Megaman is Deep stuff

[EVILNess]

Not just kid stuff about cool robots shooting each other, Megaman is actually a deep and compelling treatise on the over-reliance of technology.

In Megaman and Megaman X you have super powered robots that run amok when taken over by an external force, and this isn't even a rare occurrence. It's happened at least 10 times in 20XX and is such a common occurrence 100 years later in 21XX that there is a special police force dedicated to destroying these so-called Mavericks.

Fast forward to the era of Megaman Legends, where all the humans died from unknown causes and then were replaced with test-tube made Carbons. Who, by the way, lived and died at the hands of the robot overlords until a rebellion in the upper echelons of the robot ranks led to them being free to eke out a living on a clearly post apocalyptic world where there isn't enough landmass to sustain a population a 10th of the size of what we have now.

Not to mention in the Alternate Reality of Megaman.EXE, the internet has invaded every facet of life and thus controls everything from stoves to the cars and buses we ride in every day, and all it takes is one malfunction, intentional or not, to bring everything CRASHING down. Don't get me started on the WWW, who actively cause such malfunctions. Imagine a world like this with Anonymous running loose.

Like I said, food for thought disguised as an afternoon of fun.

[Kim]

Megaman is in Street Fighter x Tekken

http://shoryuken.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/l_megaman01.jpg

[BitVyper]

In Megaman and Megaman X you have super powered robots that run amok when taken over by an external force

I wanna point out here that I really think that was a bullshit mistake with Megaman X. Early on the whole thing is more of a class struggle wherein a charismatic leader is taking advantage of the tension to stage a coup. Reploids aren't fully perfect AIs (X is), but they're emerging as fully sapient beings. The "irregulars" (this is one place where I really prefer the Japanese version's word because I feel it serves this theme better than "maverick.") weren't ever really made out to be under the direct viral influence of Sigma (remember, they'd been around for quite awhile at the time, and Zero was only meant to be an ordinary reploid at this point) - and their actual motives were left ambiguous enough that it seemed pretty hard like they just wanted to determine their own futures. This was the source of X's internal conflict throughout the first three games. I mean, they're actually CALLED "Irregular Hunters," that's a pretty serious clue that maybe the powers that be here aren't actually good guys.

Problems started in X2 when Wily's influence on the whole thing became clear, but in and of itself this wasn't bad, since he was just one one more force influencing the conflict. In X3, Sigma was revealed to be a virus that could actually take control of other reploids, but it seemed to be a fairly limited ability that he'd only really used on Dr. Doppler, so fine whatever. Then the playstation games happened and everything went to hell. Which is funny, 'cause before then we never even got to hear the Irregulars' side of things.

X4 wasn't so bad, and it actually expanded on the class conflict a bit. However, they really started to consolidate everything into being Wily's fault here. In X5 and 6 (and beyond), they basically just stopped giving a fuck about it being anything but OH NO BAD GUY AM PSYCHOVIRUSLY CONTROLIMATING MORE MAVERICKS. X's personal conflicts all stop making sense here, 'cause now he's not really fighting reploids who maybe just want to live their own lives and explore their sapience without humans telling them what to do; he's just taking apart rabid, broken robots.

Moving to the Playstation gave Capcom a chance to really add some depth to sides of this conflict that we'd never had a chance to fully understand. Instead it actually got more and more simplified to good vs evil with every game.

In my personal canon it's all actually just a really powerful, sustained program of propaganda perpetuated by the Hunters so that they don't lose their funding. "Oh no! Our sapient machines don't want to work for us anymore! Why... they must be INFECTED BY THE EVIL VIRUS." In truth, the writing on the wall, at least in the first few games, always suggested exactly this. Hell, by... I think as early as X2, but definitely by X3, the Irregulars were only actually attacking Irregular Hunters.

[Locke cole]

I thought that X2 was about a squad of Hunters getting infected and running amok themselves? Or am I misremembering?

[BitVyper]

The boss characters have always been Hunters that turned, but in the first game it was indicated that they'd turned with Sigma, and in 2 and 3 it was more ambiguous. For instance, in the first level of X3 Mac just says he's switched sides and that X is too naive. He kiiinda hints at a virus, or at least a powerful re-education program, but like I said before, everything had already kinda started falling apart after X1 - it just wasn't that bad yet. Mac's exact dialogue is something to the effect of "I'm a member of Doppler's army now. You will make a fine addition to our forces once you have been shown the true destiny of the reploid race." Could be hinting at the virus, but then it also sounds like any given Mutant Supremacy villain speech in X-Men.

