(This review was written after only beating Xs side of this game a few times. I've yet to complete Viles side of the game as of the time I'm typing this at, but I will update this review with points about that once that's done)

So my original plan was to play and review Mega Man X: Command Mission at this point, but as my GameCube controller adapter took longer than I thought to be delivered (even then it isn't expected to arrive until either the 26th or 27th of October and I'm typing this on the 25th), I figured I'd use that time to play through Mega Man: Maverick Hunter X, a PSP remake of the original Mega Man X on the SNES. Now Mega Man X1 as it stands is a near flawless game with the only real drawbacks surrounding it being extremely minor, so it was odd that Capcom chose to develop a remake of that game for the PSP as the next step forward for the series, ESPECIALLY since this came a year following Mega Man X8 whose ending had a very clear sequel hook regarding what happened to Axl. This game, rather than being a direct re-telling of X1 instead opts to be the start of an alternate continuity for the X series as there are characters and plot elements here that were NOT present in that game which did have potential as it allowed the writers to freshen up the Mega Man X plot without any of the dumb mishaps that started coming in full force by X4. Now before I get into the actual discussion I do want to state that a lot of what I said in my review on X1 still holds true for Maverick Hunter X, so to avoid repeating myself frequently I'm only going to discuss what's new in this game alongside other notable features that are worth comparing to X1, therefore meaning this review will probably be rather short in my eyes.

Gameplay-wise, at its core it's identical to X1, even down to Xs dash being tied to the Leg upgrade like it was in the original game and despite the usage of 3D models rather than sprites it's fortunately still VERY smooth and fun to play around with. However some QoL features from X8 have been brought over into this game, most notably the ability to exit a stage without already beating that stages boss. It's a nice addition and it was amusingly a feature that came in handy for me as in my first run of this game I accidentally picked Storm Eagle before going to Chill Penguin who I wanted to go after at that point, otherwise it's just a cool feature to have overall. Additionally, like in X8, MHX stores your E-Tank energy whenever you save your game, and it's still there when you restart this addition. I LOVE this change, as means that you don't have to spend your time grinding up E-Tanks again every time you restart your save file (whether that be to give you more chances at using the Hadouken or simply to give yourself more leeway in the final boss), and why it took them until the 8th fucking entry to implement this is beyond me.

In-line with the later X games, MHX does have difficulty settings, with Normal being pretty much in line with X1 while Hard mode makes X take more damage while bosses have new attacks and patterns that they never had on Normal difficulty. I'm pretty indifferent on the difficulty here, as in terms of extremes it's not to the extreme of X5/X6s hard modes where enemies stop dropping health pickups & are placed in stages like a typical Mario Maker level but it's also not to the extreme of X8 where the lowest difficulty doesn't lock you out of certain content, so in general it's just pretty neat although if you wanna see EVERYTHING the game has to offer than you'll have to play it on hard difficulty.

MHX does however see the playable debut of Vile in his own campaign that's unlocked after beating the game as X. While I haven't fully played through it yet (am only like 2 bosses in as of me typing this as I've been busy with other things), I do know that Vile lacks the ability to dash like X does despite the fact that you can literally see Vile dashing whenever you fight him, but it is still an interesting way to spice up Viles gameplay formula, and he has his own array of powerful weapons separate from X has, but he can NOT take hits for the life of him until you get a few Life Ups, so the early game as Vile is pretty damn rough.

The level design however is where Maverick Hunter X begins to get rather different from X1. First things first, the levels that make up Sigmas Palace have been completely reworked into entirely new levels. For instance, the start of Sigma Palace 1 has you go underwater where you fight Launch Octopus as the first boss rematch rather than Boomer Kuwanger or how Sigma Palace 2 now has you destroying ginormous rocks which leads into the rematch with Armored Armadillo, and even features the climbing section at the start of the original Sigma Palace 1. In my opinion, MHXs fortress levels are WAY harder than X1s fortress levels simply due to the downright EVIL enemy placement at times, but it's nothing that you can't overcome without a good strategy.

