A pretty simple yet oozing with charm game that never overstays its welcome.

It both visually and (mostly) gameplay wise holds up incredibly well, especially for a game released in 1997. I think in terms of just presentation alone it easily knocks most of its original Playstation peers out of the park. From the very bright, warm, colorful aesthetic that reminds me a lot of the Miyazaki films, and to the often clever ways the developers mix and match 3D models with 2D sprites for the graphics. Compared to the more simplified cartoonish aesthetic of Classic Mega Man, to the modernized futuristic edge of the X series, and so on, this stands out for having probably my favorite “look and feel” of any Mega Man series.

It's weird to label this as an “RPG” because whatever elements it has are pretty light and almost superficial to what’s just a 3D running gun shooter with tricky tank controls. The amount of grinding you have to do to get the best weapons and armor is just insane in a game like this. Maybe if the enemies had a higher drop rate or if the dungeons were a bit more experimentally designed (which is weird considering Mega Man is universally known to have really specialized level design) then this could’ve felt a more rewarding effort worth taking. In my playthrough I didn’t really need to try this until the last boss of the game which I loved for how Kingdom Hearts-ish it was designed.

Also apparently this game had sidequests?? I never really bothered with that many of the NPCs to really do much of these, besides the game show and funding to rebuild the city after it got wasted in some battles. On top of that there’s apparently this hidden morality system which exists to only turn your suit darker????

Overall, a pretty great game. Tron Bonne Stans rise up.

I’ve played a lot of Mega Man games in the last six months, and even when they start to show the signs of burgeoning narrative ambition in the X series, those games are too held up by their own stupidity and refusal to consider the implications of their own worldbuilding for me to say that they’re really About anything. By the year 1997 we’re at a clear point where the X series has established characters, sort of, and a jumble of recurring ideas, kind of, but there’s no real coherence to anything narratively, no actual throughline to that world. And that’s fine with me, it’s really not what I’m here for, it’s mostly something I focus on a lot in my writing about these games because that stuff takes an ever-growing presence in these games to thus far no payoff.

But that IS also what makes Mega Man Legends feel like such a breath of fresh air when it hits the scene on the Mega Man timeline. It’s not just the radical directional shift in gameplay this one adopts (though I do really enjoy that too), and I wouldn’t call it an entirely aesthetic thing either – no, this game is obviously one of the most beautiful and pleasant to look at in the history of the medium, but Mega Man has always had exceptional aesthetics, it’s the one thing that’s virtually unassailable across every iteration of the series so far. For me I think the thing that’s so immediately remarkable about Legends is the clear and deliberate focus on the voice of the game and the characters, something that has never been present in the franchise before. The series has a lot of CHARACTER, but it doesn’t really have characterS, right? Even X and Zero, the closest thing to fleshed out guys we have so far are kind of shallow and stupid caricatures of cardboard cutouts. Legends may not win any awards for MegaMan Volnutt’s personality but the fact that this guy has such a strongly defined voice and wants and, most importantly, that the cast of people around him is much more strongly defined and central to the game than he is, makes the game stand out immediately from its parent series.

Because as much as Mega Man Legends is a run n gun 3D dungeon crawler with light RPG elements it’s equally if not moreso one of those cool mid 90s to mid-00s Japanese games where you don’t have a lot of clearly defined goals (or if you do they’re not really urgent) and you kind of just vibe with all the side characters in a small semi-open world. This is a hard thing to describe but I feel like you know what I’m talking about right? Games like Majora’s Mask, Shenmue, Chulip, most mid-period Harvest Moons, maybe Chibi-Robo? The kind of game where when you were a kid it was easy to ignore the main plot and just chill out. I never played Mega Man Legends as a kid but it would have fit right in with that collection of “games that aren’t walking sims that I forced into that mold because I’ve always been like this I guess.”

