Mega Man 9 Rocks The Gaming World

Filed in archive WiiWare on October 1, 2008

Totally hilarious image from Connectionworld.org

Last week the video game world was rocked by the release of Mega Man 9. Mega Man 9 is important because it marks the first time, to my understanding, than an entire commercial release was created in a technologically obsolete manner for artistic, and even commercial reasons.

Sure, some games hint at this: No More Heroes has old school 8 bit sprites in the game, but it is otherwise a modern, 3D title. And of course many intrepid freeware designers have and continue to make excellent games in older motifs.

So is the game any good? Yes, it is great! What I think really makes Mega Man 9 worth playing is that it embraces the "old school" but also employs a modern design aesthetic: you won't find cheap deaths and filler content here. The game is quite hard but fair (you are always carefully taught tricky stuff in a safe environment first, which is a technique right out of Design 101), and hence feels fresh. It just doesn't feel like playing an "old" game at all.

Read.