Wily isn't evil anymore!' twist was old by Mega Man 4, but I do think Mega Man 6's robot design contest angle is a good one. X who can be modded to wear a Speedo) finances a robot-building competition, then turns the winning robots to the Dark Side and begins taking over the world. One reason I disliked Mega Man 6 is because I thought its story was stupid. Mega Man 6 stands on its own merits, and if you own it (say, via the Mega Man Legacy Collection), it's absolutely worth a go-round. I suppose I spent all this time comparing it directly to Mega Man X, which is neither necessary or fair. It's a good, fun game that actually has some interesting ideas and levels that are satisfying to work through. But after re-playing Mega Man 6 for the 25th anniversary of its North American release, I see now that I wasn't being fair to it. If you dig deep enough, you'll find old 1UP articles wherein I laugh at its feeble staleness. A good one, to be sure, but a stale jest your well-meaning dad has told again and again.įor ages, I thought of Mega Man 6 as a faded, unspectacular punctuation mark for a pedigree NES action series. Another problem is right there in its title: Mega Man '6.' By the time the game arrived, the classic Mega Man series was regarded as something of a joke. One problem is that it exists in the shadow of Mega Man X, which is frankly one of the best action games ever produced. Mega Man 6 is now over a quarter of a century old, and it still receives side-eye from action game fans. Like many fans who jumped into the future with X and Zero, I balked at the very idea of looking backwards. It's hard to believe classic NES Mega Man still had something to offer the action genre in a post-Mega Man X world. Nintendo picked up and published the Blue Bomber's sixth adventure in North America on March 15, 1994, three months after Mega Man X arrived on the SNES. One game Capcom didn't deliver to the NES was Mega Man 6. Capcom also delivered Mighty Final Fight, an adorable super-deformed beat-em-up. Taito in particular offered a lot with Little Samson and The Flintstones: Surprise at Dinosaur Peak, two games that are unfortunately better known for their insane eBay prices than their great platforming action. But anyone who held off on doubling their bits after '92 still had access to some well-polished NES action titles. The rise of the 16-bit generation led to more and more NES owners stuffing the Boxy Grey Lady into their closets and garages while the new hotness took over the family TV. Even the malnourished TurboGrafx-16 showed its paltry few owners a good time with the Bonk series. Meanwhile, the Super NES was starting to prove itself as a serious contender with its deluge of new games on top of offerings like Castlevania IV, Contra 3, and Actraiser. The Sega Genesis was in the prime of its life thanks to the excellent Sonic the Hedgehog series. 1994 was a great year for 16-bit action games.

Mega man 6 boss