Mega Man - We're Here Forever!

[Paragraph]

Btw, I said yesterday that one of the three stage choices is heckin' garbage?

This wasn't it, for the record.

[Chirei]

I mean, I think raocow reading it for himself on the elf screen and being like "wait, what" would be funny, but I don't know when we'll be seeing that elf screen...

I'm just going under the assumption that we won't - because the reality is that the game not only doesn't just give you no reason to check it, it actually gives you NEGATIVE reason to bother with elves. Besides, removing all the spikes would possibly shift the game too far in one direction of difficulty. The new big elves in Z2+ will make this far less so, but I'll address those when he obtains them in the game.

[Crow]

so yeah i officially think this game is worse than X6

and it's 100% because of the goddamn awful lives system

like, how do you make a game 15+ years after the fact with a worse life system than you started out the entire mega man series out with? i'm always against fake difficulty forcing you to replay content you've already done and this is just taking that to the most absurd degree, since you can easily in up in a position where dying is restarting the entire stage, even with plentiful instakills scattered everywhere

so uhh yeah. game looks rad but i'm glad i'm not the one playing it, moreso than literally any other game in this series so far besides maybe the DOS games

and tbh? i fully support the use of save states in this game, because otherwise it's just stupid

This isn't a ROM hack. It's a commercial game. It isn't that hard.

i have literally no clue what you're trying to say here

[xnamkcor]

so yeah i officially think this game is worse than X6

and it's 100% because of the goddamn awful lives system

like, how do you make a game 15+ years after the fact with a worse life system than you started out the entire mega man series out with? i'm always against fake difficulty forcing you to replay content you've already done and this is just taking that to the most absurd degree, since you can easily in up in a position where dying is restarting the entire stage, even with plentiful instakills scattered everywhere

so uhh yeah. game looks rad but i'm glad i'm not the one playing it, moreso than literally any other game in this series so far besides maybe the DOS games

and tbh? i fully support the use of save states in this game, because otherwise it's just stupid

This isn't a ROM hack. It's a commercial game. It isn't that hard.

i have literally no clue what you're trying to say here

Don't use savestates just to make it easier. It's not a hard game. Play it normally.

[BobisOnlyBob]

and tbh? i fully support the use of save states in this game, because otherwise it's just stupid

This isn't a ROM hack. It's a commercial game. It isn't that hard.

i have literally no clue what you're trying to say here

Probably that as a retail game that had a largely positive reception that it should be played "as is", because even if Capcom did royally screw the design of the lives/continue system, the purpose of the All The MegaMan series besides being an entertainment LP is to act as an archival/retrospective of the entire platforming Mega Man series in chronological order without significant alteration, and save states would drastically change the player experience of this game instead of the actual frustration associated with the game's most significant design flaw. Also, that despite it having a huge flaw, many played past that and came to enjoy the game nonetheless and would like to see the game experienced blind, more or less the same way it would've been experienced on a GBA in 2002.

[Crow]

"it's a commercial game" is not an excuse to have to play a poorly designed game the intended way, sorry

it doesn't make it "easier". it makes it less tedious. huge friggin' difference. the concept of lives in video games has always been and will always be tedium, not difficulty. it doesn't make something harder to have to replay huge chunks of gameplay just because you screwed up a few too many times. celeste, meat boy, any games in that genre are way, way harder than any mega man game despite lacking life systems entirely. i'm goddamn sick of people confusing tedium for difficulty when they have always been two completely different things & only one of them is inherently bad

[Arctangent]

This isn't a ROM hack. It's a commercial game. It isn't that hard.

i have literally no clue what you're trying to say here

Don't use savestates just to make it easier. It's not a hard game. Play it normally.

man if you aren't trying to say "hey if you don't play video games the way i do, then you don't deserve to play video games at all!!!"

then you're doing an awful job at it

[xnamkcor]

"it's a commercial game" is not an excuse to have to play a poorly designed game the intended way, sorry

it doesn't make it "easier". it makes it less tedious. huge friggin' difference. the concept of lives in video games has always been and will always be tedium, not difficulty. it doesn't make something harder to have to replay huge chunks of gameplay just because you screwed up a few too many times. celeste, meat boy, any games in that genre are way, way harder than any mega man game despite lacking life systems entirely. i'm goddamn sick of people confusing tedium for difficulty when they have always been two completely different things & only one of them is inherently bad