The item placement in MHXs stages is rather interesting as it's not exactly the same here as in X1. For starters, the Life Up in Spark Mandrills stage now REQUIRES the use of Boomerang Cutter while previously you could get it with a wall dash or how the E-Tank in Flame Mammoths stage and the armor capsule in Storm Eagles stage now require you to have the First Armors head piece equipped, and this I admit does freshen up the experience somewhat as you realize that this isn't actually a 1:1 recreation of X1. Furthermore, the locations of each of Xs armor pieces have been COMPLETELY swapped around. The Head upgrade is now in Chill Penguins stage, the Chest upgrade is now in Storm Eagles stage, the Buster upgrade is now in Sting Chameleons stage and the Leg upgrade is now in Flame Mammoths stage. Although the Leg upgrade isn't impossible to miss in MHX, the boss orders here still have that linearity problem that X1 had as unless you're challenging yourself then you're ALWAYS gonna be going to Flame Mammoth first because the dash is still tied to this upgrade. Despite that, it does at least help in making MHX a unique enough game to play through compared to X1, as your routes across both games will likely be COMPLETELY different.

Then there's the items, and I only have one notable point to discuss here as everything is the exact same as in X1. You know how Zero gives you his arm part if you see his sacrifice without having already collected the Buster upgrade? While in X1 their functions were entirely the same, in MHX Zeros arm actually has a unique function compared to Dr Lights Buster, giving X a new charge shot that does hefty damage to bosses. Too bad that by the time you get it you only have like 3 bosses left to fight, but it's still pretty cool that they decided to give Zeros arm an actual unique function, and even adds some more replay ability to the game as not only does it mean you have to go through the first 3 Sigma levels without a Buster upgrade or the Hadouken, but it also means you have an entirely different tool to approach the final boss with.

The plot of MHX is where it REALLY starts to get interesting. First off, Sigmas reasoning for starting the war is simply to achieve the true potential of Reploids as opposed to getting corrupted by a virus program from Zero like what X4 implied, immediately establishing that this game is in an alternate continuity, otherwise the plot plays out identically to X1s plot for the most part. Additionally the final battle with Vile alongside Zeros sacrifice occur WAY later here, instead taking place at the end of Sigma Palace 3 as opposed to the start of Sigma Palace 1 like in the original and IMO this adds a LOT more stakes to the plot as the final battle against Sigma effectively takes place right after this and the writers even play with it due to how fucking PISSED X sounds when he speaks to Sigma in their pre-battle dialogue as he's literally just come off of seeing his friend sacrifice himself so X can power on while Sigma gloats about the potential of Reploids so it really is understandable that X is so goddamn mad.

Speaking of which, MHX does give the bosses a LOT more character than what they had in X1 as each of them has some dialogue with X before their battles that gives some insight to their personality and why they've joined Sigmas forces in the first place, my personal favorite being Launch Octopus as he became a Maverick simply because of his love for combat, going as far as to scream "EVEN MY EXPLOSION IS BEAUTIFUL" when you beat him and that admittedly had me laughing for a good few minutes afterwards. I won't spoil the rest of it, but the way MHX changes up the plot and characters from X1 is pretty fucking cool for the most part and I'd definitely recommend checking out the cutscenes or the special animation, "The Day of Sigma" as they both give a lot of insight to the characters of Xs world.

I have nothing to say about the bosses that I didn't already say before, so I'm moving right on to the presentation of MHX. The first major change comes in the fact that 3D models are used rather than sprites like in the original. While they can look rather dated at times, it's something that never really bothered me that much as the gameplay is still very fun and the levels/characters are both very vibrant and filled with life despite that.

I do want to give credit to the voice acting however. This is the last time that the Ocean Group (from X8 and X Command Mission) would provide English voice acting for a Mega Man X game, and this game features far and away their BEST performances, in particular fucking Mark Gathas performance as X. HOLY. FUCK does he nail it down SO hard. You can hear the hesitance in his voice during the pre-battle dialogue while also sounding like he isn't fucking around when he does realize that he has to put down these Mavericks, and then when you get to the Sigma fight he sounds like he's ready to fucking kill Sigma with the sheer ANGER in his voice as he's just come off the sacrifice of Zero, so Mark just perfectly fucking encapsulates both sides of X and IMO he's THE best VA he's ever had. That's not to say the rest of the cast aren't great either, as Lucas Gilbertson and Roger Rhodes both return to voice Zero/Vile respectively. Lucas once again nails down the cool and calm personality of Zero but Roger manages to encapsulate a different side of Vile that the story pushes here compared to X8, showing a lot more hatred for X as opposed to simply just enjoying the thrill of destruction like in that game. All in all, this is the best voice acting a Mega Man X game has ever had, nuff said.

