Mega Man X: Grand Finale!

So here we are team. Last boss. Sigma. He's a big ol' jerk. And he has 3 different stages for the fight. I am thankful that the whole stage itself was essentially just the boss battle; because I did NOT want to have to deal with any mini-punks.

I beamed into this... Pit? A rather thin pipe that I had to wall jump up. There were these two holes that little robo-worms popped out of. Every one of them would either drop health, ammo for powers or an extra life. So I spam killed them until I was satisfactorilly stocked up.

Eventually I popped up into the room where Sigma appeared with his little robo-dog. He talked a little bit in regular bad guy fashion, then he call me a traitor!

What the hell!? Who did I betray? And when!?

Gawd, what I bastard. So he vanished and left his dog to do his dirty work. Well; this dog is annoying, I'll tell ya. He had a fair amount of moves at his disposal. He could leap at me, run at me, shoot glowing blues balls up and over at me, launch a large flame curve downwards and upwards at me. I could avoid his attacks easily enough, but his leaping was hard to gauge sometimes; and if I crept up the wall, he would jump up towards the wall, back and forth before dropping down.

Hitting him with a charged shot would knock him back a bit, but hitting him with an ice shot did a helluvalot of damage. So I switched between the two and took him down. Sigma re-appeared and threw off his cape and pulled out a ligthtsaber. And then we started the fight.

He began by lounging forward at me, and so I jumped up the wall. Then he jumped up the wall, back and forth. He hit me and knocked me down. I shot at him and (because he has a lightsaber) he deflected my shots. I started a charge shot and jumped on the wall again. He leapt up at my and I shot him. It hurt him, but but he kept coming and he killed me. So this began a series of unfortunate events... Or, I suppose of series of X dying. His leaping back and forth just seemed so erratic, it was so hard to predict where he would go and he kept hitting me, and dealing a top of damage! Gah.

Eventually I took a break and took a step away from the game.

I came back and thought of how I could hit him when he was in the air. The Ice-shot, the Boomerang all had means of striking out in angles I couldn't normally hit. Since I used much of the Ice-shot against his pup, I knew that power ran out pretty quick, so I didn't use it right away. I did find the Boomerang very useful though, because it would swing around up and hit him.

The boomerang was not strong enough, and I couldn't quite finish him off by the end of the power. So I switched to the Ice-Shot and shot him a few times. I really found the rhythm of his leaping, and could avoid him fairly easily now. And so I finished him off with a good amount of health left.

He exploded and I was very happy. But, of course, that was not the end. After the explosion cleared his head was floating in the center of the room with a stupid grin on his face. He floated up and the back of the screen lit up revealing a large... Robot-Dog-Headed-Floaty-SpikeHandy-Thing. His head joined with the canine head and the battle began.

He had two floating platform (hands) which opened up and shot lightning up and down, or flew down at me. I could jump on these in order to rise up on level with the head and shoot it (with a fully charged buster shot.) The platform would open and lightning blast me off often though, so I had to get used to leaping off of them. The head could also breathe fire down at me in a slow arc, or shoot large electric orbs which had a rather slim margin of error in dashing between. Through these combinations of attacks I found myself defeated a number of times.

Luckily I had those robo-worms to farm at the start of the level each time I died, so I stocked up on health, power and lives.

Eventually I found that I could wall jump up to the platforms (instead of waiting for them to float down) and I could continuously damage him with the Rolling Shield. As long as the platform wasn't directly touching the wall I could leap off of it when it shot lightning and back onto it to continue my onslaught. This strategy worked wonderfully, and I brought Sigma to another explosion. Again, in solid bad guy fashion he had a little bit to say before he died; but he did ask some very provocative questions.

I don't know! Haven't you been reading my progress!? No one tells me anything!

So I let the baddie explode, and I teleported away, conveniently on a cliff-face many miles away. From there I saw Sigma's fortress crumble into the ocean and then explode in brilliant light.

Now... If I can teleport so far away, so easily, why do I have to go through levels at all? Can't I just teleport into the bosses rooms?

Then some nice Bit music started to play, and some epilogue details started to crawl up the screen, again, questioning why we did this whole thing.

"Those who sacrificed themselves will never return." ... Doesn't Zero have his own series now? Also, you should say "never be forgotten" it puts more of a positive swing while keeping the weight of the words... But that might just be me.

The epilogue ends saying that the X-buster on his arm knows the answer. The GUN on his arm knows the answer to whether he will have to keep fighting... I wonder what the gun will say? NO, DON'T USE ME, I WANT TO BECOME POINTLESS. But, then again, ya never know.

