raocow's talkhaus

Jesuiscontent wrote:Wait, you get rush jet by beating nail man regardless of when you beat him? It seems really weird (I also did Nail Man last so I can't tell)

That's generally how getting the Rush/Rush-style items (in Mega Man-likes) works, usually.

As for today's level, well that didn't seem too bad. Shield bosses be shieldy but shield bosses be not immune to explosions.
Also I don't know if anyone else noticed, and for some reason I didn't say this earlier, but Yo-Yo Man's weapon works literally the same way as Dolis's weapon in RKS:FS, except for some reason in that game I barely used it besides for weaknesses. :V

Regardless, good luck with Yoku Man's stage. I don't have experience with it personally (I've not really played this game much), but I've heard... things. It's going to be something.

Haha my bad. I probably shouldn't take megamari for absolute reference

Nail Man's stage is kind of cool. It was my first stage and its probably my third favorite behind Yo-Yo Man.

Yoku Man's stage is probably the best thing the game has to offer.

I dig Nail Man, and his stage, and his stage's music. Sure he's silly looking, but he was clearly designed to be silly looking and I think it's a type of silliness that fits in Mega Man games.

The battle itself, though, can be frustrating if the RNG dictates he spends too much time shielded. Sure there are weapons that can bypass it, even besides his weakness, but if he's your first boss then it can easily become a trying fight. I think if he were simply vulnerable when he does that out-of-body-experience attack instead of invulnerable for some reason that might be enough to make the fight reasonable.

Also, there was Hammer Man! Downgraded to mini-boss and increased in size, I'm glad MegaPhilX decided to keep him in the game somehow.

agie777 wrote:Man, this game really doesn't deserve all the flack it gets from everyone. Yes it has problems, so does your family. You still don't treat it like complete crap. Because it's still better than most of the others (disclaimer - it's a silly metaphor, let's not get real here). I get that it's easy to hate on someone else's work, and it's even easier to assume the same opinion as the raocow, but dude. Seriously.

Inappropriate comparisons aside, I have to wonder if the haters even watched Megaman Rocks! and/or Street Fighter x Megaman. Such thoughtless fangames compared to this one.

Hey now, SFXMM only started off as a fangame.

The story of this game predates MM10 btw.

Grounder wrote:Hey now, SFXMM only started off as a fangame.

That never changed. It's still a fangame.

agie777 wrote:Man, this game really doesn't deserve all the flack it gets from everyone. Yes it has problems, so does your family. You still don't treat it like complete crap. Because it's still better than most of the others (disclaimer - it's a silly metaphor, let's not get real here). I get that it's easy to hate on someone else's work, and it's even easier to assume the same opinion as the raocow, but dude. Seriously.

But raocow's not actually giving it that much hate. And more importantly, he's still playing it despite whatever he's said about it. I don't think it's at all fair to claim that the people who have issues with this game are just agreeing with raocow.

It's a very well made game, and ultimately it IS pretty fun, it's just unfortunately saddled with a major flaw.

tomorrow's video is half an hour so put some time aside for it!

raocow wrote:tomorrow's video is half an hour so put some time aside for it!

I am 1000% unsurprised.

raocow wrote:tomorrow's video is half an hour so put some time aside for it!

Hoping it's not a "0" video, but man, that stage will be something one way or the other.

AuraLancer wrote:

Grounder wrote:Hey now, SFXMM only started off as a fangame.

That never changed. It's still a fangame.

Capcom US made it official and helped at least a bit in the development.

That's backed by the honest and true Capcom by my standards.

Will we experience ragecow or angrycow tomorrow?

Also due to the flaw of checkpoints would you say it's one of the worst of the MM games you know (may it be fangames or official games)?
What actually IS your favourite MM fangame/ hack if I may ask? Day in the Limelight, the MM 4 hack etc...
For me it is probably one of my favourite MM games of all times.

Slit08 wrote:Will we experience ragecow or angrycow tomorrow?

Also due to the flaw of checkpoints would you say it's one of the worst of the MM games you know (may it be fangames or official games)?
What actually IS your favourite MM fangame/ hack if I may ask? Day in the Limelight, the MM 4 hack etc...
For me it is probably one of my favourite MM games of all times.

