Charge Shot is very appreciated, but apart from that, this game is kind of just... okay. I have no idea why they felt the need to make boss HP fill up way slower.

I'll do the same format as my other Mega Man reviews and go game by game.

Toad Man Stage: The water gimmick is okay-ish; I don't like the instant death pits. Other than that, this stage feels shockingly short, and a really... really... REALLY mediocre boss doesn't do it any favors.
Bright Man Stage: I love the brightness/darkness gimmick with the darkness enemies and then having to light the area back up with a firework enemy, super creative stage. The optional pendulum platform section was also a highlight. Bright Man himself isn't too fun to fight; bosses that can just freeze you in place with no real counterplay aren't fun to fight. Fun stage, bad boss.
Pharaoh Man Stage: Love my Egypt, so this stage is... just ok. Sand is an interesting gimmick and the platform enemy section is fine. Pharaoh Man's fight itself is kind of lame if you use the weakness, it's more of a mash test than anything. Kind of a letdown, but at least Pharaoh Shot is a cool ass weapon.
Ring Man Stage: The platforms that disappear are just an okay gimmick, you can kind of tell they didn't have much for Ring Man. The hippo minibosses are a little annoying to deal with but nothing compared to the ring minibosses that are a royal pain in the ass and I honestly just ran into them and skipped them with I-Frames. Ring Man himself is actually a kind of interesting fight, so it's the opposite of Bright Man funnily enough. Bad stage, fun boss.
Dust Man Stage: Interesting stage with the trash presses and the forming platforms, definitely not bad. Dust Man is a pretty fun fight and it's fun to figure him out.
Dive Man Stage: It's a water stage with semi-interesting enemies and the whale miniboss is ok, but it's not really memorable. Dive Man is just like, one step above Toad Man and that's not really saying much.
Drill Man Stage: Interesting aesthetic, but otherwise a kind of boring stage. Drill Man's fight is also not really that good, you're mostly just waiting around until he pops back up to shoot him.
Skull Man Stage: I like the diverging paths in this stage, but that's about it.

Cossack Stage 1: First stage isn't really too memorable, though it is reminiscent of the first Wily Stage in Megaman 2. Boss is cool, love sliding under the boss.
Cossack Stage 2: The Rush Jet part is neat, game gets pretty generous and gives you a lot of free stuff here. The boss is also really cool, and it reminds me of the boss in Megaman 2 that was just the stage. Very nice.
Cossack Stage 3: You can do a funny Wire bug on the autoscroller parts which is fun. Other than that, not a big fan of the autoscroller section, and the boss is just really mediocre.
Cossack Stage 4: Not much to say about this stage. Cossack himself is a fun enough fight.

Alright, onto the Wily Stages.
Wily Stage 1: This stage is full of so many fucking Mets man. There's also a really cheap blind drop into water where there's a set of asshole spikes placed purely to spite the player. Kaizo blocks reappear and are kind of pointless since the player can just use Wire. And oh, the boss of this stage is a giant Met. Thankfully it's pretty easy.
Wily Stage 2: Fun platforming, otherwise not terribly memorable. The boss isn't really great either.
Wily Stage 3: Classic Robot Master rematches. Not much else to say until Wily Machine, where it took me an exorbitant amount of time to figure out I was supposed to hit him with fully charged shots. This fight sucked big time, I'm not going to lie.
Wily Stage 4: From a bad fight to a really fucking hype fight. This is probably my favorite Wily Fight? It's easy but it's so fucking cool and is a great victory lap.

Colorblindness Rating: A
By now, Megaman's menus are no longer confusing for the colorblind with much clearer labels. Thanks, Capcom.

While Mega Man 3 felt like more Mega Man, Mega Man 4 feels like even more Mega Man. The addition of the charge blast is nice. I like the iterative nature of Mega Man's development, and here with the slide and charging blast, Mega Man finally feels complete as an action game character.

I realized this time around that I definitely prefer the latter half of the game—the two castles—to the first part where you take out the robots in their own levels, because the game requires you to use your special abilities to make it through the level. I feel like I tend to under use Mega Man's abilities in general, saving them for a challenge or an enemy type that never comes. You only really need to use robot abilities against other robots, which trivialize the fights with them, and that's always disappointing to me—I want to feel like I beat a boss, not like I found the right key to them. The non-robot bosses at the end of the game were pretty fun, and felt like they were designed to be fought rather than puzzled out.

All that said, I really got annoyed at the final boss, where you have to use a certain weapon to damage them—at that point, I was all out of ammunition for that weapon, and had to die and farm drops from enemies to fill that back up. It made me just not want to finish the game.

I'm going to put down the mainline series for now and swap over to X. I'm really interested to see how this series develops into the 16bit era.

It has been YEARS since I've played a Mega Man game. I'd heard mixed things about this particular one, but I was excited to jump back in after a long hiatus. But my excitement soon turned into nervousness when I started playing, because someone on the level design team LOVED spikes, and especially enemies coming from off-screen and knocking you into bottomless pits. It was aggravating, but, the stages got progressively easier the more weapons I unlocked (I guess that's how it goes in Mega Man, use your powers to ignore all the bullshit), so I found myself having more fun the more I pushed through. Drill Man's stage can suck it though.

Questionable design aside, there's a lot I enjoyed about Mega Man IV. The most obvious thing is the huge presentation boost. Not just the opening cutscene and the new weapon acquisition animation, but also the level themes. The coolest thing about the first Mega Man is how its level design really played into its themes; Cut Man's stage really felt like infiltrating this towering fortress, Guts Man's stage felt like descending down a huge construction shaft. MMII and III had way more visually creative themes, which was certainly for the better, but lost some of that... grounded adventurousness for lack of a better term. MMIV incorporates that same feeling, but with the way more interesting aesthetics of II and III, making for what is easily the best looking game thus far, and by a much more substantial margin than you'd expect.

