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: 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: Underwater Battle!

Alright. So, underwater levels never really were 'my thing' in most games. They make your character sluggish, unresponsive, and in general more difficult to avoid attacks. Happily it appears that SNES games (or just Mega Man X here) that they don't change all that much, except that cause your jumping to be slightly slower, but it actually enhancing my ability to choose where I fall when I leap. This level ended up being fairly lengthy, though might've just felt that way.

It started with shallow water which had robot water-bugs. They died with some buster shots. It got deeper fairly quickly and the first deep dive ran me face-to-face with some robot sea-horses who popped out of the ground and hurled themselves at me. They were rather annoying to be honest. I killed a bunch, and tried to keep moving, but they kept launching up from the ground! couldn't escape them. I kept blowing them up again and again, until I finally got out of their 'territory' and ran into these robot piranha things.

If you're wondering where I am in this picture; I'm inside the fish. It ATE me. It sucks in water and pulls you into it's belly. Luckily this doesn't do any damage and I can just shoot my way out, it's just an inconvenience. Next big thing was this guy:

There seems to be a trend of forced movement in this level, which I suppose makes sense, considering that it's underwater. Anyway, this guy didn't really have anything too special, he just sucked and blew, attempting to get me to fall into the pit of spikes. He also launched out these... robot snake-things which homed at me. I was hit by them a few times, but after continuously blasting him with my buster, and a couple other powers, he ended up dying. So I continued on my way, and these bombs started raining down from the surface. They weren't homing, but they were annoying. I moved as fast as I could through that area, and avoided the spikes... Then I heard some rumbling;

And thus, giant-snake-mini-boss thing popped up. It moved slow enough, and didn't shoot anything, so as long as I just kept myself away from where it's head was, I was alright. The only parts of the body I could hit were the head and the end of the tail. The body bounced my shots away. It took a bit to kill, because it would sometimes go back into the dirt, but it was just delaying the inevitable. It died, and dropped me some health and some energy for my ammo for my super powers, and the boss door was there shortly after. However, I didn't find a single power-up in the level so I did some back-tracking and found a rather large gap. I jumped over it before cuz I thought I'd die; but the camera moved down with me, so I decided to see how far down it would go.

I entered a cavern of some sort, and there was another giant-sea-snake-mini-boss thing. So I killed him, and then there was a health increase! I was so happy, and then promptly fell into a spike pit. so I fought my way back through the giant-sea-snake-mini-boss thing and went to slay the boss.

So this punk pointed and me, and said I was going down. So I was like 'Oh, you are SO going down.' This Octo-punk shot missiles. MISSILES! Luckily a charged shot usually destroyed the ones that would hit me, and then hit him, so I could plug away at his health that way. Again, I didn't have the power which was his weakness though, so I had to plug away his health normally. The regular buster/charge-shot combo seemed to be the most effective. So I killed him good.

So there are 3 bosses left, and the last 2 bosses I fought I didn't have their weaknesses... So, I hope I have the chameleon's weakness, because I think I'm gonna take him on next. Catch ya late gamers.

Mega Man X: Armor Time

Alright, so it was a busy-as-hell day today, but I managed to squeeze in about 30 minutes of Mega Man time, which I used to beat the Armored Armadillo. Now, that may have sounded like it was an easy task, but it wasn't. That bastard bounces all the hell around like a mother-... Anyway. I ought to talk about my trip to said Armadillo before I go harping on him, now shouldn't I?

Well, to start, this appeared to be a cavern of some fashion. I imagined the insides of a mine. Probably due to the cart that I jumped upon at the beginning. The spikes on the front and back of the cart protected me from enemies on the rails themselves, while I occupied myself with shooting at the many, many robot bats who flew at me as I careened along. I thought it was to be

an on-the-rails level, but that was silly of me. The cart dipped into a gap and then bounced back and forth between the wall towards doom. So I leapt off and went flying with the momentum into a robot heron. That hurt, so I killed it with a few buster shots.

I ran for a bit, shot some things and then dropped down a hole to find this guy break through the wall after me.

So I ran away, with my dash boots I was able to get away from him rather easily. He chased me all the way along until I leapt over a pit of spikes which he promptly fell into and died. I chuckled and then retraced my steps back to where he came from and found an Energy Tank thing! It appears to store health I pick up when I'm at full so I can use it to heal myself. Nifty. I fought my way back through all that lovely jazz and jumped over more rocks and rode another cart, which killed more guys for me and then bounced down into another gap.