This small island and it’s little city of comically fastidious bureaucrats and fantasy policeman who are just inept enough to be funny and unthreatening and workaday tradespeople baking bread and selling clothes and operating tv stations is outrageously detailed, full of little secrets and stuff that help you fill up your health bar during unexpected boss fights in normally safe zones or crafting materials that let your friend research new weapons for you, but it’s full of entirely superfluous stuff too, seemingly just for the sake of character. Multiple buildings and storefronts let you enter and are full of NPCs with bespoke dialogue that have no practical in-game benefit to you, with a fully modelled interior to explore. Lots of NPCs will give Volnutt a little yes or no question to answer for no reason, it’s cute! There are sidequests too but they’re usually stuff like help out the local kid gang with building up their clubhouse by finding a hammer and a saw, or hang out with a local sick kid, or find something this lady could use to add a little splash of color to her landscape painting. It’s a relaxed atmosphere, a game full of friendly people being generally nice, full of unthreatening villains and bright blue skies. The vibes, as they say, are immaculate here. I do want to shout out the voice acting in particular, which strikes that Saturday morning cartoon vibe perfectly but because it’s 1997 there’s not really an entrenched anime voice actor industry that just defaults into all of these roles, so you get a bunch of low budget Canadian tv people doing these voices instead in a way that gives this game some incredible character. MegaMan Volnutt himself is actually voiced by a thirteen-year-old boy rather than an adult woman doing an Anime Kid voice it’s a really distinct sound from anything you would hear today.

The gameplay is pretty slick too. I assume this is an unpopular statement here, I feel like it’s easy to see any game with tank controls and be like ah it’s clunky it’s old it doesn’t feel good or intuitive, and fuckin surprise surprise here comes ina crawling out of her well to defend an old game’s aged elements but hear me out a little bit. Anything that feels unintuitive only feels that way because we don’t have muscle memory for it, right? I have two really distinct memories from my childhood of Adult Non-Gamers pretending to take an interest in my video game at a family gathering and just being unable to conceptualize the basic movement controls of Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia and Dragon Ball Z Legacy of Goku II. These are not, these aren’t difficult games to parse, right, it’s just that someone who has literally never interacted with a game until her 50s doesn’t know how to do it. It’s fine!

So having the weird control scheme it has doesn’t automatically make Mega Man Legends unworthy, right? There’s more to it. You have to consider the game that’s built around those controls, and I think MML is pretty well constructed. If anything, the game is tuned a little too easy, with most enemies absolutely confounded by the very simple strategy of a nonstop circle strafe around them, which will serve you like 90% of the time. But by and large I found that enemies were placed pretty thoughtfully, platforming challenges were designed with the fact that your control over your character and the camera is slow and limited, and in general things are designed in such a way that I rarely felt that I was wrestling with the controller, it all felt really well done to me. There are a lot of movement options in this game too, within a couple hours of starting I was really just zooming the fuck around.

The ending of Mega Man Legends isn’t a triumph or a tragedy or a big sequel hook or anything. It has all of those thing but those aren’t the focus. The ending is the quiet few minutes where the car is getting packed up at the end of a trip and you have a moment to say goodbye. You’re encouraged to take one last lap around town, where all the important characters and sidequest NPCs are scattered around to let you know they’re gonna be thinking about you, and they appreciate the little stuff you’ve done for and with them over the last 15-or-so hours. It feels right. I did sing the praises of the dungeon crawling a bit, and I did like it, but the core of the game is fucking around, competing in game shows, helping out a pregnant woman, adopting cats, thwarting the world’s least threatening bank heist. It feels right to spend the real time saying goodbye to the stuff that matters, and spend relatively little on the actual plot stuff which is mostly pretty limp. Just like meeeee I’m very sick right now if this review is incoherent that's why okay I’m gonna go take a nap game good

Really beautiful structure to uncovering the depths of the island. Finding new entry points, realizing that it's one huge, interlocking network. A shame we don't see much more of this dungeon-crawling-influenced, platformer-esque type of design for 3D games.

Amazing contrast between friendly surface areas and the droney ambience of the underground - feels reminiscent of Dark Souls's approach to ambience 14 years later. The way Roll's radio-filtered voice comes in at the right times to describe stuff works really well to punch up the anime emotions or atmosphere.

Once you got used to it the controls were actually pretty cool. There's a bunch of things that could have been ironed out without losing the combat's identity (in particular, the ability to aim without auto-lock on would have helped a lot. Likewise, a faster camera speed and bigger FOV in boss arenas).

Uncovering dungeon maps slowly and finding treasure is fun, even if it's pretty easy most of the time and you don't need most of the treasure.

It was also fun to hop around the towns and occasionally run into random quests. Really fun atmosphere there.

Overall a really interesting world structure, interesting that within a year or two, Ocarina of Time would come out.

Weak Points:
- The pirate fights were.. acceptable story-wise (I think it got old after a while though), but from an execution standpoint they were sometimes unwelcome and sloppy. In particular parts of the air fight and the sea fight - neither were mechanically interesting, and took forever. (Taking down their airship was a little cool, though - that's the kind of setpiece fight I think Works, since it's not really hard but it feels really cool).