I also like this game's (slight) emphasis on exploration. It's really not all that special (and from what I know the rest of the classic series and especially the X series do this way more), but it's cool to occasionally stumble upon a different path and be rewarded with the balloon and wire (which are both awesome, btw).

And the core gameplay feels just as good as ever. Mega Man's still got the slide, he has the charge shot finally, Rush still rocks, Eddie's always a welcome surprise whenever he shows up, and I think the weapons are... ok. I like how the Pharaoh Shot essential gets two fully charged shots per use by hitting an enemy while charging and then throwing it; Rain Flush and Flash Stopper are great for when you don't wanna deal with things, and I like how the level design makes you use these two like you would Rush or the items, navigating around enemies rather than strictly being combat weapons. I like the Dust Crusher and the Drill Bomb as alternatives that aren't just a worse version of the Mega Buster (although I usually just used the charge shot). The Ring Boomerang sucks, I don't think I ever used the Dive Missile for anything that wasn't a boss, and the Skull Barrier is great for letting me ignore everything in Drill Man's stage, but I rarely used it outside of that. Nothing here replaces the Mega Buster for me, nor is anything as fun and broken as the Thunder Beam or the Metal Blade, but I also don't feel like most of them are worthless imitators of my basic attack like most of MMIII's arsenal.

The soundtrack I also think is... ok. It's head-boppy enough while I'm playing, but there's nothing here'd I'd go out of my way to listen to sadly. BUT there's also nothing I actively dislike, which I think is a first for a classic Mega Man.

Yea, I guess this game being just... ok... could summarize my whole opinion on it, and I guess in that sense I don't really disagree with the consensus on this entry. And as future classic games continue to iteratively improve on the formula, maybe I won't think of this as fondly. But, frustrating as it was at times, I did have a lot of fun with this one! I wouldn't shrug it off as a worthless entry in the series, and I think it at the very least is better than both I and III.

Angel_Arle Rockman reviews
Part 1: Rockman for Famicom
Part 2: Rockman 2: Dr. Wily no Nazo for Famicom
Part 3: Rockman 3: Dr. Wily no Saigo!? for Famicom
Part 4: Rockman World for GB
Part 6: Rockman World 2 for GB
Part 7: Rockman 5: Blues no Wana!? for Famicom
Part 8: Rockman World 3 for GB
Part 9: Wily & Right no RockBoard: That's Paradise for Famicom
Part 10: Rockman World 4 for GB
Part 11: Rockman 6: Shijō Saidai no Tatakai!! for Famicom
Part 12: Rockman's Soccer for Super Famicom
Part 13: Rockman World 5 for GB

Rockman has had a whole trilogy of games on the Famicom already up to this point and the Super Famicom was out for a whole year already. It made sense for Rockman to make the jump-wait you mean we’re still on the Famicom? Well okay guess we aren’t ready yet but we will be soon just you wait! So we’re here again on the Famicom with Rockman 4: Aratanaru Yabou!! (Translated as Rockman 4: A New Evil Ambition!!) and this is where the series declines for most people. You’ll find many who see 2 and 3 as the peak but that’s those people. I haven’t played this one in a while and needed an updated opinion on it and I’m glad I did.

Rockman 4 takes place a year after the events of Rockman 3 where a new threat arrives named Dr. Cossack. Wanting to show how much better he is then Dr. Right, he sends out 8 of his own Robot Masters and sends them out to cause havoc. The Robot Masters are named Ring Man, Dive Man, Skull Man, Pharaoh Man, Bright Man, Toad Man, Drill Man, and Dust Man. It’s now up to Rockman and with the New Rock Buster built by Dr. Right, he’s ready for anything! Even a new friend will help you through the adventure alongside Rush. I should mention the game starts with the opening showing the origins of Rockman before we see the actual story for this game. Some might find that weird but I guess it makes sense after you finish a trilogy of games, like this will feel like the beginning of a new trilogy!

The controls this time around are about the same though it did feel like sliding could be a bit finicky but that might just be on my end. What’s new to Rockman 4 is the New Rock Buster. Ok I have to confess real quick, I goofed hard. You see I always thought the standard weapon was called the Plasma Cannon and wouldn’t get the name Rock Buster till this one. Apologies for being wrong but that normal one was always the Rock Buster so sorry for that mistake! The New Rock Buster lets you charge the weapon up similar to Atomic Fire from 2. It’s a lot faster and can do good damage. Just don’t rely on it for every enemy.

If you remember one thing I didn’t like about Rockman 3 was how levels never always felt they belonged to a specific Robot Master. This game changes it for the better as the stage design is much better aesthetically and just gameplay wise too. You got good examples like Pharaoh Man’s stage having sand that leads into an inside location similar to that of a pyramid or something of the sorts. Toad Man’s stage has lots of water pushing you around along with rain pushing you back. Dust Man’s stage is trashy and even has huge compacts ready to squish you if you aren’t fast. It’s a massive improvement over anything we have seen in the series and I’d argue these are the best set of stages we’ve had yet. They also have the right amount of length and challenge. The only bad design I could remember is this one area you transition to in Dive Man’s stage that can kill you instantly if you arrive at it at the top of the screen. The stages also sometimes have your new robot friend named Eddie who can give you a random item from the likes of energy refill or even an E-Tank. If you don’t like what you get, just exit the room and try again, just don’t collect it if you don’t want it. The order I went to wasn't too different from my usual but it was Dive -> Drill -> Toad -> Bright -> Pharaoh -> Ring -> Dust -> Skull. Honestly it says a lot when I feel like I could even praise more than I already have like the cool enemies themed around stages too like the Skullmet in Skull Man’s stage that protect themselves with a skull on their back or the Rackaser in Toad Man’s stage that throw their umbrella at you. Though not all of it is perfect obviously like why a Totem Pole enemy in Bright Man’s stage? Anyway onto the actual Robot Masters!

