Together Retro: Mega Man X

[Gunstar Green]

Yeah, X2 Sigma is really silly. From what I understand Capcom wanted them to show off what their expansion chip could do.

X3 is where the armor upgrades matter a lot, because once you're fully upgraded it's a breeze (except for the previously mentioned final boss which is a pain even with the golden armor), the chest piece especially since that damage reduction helps so much.

There's just so much pointless collecting and backtracking but excepting the painful initial difficulty it's not horrible. I figure they wanted you to use Zero to get past hard parts at the start but since you can only use him for a third of any given level it's not much help and if he dies, he's dead for good. Dude just has terrible problems with this whole "surviving" thing.

I really like the different Ride Armors but again, they're sort of pointless and don't really add anything to the game other than needing them for secrets. I wish they had found a way to incorporate them into the gameplay better, such as how it's possible to take a Ride Armor into the Magma Dragoon fight in X4 which is awesome.

I don't like the CD version of X3 they included on the anniversary collection. The cheesy boss intro videos are alright but the redbook audio just sounds off to me. X3 doesn't have my favorite soundtrack of the series by any means but I prefer the SNES version and wish they had included both.

[ExedExes]

I rented it for a weekend and could not get *anywhere*. I think it's because I had no idea of the right order, and Nintendo Power said to start with Neon Tiger, which proceeded to kill me every time. I also tried Zero and got really frustrated when you can't use him again if he's dead. Ultimately I really had no fun with it. But now with all sorts of information and advice readily available, I should have a better go at it this time.

[Ivo]

I just finished X 3. Boy is that Z-saber overpowered.

Two hits and Sigma is down. Niiice.

Overall I thought it was good and better than X 2 from my memory of it. Some really cool scenes as usual.

Strange ending.

By this I don't mean that Sigma is the boss again (recurring bosses are to be expected from a Mega Man game. But it is not very standard to actually spoil the ending of future instalments with such direct foreshadowing.

Funnily enough, Mega Man Zero series spoiler below...

The Zero series also has Zero fight... Well, Zero. Recurring bosses and Mega Man games really do go hand in hand (and there is yet another one in the Zero series).

[noiseredux]

Got everyone beat in X... going back and getting powerups. Forgot how awesome the blaster powerup is. Tracking down the extra hearts now before Sigma.

[noiseredux]

On the last Sigma stage. His final form is a bigger jerk than I remember.

[ExedExes]

On the last Sigma stage. His final form is a bigger jerk than I remember.

I was out of practice. It took me a few times too.

[Ivo]

Got everyone beat in X... going back and getting powerups. Forgot how awesome the blaster powerup is. Tracking down the extra hearts now before Sigma.

I actually have mixed feelings about the Arm upgrade. Combining the two shots is neat and looks cool but is usually either overkill (regular enemies) or takes too long.

It changes the shape of the shot which often makes it miss.

The worst for me is that even sending the two shots one at a time, the second shot leaves you immobile and vulnerable for a bit of time, which is rather bad for the boss fights (unless I am misremembering, but it works like that in X 3, to show the other hand shooting animation).

I think faster charge would be a better upgrade, at least for my play style. Auto-charge wouldn't work so well either unless it could be turned on and off when needed.

[CFFJR]

I finished this off yesterday with everything collected.

I also had an obnoxious time against Sigma. I definitely didn't have that much difficulty the first time I beat this game. What the hell? When I finally beat him it went pretty smoothly, but he just does so much damage with each hit, even with the armor upgrade.

I also ran into a glitch this time that I've never seen before. At some point one of my subtanks just stopped filling up. The game would simply ignore the health pick ups as though all four tanks were full. I wasn't able to find any information about this online other than a couple of other people who have experienced it, so it seems no one knows the cause. It apparently happens on both the snes and ps2 versions. Whatever the case, its annoying to collect all 4 tanks and only have access to 3.

It was fun to revisit though. At some point I should probably play the X games I haven't beaten (2,3,5,6, ignoring those after 6) but it won't be this month. Too many other games to get to.

[MrPopo]

Got everyone beat in X... going back and getting powerups. Forgot how awesome the blaster powerup is. Tracking down the extra hearts now before Sigma.

I actually have mixed feelings about the Arm upgrade. Combining the two shots is neat and looks cool but is usually either overkill (regular enemies) or takes too long.

It changes the shape of the shot which often makes it miss.

The worst for me is that even sending the two shots one at a time, the second shot leaves you immobile and vulnerable for a bit of time, which is rather bad for the boss fights (unless I am misremembering, but it works like that in X 3, to show the other hand shooting animation).

I think faster charge would be a better upgrade, at least for my play style. Auto-charge wouldn't work so well either unless it could be turned on and off when needed.

That's X2's arm upgrade. X's is just an additional level of charge that creates a hugeass beam that hits everything the regular charge shot does and more.

[Ivo]

That's X2's arm upgrade. X's is just an additional level of charge that creates a hugeass beam that hits everything the regular charge shot does and more.

Ooops! And it wasn't even that long ago that I played X (PSP port / remake in fact).
Thanks for the correction, X2 and X3 upgrades have the sightly annoying features I described (even though the upgrade is still generally better all in all).

Those annoying features are not in the upgrade in X1.
X1 upgrade is probably strictly better, hitting everything and more than the charged shot would and it is certainly more flashy (and probably more fun) than just faster charge.