After completing Xtreme 1, I of course immediately fired up its sequel, as it was basically the last traditional-style Mega Man game I hadn’t yet beaten that I had any interest in playing. Now, this being a proper GBC-exclusive game, not a black cart game like its predecessor, I expected something at the very least a bit flashier, if not ultimately more of the same. While perhaps not quite what I expected, I certainly got something ambitious, that’s for sure ^^;. It took me about 6 hours to get the best ending with pretty gratuitous save state use, playing the English version on an emulator with an Xbone pad.

The story is once again more or less an excuse to remake a bunch of levels from X 1, 2, and 3, but with a bit more effort put into it this time. X, Zero, and confusingly enough, some crew from the later X games as well go to a mysterious island to learn who has been stealing reploids souls, and they end up having to do battle against the island’s strange inhabitants. It does its job just fine to set up the story as well as give the game excuses to have a lot more original levels and bosses that aren’t from any of the adapted games.

For anyone who played the first Xtreme, the setup of this game will likely be very familiar. You once again have 3 routes, with the first two each having half of the bosses, and the 3rd one (unlocked after beating the first two) has all 8 of them as well as the real final boss to fight. However, instead of just differently named difficulties like the last game, now it’s X mode and Zero mode, and then Xtreme mode where you can swap between them whenever a lot like Mega Man X3 does. However, this game is just as much a victim of its own ambition as it is just poorly designed.

The adapted levels are ones left over and not yet adapted in Xtreme 1, and its pretty clear that all the best ones had already been taken. As far as both the bosses and the stages go, they feel far more poorly adapted than the previous game’s (including one of the worst bike stages in the franchise), especially ones Zero has to fight who were never intended to be fought with him. What takes the cake though are the original levels and bosses. This is up there with the other worst MM games in just thinking “good Mega Man levels are hard” and running from there. They are unfair, difficult, and grueling trials of memory and attrition, and the true final boss is easily one of the worst bosses in the whole franchise.

As far as the presentation goes, this is once again really flexing just what the GBC was capable of. The animations especially look really impressive in just how many frames they get for the player characters. The music is also once again not really anything to write home about, as while its doing its best to adapt the tracks from the games its adapting, the GBC sound chip can only do so much. They’re noble attempts, but I’d stick with the original versions myself.

Verdict: Not Recommended. This is easily one of the worst traditional Mega Man games ever made. While it isn’t the absolute bottom of the pile of the ones I’ve played, it’s very very close at either #2 or #3. Even if you’re a big Mega Man fan, this is a game where it’s pretty darn hard to get much fun out of it, and you’re likely better off avoiding it entirely.

This is a double review for Xtreme 1 and 2. Main reason, Xt1 isn’t much of anything, it’s basically an 8bit mix of Megaman X1 and 2, and as the gameplay is the same across both of these, it’s easier to just merge them.

Both games involve travelling through stages from the console games, but in 2 There is a fair bit of originality. X controls okay but he’s pretty floaty, making it easy to lose control during tight platforming sections. In 2 you can play as Zero, who sucks compared to his PS1 outings, no range and lacking attacks. However X Can become ridiculously powerful using just his base weapon, it quickly became the best way to kill everything in seconds, and it was fun no doubt, but pretty limiting.

Extra weapons are borrowed from other games, and 1 has the better selection no doubt, as pulling from X1 and X2 is bound to have strong results. Xtreme 2 really doesn’t have much utility in the weapon department at all, it’s better to just stick to your base weapon as previously mentioned.

In both games you essentially have to play the game 3 times to see everything, as the second run brings new stages and bosses, and the 3rd combines everything in one “big” adventure. A cool thing is that in 2, you can switch characters on the fly, marking the first time this was possible in the series. It’s great for having that extra support in bosses.

These games really struggle to stand up to the console X games, but I did have fun with 2. They are little rough around the edges, But did their job at the time. So for Xtreme 1 it gets a 5/10, and 2 gets a 6/10

The sequel to Xtreme, now with fully playable Zero! Unfortunately, I don't think this one is the greatest Mega Man ever made either as it feels like it doesn't learn any lessons from the previous, as all the flaws there are here too: Unskippable text cutscenes, needing to beat the game multiple times, each playthrough only having 4 of the 8 available Mavericks, double tap to dash, unfair descents where you can't see what's below until it's too late...only here some of the bosses are worse like the tanks in the second Fortress stage which may be one of the worst bosses I've ever fought. You have no screen space as they hog all of it and fire massive homing projectiles, have fun with that. Zero isn't all that great either, dude's got no range and his abilities aren't all that incredible either outside weakness.

The only reason this game ranks the same as the previous is because they put Iris in this game and she survives the whole thing and is cute.