How do those Robot Masters fight this time around? Well let me tell you they won’t all be easy. Ring Man throws his Ring Boomerang very fast and he does a lot of contact damage so he is not a pushover even with the weakness. Be wary that his rings can move up or down as they retreat back. Dive Man loves to charge at you and he does a lot of contact damage. Take advantage of when he’s shooting Dive Missiles as it’s easy to destroy them. Also don’t jump too high due to how water works in these games. Skull Man shoots fast and can move around. His Skull Barrier keeps him fully protected so react fast once it ends. Pharaoh Man...you know it just hit me I think it’s been over 5 years since I’ve beaten him without his weakness. So ummm, sorry I don’t have tips for this one. Bright Man shoots not only forward but a little above and below so be aware of that, he also does massive contact damage and will target you. If he uses Flash Stopper, just pray he won’t hit you in the air if you happen to be in the air as he stops you. Toad Man is a joke. He’s the easiest Robot Master in the franchise so far. Just shoot him and easily avoid his hops, a disappointing fight. Drill Man likes to dig underground and come above where you’re at. Just time your movement before he comes up. He also will shoot drill bombs at you on occasion so be careful. Dust Man is similar to Magnet Man where he will pull you in so just move or slide away. His Dust Crusher can also be a bit tricky to avoid but otherwise he isn’t too hard. Pretty good fights all around outside of Mr. Toad Man over there! I like how some are still a challenge even with the special weapons unlike in past games where a lot of them can be pushovers. Though it’s still the case for some of them in this game so I’m not gonna say it’s perfect. I should also mention the weakness chain is now back to how 1 and 2 did it so don’t worry about more than one of them this time.

You know the time, it’s special weapon discussion time! I got some praise for these ones! Ring Boomerang from Ring Man is a fast projectile with adequate distance that not only never bounces away but will come back to you letting you hit enemies twice. It’s great for enemies that take multiple hits or are weak to it, especially with the speed. Dive Missile from Dive Man is a fast homing missile that tracks any enemies that can take damage to it. It’s great for enemies not in range for your normal buster and some enemies are even weak to it. Also has a good amount of ammo. The only problem I have with it really is the tracking on it can be iffy. Skull Barrier from Skull Man is okay. It’s a barrier, it works but because I usually get it late, I never feel the need to use it but it’s nice you can move around with this one. Pharaoh Shot from Pharaoh Man is amazing as it lets you charge it quickly forming a projectile above you. It’ll break from enemies requiring more hits but other enemies will die and let you keep the shot. Best of all, it even fires in multiple directions. It’s also a good move for a majority of the mini bosses. Flash Stopper from Bright Man is if Time Stopper from 2 was really great. You stop any enemies for a bit and can easily shoot them with your buster. You can’t charge your buster but that’s fine as it can even ignore defenses on enemies. It also only uses chunks of the ammo each time you use it meaning you don’t have to use it all at once. Get this weapon early if you can! Rain Flush from Toad Man is a screen nuke that takes about 2 seconds to trigger. It’s useful if you don’t want to bother with enemies but it doesn't have the best amount of ammo. It’s good for what it’s meant for. Drill Bomb from Drill Man shoots a fast exploding drill that you can even detonate early with the same button you shot it with. It’s strong and it’s great for the two big enemies. While it’s not amazing on a lot of enemies, it’s still good for the instances it’s needed for. The move can also break down barriers though these are only in after the 8 main stages. Dust Crusher from Dust Man is a projectile that can not only hit multiple times but if it lands, it’ll shoot out four projectiles diagonally hitting anything in their way. It’s good but sadly I wasn’t able to use it much in my playthrough which is a shame. This might be a hot take but I personally think this game has the most fun special weapons in the series but I’ll need to replay some of the others before I make that claim. Still an amazing selection of weapons making the replayability strong in this one.

Let’s not forget that Rush has returned in this game but oddly he’s lost Rush Jet and Rush Marine. How does that even happen? Well Coil and Marine work the same but Jet was nerfed. It now forces you to move forward only letting you control it up and down. It’ll also end if it hits a wall. It still has its moments and I think it was good they did nerf it but this might disappoint some. You’ll need to defeat Drill Man for Rush Jet and then Toad Man for Rush Marine. Not only that, there’s also special items to find this time around. In Pharaoh Man’s stage, there’s the Balloon. It’s basically like item 1 from Rockman 2 except the speed of it I think changes when you’re on it but I can’t tell. It has its moments but nothing spectacular. In Dive Man’s stage, there’s the Wire. If you hold up and shoot then you can wire to the top of the ceiling. It’s good for heights but not distance meaning it’s very situational. I think you can use it as a weapon but I never really try it for that. I would say it’s bad but I did use it a lot in the 2nd half of the game. Overall it’s all just kind of there but has its moments. I can’t complain too much but they could be better too.

