Mega-Man-2

I love it!

I got this idea from Kill Screen (who got this idea from Pitchfork) to talk about my gaming life in five year increments. Pitchfork does it with music and really it can be done with any media, but I’m doing games. AGE 5 (1991) One of my first video game memories is sitting in my parents’ living room in Hialeah watching them play a Bowser level in Super Mario Bros. I remember being scared of the creepy black castle level. This was the launch year for the SNES, but I’m sure we didn’t get it until 1992 or 1993. Instead we mostly amused ourselves with Contra, Mega Man 2, and Bubble Bobble. ...

[caption id="" align=“aligncenter” width=“375” caption=“Super Potato in Akihabara”] [/caption] As is typical of me, I played a ton of video games this year. Here’s a listing of what I played along with a few short (or long) words on each game. For the most part, this list is restricted to games released in 2010 unless I did not play them until this year. It’s also mostly in chronological order, with some skips here and there. ...

PS: It’s in Japanese. Trust me, it’s better that way. I love it, so J-Pop. PPS: Air Man is not really that hard. Wood Man is even easier. If you really want it in English:

Insert another credit, because it’s time for your weekly video game news and you’ve just hit the Game Overview screen. I figured I’d start with BlazBlue today, since the game just came out and I sunk an evening in playing it. I don’t have all that much to say about it yet, but it’s intriguing in a very not Street Fighter way. The fighters are all insanely detailed and designed in an intricately anime fashion, leaving no moe niche unserved and the fighting system is deceptively simple, but actually WAY complicated, as most of these things are nowadays. I haven’t had a whole lot of time to sink into it, especially because Street Fighter IV has nabbed my attention yet again, but I will keep posting impressions as I play. ...

Kids are stupid. It’s really not their fault, how can they know anything about the important things in life without any real-life experience. Take my music-habits as a kid as a prime example. It’s not like I was listening to The Wiggles or anything so terrible, but among the real musical gems that I was listening to (The Beatles, The Rolling Stones) on Majic 102.7 (WMXJ) was some questionable material. Sure, Alvin & the Chipmunks singing country music (Urban Chipmunk, lovingly referred to as “a piece of shit” by Rolling Stone magazine), Bugs and Friends Sing the Beatles, and Kermit Unpigged may have featured music by legitimate artists or actual classics in their genres, but, did you notice that it’s all marketing trash? ...

Inspired by a Rebel FM podcast, I found myself seeking video game remixes and music again, starting with my absolute favorite track from the Mega Man 2 soundtrack, Flash Man. Having seen a video on Youtube before, I started my search with The Minibosses. The Minibosses Ever wonder what your game themes would sound like played by a rock band with real electric guitars instead of synthy squeals? The Minibosses are for you. Their catalog is not large, with only two CDs available right now, but the benefit of their music is that you can get most of it free at their website. I’ve yet to listen to their full CD, but let me be the first to say that their Mega Man 2 medley is fantastic. ...

I’ll admit it, I’m a bit of a grinch when it comes to Christmas music. The songs never change and it all gets rather repetitive, especially since radio stations start exclusively playing Christmas music almost immediately following Thanksgiving. What’s a guy to do? Find an awesome alternative. In the past that alternative has usually been rock Christmas albums, like the always fun Relient K Christmas albums, but this year my, admittedly post-Christmas, salvation comes in the form of chip tunes. ...

Deep from the trenches, it’s time for your Monday video feature: Embedded Reporter. Mega Man 9 is HARD. People say, “That’s the idea. It’s supposed to be Retro like the days when games were tough.” Let me tell you a secret about the old Mega Man games: they were NOT this hard. Aside from Quick Man (the magma plumes were mad cheap), I could more or less reliably kill almost all of the Mega Man 2 bosses. At this point, I’ve still only killed Galaxy Man and Concrete Man. Funny thing about that is that both of those Robot Masters are more or less the easiest in the game. As hard as maybe this video looks, this is an easy stage. ...

If you read my 8-bit All-Stars feature you know I love me some Mega Man 2. There was just something sublimely perfect about that game with its polished level design and great boss battles. It’s been a long time since we’ve seen a real sequel to a Mega Man game. The last canonical MM game was MM 8 for the PSX in 1997, with the X series taking over with about eight installments that have also stopped coming out. ...