capcom, publisher of the megaman series, just announced that the next game in that series will be presented in the aesthetic of the 8-bit nes titles that comprised its earlier episodes. naturally, they’ve already been beaten there by hobbyist developers, who have remade megaman 7 - the first game in the series to leave the nes / famicom platform - in the style of the games that precede it.
what’s probably most interesting about this demake (and if that term has not yet been coined then allow me to coin it now) is the ways in which it diverges from the capcom’s original. for example, the opening stage and restricted level progression have been scrapped in favor of a format which is closer to that of the earlier rockman games.
(this one goes in my “hack” category because i think it’s the same kind of reinterpretation of an existing story that all those super mario bros. hacks i post are. i think this hack has a lot to say about the design of the megaman series, particularly illuminating the common traits that persist throughout its design history.)
via john, who is fabulous company, on selectbutton.
6 comments
It is nice that they’re finally making another one. It might have been long enough since the NES ones that the games won’t seem quite so hackenyed. I mean, they had gotten to Pharaoh Man, Top Man and Skull Man before the end there.
And then there’s Dr. Wily. Always beat down, never defeated, the Wile E. Coyote of video games.
It’s not a hack, since it shares no common code with the original.
I hate to be that guy, but TIGS already beat you to the punch on ‘demake.’
@Mistersmith: grats, you just became *that* guy ;)
NOW MY POST IS RUINED.
it’s certainly interesting that capcom is opting to build a nes game in 2008, though the megaman series, like many big videogame franchises, ran out of stories to tell long ago. maybe that’s why the sudden attempt to return to that era when the series still had something to say: a misguided attempt at recapturing the relevance the games once had.
as for labelling the game a “hack”, the term has many and nebulous meanings. the creators of computer space considered themselves “hackers” and their game a “hack”. i feel like this game is close in intention, if not in execution, to the other projects filed in my “hack” category.
hey, i coined that term!
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