Review #286: Megaman Powered Up

 And now we've come full circle, the first game I started the marathon with, is also... the last one.

 And now it's Megaman Powered Up's turn, a remake of Megaman 1 with a ton of new bells and whistles to make it worth the price of entry. As with Megaman Maverick Hunter X, this game is much more than 'just' a remake, with multiple modes and character to make it enticing both for new players and people that know Megaman 1 by heart.

 At the start of the game, you can choose either 'Old Style' or 'New Style'. 'Old Style' is probably not what you'd expect. It's Megaman 1 redone with the new game's engine, which means 3-D graphics, new physics(Megaman doesn't slide anymore, but his movements comes with a bit of a... quirk) and what not, which translates into a much easier and much more manageable game. You don't get any of the new features, like the cutscenes, the two new robot masters or the alternate playable characters, plus, the screen has borders on the edges, in order to maintain the original game's ratio. This mode doesn't unlock anything, so I think it's best of left as a curiosity.

 But if you pick 'New Style', you get to pick a difficulty setting(Easy, Normal and Hard), features two new robot masters, for a total of eight, and entirely redesigned stages. It doesn't stop there, defeating a robot master using only your Mega Buster lets you unlock as playable characters. You can also unlock Protoman, Roll and variations of Megaman(A version that can slide, one that can charge his Buster and another one that can... kick?), Oh, and it has fully voiced cutscenes, which are fantastic. The entire game has been redone in a 'super deformed' style, with huge heads and tiny bodies, with the entire world being very colorful and animated. The entire audiovisual presentation makes it look like a children's cartoon, and it's amazing.

 But you are not done with the game yet! You can create your own levels and even share them online(The servers are still up!), or download stages from other players. Still want more stuff? How about 100 challenges, which unlock Protoman on completion!

 As fantastic as it all sounds, there're a couple of issues with the game... Firstly, there's a ton of construction pieces, as well as Roll and all her costumes, that need to be downloaded.... except that you download 'unlock keys' since everything is already on the UMD. This is downright idiotic, as one day Capcom's online servers will close and you won't be able to get them anymore, even though they are on the UMD. And y'know, as with almost every PSP game, it suffers from slowdown every now and then. Lastly, Megaman's movement is a bit quirky, after coming to a full stop, when you start to move again, Megaman will stop for a second or so before taking another step. This was probably done to help you with some pixel perfect jumps, as it makes moving towards an edge much easier and precise, but, unless you're planning a jump, it just makes movement feel weird, although, eventually, you get used to it.

 And just like Megaman Maverick Hunter X before it, Megaman Powered Up is a phenomenal little game, that packs a lot of content into a tiny UMD. Capcom really knocked it out of the park with this one.
8.5 out of 10