The soundtrack, while overall being weaker than X1s, still has some damn good tunes, with my personal favorite being the new rendition of Boomer Kuwangers theme which is SO FUCKING GOOD holy shit, EASILY my favorite track from MHX specifically as it blows the X1 version out of the water.

In conclusion, Maverick Hunter X is an absolutely fantastic remake of the original Mega Man X. It fixes all but one extremely minor nitpick being the linear boss orders while not only introducing new features but also mixing up existing elements to create a fresh experience compared to X1. The voice acting is the best it's ever been, the core gameplay is still as fun as it was previously and there's also some fun content to keep you engaged in the form of the higher difficulties and Vile mode. Therefore, I feel absolutely content in giving this game a 5 star rating as I think it honestly deserves it, DEFINITELY up there with Kirby Super Star Ultra as the gold standard for video game remakes in my eyes and I even recommend this one as a good starting point into the Mega Man X series as it's pretty easy to pick up and play. Unfortunately I hear this game alongside fellow PSP Mega Man remake "Powered Up" didn't perform too well commercially (understandably so as both of them released in the pre-MHFU era of the PSP) and so we'll likely never see X2 and beyond be re-done in the style of MHX and it's a damn shame because everything after X2 has some aspect or another that a remake could address to create an absolutely amazing game, but it's something that'll sadly never happen because of how long it's been since this game released alongside the sales figures, but this is still an absolutely amazing game already for what it is.

Well, it's Mega Man X1 but you can play as fucking Zero. Any Mega Man X game becomes twice as fun if it allows you to play as Zero, so what more needs to be said?...

... Ok but on a more serious note the amount of passion and detail put into this hack is fucking unbelievable. Wily appears in the armor capsules instead of Light with changed dialogue to match his character, the Hadouken capsule even turns Zero into Black Zero, X now makes the sacrifice in the Vile fight but he actually manages to safely retreat, the post-credits scene subtly shows off Sigma talking to the X-Hunters giving a nice tease in to X2 and the list goes on in changes to adapt X1 to be about Zero rather than X. There are some odd decisions here and there such as some of the boss rematches being a 2v1 or how Zero burns through special weapon energy faster but as he's such a powerhouse it barely matters as not only will bosses usually have like 1/4 of their HP left by the time you run out of their weakness but the Spiral Crush still hits bosses REALLY hard. Then there's changes that REALLY spice up the gameplay such as how Electric Spark no longer breaks Armored Armadillos shell which initially made that fight a LOT harder for me until I realized that charged Electric Sparks still make very easy work of him or how Zeros increased jump height makes Launch Octopus way easier than he is with X (and getting the Buster capsule too I think). My favorite change however is that Variable X plays in the final Sigma level as opposed to the ominous theme in vanilla X1 and it surprisingly fits very well because man does it get you PUMPED to beat the final boss. But all in all, this is a damn good ROM hack which has love and passion present all throughout it, definitely check this one out even if you like MMX overall as opposed to just being a Zero junkie, because despite the changes it brings, it isn't that much harder than vanilla X1 so it should still be rather easy to get into so long as you know the basic MMX formula.

Well I've literally just got my final achievement in this game so it's finally time I discuss this half of the collection a bit. Coming off from X4 in the first collection, LC2 continues on with the next four games in the Mega Man X series which are rather divisive among the community but I still got enjoyment out of most of them nonetheless. Now I've already went in-depth on each of the 4 games here so I'll start off this review by giving brief rundowns of my reviews on them which are as follows:

>Mega Man X5: A game that will likely be a lot of fun on your first playthrough, but the cracks really do begin to show on replays (which you will have to do if you want to get all the achievements tied to this game) with Alia refusing to shut up which is very much capable of making you take a hit at times, the convoluted parts system forcing you to waste your time, Tidal Whales entire level, the RNG endings that dictate whether or not you get to play as Zero for the final act & the sloppily-written ending in general, although the references to the first 4 X games and the Classic series are pretty cool I'll give it that.

>Mega Man X6: A game that I personally find enjoyment in despite the consensus surrounding it. Like with X5, it has a fair amount of questionable decisions that'll likely result in the game kicking your ass HARD if you go in blind, but UNLIKE X5, there's very easy work-arounds to X6s questionable decisions, therefore making it the most replayable game in this collection IMO as it's a LOT of fun once you have hindsight of what to expect. Also has the funnest iteration of Zero, so there's that too.

>Mega Man X7: An absolutely terrible game regardless of how you slice it, as there's barely any redeeming qualities to it outside of the unintentionally funny voice acting and good soundtrack.

