Perhaps one of Capcom’s best known series, Mega Man has graced almost
every system. In fact, most major consoles can be guaranteed two
things: a few Madden titles, and a few Mega Man games. Even Sega’s
platforms have had their own Mega Man games, such as Mega Man for the
Game Gear, and The Wily Wars for the Sega Genesis. While the Game Gear
title was merely a semi-remake of Mega Man IV for the NES, The Wily War
was a compilation of the three best Mega Man games on the NES, and
possibly in the entire series. The gameplay follows the formula that
many Mega Man games before it have used: you select a level and
progress through it, shooting down enemy robots and making tricky
jumps, ultimately ending in you fighting the Robot Master of that level
one on one and moving on to the next level after having bested him.
While it may sound like another run-of-the-mill platformer when put as
such, it does have many redeeming features that keep it from drifting
into typicality.
For one, beating the Robot Master of a certain level yields you their
weapon. Additionally, no one weapon is superior to the rest, as the
Robot Masters have cyclical weaknesses, much like a larger scale of
rock-paper-scissors. Outside of battle, certain weapons hold an
auxiliary use, like Guts Man’s Super Arm being able to lift up rocks
(which is how it is used as a weapon to begin with), or Flash Man’s
Time Stopper being able to, well, stop time, allowing one to easily
blast through the infamously hard laser shaft, where quickly blasting
lasers will prevent your advance and kill you on contact. In the later
two games, you also get items that can help you advance in ways that
you couldn’t on your own, like the jet-like Item 2 of Mega Man 2, and
the submarine-esque Rush Marine from its sequel. The game includes
arguably the three best Mega Man games: the first three. It also
includes Wily Tower, an end-game challenge that has you facing off
against 3 Robot Masters inspired by Chinese folklore before, once
again, taking down Dr. Wily. You are limited to 8 weapons and 3 items
on your trek through Wily’s trial, making strategy and planning of the
utmost importance. The level design is also pretty good, making use of
many sprites and enemies from the other Mega Man games in a clever and
challenging way.
The graphics are good, but don’t take advantage of the Genesis’
hardware to the extent that they could. The levels are vibrant and the
animations remain true to the original games they depict. However, the
graphics have a bit of inconsistency as to where they have new sprites
and where they just update the old sprites. Mega Man has entirely new
sprites, which is understandable due to him being the protagonist, but
other major characters like Dr. Wily, Gamma, and most noticeable
Protoman seem to be trivial updates to the original NES sprites. And
adding insult to injury, Rush displays an odd graphical glitch that
portrays him as Mega Man blue on the weapon select screen when in
series the rest of the series (and on the field in this game) he is
shown as crimson red. The game does have some noticeable slowdown, but
this actually helps you due to the precision needed for certain bosses,
like the Yellow Devil, Quick Man, or Shadow Man. All in all, the
graphics are OK, but won’t wow you much compared to other games of the
time. Perhaps one of the best improved and most well aged aspects of
these old games is the music. Mega Man’s soundtrack was originally
intended to be played on more modern instruments than the limited
synthesizer that the NES had in 1989, and it shows. The Genesis’s 70’s
suited synthesizers give the game a vibrant personality, especially in
the psychedelic Gemini Man stage.
Overall, it’s a pretty good compilation that remains true to the
original sources with little errors to find. If you find a cartridge of
this game lying around on eBay, it would be a great addition to your
gaming collection, both in rarity and game quality.