- Special weapons ended up being underutilized. I didn't make a handful of them and pretty much dropped everything for the buster around midgame.

- The buster's range is overpowered - it ends up flattening many of the enemy designs

- The regular enemy designs aren't that interesting - the camera system struggles to reasonably handle 2-3 quick enemies. Encounters can be fun (circling and stopping to shoot at the right time), but some enemies involve just waiting around for them to drop their shield.

- Game was obviously rushed at points - the final dungeon in particular was a lot less interesting than the 2nd and 3rd sub-gates. The sub-cities definitely felt like they were going to have more narrative significance, and the drill ability didn't amount to much (there wasn't much reason to use all those shortcuts between the subgates by the end of the game.) Perhaps, too much budget spent on pirate fights...

It's got excellent art direction, some solid dungeon design, and an enjoyable story, but it's let down by it's dated controls and occasionally obnoxious structure. It took me a bit of time to adjust to the controls, but I liked them fine. However, several bosses near the end of the game expect way more of the player than the controls really allow. That made the last hour or so pretty annoying. Some of the dungeons are fun, but some want you to backtrack needlessly. I did also like a lot of the characters, even if the dialogue felt clunky at times. The first half was pretty fun overall, with some good exploration and some light puzzle solving. An uneven experience, that I liked fine.

I gotta say, this game is surprisingly fun, and holds up pretty damn well!
This game has always had my attention. A 3D Mega Man that's more of an adventure game? Sounds kinda weird, but pretty interesting. I then gave the game a shot, and I really do not regret doing so.
The game revolves around Mega Man Volnutt and his step-sister Roll, who crash-land onto an island in need to a power source for their house-plane-jet thingymabob, only to stop a much more sinister plot as they delve further underground. Along the way, they're interrupted by reaverbots and the Bonne family, a family of criminals who want to make them mad stacks. This game's story, characters, voice acting, and overall presentation is one of the most charming things I've ever seen in a video game. Contrary to the other games in the series at this point, the game actually has good voice acting. Or, good comparatively, anyway. The writing is super fun and entertaining as well. I struggle to put into words how the presentation feels, but play it for yourself, it's really good.
Graphically, the game looks rather nice. At this point in the PlayStation's life, most games looked on the simpler side, and when they didn't, they usually either relied on pre-rendered spites a lot or dated textures. This game, however, has a bright color pallet and pretty good textures, all while running at a mostly consistent 30 FPS. The art style does a pretty great job of masking how simple the visuals can actually be when you break it down, but with appealing graphics and an impressive draw distance, I'd say the game looks good anyway.
The soundtrack is rather forgettable, sadly. A lot of the time, the game forgoes music entirely, instead going for ambience. There isn't anything wrong with that, and the ambience is fitting and sounds good, but when there is music, it's usually nothing that'll stick in your head. That being said, when it's played during gameplay, it works really well with the bright visuals, as it's cheery and fun. I think the music works great in-game, but not so much outside.
Gameplay wise, this game is pretty fun too. Instead of a jump`n`shootin action game, it's more like an open adventure game like Zelda, but mixed with a third person shooter. Despite how much I hate backtracking, I never hated it in this game, partially because pretty early on you're able to fast-travel around. The game controls pretty good for the time. Yes, it's a bit clunky by today's standards, and it has no dual-analog/Dualshock support, but for the time it could be a HELL of a lot worse. Tank controls are optional and off by default, and generally you never think too much about them, which is a great thing for controls. I have some gripes, but they're very minor, like how you can't shoot while moving backwards, you're forced to stay still while you lock-on, and how the game can sometimes be vague on what to do. My biggest gripe is probably how you're unable to switch special weapons outside the van. Why they did this, I have no clue, but it restricts when you can use your special weapons and overall discourages experimentation.
Overall, this game was a surprise treat to play. It's a fun adventure game with one of the most charming presentations I've ever seen in a game. Sure, this game has aged in some aspects, but it's overall a great time. Solid 8.5/10.
As for what version you should play, the PS1 version's pretty good, and the N64 version's also solid, though inferior. If you can understand Japanese the PSP port is the best version, but if not, I'd advise against playing the PSX version on PSP, as the game uses 3 of the shoulder buttons regularly.

DeAndre Cortez Way’s 2009 critique of Braid is well known for how it pioneered games analysis on Youtube, but it’s even more famous for its assertion that the game lacked central purpose. While entertainment is generally associated with some degree of pointlessness, there’s also expected to be some degree of enrichment, whether that be through the merit of competition, mastering challenge, or constructive escapism. If the audience is left without a lasting impression, the experience may as well have never happened, so it’s important for games to construct purposefulness, regardless of how artificial it is.