Once you done the 8 stages then you’re ready for the final parts of the game being the Dr. Cossack stages. There’s only 4 this time and the stages are much better than Rockman 3’s stages for the end game. You get a lot of utility with the special weapons. Though I do find these stages still weaker than the main eight but that could just be because they were pretty damn good. Stage 3 is notable for being an auto scroller where you can even do a funny glitch with the Wire. Just get on a ceiling with it, wait for the scrolling to push you and you’ll go to the skies! Hmm there’s no rematch with the Robot Masters this time which is odd but there’s bosses to deal with. Mothraya is pretty easy if you use Ring Boomerang though be wary of it breaking the floor. Square Machine is just kind of boring like just form already so I can win with Dust Crusher! The Cockroach Twins will start with the first one only on the ceiling while the second one will travel all around, a pretty easy fight even with the buster. Finally there’s Dr. Cossack where he uses the Cossack Catcher and you better not let him catch you because it hurts like hell! Still only one form and using the buster is still pretty simple to defeat him what gives-huh who is this girl with Blues? Oh her name is Kalinka, she’s actually Cossack’s daughter and tells you not to hurt him as it turns out…DR. WILY IS THE VILLAIN AGAIN!? Ok now this crap is getting ridiculous, when will he give up?

Well now you have two more stages left to do and honestly at this point the stages are pretty standard. I won’t lie, this is probably the weak part of Rockman 4, with such a strong first half, the second half just isn’t anything spectacular. You’re just going through the motion and while I’ll say it’s much better than how Rockman 3 handled more stages, it’s still not perfect here. You have a few bosses here like Metall Daddy where it likes to jump on you and send out Metalls, simple stuff really. Tako Trash would be a fun fight if they didn’t let you stand right on the edge where he’s at making it easy to spam Ring Boomerang. Then oh god not the Robot Master rematches, ughhh! Can they stop doing these? Then you have Wily himself in Wily Machine 4 where the first phase is such a joke that I’m convinced the developers didn’t realize being very close to him lets you avoid every shot. The second form has you timing Drill Bomb explosions while dodging his huge projectiles. Once that’s over, the game gives you one more room to grind weapon energy if you need to and it’s the final boss. Wily Capsule is oddly easy but it may be because Pharaoh Shot is just that good, it’s easy for him to run into the charge you have for it. If you have at least one E-Tank, you’ll 100% win. Finally you win and let’s see how Rockman handles Dr. Wily this time you won’t get away this time! Oh he just conveniently landed next to a door to help him escape and then the building collapses. Well that’s lame, this means he’s probably out to go plan another scheme. Well on the bright side at least we now have Cossack saved along with the rest of the world for now. Rockman rides a train home with Roll and…Rush? Why was he there, you were with me! Also can we point out this has been Roll’s second appearance and the first was in the first game. What have you even been doing during these games? Still not a very spectacular end to this game, we don’t even see Cossack or Kalinka in this ending which is a shame.

The presentation in 4 is really good. It feels like with every sequel, Capcom finds a way to improve on these games graphically. It helps that like I said before, the levels fit the Robot Masters a lot more than they ever did in the past 3 Famicom games. Stuff like the opening and even the weapon get screen have good graphics that were never really attempted in past entries. The game even has less slowdown and flicker which is a really nice improvement, while it’s not 100% gone I will still easily accept that. Then we have the music and guys I’m gonna be honest, it’s good to mixed for me. I think it has a lot of good tunes like Dive Man’s stage, the first Cossack stage theme, Pharaoh Man’s stage, and a few more but they don’t ever hit the highs and some are hard for me to remember. That said however, I love Bright Man’s theme! The ending theme is also very underrated if you ask me. Though I have to ask what the heck happened with the password theme? It’s atrocious in this game, probably one of the worst songs in the franchise. I also find it interesting it has some songs from 2 like the song when you pick a Robot Master stage, the stage clear theme, and even a new take on the title screen theme for the credits. Still it’s good and besides my subjective takes, it doesn’t stop some of the impressive things done with the presentation.

Rockman 4 surprised me. It was always a game I felt like I liked more than what my old rating gave it. I used to not care about this game back when I first played it on the 3DS VC. I think after a few playthroughs it’s now become my favorite of the Famicom games with some really fun level design, great special weapons, good challenge on stages and bosses, and a good presentation as well. It’s always surprised me that people see this game as the downfall of the Classic games. To me it really shines and I think it’s worth playing despite the 2nd half being a little bit of a drop in fun but again it’s all subjective at the end of the day. While it doesn’t innovate on the series further, it doesn’t always have to as what we have here is really fun and I now appreciate it more after writing it even if at times I sounded a little too negative. Well next time we will be heading into a dark tunnel. One of the low points of the series is next and it won’t be pretty. See you for whenever that comes.

This is my favorite one so far. It keeps all the cool stuff from 3 (the better, tighter level design, the SICK MOVEMENT TECH, generous item spawns), but it’s got a much smoother difficulty curve and basically no blatantly unfair stuff going on. I was also pleasantly surprised at how little the addition of the mega buster really changed how the bosses felt tuned, and I liked it more than I was expecting to. The pacing in this game is so good I don’t even mind that there are TWO castles lmao

The music never quite reached the highs of 2 and maybe I should stop hoping it ever will, but what is here is REALLY solid, probably the most consistent score in the series so far. The graphics are slick, I think the addition of an actual pause menu is probably for the best, and holy shit there’s a real cutscene in this game??? Just the one lol but it’s fun to see things develop even as the hardware is the same and the presentation is ostensibly identical

Mega Man 4 slaps i really like this one!

Played as part of the Mega Man Anniversary Collection for the Nintendo GameCube.

Considering I have an actual cart for this one, I could just play it on my NES, too. In fact, I would like to at some point, because this is the Mega Man game I grew up with. In fact, it's actually hard for me to remember if I played any of the other NES entries when I was a kid, or if time has warped my perception so badly that memories of watching the Ruby Spears cartoon and owning a two-inch figure of Ice Man has metamorphosed into false nostalgia for games I've never played. Nothing makes me feel like I am in cognitive decline more than Mega Man.

Just as Mega Man the Third introduced the slide, Proto Man, and perennial god boy Rush, Mega Man 4 makes a significant contribution to the overarching series with the inclusion of the charge shot. So major is this change that it's endured as a series staple more than 3's aforementioned contributions, permeating through numerous spin-offs and side series where those do not. I don't think it would be an exaggeration to say it's Mega Man's equivalent of the spin dash.

