More on Mega Man

Yesterday, I posted on Game On about my recent conversion into a Mega Man fan. I'm now going though the back catalog and trying to beat all the Mega Man games I can. This means that a good chunk of my Thursday was spent defeating Robot Masters in Mega Man 1 and making my way to the first (and my first) Wily's Castle.

While playing through the first game, I entered a room where the door shut behind me. This signals a boss fight, but I saw no boss in the room. I waited a bit and after a short amount of time, Mega Man was hit from behind with a big spikey block that flew across the room. This block was followed by more. I'd jump to dodge, but get hit from the higher blocks. I'd jump a low block and get hit by another low block while I was landing. As these block reached the other side of the room, they started to form what is known as the 'Yellow Devil'. I didn't even get a chance to see it fully form before I was dead.

I started again and did a little better at dodging blocks, but I was still getting hit more then I would have liked. It only took seven hits before I was out of health. I did stay alive long enough to see the Yellow Devil in his complete form. As the tall beast stood in front of me, a red eye opened and shot a projectile at Mega Man. I immediate noticed this as the weakness and jumped to shoot the eye. It felt good to see that the robot flash. Flashing in retro games means that damage was done. What I wasn't ready for was the devil to turn back into blocks and fly across to the opposite side of the room. I didn't survive another round of spiky block jumping.

So my strategy was clear, hit the enemy in the eye. What wasn't clear was how I was going to jump the blocks without getting hit. I hadn't quite figured out the pattern. I started to jump low over the first three lower blocks, but as I jumped the fourth I would get hit by the fifth lower block. Getting hit messed up my timing and I would eventually get hit by the sixth or seventh as well. I attempted lower jumps, but the time between the fourth and fifth was too short.

After some time, I realized that while the higher blocks were keeping me to low jumps, the upper space was clear while the fourth and fifth lower blocks were flying, which meant that I could jump BOTH four and five with one jump instead of trying to jump over each separately.

I had the pattern.

I beat the boss with full health.

Fuck you, Yellow Devil.



This post mirrors what I wrote on Game On yesterday. While it could be considered terribly frustrating to attempt to find patterns, I can't get over how rewarding it feels to actually beat stages in Mega Man games. It seems daunting to take on 9 Mega Man games, but if they all feel as rewarding as what I've played so far... I'm in gaming bliss.