I started reevaluating this concept when Roll called me up as I exited a dungeon, mentioning that I must be getting hungry, and that I could have a slice of the apricot pie she baked as soon as I got back to the ship. The line is completely pointless. The subject never comes up again, it doesn’t build into any new characterization, and the game would be functionally identical without it, but even so, they went to the trouble of writing and recording a voice line for it. Similarly, while Roll is established as your mechanic, she’s not the person who saves your game and heals you, it’s a small robotic monkey that constantly does The Monkey like Johnny Bravo, and I can’t fathom why. That is to say, I can’t fathom why it’s constantly dancing and I also can’t fathom why it was included in the game at all, but there it is. The more I looked for it, the more I noticed how Legends is completely saturated with pointlessness, including its plot. The stakes are incredibly low, you’re simply trying to find a treasure before the Bonne Family Pirates do, but they’re such a loving family of good-natured criminals that you wouldn’t mind them winning. In multiple cutscenes, MegaMan seems like he wants to communicate to the Bonnes that there’s no real reason to fight, but they keep doing it because they love it. Details like these give the game a totally unique atmosphere of joyous pointlessness, like the developers themselves were building the game in ways that made them laugh, regardless of how much sense their design actually made. The game feels like a celebration of doing things entirely for their own sake, and not getting too caught up in finding a grand purpose. I wouldn’t exactly call it The Myth of Sisyphus for kids or anything, but at the very least it’s a perfect example of how pleasant it can be that there ain’t no point to the game.

Mega Man Legends is a bit hard to review. It’s definitely one of the classics that you need to play, but it’s not without its faults or things that could have been done better. Especially if you play this on the PSP like I did. Still though, it’s probably asking too much from a PS1 game. In many respects, it’s ahead of its time. You can go to a save point, fast travel and skip cutscenes for instance. It’s like a mini open world game where you can explore to your heart’s content, do valuable side quests or completely ignore getting items that can be game changing. The amount of freedom is pretty crazy. It’s also a very charming game with many little details that make you appreciate what the devs did. The island is very impressive. You can visit most buildings and it’s pretty huge. The story is presented in a cute way with a good performance by the voice cast. Still, there could have been a better map that is less confusing, I’d have like to save everywhere instead of going to Roll and the fast travel option is also limited. It’s needed because the game has huge areas. Sometimes it’s annoying to return to the surface just to save. The reason I brought up the PSP is because of the controls. You’re going to need all the buttons from the DualShock controller that the PSP is missing. It makes for very awkward controls when you need to use the special weapons and need to aim properly. Customising the controls is not going to fix this because you need pretty much all the buttons that the PSP lacks. What I did is creating custom controls for 2 different situations. The default one when I’m playing normally and the other for boss fights when I need precise controls. MML1 has been an exciting journey that makes me look forward to MML2 even more.

A good-looking PlayStation 1 game?! How can that be...

Time to point out the obvious, this game is adorable and has one of the most unique art styles in all of the PS1 library, and proves that a well-crafted art style can be timeless just like how Wind Waker did in the next console generation.

Now, now we all know that this game is adorable but what about the gameplay? It's alright, the overall gameplay loop is great I really like exploring the dungeons, killing monsters, and finding secret items to unlock new weapons and upgrades it's pretty basic but it works well. Now the main issue of this game is the controls, it's infamously bad and even if I really do love this game I think it just really kills it. Of course, I'll recommend this game to people it's just that most people tend to get filtered by the odd controls, and especially when the game first starts you are forced into 3 boss battles in a row. The main issue with the controls is that it uses tank controls with L and R to rotate the camera to the side pressed making the game very clunky to control and move around, though you do get used to it so it's not unplayable.

Even if the gameplay isn't for everyone there's still a lot to love in this game such as the dialogue and overall ambiance of the game reminiscent of an anime from the 80s-90s which is highly noticeable during the cutscenes with the character's facial expressions.

Outside of the main story, there are a few side quests that unlock over time and they are fine at best, they are mostly just fetching quests in the city with cute scenarios and the reward often tends to be upgrade materials for new weapons.

This game is highly in need of a Remaster fixing the control and some gameplay clunk but nothing graphics wise dear god please do not make an HD remaster of this game and ruin the art style I beg of you Capcom do not fuck this up.

Roll Caskett is my wife.