At the time of this writing, it is next to impossible to download and preserve the many i-Mode, EZweb and Java exclusive Rockman games that released in Japan between 2002 and 2011. Capcom Japan have long abandoned support for those platforms, leaving dozens of these weird Rockman games lost to time.
There are, however, ongoing efforts to rescue and preserve various i-mode games (hit up that link for more info). And while nothing has come out from the Rockman front (yet), we are lucky enough to have recorded evidence that these games once existed. YouTubers from Japan has started to upload footage of several "dumb phone" Rockman games, some of which we haven't seen in motion before. It looks like he has all of them on his phone so we can be hopeful they'll be dumped eventually. In the meantime, this is the next best thing. Check out the videos in the link above or after the break!
As an added bonus, here's some older footage of other lost games:
Some of those look alright (Tennis, Intuition) but I'm surprised to see the X4 port
ReplyDeleteSaid it before, I'll say it again. It'll never happen, but Capcom needs to combine every mobile Rockman game into one game app for everyone. Some of these may be mediocre, but some look very good. Either way, it'd be a great thing to have. Especially for the 30th anniversary.
ReplyDeleteSay whatever you want, that tennis game has a SICK MegaMan X intro stage theme seen in Megacocorock's video
ReplyDeleteAsk him to dump them all!!!
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZMAUU29WvU
ReplyDeletemobile Rockman X3 - Zero vs bosses
See, now, this is interesting, to me. They actually changed how Zero works, in the mobile version, letting him fight bosses, but making his Z-Saber do a reasonable amount of damage. (It normally does, I believe, 64 damage to any enemy.) I think that's a good trade-off, for being able to play as Zero, in any area of every level. It might be what inspired that Mega Man X3 ROM hack, too.
DeleteThe main inspiration for Justin's Zero Project is the DHS mod for X3's PC version. I could be wrong, but I don't think this port was ever brought up/even known, but it's definitely a possibility.
DeleteOn topic of this video, wow, first video I've ever seen of this (and first I've heard of it even). Same goes for the X2 port: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqJOgXoc15Y To be honest, it makes me angry these kinds of ports won't be preserved unless uber dedicated fans or preservationists go to all the trouble to do so. (But then again, it's always that way, I suppose.)
But it's also extremely frustrating that these kinds of features aren't at least present in modern re-releases, and said modern re-releases sometimes are not even ports themselves, in the case of Megaman Legacy Collection 1. Capcom could be bothered to add a score mode, add bonus Zero fights to X2, and make Zero playable against X3 bosses for a couple crappy mobile ports only released in Japan, but they can't even add both OSTs for Megaman X3 in the upcoming X collection?
Add the extra heat wave effect in X4 from the Saturn port?
Add MM8's bonus content from its Saturn port?
Remove all slowdown/sprite flicker/audio cut outs/other hardware issues of various games?
Keep Roll playable in the otherwise garbage Megaman 1 Mobile port recently released on Android/iOS, despite the fact that version is based on the old mobile ports and Roll's sprites are still in the data for the new versions?
Sure, we're getting X Challenge, which IS awesome(!!!), but as such a huge fan of the series, I see all this great potential for adding extra things to the games (that could be disabled if so desired) and obviously Capcom did at one point as well, but instead those things only show up in clunky, 15fps, "dumb phone," Japan only, unpreserved, mobile ports. Baka.
I'd always wanted to play a tennis game with Mega Man characters. A shame it was never brought over.
ReplyDeleteIt is fun how in the gallery shooter part of Intuiton! Rockman you aim rockmans head and not his buster
ReplyDeleteThe Megaman X4 one looks pretty cool.
ReplyDeleteI really wish they would start uploading the ROMs of these, so we can play them on emulators and maybe even rip the sprites, midi files, etc.. or just play them. I've been looking for ROM files of these for a while, especially Tennis.
ReplyDeleteI dig the look of Puzzle Battle. Those higher-res 8-bit style sprites are cute.
ReplyDeleteWhat were those 2 games (broken links)? Any alternative links for those?
ReplyDelete