Douglas's game of the week: Megaman Battle Network

[Sim Kid]

Megaman Battle Network is yet another spinoff series of the blue bomber-But here he's the blue bomber.EXE! Unlike most of the other Megaman spinoffs, this one is an alternate dimension(Megaman X takes place after the original, Megaman Zero takes place after the X series, and Megaman Legends takes place after the Zero series. No, I'm not lying. Ever notice the use of Elysium and the Reaverbot symbol in the Zero games?) where instead of robots, it's all navis and PeTs. (Personal terminals) It is also a Megaman RPG-That's more or less what caught the eyes of this RPG addict.

While you may think you play as Megaman.EXE, you instead begin playing as Lan Hakiri(Light). you learn about jacking in, and that is how you control Megaman.EXE. Lan also has several friends, Mayl (His love interest), Dex (LOOK OUT CODIEKITTY!! POKEY MINCH LOOKALIKE!), Yai (Intelligent girl who's yet to show her intellect), and his rival, Chaud. (Who is one of the best designs) The crime wave, WWW, consists of both human and Navi members. Some of those WWW members look just plain freaky, especially Count Zap.

The graphics of Megaman Battle Network look good-Nice use of 32-bit sprites, though the trees in ACDC town look like green grapes and are unrealistic. (I say they should dither them a bit) However, they have some nice house designs in ACDC town. However, Lan really needs some work. I think he looks pretty dorky since he wears a sweatshirt and shorts. It makes him look like he has the fashion sense of one of those people on ***** Eye! Also, his feet seem to slide everywhere when he walks, but this doesn't inhabit gameplay. I like how some of the Navis are designed, but I already mentioned that some look freaky. (Like Count Zap and Colourman. O_O) Unfortunatley, the viruses are..are...*gasp*PALLETTE SWAPS!!!

The story of Megaman Battle Network isn't really anything too impressive-It's basically just Lan trying to disband a crime ring called the WWW. Most of the plots involve Lan doing something like going to a party or to school, the WWW makes something happen like Lan's oven split fire or the lights go out (During the WWW Party of Death), then Lan must jack in to a device, bust viruses, find and delete the WWW navi. It's awfully predictable, but near the end it throws out a nice twist. Oh, and the WWW is lead by...by...by...WILY!!!

The music is basically just a take-it-or-leave it scenerio. Some musics are good, like the battle theme and Elecman's stage, but others I'm not so particularily hot about.

The gameplay is indeed original. Megaman games are known for being action games while traditional RPGs are turn-based. Megaman Battle Network is sort of a combination of the two. You enter a battle screen, but you can move Megaman.EXE around, have him fire his (weak) buster, dodge enemy attacks, and have him unleash chips (Which are the attacks) when the custom gage is full, and even summon other Navis (Which only do one attack). Battles never really get boring, and it's quite fun because some enemies have different attack styles. While you don't gain any EXP from battles, you have to buy Megaman.EXE's level-ups. Power-ups upgrade the power of his buster and HPMemories contribute to his health.

The game is more or less on the easy side in terms of difficulty. The stages feature a few puzzles but nothing too impressive. Most bosses belong to a specific element and you can easily beat them by applying their weakensses, such as Water beats fire, Electricity beats water, Wood beats electricity, and Fire beats wood. Some enemies will try to steal your territory, and if they are swordies, that can get incredibly annoying. Several enemes just steal the squares back though.

When unleashing battle chips, you can either unleash two or three of the same kind or several of the same letter, I.E Steal S and Wideswrd S. There are also some combinations but I haven't really discovered them yet.

Overall, Megaman Battle Network is a relativley good game. While Yuyuyami of Saqbb2 may think my score should be reduced by 7.50 points, I personally liked the game. It's certainly not the best out there, but it's worth it if you like Megaman.EXE. 7.50/10

Pros:
-=METS!!!!!!!=-
-=some nice musics=-
-=Some nice graphics and character designs=-
-=Battle system is fun and original=-
-=May provide some challenge=-
-=Nice twist at the end=-

Cons:
-=PALETTE SWAPS!!=-
-=Other musics are boring=-
-=Character designs like Count Zap, Colourman, and Yahoot look just plain freaky=-
-=A rather predictable plot=-

[[Dragoon]]

The plot, although predictable, was quite good. The predictable aspect was only what you'd have to do, but how it'd come to pass and how you'd do it were all compleatly different. That's what made it a great game.

Also, Megaman Battle Network 3 kickes some serious butt. (#4 sent the series down the tubes...)

[Codiekitty]

Dex (LOOK OUT CODIEKITTY!! POKEY MINCH LOOKALIKE!),

...what the hell are you saying? You saying I'm not going to like the game because of a fat kid, even though I've already gone through the entire game twice and am just 20 chips short of having them all?

And quite frankly, I never noticed a similarity between Dex and Pokey...


Where are these lemmings going? The Super Nintendo Super Shire! Hop in line and follow them there!

[Glyph Phoenix]

I didn't care much for 3... but 2 rocks. MM:BN 2 is one of my all time favorite games, along with Paper Mario and Chrono Trigger.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Avatar Mario
Now with 300% more tildes!

[Sim Kid]

Originally posted by CodieKitty:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Dex (LOOK OUT CODIEKITTY!! POKEY MINCH LOOKALIKE!),

...what the hell are you saying? You saying I'm not going to like the game because of a fat kid, even though I've already gone through the entire game twice and am just 20 chips short of having them all?

And quite frankly, I never noticed a similarity between Dex and Pokey...</font>[/quote]I know that you had played through the game twice, but I didn't know you had all but 20 chips.

You never noticed a similarity between Dex and Pokey? Look at the size of their guts.

[[sage]]

MMBN kicks ass. Although i never finished any of them cause I'd stop playing and then get lost and start over and it'd happen again. I can't even remember where i am in the game.

[X-3]

MegaMan Battle Network 1 was not as good as MMBN:3. The bosses are TOO easy, at least from what I've played(I got to Colorman).

Still, its good.

I think I have proof that MMBN take plce somewhere in the time-line.

1. Wily. Unless its a diffrent Wily.

2. I found out that "Hikari" means......... Light. I also went to vgmuseum.com and saw the ending for MMBN:3. Lan's granfather looked a LOT like Dr. Light....

P.S:

I liked MMBN:4 better then both for some reason. Whats so bad about it? Its pretty good acually.

[Sim Kid]

Megaman Battle Network's storyline assumes that:

1) Dr. Light is Japanese
2) Dr. Light got his way so that net navis were popularized instead of robots. The other megaman games assume that Wily got his way and that robots were popularized instead of navis. (Feel free to correct this if it's wrong)