Being commercial may not make it easier, but, regardless, the game isn't hard. Not savestate hard. It's easy enough that a child with a real GBA can beat it.

i have literally no clue what you're trying to say here

Don't use savestates just to make it easier. It's not a hard game. Play it normally.

man if you aren't trying to say "hey if you don't play video games the way i do, then you don't deserve to play video games at all!!!"

then you're doing an awful job at it

If that were the case, is say the can't use the Dash button, and he can only Dash using Command Dash.

PS: He can have a handicap if he wants, but raocow is a competent Megaman player. He doesn't need a handicap.

[Leet]

Just because the continue system in Zero is garbage, doesn't mean that adding save-scumming is game design panacea. I don't find raocow ceasing to try at all on bosses, which is what he did for the past few X games where he had infinite lives, to be very entertaining. The fight with the Train Core was the first real fight in this LP series in a long time.

[Grounder]

Just because the continue system in Zero is garbage, doesn't mean that adding save-scumming is game design panacea. I don't find raocow ceasing to try at all on bosses, which is what he did for the past few X games where he had infinite lives, to be very entertaining. The fight with the Train Core was the first real fight in this LP series in a long time.

excuse you x6 sigma is one of the boss battles in mega man history

[Crow]

Just because the continue system in Zero is garbage, doesn't mean that adding save-scumming is game design panacea. I don't find raocow ceasing to try at all on bosses, which is what he did for the past few X games where he had infinite lives, to be very entertaining. The fight with the Train Core was the first real fight in this LP series in a long time.

it wouldn't make the fight any easier if there was a savestate before it (or even at the start of the train segment)

[Leet]

Just because the continue system in Zero is garbage, doesn't mean that adding save-scumming is game design panacea. I don't find raocow ceasing to try at all on bosses, which is what he did for the past few X games where he had infinite lives, to be very entertaining. The fight with the Train Core was the first real fight in this LP series in a long time.

it wouldn't make the fight any easier if there was a savestate before it (or even at the start of the train segment)

This is a non-sequitor.

[ano0maly]

I wouldn't mind using save states when your retries run out. As I've said, it's analogous to what raocow did for romhacks when he ran out of lives there. Experiencing the game as is makes sense for an individual boss or level that's hard or badly designed, but it's different if the continue system affects the rest of the game. He doesn't have to use this option, but it's there if needed. And the way the MMZ playthrough is approached feels more like a B-side than a C-side honestly.

Although, it was mentioned by others that the alternate workaround was to just save after each mission and use the load function, so we may not need this very often.

[Paragraph]

I can't fathom not saving after every mission, honestly - at least on an actual console, that's the very first thing you would do after finally beating one of those missions. At least if you feel like you have enough lives left to "justify" a hard save. raocow is using save states after every recording out of convenience because he's emulating, which is of course perfectly fine and works without a hitch for games where you never really HAVE to load anyway, but it's an issue for this game where reloading manually is not only a good idea, it's 100% required by the game itself.

If you do save manually after every mission, then the only big issue with the lives system is that it forces a very dumb decision upon you: if you lost one or more lives to retries during the stage, can you see yourself going further in the game with less lives? It's like you're suddenly playing a Roguelike with resource management, you're making meta decisions based on your personal analysis of how you're going to do later in the game, which is utter nonsense in a game like this. You literally cannot know how much later bosses will kick your ass on your first playthrough, and you're good enough to not worry too much about the lives system on a repeat playthrough.

It's the same weird paradox the Elves present: an experienced player would never use them because they're probably going for rank and also don't need them, but a new player is constantly being discouraged to use them, most especially by their gigantic energy crystal cost. The solution seems to be to grind hard and early, which is a terrible one (though it would also solve your life problem through random drops...but seriously, it's nonsense).

[Bean]

It's interesting watching this because for first-time players, the game is going to hand it to you and then some. I'm not a huge fan of not being able to use the Cyber Elves you earn without penalty, but at the same time, you at least get those Elemental Chips and power-ups for your weapons the more you use them.

