zippdementia's Mega Man 4 review

I once had the crazy idea to fight Bright Man using rush coil. I would hope Rush was standing there right before Bright Man did his flash thing, then I'd spring to safety! I don't recommend this insane strategy...

I actually think this is one of the easiest Mega Man games. I played through it this morning before work and ended with 9 lives and a crap-ton of unused E-tanks. Everything has a predictable pattern and, aside from a few rare instances (Bright Man), there are no unavoidable attacks or enemies. It's like the enemies are lined up in a row for me to shoot, so long as I memorized where they appear...

That said, I've played this game too many times to know what it's like to play it without having it memorized. There are some enemies that you have to know where they are going to appear and have perfect timing to have a shot already in the air before they appear to not get hit. It also seems like there are a lot of enemies that appear when you are over pits and things like that. I was surprised this wasn't more of a sore spot with you given your complaints of the exact same thing in other titles.

I'm thoughly enjoying these reviews though; the fresh perspective and meticuously detail is great. May I ask if you are playing these games on an actual system or emulation? (Not that playing on an emulator is a bad thing--just curious)

Ha, the rush coil against Bright Man! Wow, that is inventive! One of the Wily forms in Mega Man 4 makes use of the rush coil, though you can also use the wire shot (which I didn't even talk about, bad me!) and the mega buster, charged to full (because it has a wider spread).

I don't know that I've complained about those things in any of the reviews (I'm not calling you out, I'd be happy to be quoted and discuss—you've changed my mind in the past!). Mega Man 1, my big complaint was boring design. Mega Man 2 my big complaint was Wily's Castle. I didn't even complain all that much about the instant deaths, I just pointed them out as design that would later hamper the castle. I also complained about long sections without enemies. Mega Man 3 I complained about the game suddenly becoming too easy at random times and some of the bosses being stupid. I think there may have been some confusion when I called Mega Man 2 "cheap" as to what I was exactly calling cheap.

Actually, I praise it in Mega Man 2: "There are plenty of pits, a few tricky jumps, and enemies you have to shoot mid-air or be knocked out of the sky by. Playing it definitely gives you that adrenaline rush that we associate with the best of Mega Man."

One of the things I talk about in this review is that Mega Man 4 fixes the problems I had with that game by letting you decide how prepared you want to be for the castle. If you want to stock up on E-Tanks and lives, or you can just go for it.

I'm playing the anniversary collection, normal mode for all games (which is hard mode on some of the games, like 2). The only crutch I'm giving myself is I start with five lives rather than three. There's spots in each level where I could spam kill enemies for the lives, but I detest grinding, so I'm just removing that element of it. Even so, I've collected enough lives just randomly dropped that I often hit nine and would go past it if not for the cap. I don't usually die a lot until the Castle stages.

and, aside from a few rare instances (Bright Man), there are no unavoidable attacks or enemies.

You can actually defeat Bright Man without taking any damage. The key to his time stopping attack is that he activates it whenever his health falls down to a certain number of sticks. If you make clever use of your normal and charged shots, you can get through the battle without Bright Man ever activating his time stopper attack.

You can actually defeat Bright Man without taking any damage. The key to his time stopping attack is that he activates it whenever his health falls down to a certain number of sticks. If you make clever use of your normal and charged shots, you can get through the battle without Bright Man ever activating his time stopper attack.

What? Please do tell. It always seemed that he randomly chose between shooting and stopping time, with shooting being favoured. I've never noticed a difference between his health and freezing frequency...

I think there may have been some confusion when I called Mega Man 2 "cheap" as to what I was exactly calling cheap.

I'm probably getting what you wrote confused with the discussion topic that sprang out of it. The word cheap was getting thrown around more than my wife yelling at me at the mall.

This video goes into detail about Bright Man and the trigger for his time stopper attack:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDro_pPPwvw

Pretty mind-blowing, isn't it? :)

Holy crap--I never knew that!

That guy also had a video on an Elec Man trick that I didn't know.

The more you know!

I'm probably getting what you wrote confused with the discussion topic that sprang out of it. The word cheap was getting thrown around more than my wife yelling at me at the mall.

Well said and very true.

Joseph, what a find! I'm not going to change the sentiment in the review for it because, I mean, who knows that going into the game?! Even Roahim, who is the best perfect runner I've seen, didn't know that. Really interesting information, though. Does he have anything about Quick Man?

Okay, so I did end up adding something about it in the end.