*I* think Sigma just kept some sleeper agents in the Hunters rather than taking them all with him when he left, and that more were turning at the same time. Anything after X3 just plain doesn't count. Really, I'd like anything after X1 to not count. Not that the other games didn't have good aspects, just that Capcom flubbed the plot all over the place. Not just with the central aspect either - stuff like the suspiciously conversational Light capsules, and the guy who was pretty damn clearly meant to be Dr. Wily in X6 (Isoc) all got drawn out forever, never resolved, and then just suddenly dropped. It seemed like the X series was changing its plot constantly and just pretending all the other stuff had never happened.

[TDK]

Wasn't Megaman X like a simulation that X was undergoing? Like I don't think its even a retcon, I still have the instruction booklet around somewhere and I'm pretty sure it says that.

[BitVyper]

Nah, X needed 30 years of diagnostic testing, so Dr. Light sealed him up. Then Dr. Cain found him and built the reploids by copying his design (hence the term 'reploid').

Although that would be a pretty great twist - having the entire series just turn out to be the diagnostic pod stress testing X's morals. Not even an unreasonable twist either.

[Osterbaum]

Wouldn't that be the sort of cop-out as "It was a dream all along!".

[BitVyper]

Nah, 'cause this would at least be foreshadowed and serve a purpose. I mean, you'd probably wanna rewrite things a bit, but the handy thing is that it would also make sense of why the later games are so disconnected from each other in terms of plot elements. It's basically "Ash is in a coma" but using a mechanism that we've actually been shown exists in the universe, so more reasonable.

[EVILNess]

Nah, 'cause this would at least be foreshadowed and serve a purpose. I mean, you'd probably wanna rewrite things a bit, but the handy thing is that it would also make sense of why the later games are so disconnected from each other in terms of plot elements. It's basically "Ash is in a coma" but using a mechanism that we've actually been shown exists in the universe, so more reasonable.

Except then the Megaman Zero games would be what? X dies and the story kinda goes on from there, then he does it again in Zero 3!

[Fifthfiend]

Did you know that Captain Planet, far from just being the adventures of another fun-loving superhero team, also tells a cautionary tale about THE ENVIRONMENT?

It's true!!

[EVILNess]

Did you know that Captain Planet, far from just being the adventures of another fun-loving superhero team, also tells a cautionary tale about THE ENVIRONMENT?

It's true!!

Is that sarcasm I sense? From Fifth? Nah...

[Magus]

The Sigma virus was midichlorian-level stupid. Way to ruin the plot, Capcom. I guess ambiguity has lost its appeal in storytelling?

Mega Man Zero was also a very interesting twist on the reploids plot, where in this case, the future dystopian human state of Neo Arcadia is attempting to exterminate all reploids, even ones who are not actually Mavericks yet. Zero has to struggle with the fact that his old pal X is the high protector of Neo Arcadia, prosecuting the extermination war, and fight against his armies.

Then it turns out it wasn't really X but a copy of him. The real X is just a computer program now or something. What a cop out.

What has really soured the entire Mega Man X mythos was Mega Man X7, though. Just absolutely terrible plotwise, besides the terrible gameplay which has been covered pretty thoroughly. Crap did not even attempt to make sense.

[Locke cole]

I kinda liked the story of Mega Man 9, because it was pretty effective at showing just how much more human-like X is than the original Mega Man, who didn't understand why the robots would rebel against their "decomissioning".

[BitVyper]

Other thing that pissed me off was Capcom never following through on X and Zero's fate. The end of X3 directly states that to save the world, X must destroy Zero. Sure they fought a couple times, but the closest Zero ever came to destroyed turned out to be not destroyed at all because Zero is Wolverine Do'Urden.

I don't even mind the virus so much as I mind the virus being the entire reason reploids ever rebelled.

[EVILNess]

Sure they fought a couple times, but the closest Zero ever came to destroyed turned out to be not destroyed at all because Zero is Wolverine Do'Urden.

Which is why I think that the Megaman Zero series completely redeems the X series (Pre X6).

Spoilers of course:
1. Zero fights X. It's not really X, but Zero and the X-clone didn't know that for most of the first game. Incidentally, the battle between Zero and Copy-X gave me chills.

2. Dr. Weil ends up fulfilling the X and Zero fight prophecy by turning Zero's body into Omega. Also, because of this we get the awesome Zero versus Zero boss battle.

3. Zero dies at the end, proving that the hero doesn't always ride off into the sunset.

[BitVyper]

I liked Zero 1 and 2 gameplaywise, but the series sorta lost me after that (the mechanics of how you got rankings and your special moves really didn't help). Also just completely throwing out three central characters off-screen was all kinds of bullshit. I can't really consider it any kind of "redemption" for the X series, at any rate - decent in its own right, but by no means any sort of conclusion to the X series' plot threads.

[EVILNess]

The best part of the Zero series is that in that canon Megaman X6 and beyond never happened.

[Ookalf]

Other thing that pissed me off was Capcom never following through on X and Zero's fate. The end of X3 directly states that to save the world, X must destroy Zero. Sure they fought a couple times, but the closest Zero ever came to destroyed turned out to be not destroyed at all because Zero is Wolverine Do'Urden.

