Don’t get me wrong, the SNES X games had some dialogue at pivotal moments, but it’s especially clear when playing these games back to back how much the amount of dialogue increases, and how much it gets in the way of the experience of actually playing. The CD format of the PlayStation also meant storage space for cutscenes and voice acting, pushing the series to do more direct storytelling and character interactions than before. The extra capabilities of the PlayStation means the X games from that era have far more detailed environments and characters that can reduce clarity in level design - it’s sometimes unclear what is on the play space and what is set dressing. The later games in the series though, started making changes that were controversial at the time and still feel questionable.

They experimented with the Mega Man formula, adding optional armour upgrades hidden in levels and leaning in to the rock ‘n roll aesthetic while leaning into the burgeoning popularity of anime in the west at the time to inform it’s character design. The first three especially were considered impressive for their time and classics in retrospect. Things would get a bit wild as the series soldiered on through generations of console hardware, but the foundations for a great series had been laid.Īnd things were great for a while with the series. True to the past series, he would need to take down robots who had gone rogue one-by-one until finally reaching the lair of the Big Bad – levels that would really test players’ mettle before facing off against the villain themselves. What we got was an entirely new Mega Man, who explored newer and much more complex levels with new mobility options and could affect the environment through his actions.

If you’re unfamiliar with the X series, it was essentially the result of Capcom experimenting with how they could change up the Mega Man formula to take advantage of the new power and features of the Super Nintendo.

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