MB: Greetings and salutations, loyal Game Freaks readers! This week's review brings us back to what seems to be our system of reviewing choice, the Super Nintendo, and a game that is simultaneously a continuation of a series and the beginning of a new series. The Mega Man series is probably the longest running video games series in the history of video games. This series established itself on the Nintendo Entertainment System with 6 games, but Mega Man X redefined the series on the SNES. I'll let Mr. White lead off...

MB: I owned Mega Man 3 for the Nintendo Entertainment System, and I played it off and on for a very long time, and frankly I was never too into it, mostly because of the difficulty. However, when I got my Super Nintendo, I decided to give Mega Man X a shot, partially because I was somewhat fond of earlier games in the series, and partially because it was very well-reviewed in a number of video game magazines. And from the opening level, where a city crumbles around you as you try to make it through, Mega Man X never failed to disappoint.

The gameplay is fairly simple. You can jump, shoot your gun at enemies, climb walls, and slide. That's really about it, and the game doesn't offer a lot of variety as far as that aspect goes. However, "shoot your gun at enemies" describes the fighting aspect of the game far too simply, because the hallmark of the Mega Man series is in full force in this game: the ability to use customized and upgraded weapons.

For the uninitiated, in almost any given Mega Man game, you start off a level by picking which boss you eventually want to fight. These bosses always have some kind of goofy name or theme, like Chill Penguin or Launch Octopus. You fight your way through their level, which always fits in with the theme (Chill Penguin's level is all ice, and Launch Octopus' Lair is underwater). Eventually, you fight the boss, and when you successfully defeat them, you get their weapon for your own personal use. These various weapons all have different effects and ways of working, which increases the variety of gameplay.

That description of the game mentioned what's probably my favorite part of Mega Man X: the levels. As strange as the themes may be, they always manage to add a new aspect to make the game more challenging. Also, the art in the levels is beautifully done. The effects used to create various elements are fairly convincing for a SNES game and just plain look nice as well.

The main drawback to Mega Man X--and, as previously mentioned, the entire Mega Man series--is the enormous difficulty. Some of the levels can be quite tricky, and will require multiple attempts to get through. Where the difficulty goes insane, however, is at the very end. The last boss, Sigma, is, by all means, practically invincible. It will probably take you roughly 7942 attempts to beat him, and even then, it'll be very, very close. Do not pick up this game if you don't want a challenge.

Rating: 8/10

MW: So I'm pretty certain that this is the first game we've reviewed that I personally have never finished. My figures could be off on that, but I think that's accurate. The reason I've never finished this game is because I've never been willing to devote days of my life to beating the final boss, Sigma. I can't get past the initial encounter with him, after you kill his attack dog, who we can only assume is named Buddy.

For as asininely difficult as Sigma is, Mega Man X is, on the whole, one of the easiest games of the X series. Having played X2 and X3, as well as snippets of the Playstation X games, I can say almost without fear of contradiction that the first adventure of the android known as X was by far his easiest. The levels, while challenging, are not death-defying, and the bosses are relatively easy once you break into the weapon-chain common to all Mega Man games (A's weapon beats B, whose weapon beats C, etc). The hardest parts of the game, as with all the Mega Man games, are getting started and beating the final boss(es).

Graphic design in X is really quite pretty for a Super Nintendo side-scroller. The futuristic backgrounds and crisp, cartoon-like enemies lend a distinct flavor to the game: this is Mega Man, but not the Mega Man you were used to before. Another nifty aspect of the graphics in X is the "Easter eggs" scattered throughout the game. If certain Maverick bosses are beaten before others in the sequence of the game's events, the layout of the stages will alter slightly. For example, beating Chill Penguin before taking on Flame Mammoth causes the otherwise lava-filled Flame Mammoth level to become a frosted-over paradise, relatively. Many areas of the level actually become easier, all because you chose to beat Chill first.

By far, the coolest of these "eggs" is the hidden Hadouken shot; by accomplishing a relatively complex series of maneuvers after attaining all the power-ups for X's armor, one can obtain a Street Fighter II-style Hadouken. X even yells "Ha-DOU-ken!" when he uses it. Incidentally, it's pretty much the best weapon in the game--it destroys nearly everything in one shot, although this hasn't been tested on all of Sigma's final forms.

Story, my personal clincher with any game, is really quite, well, X-cellent. The story of this particular game isn't that great, but the player is lured into the world of Mega Man X, which carries with it a plot so convoluted, and with so many strange parallels and linkages to the original MM games, that entire websites have been created to try to publicly synthesize the outrageously novel-like story. If anyone could actually figure out what's going on in the X universe, or, even more challenging, what actually happened to the original Mega Man cast, that person would be hailed as a hero by the gaming community at large, and possibly even by the Capcom company, which, in my opinion, has no idea what to do with the monster they've unleashed. X is easily the most story-intensive side-scroller series on the market.

The music is great. In the style of all Mega Man games, the music is jazzy, up-tempo, and immediately memorable, as well as being hilariously annoying if you hum it in a crowded room. Somewhere between Uematsu (famous Final Fantasy music composer) and "Eye of the Tiger," the X series continues in the musical traditions of its predecessor series quite nicely.

All in all, Mega Man X should be recognized as the proud originator of an excellent side-scroller series, with fun secrets, good music, a great story, and simple controls. The unreasonable difficulty of the final boss really does the most damage to this game, but even considering that, I give X a:

Rating: 9/10