25 Gaming Experiences You Must Have Before You Die - Part V: Mega Man 2 & 3

Mega Man 2 (NES, 1988)

Mega Man 3 (NES, 1990)

Why You Should Play It

I was somewhat trepidatious about having Mega Man on this list. Of the five 8-bit era games/series I've chosen for this piece, Mega Man is the closest to Mario and Zelda levels of popularity.
Even Castlevania and Ninja Gaiden, popular as they are, don't quite hold the same level of retro game fan adoration as Mega Man. Why is the Blue Bomber so popular? Why is Capcom still making games modeled after his NES outings? This success can be pinpointed to these two games in particular. Mega Man's first outing, while a solid game in its own right, came and went without too much impact. It wasn't until Mega Man 2 a year later that the franchise became a household name and a prominent fixture in gaming culture.

So what changed? Mega Man is formulaic to a fault. Until Mega Man Legends in 1997, every game in the franchise, even the somewhat more complex Mega Man X entries, were essentially the same game. Run through eight thematic stages, fight a thematic boss at the end of each, and take his thematic weapon. The only element of this the original Mega Man lacked was that it only had six stages. Not a big deal. Moreover, there isn't a significant difference in the quality of level design between Mega Man and Mega Man 2, as much as any gamer might try to argue. It's practically the same exact game. Except for this:

Yes. More than any technical or mechanical difference between the two, the thing that made Mega Man 2 better, the thing that launched it into the annals of gaming history, was its music. And that, more than any other seemingly more appropriate reason, is why you should play it.

The music in Mega Man 2 and 3 isn't just good. It represents a level of skill and finesse with such limited hardware as the NES's five-channel sound chip that borders on being its own art form. Takashi Tateishi (Mega Man 2) and Yasuaki Fujita (Mega Man 3) didn't just lay tracks beneath the gameplay and graphics. They created a soul for a pair of games that were by the numbers, cranked out by a machine-like design principle that would turn out countless other renditions of the same game over the next twenty-or-so years. The tracks are every bit as much a part of the gaming experience in Mega Man 2 and 3 as pressing B to fire and A to jump. For all intents and purposes, the music is the game, and without it, as fun as these two entries in this immense series are, they would not be remembered as they are now.

Potential Barriers

Mega Man 2 and 3 can be pretty brutal. If you figure out the “proper” pattern to follow in defeating the bosses, you can get through it much more smoothly, but areas like Quick Man's stage and the Wily compounds are still infuriating no matter what methods you employ. But again, the music will energize you enough to plow through them no matter how dated they feel to you.

Current Availability

The Mega Man games have been reassembled in various collections throughout gaming history, and are readily available across multiple generations of hardware. Most recently, the two showcased here are available via the Wii's Virtual Console. Mega Man 2 and 3 were rereleased for PSOne in Japan, and these ports are available on Sony's Playstation Network in the PSOne Imports section. Beware that these versions have somewhat wonky emulation. Stepping back a generation, the entire (then) eight game series was assembled into one massive collection called Mega Man Anniversary Collection and released on PS2, GameCube and XBox, and this release is still pretty easy to find for single-digit price tags anywhere secondhand games are sold. There's also a fairly obscure remake of the first three games together for the Genesis called Mega Man: The Wily Wars. Good luck finding it though.

If You Really Dig It
In spite of being such a classic gaming icon, there really aren't a lot of Mega Man imitators out there. Fortunately, there are plenty of other Mega Man games for you to experience, as it's one of the most extensive franchises in the business.

Other NES Capcom games

Capcom's other NES games all borrow at least a little bit from the Blue Bomber, but stand apart from just about any other NES game they shared their release window with. Capcom's Disney games in particular are some of the best games on the system and the music is similarly spectacular in most of them.

The rest of the Mega Man series

I'm not implying that the other Mega Man games aren't worthwhile by excluding them from the list. It's just that Mega Man 2 and 3 really are the pinnacle of their series and the other games, though great in their own right, just aren't quite up to that same brilliant standard. Mega Man 4-6 are very similar to Mega Man 2 and 3, running off of the same engines. Mega Man 7 also plays very similarly with the added benefit of 16-bit graphics. Mega Man 8 was released on PSOne and Saturn, and is probably the weakest link in the Mega Man saga, but still fun. Mega Man & Bass was released after Mega Man 8, but on the Japanese Super Famicom (and much later on the Game Boy Advance here). It's probably the best of the post-classic era Mega Man games as it takes the Mega Man experience much deeper than ever before. Mega Man 9 and 10 attempt quite successfully to recapture the feeling of the classic NES games, complete with ridiculous cover art. Additionally, there are enhanced ports for the Mega Man series on Game Boy.

Mega Man X series

Mega Man X was Capcom's attempt at letting Mega Man grow up a little with the dawning of a new generation. X boasted a more anime-style aesthetic, hard-rock music, and much more depth than its NES predecessors. The SNES trilogy is rock-solid, with X2 in particular being one of the best games in Mega Man as a whole. The PSOne trilogy is fun but not quite up to par, and the two 3D excursions on PS2 have debatable quality. There's also a JRPG called Mega Man X: Command Mission and a couple Game Boy color entries.

Mega Man Legends series

Just as Mega Man had evolved by being a little more hard-edged in the 16-bit era, the possibilities brought on by the 32/64-bit era allowed the Blue Bomber to venture into the world of 3D. Thus, we have Mega Man Legends. MML takes place in an entirely different universe from the other games in the Mega Man lineage, but still holds the same spark. MML was initially available exclusively for the PSOne, but was later ported to the N64 as Mega Man 64. Mega Man Legends 2 and its spinoff, Tron Bonne are still only available for PSOne. Also, keep a lookout for Mega Man Legends 3 for the 3DS! ... or not.

Mega Man Zero series

Mega Man Zero takes place in the same world as the Mega Man and Mega Man X sagas, but takes place far in the future in a post-apocalyptic setting. It once again furthers the depth of the traditional Mega Man template by making it a bit more open-ended and "Metroidian". The two ZX games take this even farther and can almost be considered full-blown Metroidvanias.