I wouldn't say it's "the worst", or even that it's necessarily a *bad* game. There are just two kinds of difficulty. The first kind is one that challenges the player, but doesn't necessarily heavily punish them for making a mistake. Once they're past a tough spot, they're past that tough spot and can move on to the next challenge without worry. The other type of difficulty is, well, just the opposite. There's a strict penalty for failure, be it loss of abilities, being sent back a long ways and having to replay a lot, whatever. Megaman Unlimited is, well, firmly in the latter category, by virtue of forcing you to redo a *lot* if you die.

While I know a lot of people thrive on the latter kind of difficulty, feeling it to be more "thrilling", I'm firmly in favor of the former. I like games to be challenging, but I feel that clearing a difficult segment is considerably more rewarding if I don't have to keep repeating it because yet *another* challenging obstacle beyond it is giving me more problems. It just feels like padding; like busywork. And I have a very low tolerance towards having to replay half a stage if I die near the end of it. It's kind of funny, because I have no problem with grinding, which to many is *the* ultimate busywork. But the thing with that is, as I slowly watch those numbers increase, that, to me, feels like I'm making progress. Having to simply redo something because the game doesn't offer enough checkpoints... that just gets frustrating. I don't even feel like I'm getting *better*. I just feel like "dammit, I want to figure out that tough part, not waste my time going back over stuff I already know how to clear".

agie777 wrote:Man, this game really doesn't deserve all the flack it gets from everyone. Yes it has problems, so does your family. You still don't treat it like complete crap. Because it's still better than most of the others (disclaimer - it's a silly metaphor, let's not get real here). I get that it's easy to hate on someone else's work, and it's even easier to assume the same opinion as the raocow, but dude. Seriously.

What? This game was released nearly a year ago and was high profile enough to get articles on a few gaming sites. It's not like no one else played this before raocow. The issues with it have been echoed by a lot of people, because they're really obvious.

raocow wrote:tomorrow's video is half an hour so put some time aside for it!

Oh man. I am going to have words about this stage tomorrow.

YelseyKing wrote:The other type of difficulty is, well, just the opposite. There's a strict penalty for failure, be it loss of abilities, being sent back a long ways and having to replay a lot, whatever. Megaman Unlimited is, well, firmly in the latter category, by virtue of forcing you to redo a *lot* if you die.

While I know a lot of people thrive on the latter kind of difficulty, feeling it to be more "thrilling", I'm firmly in favor of the former.

The punishing type of difficulty can work well, but only if improving your performance in the earlier parts of the game (or level) will give you advantages in the later parts. Contra is a great example of this at work. You always respawn where you die, so if you are able to play well in the early parts of the game and build up a stockpile of lives you can tank your way through the later levels that are giving you difficulty.

Punishing difficulty does work in Mega Man when it's a level of attrition with regards to your health or special weapon energy (for example an enemy gauntlet), but when the deaths are instant kill you can't improve your performance. You either pass them or you don't. And once you do pass them it's a waste of time to play those sections of the level again.

tl;dr - Punishing difficulty needs to be about attrition. Instant death doesn't work with punishing difficulty.

YelseyKing wrote:I wouldn't say it's "the worst", or even that it's necessarily a *bad* game. There are just two kinds of difficulty. The first kind is one that challenges the player, but doesn't necessarily heavily punish them for making a mistake. Once they're past a tough spot, they're past that tough spot and can move on to the next challenge without worry. The other type of difficulty is, well, just the opposite. There's a strict penalty for failure, be it loss of abilities, being sent back a long ways and having to replay a lot, whatever. Megaman Unlimited is, well, firmly in the latter category, by virtue of forcing you to redo a *lot* if you die.

I like a happy medium where there's plentiful checkpoints and no lives, but a reward for better performance. Games that force you to learn *and* give you the ability to, instead of making you replay 2-3 minutes to get a second shot at what killed you. There's a feeling of satisfaction in overcoming an obstacle for the first time, but an even greater one at mastering it to the point where what once was challenging has become trivial. If I had to pick one of the two presented here though, definitely the former. The latter is fake difficulty to me and generally pisses me off; lots of old games I save-state abuse simply for this reason alone, since it's far less fun to play them legitimately.

Basically I'm addicted to Dustforce.

