Mighty Number 9

   But even firster (before Sonic, after Inside (read the last one)), I've player mighty number 9, despite being told not to. Now, I'm not a megaman fan, in fact, I think I've played megaman games for a combined 15 minutes in my entire life so I figured that the 'this isn't like megaman' aspect of the game wouldn't bother me, and I also heard it was fast paced, so I was thinking hmm, sounds like an interesting cross between megaman and Sonic. Well...

   Okay, the basics first. Incase you don't know this was the first high profile game that was funded by Kickstarter. A spiritual successor to megaman by it's creator Keji Inafune (a much respected creator in the video games industry, and not just for megaman (in case you were wondering, he couldn't just make a new megaman game as he pissed Capcom off)) and other members of the team, including using the same developers as the much loved (by 'classic' megaman fans) megamen (megamans?) 9 &10 which were 8 bit sequels to the originals released in 2008 and 2010 respectively. So this couldn't help but be good right?
   The only way to answer is to talk about the actual game. So, as I said, megaman fans don't think it's like megaman (top tip to the average man, it kinda is) and it's at quite a fast pace. The game itself doesn't actually play too badly, the shoot and dash destruction of enemies is a fun high score chase. That's about all the good I have to say though.
   It's a budget game, or so it seems. It would not look out of place on a PS2. The graphics and overall art direction is bland as anything. The voice overs are terrible and their attempted animated cut scenes don't even have moving mouths. Not to mention the crazy loading times on such a simple game. When you're trying to get back in at a boss and have to wait an entire life time for it to load back up, it's annoying to say the least.
   As for the game, it is a lot like megaman, in the worst ways. For example, the instant kill moments where you only learn by trial that doing this specific thing will kill you, and when you only have limited lives (and I'm not complaining about that at all) and you have to restart long levels over again when you die a couple of times (though you can fiddle with the settings and give yourself 10 lives, so top tip there), this is extremely annoying, and this is straight out of the megaman handbook.
   Bosses. Now, I've spoke about my dislike plenty of times, but here the boss battles are actually okay, learn the pattern and you should win, SHOULD win. The bosses have about 5 times more of a life bar than you, and you have to dash attack them to drain their health otherwise it comes back, so in many cases it can be very difficult to do actual damage that counts without hurting yourself in the process.
   It's not the worst game it really isn't. If it had came out 15 years ago, it would've been pretty good, but it's 2016 here. People still make games for Dreamcast, maybe they should've just put it on there. If you have anything more recent than a Dreamcast though I'd give it a miss.

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