That one was actually a mistake in the English translation. The Japanese version of that scene just talks about how X and Zero will have to fight each other one day, but leaves the question of what happens after that open.

[Magus]

That one was actually a mistake in the English translation. The Japanese version of that scene just talks about how X and Zero will have to fight each other one day, but leaves the question of what happens after that open.

If the internet has anything to say about it, it will be hot yaoi make-up sex.

[BitVyper]

That one was actually a mistake in the English translation. The Japanese version of that scene just talks about how X and Zero will have to fight each other one day, but leaves the question of what happens after that open.

Yeah, that's not really an excuse for Capcom failing to give the fight any relevance whatsoever. Zero randomly turns evil (or sometimes doesn't and X just fights him like, because) for I think like, two stages, and fights X in a battle that has absolutely zero effect on anything. You could remove the whole thing and change nothing. It's not even why Zero fakedies. It's like they put it in just to tick off a box on the checklist.

However, this is also another case where the localization comes off better than the original. Other such cases include the "I am more than a robot" line in Megaman 7, and basically everything Ted Woolsey ever did for Squaresoft. X SHOULD have to destroy Zero, or at least deal with some conflict over the issue. The matter plays into everything X is about perfectly. Sure, putting down Irregulars is a job he can do and then philosophise about later, but when it's someone he looks up to and cares about? This is the perfect issue for X to have to overcome. It would be even better if Zero actually switched sides on his own because the virus was never actually a thing and he's actually just fed up with the hunters whereas X can't abide the actions of the Irregulars but has to deal with an increasingly triggerhappy Hunter organization. It could even be because Zero is learning more about his creator, and that colouring his views of how humans perceive reploids, and that would work great too, 'cause then you've got X whose creator is basically a nice guy who thought of his robots as his children and just wanted X to grow up in a peaceful world. It's not hard to see how they could have different feelings toward humans. And THEN you've still got the whole ghosts-of-the-past-driving-the-conflict angle - Father's War. At that point if they overcame their dark fate, it would actually mean something.

[Ryong]

Isn't like, the whole point of the transition from Megaman to Megaman X that Zero fucked everything up, Sigma rose up to fight him and in his victory he rid the maverick virus off Zero only to be infected by it?

Like, that's totally a nice plot, sans that Sigma couldn't manage to, like, kill himself and become the greatest hero ever.

[Loyal]

I'm pretty sure the entirety of the Megaman continuity is just an ode to potentially-deep plots with no ability to deliver.

[Ryong]

I'm pretty sure the entirety of the Megaman continuity is just an ode to potentially-deep plots with no ability to deliver.

True that.

X somewhere on Megaman Zero ( think it's on 2? ) seemed like he knew everything that had to happen in order to fix everything, yet powerless. Like he was a dying messiah and Zero would carry on his legacy.

Which is an interesting spin on Zero's original death and giving the Z-Saber to X.

[Aerozord]

I kinda liked the story of Mega Man 9, because it was pretty effective at showing just how much more human-like X is than the original Mega Man, who didn't understand why the robots would rebel against their "decomissioning".

If I recall 9 was the one where they weren't rebelling. That was a rouse, the robots saw nothing wrong with being tossed into a junk heap, because you know they are robots and thus dont even have a concept of self-preservation. One of the few examples of robots being portrayed as robots. Where they dont assume sentient = human like thinking.

[EVILNess]

If I recall 9 was the one where they weren't rebelling.

There was a specific scene in 9 where Wily explains to the horrified Robot Masters what was going to happen to them. They then agreed to join him. So technically, it's the only Megaman game where the robots intentionally rebel.

I would like to point out that the fact that they even decommission the robots is Wily's fault. If he didn't jack 8 of every new shipment for some new plan to rule the world, they would probably just use them until they became obsolete or broke down.

[BitVyper]

Isn't like, the whole point of the transition from Megaman to Megaman X that Zero fucked everything up

Nah, that's fanon because of Bob and George. One thing we can be relatively sure of is that Zero didn't show up until after X, 'cause no one had ever seen anything like X. Plus obviously if Zero was running around taking control of bots and going crazy before X showed up and the reploids were created, society would have fallen.

Remember, originally Zero was meant to just be another reploid based on X's design.

[Locke cole]

Actually, there was this one Megaman fighting-game, Megaman Power Fighters. In Bass's ending, Wily shows him a new robot that he's working on, and it happens to be Zero.

I don't know if that game's meant to be canon, but if it is, then Wily was working on Zero around the same time Light was probably starting work on X.

Which would mean Zero's not a "Reploid" in the literal sense of the term, I suppose.

[Ryong]

Which is why I talked about the Sigma thing where Zero and Sigma switch places.