>Mega Man X8: The best controls & voice acting (barring Maverick Hunter X) this series has seen IMO are present in this game, but the level design here can be VERY hit or miss although it's still a fine experience despite that, just be mindful about this game if you're an achievement hunter.

Now that that's out of the way I do want to state that I've ALSO already reviewed the first half of the X Legacy Collection so I'm only gonna discuss what's unique to this half specifically to avoid repeating myself, starting with presentation changes. The version of X6 that's found here no longer has the vocal songs found in the original release; instead having a remix of the Gateway theme from X8 be used for its intro and credits. How very strange that they did this but refused to fix X6s godawful translation as that's still very much present in the Legacy Collection, and this is made even MORE strange by the fact that the stage bosses in X5 now have translated names that match their original Japanese names as opposed to the Guns N' Roses references that they had for names in the original western release alongside other minor translation tweaks like "Octopardo" being changed to "Launch Octopus" so that the dialogue between X & Volt Kraken actually makes sense. A more universal change to the presentation however comes in the fact that load times and frame rate chugs have been drastically cut down across all 4 games (well, barring Dark Necrobats stage in X5 but I believe the slow down there is actually intentional), ESPECIALLY in X7 and X8 and because of this it seems that this collection is the definitive way to play those 2 games, as not only are the load times cut down in both of them, but the visuals overall are cleaned up & look much smoother than they did on the original hardware.

The achievements in the first half of the collection weren't the hardest things to get, but some of the achievements in the second half are just plain evil. In here you can expect such RIVETING achievements as:

>Destroying the colony with the cannon in X5
>Seeing all 3 endings in X5
>Listening to all of Alias support calls in X7
>Getting every part upgrade for a specific character in X7
>Saving every Reploid hostage in X7
>Getting every single upgrade for X, Zero & Axl in X8
>Playing as all 3 navigators in X8

That's the worst of it, but despite these only making up 7 of the 52 achievements in this game they are NOT fun at all to go for. After getting every achievement here I have nothing but pity for anyone who tries to do the same in the future as those achievements I listed will be sure to make your experience much more of a drag. With the X5 achievements you gotta contend with crappy RNG unless you do some convoluted manipulation tactics to guarantee the outcome you want, the X7 achievements don't need any explaining and in the case of the X8 achievements specifically you have to spend several hours just grinding up the required metal amount to even get the items tied to those achievements.

The new X Challenge stages specific to this collection are also equally brutal. Vile & High Max? Dynamo & Gate? Blast Hornet & Blaze Heatnix? This half of the collection has them all, and it REALLY proves that some of these bosses were NOT designed with the stages that this mode sometimes puts them in in mind, in particular fucking Blast Hornet in Blaze Heatnixs arena, where the 3 suspended platforms pretty much strip out all breathing room you'd normally have to dodge his attacks. Additionally, the X Challenge mode overall seems to have a fetish for making you fight Neon Tiger and Spiral Pegasus because I felt as if the game made me fight one or the other relatively frequently. Not that I'm complaining, because Spiral Pegasus' weakness, Dark Hold now works on pretty much every boss aside from Dark Necrobat which makes it a DAMN good weapon to bring into a stage should the game allow you to use it.

Likewise, I've heard complaints about input lag that I've barely never noticed in-game (if anyone is curious I used a keyboard with Vsync enabled again before eventually swapping to a GameCube controller which I also saw no input delay with) and what I did notice barely amounted to much and was absolutely not able to ruin my enjoyment with any of the games.

So in conclusion, if you liked the 4 games in the first Legacy Collection then I'd say pick this one up. Both parts of it sit at like 20 bucks on Steam at most and go on sale relatively frequently, & across both collections I've gotten around 115 hours so far as I'll definitely be returning to everything besides X7 to continue getting better at them so therefore I'd say it's worth your cash if you liked what you got from LC1, as it also features those same cool extras from that, applying now to X5-X8 whenever necessary. However if you're into achievement hunting then this is NOT a fun one to go through as you'll be here for a while trying to get the worst of them, but at least it feels satisfying to finally get them... I guess....?

>Play the game normally, beating the 8 Robot Masters like you normally would
>Get to the Doc Robot stages
>Reset the game
>Input this password

That's how this game was intended to be played.




(Proper reviews of this alongside the rest of the Classic series will come some day, still currently playing through each of them when I'm typing this).