Capcom Ports 'Mega Man 2' to iPhone Platform with Disappointing Controls
posted by Blake Patterson on March 29th, 2009 2:35 PM EDT in $4.99, Platform, iPhone games, iPod touch games
The platform game. Looking from the present all the way back to the very early days of video gaming, it is perhaps the quintessential video game genre. And, while thousands of platformers have been written for hundreds of platforms over the years, a few truly exceptional examples stand out from the rest.
One of those was Capcom's Mega Man II, originally released for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1988. GameSpot called Mega Man II one of "The Greatest Games of All Time."
What really made Mega Man 2 so superb can be summed up in a single word: consistency. To elaborate on that, Mega Man 2 was consistently challenging, inventive, and, most importantly, fun throughout the entire gameplay experience. Every level in the game was a significant improvement over the basic concepts laid in the first Mega Man, each with an impressive array of challenging jumps and tough bad guys that made it a unique experience. All of the boss characters were impressively designed, as were their acquirable weapons–well, except for maybe Bubble Man, but seven out of eight isn't bad at all.
Retro iPhone gamers may be happy to hear that Capcom has released Mega Man II [App Store] for the iPhone and iPod touch.
Mega Man II for the iPhone is pretty close to a direct rendition of the NES original. The game features the original's simple graphics and 256×256 pixel playfield (with a graphical border and control panel to fill out the rest of the iPhone's screen). Controls are handled via a virtual onscreen joystick that can be manipulated by touch swipes and two buttons (fire and jump). The game supports multitouch, so the stick and both buttons can be used at the same time–and using all three at once is often a necessity in this game.
See a video of one NES level for a feel of the action:
The release of Mega Man II for the iPhone and iPod touch is being discussed in a lengthy thread in our forums, however, with disappointing reviews even amongst original MegaMan fans:
The controls are not very well done. The jump isn't right and the joystick controls are to touchy.The sound was set to off by default. Go to options and you can turn it on. I am very disappointed I love megaman 2 but I hate this sloppy port.
I just beat 2 levels and it seems easier than the original. The bosses seem to have very little health. The controls still don't feel very natural.
App Store Link: Mega Man II, $4.99
IGN Wireless: 1/10 Abysmal – "First of all, do not buy this game for any reason whatsoever. Don't. Don't buy it. Do not buy it..With a download service like the Apps Store, competition is crazier than ever, and with no limitation on creativity we’re now seeing first-time dev teams going toe-to-toe with huge publishers, and in a lot of cases (this being one of them) the smaller teams are schooling the long-established companies. Vote with your cash, and stay clear of this game. It’s a complete mess."
Sounds like total garbage. Maybe I'd download it if it was free, but probably not.
Why go through this trouble detailing a game and NOT informing readers that "by the way, it's an utter piece of trash"?
Funny haters out there.
There are some people really enjoying this game!
I like it. And still there are just a few serious jump 'n run games out there. This is one of them, even if it's just a port. It's a fun one. IGN has nothing but a too big ego in this case.
the fooked this one right up
Capcom should be ashamed of itself doing this not only to the iPhone platform (that has better hardware than both the DS and PSP), but to the legacy and legend of the Mega Man franchise. I'd've settled for a Battle Network port even. No sense in them doing this… underdevelopment. IGN's right, and sadly, Capcom may end up not further developing on the platform simply because they under-performed to begin with. Shooting themselves in the foot….
It's abysmal — and will only appeal to those blinded by the nostalgic love for Megaman light. While Capcom no doubt has created some of the best franchises in video gaming history, they are also one of the guiltiest for milking customers, simply because they know they can.
O bought this s*** over Wolf3d… Ohhh! What a regret! I can't understand why a big company would release something like this…. What a mess…
Needs a control update, but with the Resident Evil release on the horizon it might not be worth getting to excited about
The IGN review is a bit harsh, but I wouldn't argue that this is a poor port. The controls are the biggest issue, and it's pretty alarming Capcom didn't realise that before release. If through an update they can switch it to landscape mode, make the virtual stick less twitchy, and space the buttos out it could improve the game a lot. Then just fix the frame rate and scale the game up to full screen.
Better still people can just buy the far, far superior Megaman Powered Up on PSP, or download Megaman 1, 2, or 3 on the Wii's Virtual Console.
I appreciate the faithfulness of the graphics and overall game to the NES orig, but some sort of swipe-anywhere mechamism would have been an improvement in the controls area. It did take me some time to get comfortable with them.
IGN's review seems unduly harsh, in my opinion, however.
IGN's review is honest and SPOT ON!
So close, yet so far. I really hope Capcom can find it in it's heart to update this game. Playing in landscape mode would be wonderful. Edge-like gesture controls would be appreciated. Restoring the enemies to full strength would make me want to play this. It was one of the best, back in it's time, and it's just so disappointing that this port feels 'mobile.'
Jailbreak your iphone and you won't have to put up with shitty NES ports.
This game diserves the low ratings. The game is obviously marketed towards people who originally played it on the NES back in the day. The only problem is that it 'plays' nothing like the original, aside from level layout, sounds, and the graphics. I also don't enjoy how they toned down the difficulty. Megaman 2 is known as being one of the hardest megaman games ever made, aside from the newer Zero series on the GBA.
Big deal. My iPhone 2g jailbreak has had megaman 2 & 3 on it since os 1.4.
That NES emulator does landscape and accelerometer. Megaman is still really hard on the iPhone though. Excitebike owns it though as does duck hunt
I'm highly disappointed. This is a straight port of their java version on mobile phones. The physics are completely off from the NES version. I don't think it's the controls as much as it's the physics that make it some crap. I can deal with the controls, but with Mega Man "floating" everywhere, and everything running so slow, it feels like crap. I think a game like Rick Rocketson can get away with the floatiness of it's controls, for that's how the game was created, but Mega Man? They better get to porting the NES version in the next version they make. Run an emulation layer on top or something. This hurts my little fighting robot heart.. At least the music is still perfect. Oh man is it perfect..!
There are a couple of things I think Capcom could have done to make this game work better on the iPhone platform. First off I think playing in landscape mode would have made a lot more sense. This would have allowed for more space for the control buttons. Currently the only way I can play Megaman 2 is if I have my iPod in it's hard case.. Otherwise I can't hold onto it to play. Hopefully Capcom will get a clue and fix this to work in landscape mode. Secondly is the the directional control system doesn't work well here.. What I think would work is an OSD d-pad similar to that of the PSP but with the direction buttons spaced a bit farther apart.