A brief aside at that mention of Sonic, but in the early 2000s there was a Sonic fan site I frequented that had a looping MIDI on the home page that I kept coming back just to listen to. It had this somewhat haunting intro that opened up into a faster, head-bopping melody. There was no identifiable way to name the track, but there was something strangely familiar about it. One of those things you recognize but cannot place. After all, it had been years since I first heard it and years still until the source would finally click into place. I haven't touched much on the legacy of Mega Man's music in these reviews, but that's because there's so many iconic tracks that the sound of Mega Man might as well be more recognizable than the games themselves. I also just don't find myself to be particularly qualified to talk about music. But just as Mega Man 4 is my favorite in the series, so too is its soundtrack. Like yeah, Crash Man's theme is great and all, but it's no Bright man.

Outside of the introduction of the charge shot, Mega Man 4 is really just more Mega Man, albeit with that "late NES" sharpness. By this point, Capcom knew how to put together a damn good Mega Man game. The stages have a wonderful sense of flow, the weapon powers all feel great and have a good amount of utility, Rush is as useful as he is adorable, and I think they really came out swinging with some of these Robot Master designs. Pharoh Man rules, but have you seen Skull Man? If you look like Skull Man, please contact me. I will buy you literally anything from your Amazon wish list.

As is customary for these reviews, I do need to touch on the way this game handles Mega Man's abilities and boss weaknesses. I did not list the boss order because at this point weaknesses are inscrutable. I've pretty much given up trying to intuit my way through who is weak to what, the only thing bashing my head against the wall accomplishes is making me like these games less. That said, it also feels like weapons need to be employed in a more skillful manner than in previous games. Bosses have invulnerability on some attacks, and the way your weapons operate can at times make it easy to whiff and waste energy. I find this to be a positive. They're still powerful, but rather than utterly steamrolling each boss, victories still feel earned. You get that satisfying sense of overcoming an obstacle along with the smug satisfaction of exploiting a weakness, and it's just perfect. Well, except for Pharoh Man, who gets done dirty worse than any Robot Master in this entire series. I just felt bad about that.

Mega Man 4 also executes another fake out, similar to Mega Man 2's true last "level," or 3's jaunt through four previously completed stages. This time, you get to clear two whole castles. Thankfully, they're both pretty good, and getting a game over doesn't totally reset your progress like it does in Mega Man 3! You are also able to go back and freely explore any beaten levels, though outside of two hidden powers, there's really not much reason to do this. Muted as it is, it's a good idea that Capcom would later build on, becoming an integral element of the X series.

Yeah, ok, nostalgia might be playing a big role in my love for Mega Man 4, but I'm ok with that. I really have to strain to come up with a negative for this game, even though I'm sure your average Backloggd dot com user could divine half a dozen from thin air. Actually, no... wait... I can think of at least one: the final Dr. Wily fight. Stupid asshole just shut off the damn lights, getting killed over here because I keep having the misfortune of just running into this bozo. Can't see shit!

Oh, Kalinka...

Mega Man 4 was my favorite when I originally played all the games on the AV collection back on Gamecube, so it's gonna be interesting to see if my opinion from back then holds up or if my current one does (I like 6 the most for now).

In this game we get a charged shot to help with taking down the Robot Masters without their weaknesses, unfortunately maybe it does it a bit too well (YMMV). Hilariously, despite its reputation it isn't even the most OP charge weapon in this game. Pharaoh Shot is so ridiculously glitchy, has insane hidden utility due to hitting stuff above it while charging and is a weakness for at least three castle bosses, it's insane. You can even fire it in multiple directions! Ridiculous! Gotta push Pharaoh Man. Despite that though other weapons manage to see use, which honestly is really impressive. The obvious exception to this is Skull Barrier, the worst shield ever in a category of weapons that are already considered boring by many within the fanbase.

The stages themselves for the most part are pretty good again like in 3. I'll say I'm not too much of a fan of the mini-boss spam in Ring Man's stage, the hoop throwing guys (Called "Whopper" just so you know) are a pain in the ass to not take damage from and it's made worse by the fact that the projectiles are still active even when it dies. Bright Man's stage is also supposedly really hard compared to the other stages, but I didn't die at all somehow in my run so maybe I'm just godlike. I absolutely love the Cossack stages and their snowy atmosphere, I think if the music in the autoscroller stage wasn't so fucking good I'd probably dislike it, but even then they're not long enough to be annoying or anything.

Which speaking of Bright Man, some of the fights in this game aren't super great. I'm not a fan of needing to keep my eyes bleeding with attention toward Bright Man's HP to know when he's gonna throw an unavoidable attack. It just reeks of garbage to have to figure that whole shit out to save yourself a massive headache. I know it's one peashooter shot and then only full charged shots afterwards, but you're not gonna know that on your first several playthroughs or even know that it works that way. Drill Man also sometimes just loves to make himself invincible from anywhere between 5 seconds to nine million centuries depending on how many times he wants to burrow. Wily Machine's hitbox is also needlessly tiny for no reason, he's just awful to fight without knowing how to detonate the Drill Bomb. Nothing Boobeam Trap-esque at least, thank fucking god.

Meanwhile Toad Man just wants to dance.

Overall I enjoyed it a lot, it's better than the first two games for sure and I think I'm a bit iffy on it being better than 3. I dunno if it's better than 6 for me yet, we can only find that out once I actually get to that game. So far I'm gonna say 4 >= 3 > 2 => 1

Favorite Enemy Name: Tom Boy! It's a slinky! Maybe it's related to Fly Boy from MM2. Special Shoutout to Totem Polen. Why is he randomly in Bright Man's stage? Were they designing Tomahawk Man enemies this far in advance and just loved the design for some reason?