Just make sure you attack with that Z-Saber when the enemies aren't flashing. Going to fight some actual bosses soon though that will make that a bit tough! Hopefully it won't take too much longer to unlock the better abilities, and I'm pretty sure the triple slash cuts through invincibility frames on everything, too.

[Grounder]

[T-A-C]

I am pretty sure that Reploid you escort can't die. If it's like the intro stage, he has infinite HP but every time he gets hit lowers your Mission score for the stage.

[Heavy Sigh]

raocow teleportation is for maverick hunters and important people only. that soldier is a civilian model reploid, be happy his designers cared enough to give him the power of wussy jumps.

MUTOS FACTS! IN WHICH THE GOVERNMENT NOW PRACTICES (really basic) NECROMANCY!

"Anubis Necromancess, known as Anubistep Necromances in Japan, is a boss character from the Mega Man Zero series. He is a Mutos Reploid based on the jackal god of death, Anubis, and is a member of Fefnir's Scorched Earth Squadron. He adds numbers to his name every time he dies and manages to resurrect himself.
Nickname: 冥界の聖掃王 (Meikai no Seisou-Oh, "Sacred Sweeping King of Hades")
Before his encounter with Zero, Anubis Necromancess's first "death" was during an operation with the Scorched Earth Squadron, where his abilities revived him after being given up as dead. Taking the name Anubis Necromancess II, he then died again when the Resistance shuttle crashed into him, but revived again.

Now calling himself Anubis Necromancess the Third, he was then fought by Zero when the latter tried to find survivors from a shuttle that crashed in the desert.

As long as his control core isn't destroyed, Anubis Necromancess can use special nanobots to repair himself from even the most grievous wounds. He can also dismantle and repair his body for quick escapes within sand, and use the nanobots to control his surroundings, including modifiying the shape of sand to create walls, dunes, and quicksand, and summoning "zombies" (really just junk Mechaniloids, as the energy requirements for more powerful machines are beyond what his nanobots can provide).

Attacks:

Anubis will attack using his flying cane.
Anubis will summon a pair of sand walls with spikes on top to smash Zero. Touching the spikes or getting squished will not instantly kill Zero.
Anubis will summon Pantheon Zombies.
EX skill: Dead Cane (デッドケイン): Anubis makes his cane spin across the ground."

[Bean]

This stage took forever when trying to do an 100-point run since it checks all the boxes of frustration. The birds that fly in out of nowhere, a somewhat tricky boss, and then an escort mission where the dude follows behind you at a set distance and will inevitably get picked off by something.

All in all, there's not much going on here, but it's still pretty freaking hard to pull off a good run even with experience.

[ano0maly]

I am pretty sure that Reploid you escort can't die. If it's like the intro stage, he has infinite HP but every time he gets hit lowers your Mission score for the stage.

Some of the comments were saying he can?

[Chirei]

Some of the comments were saying he can?

He actually can, and that combined with how annoying this mission is is what causes me brother to skip it with the Escape Unit every time if he can't help it, and he is the type of person who will get perfect scores just for the sake of perfect scores. Thankfully Capcom at least gives you a full life item and a 1-up further to the left of the crash site before you make the trek.

So as you noticed while trying to undo the bear traps (why is Neo Arcadia trying to use bear traps??? there aren't even any bears in this game?), Zero's second slash has a slightly lower vertical reach than the other slashes. This is actually something that ends up being surprisingly relevant across all four games, so it might help remembering this.

If you destroy the sand drills on the forward trip, the return trip becomes much easier. (Though I wouldn't have either if I had to retry that many times.)

Anubis Necromancess is actually one of the two Megaman bosses that were used as inspiration for Pandora in Rabi-Ribi. Their staves even have the same design! You'll meet the other one further down the line and it'll be obvious who it is.

73 points isn't too bad for this mission, either. Probably the longest of the normal ones too.

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EDIT: So the Nurse Elf you actually found at the top of the ruins is a rather important one, and if you must use a Cyber-Elf, it should probably be her.

