Ugh, this is a difficult game for me to gather my thoughts about. Megaman Battle Network is a game I want to enjoy. There’s a lot of good stuff here, and a ridiculous amount of charm. But there’s so many issues that kept me from properly enjoying this game. And its frustrating because the highs of this game are really high, but as the game continues, the lows become really low. But this all makes Megaman Battle Network an interesting game to examine.
I would say until the end of the game, particularly the final few battles, the actual combat of this game is top notch. Dodging around spaces shooting at enemies and waiting for the next set of cards, it’s high action and really fun. I think sometimes enemies dealt a bit too much damage, but that’s only a minor thing, the general combat is really fun. Though I think the final few bosses of the game are bad. The penultimate boss does my ultimate pet peeve of boss fights, which is just spawning enemies at a ridiculous rate, leading to the fight just being an unfair bullet hell. I had a lot of fun with most of the other bosses, even the ones I struggled with, like the optional Woodman fight, but the penultimate boss I think is just outright bad. It’s impossible to save between the penultimate and the final boss, and if you die you have to do both. I’ll be honest and admit, for the last 2 bosses in the game, I used Buster MAX. Only there, and in random encounters, I’ll explain for the latter later on. I was just so tired by how frustrating the game became that I just wanted to be done with it as soon as possible.
And overall the game itself is really charming. I like how each sort of chapter in the game has its own little plot going on, like an episode of a TV Show. The characters are all super charming, both the main characters and the villains. I’m not super well versed with the Megaman series as a whole but I really love the altered designs of pre-existing megaman characters. It’s all really nice I have to say. I also really like the internet aesthetic the game has going on. This game overall just has a lot of charm to it.
I’m not going to hold back here, this game has some of the worst dungeons I’ve ever had to deal with in a videogame. The best dungeons in the game are fine at best, but they still suffer from the same flaws that the rest of the dungeons have, the issue just isn’t as bad. First and foremost, these aren’t dungeons, they’re labyrinths, mazes, if you told me you got through the game without a guide, and never got lost, I’d believe you were lying. Navigating each dungeon is terrible, sometimes you can be going for a couple minutes before winding up at a dead end. A map could definitely solve this, but then the later dungeons come in and make things worse. There’s an ice dungeon with slide floors, which would be fine but positioning yourself to slide diagonally is ridiculously difficult. There’s a dungeon that would’ve been fun where you had to find count certain parts of the environment and answer with the number, but it gets to a point where you don’t get a hint and just have to randomly guess the number.
The absolute worst dungeon though was the Powerplant. One of the most convenient parts of Mega Man Battle Network is that you can fully heal after ever battle. However in the Powerplant dungeon, there’s constantly a ticking timer going down, and when it goes down, you lose the ability to heal. On top of it, not only is this dungeon labyrinthian, but a good number of the dungeon is invisible paths, which makes it a guessing game to figure out where to go. And to top it all off, the dungeon has these really bad battery placement puzzles where you have to guess where these batteries go, and the game barely indicates how correct you are. If you get placement right, good luck knowing which of the 3 batteries is placed correctly. This dungeon is awful, probably the worst I’ve dealt with ever in a videogame.
And I’m not even done talking about the navigation in the game. For the most part, it’s fine. It gives you the general idea of where to go, and sometimes it’s specifically pointed out. But there’s some times where you’re given zero clue where to go.
I can’t think of another game with as bad of random encounter rates as this game. It felt like every 5-10 steps I ran into a battle. And while most battles aren’t too lengthy, particularly most take under a minute to beat, the constant repetition of being put into another battle when you’re trying to get through the poorly designed dungeons make things far more frustrating. And there’s no easy option to flee either, fleeing is only available through a chip, and you have to be lucky enough to draw that chip in order to flee. It basically means you’re forced to battle, as getting that option to flee is nigh unlikely. It’s not even too beneficial to fight every random encounter. There’s no EXP, you can get new chips and money, but I found myself not really using them. It’s why I chose to use Buster MAX in the last bits of the game, the game bombards you with somewhat pointless random encounters and I got extremely tired of it.
