Mega Man 9 - First Impressions

My first ever WiiWare download. In fact, my first ever purchase of DDL-software on the Wii using the WiiPoints system. And easily the best $10 I have spent on a video game ever. There's a catch to that, hint hint How many $10 games do you think I've ever bought period? ^^; But nah! It's fucking awesome! Read on!

Released twelve years after Mega Man 8, Capcom's ninth installment in the classic Mega Man series feels much more like Mega Man 3b. And as somebody who grew up playing more Mega Man 3 than any other person he's ever met, I think I'm qualified to make this claim. ;p If you'll excuse me. :o So. Why Mega Man "3b"? Because: Mega Man 9 utilizes the Mega Man 2 engine but adds in quirky new features never seen before in any of the first 6 Mega Man titles (I never played 7 or 8, so no idea).

WHAT'S MISSING?
- the ability to hit Down + A to do a powerslide (Mega Man 3 onward)
- the ability to hold down B to charge your Buster (Mega Man 3 onward)
- the ability to hold down B to charge your buster to more powerful levels (Mega Man 4 onward)
- the ability to fully control the Rush Jet (I forget since when, at least since Mega Man 3)
- the ability to find E Tanks in the environment (all classic Mega Man titles)

WHAT'S BROUGHT BACK FROM THE GRAVE
- Eddie from Mega Man 1 is back (see below)
- gears from Mega Man 1 are back, although they play a new role (see below)
- a villain in TornadoMan's stage resembles a hybrid of ProtoMan (Mega Man's brother) and a classic baddy-type seen in Mega Man 2 and Mega Man 3 who fires off salvos and then hides behind a nearly-impenetrable shield

WHAT'S COMPLETELY NEW TO THIS GAME
- you can buy an ~infinite supply of extra lives and E Tanks at a store now
- in fact, you buy Eddie at this store, too, and a bird character I don't really remember ever but meh
- and I should mention, gears now play a role as the game's "3rd currency" alongside the traditional Energy Pellets (#1) and Power Gems (#2). Gears can be used at Home where you talk to Roll and pay her gears in exchange for the wares she sells, such as Eddie, the bird guy, etc.
- there's a new device Rock can buy that allows him to pick up gems and have them auto-fill into his most depleted power; in all classic Mega Man titles, Rock in his Blue Bomber default outfit would just absorb gems and render them useless, and so the player would have to annoyingly open the Start menu, switch to a target power suit, walk over the gem, open the menu again, and switch back to the default suit
- the first-ever bad guy woman in a classically-themed Mega Man. She's called Splash Woman. And she's appropriately very difficult to beat with no power advantage but is killed in about 5 seconds with the right power (BEES, go figure! lol I tried electricity at first!). Splash Woman is not the franchise's first bad guy woman, though: the title of "first villain woman in a Mega Man game" goes to Pandora from Mega Man ZX; and before her we had Harpuia, who is actually a man but everyone thought was a woman; and before him we had Zero, who again everyone thought was a woman way back when we were kids in '94, hahaha, oh well ... IT'S THE PONYTAIL!


It's those first two hashmarks in the "What's Missing" list that REALLY makes this game feel older school than I would have liked (MEGA MAN 3 IS THE BEST! MEGA MAN 2 AND 1 ARE SLIGHTLY DEPRECATED!!) but it's obviously what Capcom was going for since I think more fans associate with Mega Man 2 instead of Mega Man 3 and of course new blood to the franchise is going to go investigate the game that started it all (Mega Man 1) and formulate their first impressions around it. So yeah, I can see why Mega Man 9 needed to be more like 1 and 2 than like 3 onward. But ... oh well. :) :( :)


As for who I fought:
0th stage - attempted Hornet Man's stage, but couldn't reach him at first
1st stage - Gravity Man's, the first where I reached a boss and I also defeated him on the 2nd life (i.e. died only once). His stage was pretty easy and so was he once I'd gotten a chance to feel him out, even if he took a while to fight safely.
2nd stage - Hornet Man's (and then defeated him, and go figure Gravity was his weakness!)
~~~~~~~~STAGES ATTEMPTED BUT I DON'T REMEMBER IN WHAT ORDER, SO SKIPPING BACK TO WHEN I NEXT DEFEATED SOMEBODY~~~~~~~~~
3rd stage - Magma Man (powered through it using 2 E Tanks and had near full energy to begin with and had only 3 slivers of life at the end, so basically he exhausted ~3 full life bars!! I definitely was not supposed to fight him just yet, whoops, but whatever. ^^; )
4th stage - (the electric guy) Man - I forget what I used to beat him, but it seemed to have somewhat of an elemental advantage, though not much
5th Stage - Splash Woman - I used the electric guy's powerup first and was surprised to see it do so little. Then I tried Magma Man's, no good. Then I laughingly said, "I wonder if bees in the water will hurt her!" And sweet Jesus, I hit the button 5 or 6 times in under 3 seconds and she was gone. I was flabbergasted. What the hell, Capcom!? XD
6th Stage - Concrete Man - difficult son of a bitch. Even with his bizarre weakness to electricity, he still required two E Tanks. Making him even harder than the already crazy-hard Magma Man. Jesus.

So right now I've got TornadoMan (never seen him) and Jewel Man (never seen him) left. I figure TornadoMan's weak to Concrete and Jewel Man's weak to either Splash Woman's trident or Magma Man's fire, but who knows. BEES IN THE WATER proved me wrong before, so I'll hold off until I actually reach these guys.

OH! AND TWO MORE THINGS!!

1) NO SPOILERS PLEASE! THANK YOU!
2) I AM NOT USING A WALKTHROUGH! I AM 100% DOING THIS ALL ON MY OWN. SO I MAY HAVE SAID THINGS THAT ARE ERRONEOUS OR BEATEN BOSSES IN WHAT TO YOU SEEMS LIKE "THE WRONG ORDER." TOUGH! REAL MEGA MAN FANS BEAT MEGA MAN WITH NO WALKTHROUGHS! :P