So the credits rolled, and there were some names and stuff, and then they ended and I was greeted with this smiling face! (Accompanied by some rather creepy music.)

!!! A sequel!? No way!

And that concludes my trip through Mega Man X. I hope you all enjoyed the adventure as much as I did! I had a lot of fun with the game, I can see why it is held in high regard among those lists of "Best SNES games." The action is alot of fun, and the 16-Bit graphic style is quite lovely. My only gripe is story... But, I suppose that's what RPGs are for!... I don't think I'll do an RPG next though, judging by the amount of time I've been able to settle down and play last month, it'll be best to get a less time consuming game out of the way... But which one? If anyone has any ideas, throw them out in the comment section below, I'd be happy to see what you're all thinking.

Catch ya later gamers!

Mega Man X: Holy Boss-Battles Batman!

So I demolished the rest of the old bosses in this one level, and fought a new robo-beast; which ended up having me face 6 boss fights in one level! SIX. I was running low on all counts of powers and energy tanks as the level progressed. It also felt like the bosses were a little more difficult than the first time I fought them... not that I DIED a whole lot. The fights just felt harder.

The first boss door (which again was pretty much as the start of the level) was the Armored Armadillo. I knew I had to electrocute him with my lightning shot to get rid of his armor, and then continuously do so until he died.

Don't worry, I'm not invisible, I just got hit by his forehead shot.

After defeating Armadillo, I made my way through some baddies and got myself to full health; just in time for the next boss door (which was pretty much a single hallway away.)

And within this doorway was that bastard who can actually turn invisible: Sting Chameleon. He was just as annoying as I recall, the first time we fought. Only THIS time, I found his weakness!

THE BOOM!... erang.

So I made my way out of his chamber, down a little drop where there was some health behind some pipes. I used the boomerang to snag them up (that thing is all kinds of handy, ain't it?)

Onto the next boss! Here I had to face off with Spark Mandrill! I already knew his weakness, so I could use my wonderful Ice Shot to freeze him whenever he was getting to close for comfort. I did not leave the battle unscathed however, as each one of his flying punches would knock me off the wall if I tried to avoid them that way.

You know what killed the dinosaurs? The ICE AGE!

So that was 3 bosses down, so I was imagining I would be facing a new boss right away, but I was wrong! I dove down into some water and instantly knew what was coming.

Hmm... I wonder who I'm fighting next?

Oooo... Surprise, surprise.

Octo-whatever his face is was a bastard. I very much did not enjoy fighting him. Mainly because I couldn't figure out his weakness, and also I couldn't remember how I beat him last time. So I switched rapidly through my powers and buster shots, trying to avoid his missiles and keep away from his whirlpool thang.

Then I killed him with his own powers; just for the hell of it.

Then I leapt out of the water and found another boss door. When I entered I saw the conveyor belt and knew right away I was to be facing Flame Mammoth. Last time I didn't have his weakness, and I knew I did this time. As far as I could tell, it seemed the tornado power did more damage to him. I jumped away from his fireballs, and soot shot, and blasted him down as much as I could.

I finished him off at the same time as getting knocked into the air by his fat-ass weight coming down.

So I had finished them all off. All them old guys. And the level wasn't over? Who was I supposed to fight next?... Some rather large robot, T-Rex head thing? This guy was annoying as hell. He killed me a fair amount of times, to be honest. He only had two attacks really. His upper half and lower half would split and move seperately attempting to hit me. The other is if both halves come together and shoot a large electric orb out at you. I had to dash under that one. You can't hang up on the wall to avoid it... It will launch at you.

Also, in trying to jump through the gap of top and bottom, the top would often be too fast and crush down on me, causing a fair amount of pain. How I ended up winning was getting into a rhythm of his movements and blasts; I scrolled through my powers, charging fully as well as I could to do the most damage possible. And in the end, it was still a damn close call.

HUZZAH! I won! Whew... That was DAMN stressful.

But I finished him off, that I did. And was then sent to the boss screen again. This HAS to be the final boss now; Sigma. I'm also curious as to whether I'll get some answers of some plot? Maybe?... Maybe I'm hoping too much. I guess we'll see.

Catch ya later gamers.

Mega Man X: Another Down

On the home stretch team! I demolished the next level of Sigma's Fortress, and killed some more old bosses. The levels in the fortress are fairly standard; as a matter of fact, there isn't much in the way of platforming or obstacles that cause worry. It's more about getting X from one boss-fight to the next.