Yet again, I really want to like this game. There’s so much good in it, but this game is so rough around the edges I can’t fully enjoy it as much as I should. The combat for most of the game is addicting, but those last few sections of the game took away the joy that I once had. I would like to play the later Battle Network games though, I’m hoping they improve upon this game, and provide a better experience overall.
I would say until the end of the game, particularly the final few battles, the actual combat of this game is top notch. Dodging around spaces shooting at enemies and waiting for the next set of cards, it’s high action and really fun. I think sometimes enemies dealt a bit too much damage, but that’s only a minor thing, the general combat is really fun. Though I think the final few bosses of the game are bad. The penultimate boss does my ultimate pet peeve of boss fights, which is just spawning enemies at a ridiculous rate, leading to the fight just being an unfair bullet hell. I had a lot of fun with most of the other bosses, even the ones I struggled with, like the optional Woodman fight, but the penultimate boss I think is just outright bad. It’s impossible to save between the penultimate and the final boss, and if you die you have to do both. I’ll be honest and admit, for the last 2 bosses in the game, I used Buster MAX. Only there, and in random encounters, I’ll explain for the latter later on. I was just so tired by how frustrating the game became that I just wanted to be done with it as soon as possible.
And overall the game itself is really charming. I like how each sort of chapter in the game has its own little plot going on, like an episode of a TV Show. The characters are all super charming, both the main characters and the villains. I’m not super well versed with the Megaman series as a whole but I really love the altered designs of pre-existing megaman characters. It’s all really nice I have to say. I also really like the internet aesthetic the game has going on. This game overall just has a lot of charm to it.
I’m not going to hold back here, this game has some of the worst dungeons I’ve ever had to deal with in a videogame. The best dungeons in the game are fine at best, but they still suffer from the same flaws that the rest of the dungeons have, the issue just isn’t as bad. First and foremost, these aren’t dungeons, they’re labyrinths, mazes, if you told me you got through the game without a guide, and never got lost, I’d believe you were lying. Navigating each dungeon is terrible, sometimes you can be going for a couple minutes before winding up at a dead end. A map could definitely solve this, but then the later dungeons come in and make things worse. There’s an ice dungeon with slide floors, which would be fine but positioning yourself to slide diagonally is ridiculously difficult. There’s a dungeon that would’ve been fun where you had to find count certain parts of the environment and answer with the number, but it gets to a point where you don’t get a hint and just have to randomly guess the number.
The absolute worst dungeon though was the Powerplant. One of the most convenient parts of Mega Man Battle Network is that you can fully heal after ever battle. However in the Powerplant dungeon, there’s constantly a ticking timer going down, and when it goes down, you lose the ability to heal. On top of it, not only is this dungeon labyrinthian, but a good number of the dungeon is invisible paths, which makes it a guessing game to figure out where to go. And to top it all off, the dungeon has these really bad battery placement puzzles where you have to guess where these batteries go, and the game barely indicates how correct you are. If you get placement right, good luck knowing which of the 3 batteries is placed correctly. This dungeon is awful, probably the worst I’ve dealt with ever in a videogame.
And I’m not even done talking about the navigation in the game. For the most part, it’s fine. It gives you the general idea of where to go, and sometimes it’s specifically pointed out. But there’s some times where you’re given zero clue where to go.
I can’t think of another game with as bad of random encounter rates as this game. It felt like every 5-10 steps I ran into a battle. And while most battles aren’t too lengthy, particularly most take under a minute to beat, the constant repetition of being put into another battle when you’re trying to get through the poorly designed dungeons make things far more frustrating. And there’s no easy option to flee either, fleeing is only available through a chip, and you have to be lucky enough to draw that chip in order to flee. It basically means you’re forced to battle, as getting that option to flee is nigh unlikely. It’s not even too beneficial to fight every random encounter. There’s no EXP, you can get new chips and money, but I found myself not really using them. It’s why I chose to use Buster MAX in the last bits of the game, the game bombards you with somewhat pointless random encounters and I got extremely tired of it.
Yet again, I really want to like this game. There’s so much good in it, but this game is so rough around the edges I can’t fully enjoy it as much as I should. The combat for most of the game is addicting, but those last few sections of the game took away the joy that I once had. I would like to play the later Battle Network games though, I’m hoping they improve upon this game, and provide a better experience overall.