Favorite Music: Cossack Stage 3-4! No idea why some people don't like this game's ost, it's down a notch from MM3 for sure, but still. Different strokes for different folks I guess. Go listen to Mega Man 2 GB's ost and get back to me.

Let me get this out of the way first... breathes in... - THEY ADDED AN ACTUAL WEAPON SELECT SCREEN! I don't know why that excited me so much, but it did. No more dumb initials on the lower half of the screen. A full screen menu with actual weapon names this time. Anyway, moving on...

I'm happy to report that MM3 was not just simply a case of series fatigue, but rather just a case of subpar level design. MM4 doesn't feature as much innovation, but that's okay, because the level design here is pretty darn good - maybe even surpassing MM2's for me. I like how the second half was divided into two castle stages. Sure, it's still a test of endurance, but unlike MM3, I really liked the bosses in these castle stages for the most part.

This game features the addition of the upgraded Mega Buster, which allows you to charge up a more powerful shot. This was pretty helpful for taking down a handful of bosses more quickly if you happen to run out of energy on another weapon. But there's actually one thing I wish they had kept from MM3... free movement with Rush Jet is no longer a thing. Terrible. Disgusting. If I was a spiteful person, I'd take away an entire star just for that. But I digress, this is a great game. Definitely has similar replay value to 2, but overall this is the better game, I feel.

As one would expect, Mega Man 3 was pretty successful for Capcom, despite not being quite on the same level as the success of Mega Man 2. Nevertheless, a sequel was already being put in development shortly after, even though at this point, given how the SNES was already out, they could have just as easily ended off the NES lineup with 3 and called it a day. Instead, however, they pressed on to make yet another set of games for the system, starting off with Mega Man 4.

So, this is where a majority of people would consider this to be the start of the “lesser” NES Mega Man games. Not bad by any means, but compared what had come before, people would consider this, as well as the two games to follow, very samey, repetitive, and just not as interesting as before. Honestly, I completely understand where people are coming from when they say that… but with that being said, of course I still fucking love Mega Man 4. Would I consider it as good as Mega Man 2 or 3? No, but it is still a fantastic entry in the series, and one that no fan of the franchise should pass up.

The story is pretty much the exact same, except now changing up the characters, which is fine for me, although I don’t understand why now in the 4th entry we are getting a cutscene that details the origins of Mega Man, the graphics are the best in the series so far, even if they appear very similar to that of the previous titles, the music is awesome, no surprise there, the control is just as tight, responsive, and fun as ever, and the gameplay is also just as fun and satisfying as every other mainline entry so far.

If you somehow need a reminder of how the gameplay in Mega Man works, then you should probably see a doctor for your memory loss issues. You run through stages, jumping and shooting through many enemies, getting health and weapon supplies along the way, defeating bosses, gaining their powers, and using those powers to your advantage in other stages. Just like with the previous games, though, they do add a few new features in this game to spice things up. For starters, this is the first game in the series to give you a charge shot, which is very great to see, as it helps out with dealing with a lot of the bigger threats that you will face throughout the game. Sure, it isn’t as big or effective as future charge shots from future games, but for what we have here, it is still pretty great stuff, even if the noise it makes can make other people want to permanently clog up their ears so they can never hear it. I’ve just gotten used to the sound now.

In addition to all the new powers you get throughout the game, as well as the Rush abilities still here, there are also additional hidden powers that you can find in two of the levels, those being Balloon, which is just Item 1 from Mega Man 2, and the Wire, which is a grappling hook that allows you to get to places for extra goodies. Not only does this add replay value to the game, which is always appreciated, but the items themselves are very useful in several scenarios, so it doesn’t feel like too much stuff at once. Not much else to say about the changed gameplay, except for the introduction of Eddie, who shows up in several levels to give you an item, which you can then exploit into him giving you a free E-Tank, which is nice.

In terms of problems with the game, this goes back to something I brought up in my review of Mega Man 3: the padding. In this game, as well as the next two after this, you have to go through two separate final castles to beat the game, because the plot demands that you find out about this obvious twist that you already know going in. Granted, it’s not as annoying as it is in Mega Man 3, but padding is still padding, no matter what form it comes in, and needless to say, the game doesn’t need to be extended for this long, even if I still find it to be fun and challenging. In addition, from here on out, the Rush Jet ability gets nerfed pretty hard. In Mega Man 3, you could move about freely on Rush Jet, allowing you to get to various hard-to-reach areas with little to no trouble. Here, and in every other subsequent game to come after, you can only move up and down while moving forward constantly in the direction you are facing, which isn’t terrible by any means, but it just sucks compared to what we had before. There are also other minor things, like, y’know… Toad Man, but that other stuff doesn’t really bother me too much, and none of the problems did anything to keep me from having a great time

Overall, despite the issues that it has, this is still yet again another fantastic entry in the Mega Man series, and I would definitely recommend it not just for Mega Man fans, but anyone who wants to get into the series in general. I mean, it has the origins of Mega Man in the opening cutscene, so hey, you may as well get people started on this game instead of the first one. Probably would make for a better experience.

