Playing some Megaman games is the perfect segue into Mighty No. 9, the spiritual successor that I backed and has been sitting on my Wii U hard drive for four years… oops.
Let’s not get into the backlash on this project. It’s overblown and played out, and has the potential to taint what is a really fun game with some fresh ideas. Yes, I think it leans too heavily on being a Megaman clone, but it has some genuinely cool twists on the formula and is otherwise a competently made game that I enjoyed greatly.
So taking the game for what it is, we have an action sidescroller where a plucky robot boy has to stop a bunch of robots gone mad. The core mechanic is Beck’s ability to absorb enemy energy by dashing into them after they’ve taken some damage. This factors into almost every interaction with an enemy that you encounter, and it works. It means you’re always moving and getting close to danger, in order to absorb enemies to restore your special weapon ammo and to get temporary boosts. It also makes boss fights very dynamic, breaking them up into natural stages and giving them a rhythm.
Beck’s dash is a welcome break from the Megaman Classic formula. It can be infinitely used in the air, and I just got done gushing about Xtreme 2′s air dash so you know I loved this. It lets you recover from bad jumps (in combination with the ledge grab), it picks up the pace, and it’s integrated into the combat. This is the key difference from MN9′s inspiration, and easily the best part of the game.
The plot builds on what Megaman has been doing nothing but for 30 years. I wish the game did its own thing more, but it’s kind of bound by being a Kickstarted clone. For example, the designs of certain characters such as support character Call are way too derivative. Again, the points of diversion were the most interesting parts: there’s a more complex character dynamic happening with a few factions and established backstory, making you feel you’re stepping into a world in progress. The final boss is a rampaging experiment that’s linked to Beck’s key ability in some way. And the robot bosses become your pals once liberated, helping you out along the way (although this was kind of used in Powered Up).
Another aspect in common between generations is the difficulty. This game makes you work for your victories, and achieving them feels earned. Sometimes checkpoints are too far apart, like in Countershade’s stage, but it’s mostly fair. Tip: set number of lives to 9 in options; I’d rather they did away with the concept of lives altogether but oh well.
The DLC mode where you play as Ray is even harder, as Ray’s health constantly drains very quickly. I managed to clear that too eventually, which felt extra satisfying, especially as she is a melee character much like Zero. Her dash is also damaging which combined with the health drain (restored by defeating enemies, but requiring almost perfect play at times) gives her a very quick playstyle that feels good to pull off. She’s an interesting take on Blues mixed with Zero.EXE, but her story doesn’t really go anywhere. Still, she is a black woman (robot) and as I’ve discovered that kind of representation for video game protagonists is all too rare.
Quickfire points. The game has full voice acting, and it’s not bad either. In English, Japanese or even French I didn’t hate it so thumbs up. The online mode, which caused months of delays, I didn’t even try—oops. Challenge mode was a nice distraction. Call is playable in one stage only, ho hum, but it’s better than nothing. At least we have Ray.
My only real complaints about the game were that the character models were a bit too chunky and unexpressive for cutscenes, explosion effects looked a bit cheap, the load times were a bit long, and I had occasional stuttering performance problems which I’ve been told aren’t an issue on other platforms. Other than that I had a gay old time, so give MN9 a chance! Sorry for the overlong review!
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