For instance, within the first 10 seconds of the level I came to a boss door!

And it was my good friend Chill Penguin.

The fight was pretty similar to how the last one went, I jumped over his attacks, shot him when he was up blowing wind, and got hit by his tackle a few times. The big difference this time though, was that I found his weakness!

FIRE! Hahahahaha!!

.... Ahem. So, that killed him faster.

Next I came to a mech which I used to tear through some baddies. Short and sweet, as usual.

Next there were these two paths I could go up, littered with bad guys either way. After getting struck down a couple times, I used my Chamleon ability so I was untouchable to leap up as fast as I could, avoiding bad guys and shots alike.

I ran out into the open and was greeted by the noise of flapping wings. And so I faught Storm Eagle again. He felt more annoying this go around, but that may just be because he didn't do anything special when I hit him with any of my powers. The Chameleon Sting shot seemed to do more damage, but it didn't stun him so I kept getting hit by his little birds or dive attack.

I did manage to kill him before I fell off the edge, luckily. But I was hurtin' pretty bad. After the fight I made my way forward and got some more health. It was a short distance however, before I came to the last boss of this level. Which was a big, giant, robot, face.

So, this guy had a few options for attacking. His eyes opened one at a time, being different colors. The green eye shot one bullet, the red eye shot a spray of 3 bullets (it could also fly out at you) and the blue eye, which kinda flys at you and then hovers there for a bit. After a bit the walls would close in and it's nose would fly around and try to hit you.

After enough damage, the eyes would explode, leaving you to just deal with the nose.

When you kill it, the spikes disappear and you teleport away, victorious! Onto the next level, I'm feeling so pumped, I know I'm close to the end!

Catch ya later gamers!

Mega Man X: First of the Last

So, it was silly of me to think that it was just going to be the last boss right away, I OBVIOUSLY was going to have to go through his mystery hideout and fight legions of baddies, and then take on old bosses again. Why didn't I think of that? Tsk, tsk.

Anywho, it started with meeting up with big ol' Zero. I don't wanna say he's a cocky bugger. But. He's a cocky bugger. "Don't worry X, I'll handle the big guys." "Don't worry X, I'll go first so I can destroy all the big guys who might give you trouble." "Don't worry "X, I'm just viscerally better than you in every way, no big." I'm not bitter.

Ya, that's always a good idea.

So, I make my way, tearing through some robo-turtles. Leap on some floating platforms and make my way up along this floating path, careful not to fall to my doom. I enter Sigma's fortress and begin blowing apart some baddies. Nothing too out of the ordinary here, just had to blast away. I started to realize that I had so many different powers that I could totally start using them to ease my way through the levels. The cyclone power is SO FREAKING SWEET. It protects me from things coming at me, and rips apart any bad guy infront of me, cuz it hits them so many times.

I made my way up to this ladder area and had to deal with some rather annoying moving turrets. I popped up through the ladder though, and Purple-Jackass popped down and was ready to get an ass-whooping when Big Red shows up being a 'hero' (even though I'M the hero of this story... Right?)

You jackass, let me do my own dirty work!

So I follow after them and hear the sound of some charge shotting, and a >thunk<, and I'm thinking "Oh shit, Zero got pwned!" And I hurried forward, and I was mostly right.

Oh, so I guess you aren't so ALL POWERFUL are you, Zero!? Hah!... And I resent your words, Purple-face.

So, Purple-Face managed to get IN his mech and trap Zero in a very short amount of time. After some banter about how I can defeat him, and how I know I can't defeat him, the battle began. However, there was no health bar for Big-Purple-Mech so I didn't get the feeling I was supposed to win again. I was right. When I got me down to near dead he paralyzed me AGAIN, and then picked me up to bring me over to the other side of the screen for... Some reason.

He laughed, and said I was helpless. Then Zero did a big ol' "BUT I'M NOT!!!" And broke free of the prison and exploded them both.

... Well shit, he saved me.

However, Zero only destroyed the mech, leaving Purple-Man for me to deal with. Out of nowhere, I broke out of the paralization and was restored to full health. Baddie says "Where did that energy come from!?" I dunno. Still don't. Plot hole anyone?

Anywho, without his mech, I could easily jump over Purple when he charged, and I could damaged him with all my attacks. I didn't really pick a defined strategy, I just charged up my buster, or switched between powers, and just shot the hell outta him. And thus he died.

Not so tough without your big mech, eh? I tore through you, boi.