Game #196

From an artistic standpoint, I am of the belief that a franchise shouldn’t surpass the number of entries fitting for a trilogy. Brevity is not only the soul of wit but also a necessity to retain the magic and integrity of a series of entertainment properties. However, my passionate sentiments would cause serious humiliation at the Capcom offices, as they would laugh like hyenas as I ran out of the room in a crying frenzy like a girl who just bombed her school’s talent show. As thankful as I am for Capcom and all of the other video game conglomerates, their ultimate goal at the end of the day is to turn a profit with their creative properties. Since Capcom now found a winning formula with their Mega Man franchise, they milked that udder dry until it shriveled up and could only produce dust. I suppose Mega Man 4 was the first entry that overstayed Mega Man’s welcome on the NES considering it surpasses the number of titles that make up a solid trilogy of games, so we can attribute this game to commencing Mega Man’s downfall further into the future. However, the strange revelation that I’ve come to is that Mega Man 4 might arguably be the best game in the original series. Come to think of it, Mega Man 3 would’ve been an askew note to leave the series on, what with its unreached ambitions that fell apart in execution. Maybe a proper (and hypothetical) series send-off should signal a true return to form, and that’s certainly what Mega Man 4 offers.

Alert the presses, everyone, for Capcom decided to place another mad scientist on the pedestal of Mega Man bad guys that isn’t Dr. Wily! Approximately a year after the events of the last game, a Russian scientist named Dr. Cossack constructs eight new Robot Masters with the intention of seizing total sovereignty. I’m surprised it took Capcom this long to create a Russian villain at the helm of a megalomaniacal power surge, considering the franchise debuted in the 80s when their association with scum and villainy was at its peak. I suppose Capcom thought it would be wise to wait until the Soviet Union crumbled to feature one of their citizens in an antagonistic role so as to not sour the foreign affairs between them and Japan. Their country is only a submarine ride over from the Pacific coast of Russia, after all. Nevertheless, the fact that Capcom retired their standard bald, mustachioed bad guy here makes me beam with pride. Cossack may be committing a copycat crime here, but the slight deviation his presence represents makes a world of difference. NES franchises have been known to acquiesce to feelings of separation anxiety regarding their main villains, so I realize how hard it was for Capcom to let Wily go.

By this point in the early 90s, developers had honed the rudimentary 8-bit aesthetic into an art form. After the humble, fuzzy entry point in the first Mega Man title, Mega Man 2 made strides in elevating the visual capabilities of the NES console, just to have Mega Man 3 vomit on its contributions. One vital aspect of Mega Man 4’s return to form is the pixelated splendor displayed throughout, starting from the opening sequence. Somehow, Capcom felt that an introduction detailing the genesis point of Mega Man’s creation needed to surpass all other 8-bit cutscenes on the system by illustrating an origin story for Mega Man. A tranquil cityscape is shown from the cycle of day to dusk, with chaotic blasts of malevolent fire disrupting the peaceful atmosphere and calling Mega Man to action out of a valiant sense of justice. We also learn that his Japanese moniker “Rock” is merely the robot’s birth name and that Mega Man is his crime-fighting pseudonym. We also learn from this introduction that Mega Man’s hair was intended to be blue, thus making the initial reveal under his helmet in Mega Man 2 to be a graphical blip. As one could probably infer from the outstanding presentation here, all of the erroneous smudges in the pixels have been wiped out. The cityscape scene is gorgeous, and the following sequence where Mega Man is riding on top of a moving vehicle is spellbinding to watch.

Of course, the effort of high graphical fidelity extends to what is present during the gameplay. A pleasing color pallet was needed in the Mega Man series after Mega Man 3’s muted, flat textures that made the game look depleted. Mega Man 4’s return to form also saw the revival of the visual vibrancy seen in Mega Man 2, and thank the Lords for this. Every level in Mega Man 4 looks uniquely dazzling, meeting the standard established in Mega Man 2. Ring Man’s stage has candy neon evaporating platforms juxtaposed with some crystalline chrome architecture. Pharoah Man’s tomb is built with a tan-colored brick that looks appropriately weathered enough for an ancient construction, and the flow of the sinking sand is borderline hypnotizing. The showering rain effect in Toad Man’s stage is only distracting on a mechanical level, and Dive Man’s teal foreground compliments the water splendidly. The lavender color of Skull Man’s stage probably doesn’t make sense from a thematic standpoint, but I can’t deny that its contrast with the bleached skeletal platforms is striking.

I suppose what is more important about the new crop of levels is their level design. Mega Man 4 doesn’t do too much to deviate from the series' tried and true 2D platforming from point A to B where the Robot Master’s domain lies except for one true stride in ingenuity. Just because Mega Man’s trajectory is fairly straightforward doesn’t mean that each level should offer nothing but a straight line with enemies to halt progression. For the first time in series history, the levels will offer alternate paths for the player to take, usually signified by both ascending and descending ladders. Once Mega Man climbs one of these ladders in either direction on the Y-axis, surviving enemy fire and the various pratfalls will eventually lead Mega Man to the same result as the standard pathway. Sometimes, these alternate passages lead Mega Man to dead ends and the extra challenges before he hits a brick wall often lead to goodies like E-Tanks and health upgrades, rewarding the players for their troubles. God only knows we can’t rely on Dr. Light’s new, little support bot Eddie to supply Mega Man with what he needs because the little guy seems to have difficulties discerning whether or not Mega Man’s health or energy is low. He’s too adorably pathetic to chastise, really. Speaking of difficulties, Mega Man 4 still retains that classic NES challenge that was absent in Mega Man 2 compared to the two games that border it in the main series timeline. The game presents a smattering of dangerous sections like riding on robot enemies over pits of spikes like the bouncy grasshoppers in Bright Man’s stage and the floating platforms in Pharaoh Man’s stage. It’s best to shoot first between a chasm because a cap enemy will fly upward and knock Mega Man out of his airborne velocity to his untimely demise. The midway miniboss robots resembling animals often proved to be formidable obstacles to my goal, such as the hulking whales in Dive Man’s stage and the hippos in Ring Man’s stage that spit missiles comfortably from their high perches. Because of all of these impediments prove to cause a small amount of grief to the player, Mega Man 2’s one big criticism of being too easy cannot be applied here.

