies, in MM8 there are only a certain amount of bolts hidden through the levels. You can buy powerups for Megaman with them, and to have a maxed out Megaman you'll need to find them all. MM8 might not be the most innovative sequel ever made, but I think the quality of the gameplay easily makes up for that. I personally can never get enough Megaman. 

THE GRAPHICS: Megaman 8 has very well done graphics. The levels are very colorful and have a 3D look to them. The characters are well detailed, giving the bosses plenty of personality. Foreground objects seem to pop out at you, and the animation is very smooth and detailed. You also get incredible FMV sequences. They are easily good enough to use in a Megaman cartoon. Unfortunately there is a big problem with the FMV sequences, but it's not in the graphics department. Even by today's standards Megaman 8 looks fantastic. A 2D work of art. 

THE SOUND: Megaman 8 has good music. It doesn't stick in your head, but every stages music fits it. The sound effects are also well done, although I can think of very few games that manage to mess up sound effects. Now we get to the game's biggest flaw. I'm reluctant to call it a flaw, because it has arguably entertained me more than it would have if done correctly. Either way, we now arrive at voice acting. To put it simply, the voices are horrible. Hideous. Mega Man 1 box art bad. But they're so terrible they're funny. As I stated above, Dr. Light sounds exactly like Elmer Fudd. I kept expecting him to order Megaman to ''Get that screwy wabbit!'' (looney tunes joke was here, in case you haven't noticed). Megaman has an incredibly high pitched and annoying voice. Dr. Wily's voice acting is just hysterical. I still laugh when I remember him screaming as though it were the most thrilling statement ever made ''I DON'T HAVE TIME..... TO DEAL WITH YOU!''. Bass and Duo's (a new character who's role could be considered a spoiler) voice acting isn't so bad, but Megaman, Light and Wily make up atleast 80% of it. It drains any drama out of the cinemas, which would otherwise be some of the best in any game. But they can be enjoyed in the right mind set. The voice acting really is so bad it's funny. Whether that makes up for any drama being sucked out of the story is up to you, but either way it makes little impact on the actual game.

Here are some really good remix

And here is a clip that shows the bad dub that they made (a fanmade clip of course :P )

FUN FACTOR & FRUSTRATUON: Beating this game should not take that long even for beginners. It took me about a couple of days to fully beat it and getting all the 40 bolts. Unlike Megaman 7 and Megaman & Bass, bolts here are not as easy to get since in those games the enemies have some probability to drop a small or large bolt. Here they’re 40 bolts to collect. The bolts are what make most Megaman 8 gamers continue to play it even if they beat Wily. About 20 of the Bolts are easy to get and are pretty obvious to locate. The rest are hidden well and will take some times to find. But after doing this and beating Wily for the 6th time, you might not want to play it anymore. I still play it for fun now and then but I’m mostly finished with it.

OVERALL: This game really evolved Megaman to the best Capcom could do back then. My opinions on this game might be different from those of other Megaman fans but many would agree that this was a major change for our Blue Friend. The Blue Bomber really does it all in this game so my rating for this game shall be a 9 out of 10. I gave it a 9 because even if it has Anime scenes and all the other wonderful additions to this game, there are some elements that brought its rate down. A 9 is still a very high score, and it deserves it. Megaman is one of the best of the original Megaman games. It is a very well executed platformer worth playing again and again. If you don't have the patience to wait for MegaMan Collection, get this game. You won't be sorry.

Yeah, one more thing, the Japanese version of the game is way more better then the US & EU versions, mostly because of the dub of the cut scenes!

NAME: MEGAMAN 8
SYSTEM: Play Station, Sega Saturn