So, I washed my hands of Big-Purple and continued on my way, only to find Zero's body... And from the looks of it, his legs were gone. He told me I was stronger than he ever imagined, and then said that "Maybe you can defeat Sigma..." And, I still have NO IDEA who that is! So he faded away and died.

Now I feel bad for those bad things I said. Why'd you have to go and die?

And that WASN'T the ended of the level. I still had to fight some regular bad-guys and leap over some other guys. Again, same old same old. No new faces here. And then I came to a boss room, with an especially familiar face. KUWANGER!

When I entered the room and he started in with his phasing-in-out-dance thing, I was like: "Oh, I know how to deal with you." And he was exactly the same as I could tell. I switched to his weakness (missles) and blasted him away with them. Just for the hell of it, I waited when he was at low health to charge up my missle shot and...

I beat you already, bitch. Eat homing pirahnas!

And that wasn't the end of the level! I still had to continue on and fight more baddies, and lump up some walls, and get annoyed with some turrets and whatnot, but I made it to the NEXT boss in a short amount of time. And boy, was he annoying.

Enter Big-Spider-Robot. He has these four long poles in the room which he manuvers on, and when he exits the screen these little horizontal green bars appear in random patterns between them, somewhat hinted out how he'll approach next. That is sometimes difficult to judge. You think he's going to follow the descending path of bars, but sometimes he'll wipe around and come at you from the top. Other than simple charging down the poles at you, Spider only has one other attack. Which is to throw down four mini-spiders which run at you and are an inconvenience.

The only way I seems to be able to get him was to shoot the moment BEFORE he came to the bottom of his trip downwards, because he scurried up the pole very quickly upon reaching hitting you or not. And forget about hitting him if he hits you. Ain't gonna happen. I'm so glad I got the armor upgrade, because he was still hurting me quite a bit with his obviously excessive body weight.

Ouch. Scary robo-spider moves fast.

Also, he speeds up the more you damage him. Just thought you should know.

But he still dies like everybody else!

So I finally beat him by constantly doing a super-charge of my regular ol' Buster shot, as you can see here.

That was the end of the level. The game returned me to the boss screen again, with the same picture of that Sigma guy... So I'm guessing I'll have a few more levels, maybe 3 bosses per level from now on? I guess we'll see.

Catch ya later gamers!

Mega Man X: Prepping for Onslaught

Hey gamers, sorry about the mini-hiatus, but life has a way of not giving you any free time sometimes, y'know?

As I said in my last post, I headed back into the older levels to find myself some missing upgrades, and I did just that! I got myself 2 more health upgrades, an energy sub-tank and the super-charge buster cannon.

The health upgrades were both in sight when I first ran through the levels but I just didn't know how to get them. The boomerang got me the one in Kuwanger's level (see Kuwanger), and then I just had to be more of a badass in the Chameleon level and jump into the unknown (see Chameleon.)

For the energy tank, again I needed the boomerang, this time in the Spark Mandrill level. Note: You have to jump in order for the boomerang to curve downward.

The king of all upgrades; the arm upgrade. I said I needed a new buster cannon, and boy did I get a new cannon. This was in the Flame Mammoth level. There were these 'blocks' that I paid no attention to my first play through on the level, and with my new helmet (see Eagle) I could pop through them and get an awesome new toy.

This epic charge shot not only works for the regular buster cannon, but it also gives supped up versions of all my elemental powers. Awesome? I thought so. Let's take a look at what we got!

Here we have the buster shot, becoming a wave of fireball death.

Lightning shot

Then it streaks out in both directions, pretty sweet, huh? This all happens very fast of course.

Super boomerangs! If you really are surrounded and need to hit multiple guys around the screen.

This ones wicked. Fire shoots up infront of you and continues in a straight line. Until the floor runs out, or it hits a wall. Bad-Ass.

Now, this one isn't so easy to tell, but you kinda of gain a phasing quality and attacks pass through you and you can run through bad guys.

Here we have the missles, which launch five homing pirahnas! Sweet.

Alright... So... You create an ice penguin sled. You can ride it! Not sure when this will be useful...

Bubble shield! Simple enough, except I don't think you can attack when you're in it, and I think it only stops one hit. Meh?

Giant whirlwind tornado! So cool, really good at dealing with anything above you or coming towards you.

So there we have it. I'm all set to face Sigma, but I don't have time right, right this moment... So hopefully I will get to it soon. Thank you for the patience and the continuous views, keeps us going! Catch ya later gamers.