Good luck trying to find the correct order to defeat Mega Man 4’s Robot Masters, for this lineup is when the lineup started becoming abstract. Like Mega Man 3, all of these Robot Masters were submitted by Japanese children via a contest and the best of the bunch were granted life by the developers. I don’t know how some kid living in Japan in the early 90s knew what a Pharaoh was, but maybe that's how advanced their education system is. Drill Man is an inspired ground-type Robot Master in the same vein as Gutsman and Hard Man, and his drill bomb weapon is like a more manageable version of the Crash Bomb. Skull Man is the coolest one here from a design standpoint, but I’m not enthused by his weapon being a recycled version of Wood Man’s leaf shield. What makes the weapon worse is that it’s Dive Man’s weakness, and his apt dive maneuver makes sure that plenty of contact damage will occur while fighting him. Bright Man copies Flash Man’s time freeze move, and Dust Man’s mound of vacuumed trash is an effective cluster bomb. God bless Toad Man, for the developers inadvertently made him into a spongy whelp of a Robot Master AND his acid rain weapon clears the screen. Guess which Robot Master I recommend tackling first? Overall, I can’t find too much fault with Cossack’s coalition of Robot Masters. They all have interesting designs and none of their weapons fall under the category of useless junk (points directly at Top Man from Mega Man 3).

Fortunately, if the player isn’t content with using any of these weapons, maybe because they feel the Robot Master weapons peaked with the Metal Blade as I do, Mega Man 4 provides a suitable alternative. This game’s innovative stride in updating Mega Man’s battle prowess is the new addition of the charge shot. By holding down the shoot button on the controller, the collective energy needed for a regular shot of Mega Man’s base beam builds up inside his being and radiates all over him. Releasing Mega Man’s edged shot will unleash a single burst of energy much bigger and much more lethal than the piddly lemon drops it normally sputters out. I probably use the standard blaster more often than most people who have played a Mega Man game, so this addition is a godsend. I’ve always appreciated the variety in store with Mega Man sucking up his enemy's abilities, but I have to admit that pausing the game to cycle through the options can be a tad irksome. Revving up the blaster to blow through enemies that have stronger defenses is incredibly convenient and satisfying, and is just as crucial to Mega Man’s evolution as the slide move (which also returns from Mega Man 3). If it could shoot in the same number of directions as the Metal Blade, I’d never use any of the alternate weapons.

Whether or not using the enhanced blaster or figuring out a Robot Masters's specific weakness works for you, it still culminates in climbing the castle of a wicked scientific genius. This time, it’s the blonde, bearded Cossack instead of Wily’s wild eyebrows. When storming through Cossack’s castle, each level seems deceptively easier than the last. The castle offers some substantial sections involving Rush’s mechanical aid, and we can all breathe a sigh of relief that the Yellow Devil doesn’t make his return to pummel me to oblivion. Still, roaming through the fortress of a madman as the climax of a video game on the NES should warrant great difficulties. My suspicions unraveled with the appalling revelation that Cossack is a red-herring and that Dr. Wily has been using him as a scapegoat the entire time. Naturally, it’s when Wily reveals himself that the apropos difficulty curve reveals itself too, as Wily’s final fight in Mega Man 4 is the most irritating one so far. The weak spot on Wily’s new death machine is high enough that Mega Man must strain himself trying to reach it, and finding Wily in complete darkness while being confined to using Pharaoh Man’s weapon conjures up unpleasant memories of having to use Crash Man’s weapon in the conclusive fight in Mega Man 2, showing that the developers didn’t learn from their mistake.

God dammit. So much for subversion. The old saying that old dogs never learn new tricks is just as applicable to video game franchises, which is why they tend to struggle with innovation past the third entry. Yet, Mega Man 4 seemed like it could’ve at least gone against the grain with the opportunity to do the bare minimum of putting another antagonist in the front seat. Alas, it seems like Dr. Wily will always be the nagging force of oppression like his NES contemporaries Bowser and Ganondorf. Up until this point, I was enjoying Mega Man 4 vastly more than Mega Man 3. Mega Man 4’s back to basics after Mega Man 3 shot to the moon and missed by a mile making for the most balanced of Mega Man titles so far. It’s as smooth as Mega Man 2 was without the few discrepancies that sullied its near-perfect status. If reusing the same villain in a bait-and-switch routine is the only sniggle the game has in a series filled with unfair, broken bullshit, Capcom has more than legitimized Mega Man 4’s existence. Quit while you're ahead, guys.

------
Attribution: https://erockreviews.com

With the introduction of the "Twin Wily" castles formula, also seen in "Mega Man 5" and "Mega Man 6", this iteration offers a relief from the recycled stages used in its direct predecessor, "Mega Man 3".
We can always use more Wily Castle - "Mega Man 4" offers us a whopping 8 Wily stages to boot, in addition to the 8 robot masters.

While the Robot Masters themselves are hit or miss, looking at you - "Toad Man", cough "Dust Man" - some of them are the most memorable characters of the franchise, mainly including the memorable Skull-Man and fan-favorite Pharaoh-Man.

Where Mega Man 4 shines is in its brilliant stage design, featuring some of the cleverest ideas and stage hazards introduced in the franchise so far, every stage has quirks that make them uniquely challenging to maneuver - be it moving sand, heavy rain, or rainbow roads.

Multiple mini-bosses are present throughout the stages to keep you occupied, and there's just something about defeating these oversized robots that make us feel like a total bad-ass.

Our main complaint was how the newly introduced charge shot felt too powerful and stole the show to the now useless special weapons. Notable weapons are the "Dive Missile", "Skull Barrier" and "Ring Boomerang", as well as the sometimes handy "Rain Flush".