This game actually has 4 Sub-Tanks like the original trilogy of X games, and they are now a new model of Smart Sub-Tanks that use only exactly enough energy to fill up your health. The bad part is that they're all attached to Cyber-Elves in this game, and you just found one of them. The Sub-Tanks are what that last mystery slot on Zero's pause screen are.

All of the Sub-Tank elves will have -tan at the end of their names to denote they belong to that sub-group, and cost 1000 Crystals to grow. They'll literally turn into a Sub-Tank for Zero to use, and can hold 30 lines of reserve health, effectively increasing your maximum health from 16 to 46. If you end up getting enough Crystals and can't bear to keep playing with only 16, unarmored health, this is probably what will get you the most bang for your buck.

[Paragraph]

raocow didn't get the Elf on top of the ruins in his successful run...


That was it, the worst mission in the game! At least if you want to go for high ranks.

Your escortee can absolutely die, let's make this clear from the start. You'll have to retry the escort mission then. He's also very much not immune to the traps, but they can't catch him for a bit after having clamped down on Zero.

Apart from the utter tedium of going back and forth (slower the second time!), there's one more super fuck you from the mission: the crumbling parts of the ruins won't ever respawn, so if you break the ones leading up to the Elf because you don't know any better the first time (and how would you), you cannot get the Elf for the rest of your playthrough.

raocow was wisely using the full Saber combo for the traps on slopes below him, but you can also jump over them and precisely land in between, then slash them up from below. Doing this while the idiot follows you, however, is insanely frustrating because he'll just walk into them as you move forward. Also, it's really damn hard to do while the sand generators are still running, but fortunately those don't respawn, so you can blitz them on your first go without being shackled to a moron.

So, while you have him around, the only real feasible way to take out the traps safely is a slow three triple slashes...however! You're not guaranteed to have the Saber leveled enough, and on Hard Mode, you don't get to level the Saber. So what do you do then? Well, there is a way, but as raocow showed, you are not guaranteed to have that at your disposal either.


I also have a bone to pick with Anubis, because he's a pain in the ass at the middle of a terrible pain in the ass mission. Apart from the high damage his staff does and how easily the zombies can overwhelm you if you don't keep your cool (great job there, raocow), getting the timing to jump between the pillars is also not trivial (another great job), so it's a major stumbling block for a new player. To add even more unreasonable newbie traps to this stage, he's immune to the Electric element, and for some reason weak to Fire...which you can only get if you do two other missions before. raocow was actually not missing anything in the list, doing Destroy Train simply unlocks more missions down the line for whatever reason. And despite Pantheon Core being quite hot, it's only in one of those where you'll get the Fire chip. And it happens to be the other "worst mission" ;).

Anyway...here's his EX skill, it's just another staff pattern, but a tough one to deal with because now you don't have a guaranteed way of avoiding it anymore. This video contains spoilers after the boss fight (and before but that's why I have a time stamp).


Oh, and raocow, the game will tell you that, but please remember to talk to Cerveau after the next mission :).

[LunarRainbowShyGuy]

I remember this stage being pretty hard when going for an S rank. Those zombies the boss summons are annoyingly durable, and you don't really have time to take them out at your leisure when you're trying to go fast. Escorting the guy back through the stage is annoying; he moves pretty slowly and letting him get hit makes you lose points. If you go to fast and scroll him off screen he stops moving and I think after a few seconds enemies will appear and attack him.

I was going to suggest that raocow should go and get that extra life he saw in a mission early on, but I started up my copy of the game to see if extra lives actually appear outside of missions... and they don't. It would seem that the only way to get extra lives outside of missions is to kill a bunch of enemies until you get lucky and they drop one. I don't know the chances of an enemy dropping an extra life, but at this point I have to agree that this game's life system is pretty bad.

[Stink Terios]

Watching raocow almost see the 1-up then turn back hurt a little bit.

[Dragon Fogel]

Apart from the utter tedium of going back and forth (slower the second time!), there's one more super fuck you from the mission: the crumbling parts of the ruins won't ever respawn, so if you break the ones leading up to the Elf because you don't know any better the first time (and how would you), you cannot get the Elf for the rest of your playthrough.

Can't you break the container from below and let the elf drift down to you?