I was hurled through the air again and ended up dropping down another long fall where another smashy-smashy thing was waiting for me to tear apart some walls. I bolted along infront of it again and spotted a little glowing heart thing up above, so I did some wall jumping and grabbed it up. It game me more health! Awesome, right? Ya, pretty happy with that.

So, another cart, except this time, instead of flying down into a gap, it went hurling THROUGH THE AIR. I didn't know what was happening so I jumped right away, and flew onto the top of the cliff thing. There was a large thing of health sitting there but I couldn't go anywhere else. So I figured I'd slide down the wall, and then there was the boss door.

So. Armored Armadillo. Has armor. And can block by buster shots. That was annoying as hell. Also; he bounces around which is near impossible to continously avoid. He killed me so, so, SO many times. And everytime he killed me more than 3 times, I had to do the level over again. Yeesh. He has the bounce attack which can go on forever, he also has a little gun that pops out from his head and shoots a little dinky shot.

Anyhow, I remembered that the ice froze the one guy, and found it wasn't effective, HOWEVER, the lightning shot electrocuted him! And his armor fell off. Awesome, right? Now I could kept shooting him with the lightning shot. And he eventually died. I then unlocked the Rolling Shield, which is essentially a giant blue ball. I wonder which boss it'll pwn?... I also haven't decided which boss to strike next. So tired. Must sleep... Catch ya later gamers.

Mega Man X: Penguin

So I beamed down onto this snowy tundra, and was quickly assaulted by some robot bunnies, wasps and this jackass robot with an axe who shot pieces of a spiked pillar at me. I got hit. Alot. I even came close to dying, but X is too good for that. The X buster is the best. I love charging and then sending out a great big blue blast the size of my body. It tears through baddies like a hot knife through butter... If the butter explodes afterwards that is.

Then I dealt with some leaping and wall jumping and whatnot. Robot bats and killer spiked wheels with angry faces... Thankfully whenever my health was dipping low, some bad guys would drop some health and I would get back to full. Then there was a capsule. Like, a big bacta tank. I approached it and then a hollowgram of Santa Clause in a labcoat appeared; telling me that I was very special and that he was hoping that I could live a life of peace. Except he now realized that I was destined to fight. I still don't know what I'm fighting or why, really. Just that this 'Sigma' is a bad crew. Anyway, he gave me dash boots. Which are awesome. I can finally 'duck' in some kind of fashion! Also, I can jump soooo much farther now.

So away I go, leaping over greater gaps, until I spot an abandoned mech armor. So I obviously jump in. I can dash in that too, but I can't shoot, only punch. I don't take damage though haha! So I demolish an enemy mech, and some bats, and then am met by a wall. I can't jump over it, and I can't punch through it. Lame. Had a whole 30 seconds with the armor. Fine. So I dash through the level, shooting down some robot herons that launch buzzsaws (ya, I know right?).

I came to a large metal door which I could only assume meant it was boss time. And I was right. Chill Penguin he's called. He dropped down from somewhere and then we started to fight. He could shoot ice balls at me that deflect my shots, he can breathe up some ice penguins (conceited much?) which I'd have to shoot to pieces, he sometimes launches himself on a belly slide which

deflects bullets as well, and on top of those options he can leap up to the center of the ceiling and starts a snow storm which blows in one direction and slows me down; ad can launch the ice penguins at me. I kept close to the wall so I could jump up over his attacks, using the wall to stay above his charges. I kept picking him off when he was immune to it, and we were both losing health. However, X is awesome and refuses to die. So even though I had one hit left, I blasted him every time he was about to attack, and finished him off with a quick shot after leaping over his ice shot.

Que victory music, strike a pose, beam up and away. Then I unlocked an ice power! I can now shoot a snowflake which explodes out into a bunch more, which should come in handy.
I suppose I should touch on the 'saving' system now. There is none. It's a password system thing. At the end of each level you get a screen with a bunch of numbers that you're supposed to write down if you plan on shutting the game off.

I can go on and on about one level it seems, and it didn't even take that long to beat, I think I'll cut down on rambling and bet two bosses for my next post. Ya. Catch ya later gamers.