Mega Man 10 - Review

Alright, right off the bat before I start. I have never played a Mega Man game in my life... well, aside Mega Man Man Battlenetwork on the Gameboy advance, way back. So this games really new to me, I've tried the Megaman 9 demo and I felt like it kinda throws you in the deepend, but since Mega Man 10 was on sale; I decided to see what all the fuss was all about. This review probably isn't for those that are already fans of the Megaman games... since I can't review it relative to the others, and I'm sure as Megaman fans you'll probably be getting the game anyway.

Mega Man 10 is presented like a classic SNES title. It's 8 bit presentation will be endearing to fans of retro in general. There's some very lose introduction... a bad guys done something bad, and Megaman as the good guy is tasked to put a stop to it. Where the thick of Megaman lies though is in the gameplay.

It follows pretty typical platforming mechanics, you can jump, and you can shoot. Kind of similar to the Metal Slug titles aside you can only shoot either directly left, or directly right. This presents a challenge at times as you're tasked to get in line with enemies in order to  be able to defeat them so you'll still be very reliant on your platforming ability to dodge around enemies and hazards, whilst trying to get in line for shots. It can be pretty challenging at times, but it's pretty fun. There's also a good amount of variety, with lots of different enemies, with different attack patterns and relative strategies to beat them, and lots of unique enviroment objects such as Ice which  makes you slide, and sand which makes you sink.

The game is structured so that you can go to any of the 8 stages from the start, each stage has a different boss, and powerup reward. Using this knowledge if you're having difficulty with one stage you can switch to another, and hopefully the stage you switch to will give you a powerup that'll help you with the other stage you were stuck on. It's part trial and error, but at the same time all of the stages can be beaten without any of the powerups so you don't need to go out of your way to seek for the best strategy, if you don't wish to.

It's quite hard to fault the game, to be honest. Yes it is pretty hard, even verging on frustration at times, but at the same time there's really nothing that feels unfair, and if you are having trouble something introduced with Megaman 10 is 'easy mode' which makes the game a lot more easier, and generally accessible for new players. I gave this mode and it did a good job of things easier, with extra platforms to jump on, less enemies, and allowing you to take more damage. So if normal is too hard for you, there's really no shame just switching down the difficulty... okay, well... there's a little shame - but if you're not that good at platformers you'll still be able to enjoy the game on this difficulty.

Verdict
Overall, I'm very glad I gave Megaman 10 a chance. By the looks of things this is a title that should be able to please all fans of the genre, so long as the ones struggling can bear turning down the difficulty. If not some with shorter attention spans may go away from the title frustrated rather quickly. However if you're a fan of 8 bit retro, or Megaman himself this is definitely one to pick up.