The Doctor wrote:The punishing type of difficulty can work well, but only if improving your performance in the earlier parts of the game (or level) will give you advantages in the later parts. Contra is a great example of this at work. You always respawn where you die, so if you are able to play well in the early parts of the game and build up a stockpile of lives you can tank your way through the later levels that are giving you difficulty.

Punishing difficulty does work in Mega Man when it's a level of attrition with regards to your health or special weapon energy (for example an enemy gauntlet), but when the deaths are instant kill you can't improve your performance. You either pass them or you don't. And once you do pass them it's a waste of time to play those sections of the level again.

tl;dr - Punishing difficulty needs to be about attrition. Instant death doesn't work with punishing difficulty.

You make some good points. I was actually only taking instant death (or games in which one hit from *anything* kills you, *and* sends you back to the last checkpoint) into account when I said that; I wasn't even considering the more attrition-based gaming. In that case, yes, that can work.

As an example, take the first Metroid Prime. The early period of the Phazon Mines have quite a reputation for how long it is between the save point near the entrance, and the next one you'll encounter. During that time, you find yourself dealing with a lot of new types of enemies, some tricky puzzles, and at least two mini-bosses. But because you're given leeway (due to being able to have quite a bit of energy and ammo), and you're given ample opportunity to learn how to deal with such threats... well, it's still daunting, but it's not like making a single mistake will completely end your run and force you to start over. It also comes late enough into a decently lengthy game that you've had plenty of practice with all the game's mechanics.

In some of the more notoriously difficult games -- and I'll use Super Meat Boy as an example -- it's pretty much *expected* that you'll be killed the first few times that you encounter a new obstacle before you figure out how it works. But since Super Meat Boy's stages are generally short, respawning is completely instant, and there are no lives to worry about, the end result is often that the game actually ends up *easier*, or at least *more accessible*, than something like Megaman Unlimited (or in many, *many* of the Super Mario World hacks or SMBX games raocow has LP'd over the years), which can be just as fiendish with its traps, and seemingly still expects you to die early and often, but the penalties for doing so are considerably harsher. *That* is where I feel the line between "fair" and "bullshit" has been crossed.

Lejes wrote:What? This game was released nearly a year ago and was high profile enough to get articles on a few gaming sites. It's not like no one else played this before raocow. The issues with it have been echoed by a lot of people, because they're really obvious.

Of course that's true. What I'm referring to is some people's reactions in this thread.

Heavy Sigh wrote:This stage is a pretty good example of how the people who made this game just don't understand how to make a good level

Zyglrox Odyssey wrote:The bosses have been pretty neat so far, but the levels preceding them just look bad.

Blivsey wrote:I could make a better and more-fun Mega Man level than that. It looked downright painful to play.

Clemasterable wrote:Rainbow Man's level secret sections actually feels like an actual level compared to the non-secret part. That's not saying much though.

People that for the most part visit the thread once and leave a comment among the lines of "This game sucks it's the worst thing ever I have no arguments it just is and it's factual because I've heard other people say it as well". It's like they've never even played a MM game. It's obvious that this game's flaw is the stage length and midpoint thing, but besides that it's very much on par and better than the main series.

It's the classic internet hate train. Guess it's my fault for being bothered by that, but it's kind of hard to ignore as well.

In fairness if you'd only played Mega Man 5-8 you'd get the impression that Capcom didn't know how to make a good game either. So if a flaw in this game is shared by the main series that's not necessarily an excuse.

The nailman's level was neat looking with the orange sky and the clever use of nails in the tileset. There was enough change to keep it interesting.

Doctor Shemp wrote:In fairness if you'd only played Mega Man 5-8 you'd get the impression that Capcom didn't know how to make a good game either. So if a flaw in this game is shared by the main series that's not necessarily an excuse.

Do you have screen counts to back this up? Other than maybe Plant and Turbo, I can't think of any Robot Master stages in that feel as long as the levels in this game. I'm not ruling it out that the lengths are similar, but... Just going by feel, these levels all end several screens after I start thinking "this is about the right length, boss door should be at the end of this part."

Of course, if the flaw you're referring to wasn't the levels going on too long, feel free to ignore me.

All that said, for some bizarre reason, Nail Man's level didn't bother me as much as some of the earlier ones. Maybe because the spike shooting blocks tended to be over ground or spikes instead of pits, so they weren't instant death. That puts me at 4-4 on levels I liked vs. ones I didn't. I really don't know how to feel about this game.