Rewind Back: Mega Man

Let me take you back to the time of 1987. The NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) was a hit almost everywhere in the world. Everyone was raving about it and the awesome games on it. How amazing Super Mario Bros looked. How great the colors mismatched. How amazing 8 bits were. Then a game from Japan hit the console and took tons by storm. That game was called Mega Man.

Mega Man took a basic platforming formula and reworked it to make such a great game. The story on the surface was simple. You were a blue robot named Mega Man (oddly enough) and you had to battle robot masters that tried to destroy the world. Simple, right? Nope. The story is deeper than that. Actually an amazing story for just a video game in 1987. How would a measly NES cartridge tell the story? Easy. The game was part of a huge story, right? How are stories normally told? That's right, books. After the original release of Mega Man, books telling the back story of the game were published and for sale by Nintendo's own gaming magazine, Nintendo Power.

But that's a post for another day. We're here to talk about a game, right?

Mega Man was a mind blowing game for the time. When it was first booted up, you were given a title screen that just said MEGA MAN in all capital letters. And small letters that told you to press start. After that, you were given a simple level select screen. This would be a main stay for the rest of the series. Each level had a final boss, which was the level's name. Again, simple so far.

After this, the entire game takes a big turn. Good bye, simple, hello awesome 8-bit platforming greatness.

Each level makes a unique experience in itself. All of them have to be played differently. And once you finish it you have a boss battle.

Each boss fights differently than the last and have their own weaknesses. Now let me explain. After you defeat each robot master, they drop their power in which you can download it to Mega Man. After this, he can use that power for himself and to defeat the other robot masters. For example, Cutman's blades is the weakness to Fireman. This makes the boss fight easier and helps you progress the game.

The controls were simple and easy to use. Where ever you moved the directional pad while jumping, you moved to that place. No shoddy jumping or annoying break falls here. But those disappearing blocks; don't get me started.

After finally taking down the six robot masters and adapting to their abilities. You're presented to  Dr. Whily's Castle, the final level of the game.

This is when the difficulty of the game really kicks up. Because Wily isn't giving up without a fight.

After battling through his level, with possibly a few words of encouragement from you to the game after dying a couple of times.You come to Wily's first boss battle. Oh yes, you have to defeat him more than once and that alone is easier said than done.

Unless you've perfected your platforming skills and have gotten used to using all of the robot master's powers, you aren't going to beat Wily; not by a long shot. The entire game has built you from the ground up from a simple helper robot, to a full fledged defender of Earth. I'd better explain now. When I said earlier that most of the story for Mega Man was in a book, I wasn't kidding. The story of Mega Man is this. Dr. White, your creator, made all of the robot masters himself. He built them all with the option to think on their own. Dr. Wily, his rival, stole them all and reprogrammed them all for himself. Leaving only you, White's helper robot. Wanting to help your creator and the entire human race. you arm yourself in experimental armor and buster cannon. You take on every robot master, learning their own power with the adaptation chip. A piece of hardware that allows you to adapt to another power with their power card. With all of this, you take down Wily and destroy his castle for the first time. Yeah... You do this in every Mega Man game. But that's what made these games fun. It wasn't all story back then. It was gameplay. And the gameplay made it so good. The platforming, the enjoyment of destroying your foes even though they seemingly outmatch you. That is Mega Man in a nutshell. And that is my retrospective. I loved this game as a kid, and I still love it today. Mega Man made a big impact on me. As did a lot games that I played as a kid. I had an entire world of video games to enjoy and love. And you'll be seeing a lot more of them. I hope you enjoyed this first episode of Rewind Back. There's plenty more to come. Hope you had fun reading, and keep on gaming. 

Mega Man and any other related symbols are owned by Capcom. All images were found by a basic Google Search. Don't sue me!