Learning from mistakes, polishing the edges, the making of a classic.
One measly year after the debut of Mega Man on video-games the sequel arrived. It was pretty clear that while the first game had great potential to establish a few ground rules when it came to the newly created series it came short on polish. The ideas were fresh and inventive, but the delivery was not. Everything came together with the release of Mega Man 2.
It can be ultimately said that Mega Man 2 does everything better than the first. It holds a level os polish that wasn’t really found in the first one. Enemy patterns were clunky and a few design problems lead to dead-ends that jeopardized the fun factor. No one likes to play a game hard as hell and end up trapped in bad game design.
The levels flow much more naturally here, they feature themes that aren’t just for the sake of being there, they are well planned. The game suddenly becomes more interesting to be played, and replayed. There’s a general sense of atmosphere that could only be accomplished by cleverer level design, a know-how that was acquired without a doubt from witnessing the quirks from the first one.
There’s a whole new variety of enemies, some of them are merely present in themed levels, never to be used again. It gives out a feeling that they didn’t have the urgent need to refurbish enemies in a copy and paste manner to fill a quota, they had their role in the whole, but their role wasn’t exceeded in any fashion.
The final bosses for each stage also have improved much. They were originally confined in a square that offered very little in terms of spatial depth, strategy. Here, their attacks are more varied, their locales feel much better accomplished. Again, the formula of having one or two weaknesses from previously acquired weapons is kept. Any boss you defeat automatically hands you their special weapon. Even the way is translates into the game has changed, now there’s a small cutscene with Dr. Light — the good scientist — inserting the newly received power onto your suit.
The powers are also better conceived. Special weapons that attack in certain manners, offering less glitches upon using them, with some cool ideas behind all that. The time stopper power for example, which proves useful in more than one situations. There’s also the debut of utilitarian items, called item 1, 2 and 3, for some strange reason.
Item number 1 creates a floating platform in the air for Mega Man to climb unreachable places; you can have up to three platforms at once. The second item is a version of what would later become the Rush’s Jet. It creates a flying machine that goes straight forward, there’s no possibility of controlling its path. Item number 3 is some kind of wall-climbing robot that helps climbing tall walls. If you think about it, the first item deals with diagonal movement, the second with horizontal movement and the third item with vertical movement.
These utilitarian items have a lesser role in the game than they could have. They are necessary for the last showdown against the main antagonist, once again Dr. Wily, but in the actual stages their role is pretty secondary; probably because you can still follow your own chronology of stages, and the only time where you are sure to have all items is on Wily’s Castle.
For the first time a Mega man game offers the usual 8 stages along with 8 Robot Masters, If you recall the first one you’ll remember that it only featured 6 of them. The layout in which it’s presented would also make comebacks and become a series’ staple.
The overall gameplay improved a lot. In the first one Mega Man was a bit slippery, often going a bit too far for his own good. In this one his movement was chosen to be tighter, firmer. In a game that precision has such a huge role this decision couldn’t have been better. The whole scope of controlling him against better designed enemies seem more natural, you feel much more in control, both to attack and to dodge enemies.
A good example on how dodging is easier performed here is with those ground cup-like enemies that start to move faster as you approach them. In the first game they were present as well, and they were a nightmare; in the second installment, they are much more manageable.
One vastly improved aspect is the soundtrack. Mega Man 2 not only surpasses the original, it manages to create a few instant classics while it does that. The sound tracks are much more coherent with the actual mood of each stage, it feels much, much les generic. Some tracks like Dr. Wily’s Castle 1 and the Robot Masters tracks are among the best tracks in video-games. Not bad for an 8-bit technology.
Mega Man 2 is an instant classic, it’s the game that introduced a level of sophistication that would endure for the rest of the classic Mega Man titles. The original set the foundation for most of the tricks here, but still in a brute state. Mega Man 2 unleashed the finesse of each aspect that had been previously set to create a masterpiece that will certainly stand the test of time.
