Nintendo has announced that all five Game Boy Mega Man games are now available on Nintendo Switch Online. This includes Mega Man: Dr. Wily's Revenge, Mega Man II, III, IV, and V. This also covers Japan, as they have received Rockman World 1-5.
With these re-releases, this marks the second time all five games have been officially available outside of Game Boy hardware, having previously been accessible for individual download from the Nintendo 3DS eShop. However, to play them, you will need an active subscription to Nintendo Switch Online. The basic membership will get you in the door, so don't fret if you're not an "Expansion Pass" member.
Not much else to add—fire up your Switch and relive these bite-sized classics today!
Time to fire up the Switch then!
ReplyDeleteWhile I'm glad that these games are available on a modern system, I really have to wonder why are these being locked behind a paywall instead of being put in a proper legacy collection for all platforms?
ReplyDeleteToo many Legacy Collections already? Classic 1, Classic 2, X1, X2, Zero/ZX, Battle Network V1, Battle Network V2, that's all
DeleteIt's about TIME they released these to the Switch! Thank you, Nintendo!
ReplyDeleteI wish it had been a collection pack like the Castlevania Advance Collection released for all platforms.
ReplyDeleteIt's nice but too bad there's no effort to bring the games in full color
ReplyDeleteThat takes me back to when Atomic Planet (R.I.P.) was planning to release all of the Game Boy titles with color in a collection just like they did with Mega Man Anniversary Collection and an additional bonus game (no one knows what it was going to be though).
DeleteI don't know whether this was a coincidence or not, but a trailer has been released yesterday, showing the fanmade color versions of Dr. Wily's Revenge and GB Mega Man V that already exist, along with colored versions of GB Mega Man II-IV that are currently in development.
DeleteIT'S A SIGN FOR TOMORROW!!!!!! YAYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeletemy god i am still waiting for a remake of megaman V one of thebest if not best game on the game boy. Wish they would wokr on that game the music and entire premise for the game is amazing
ReplyDeleteF Nintendo, I'll wait for a proper port and purchase on another platform or emulate on my own without the premium subscription for the privilege. Nintendo can eat a.
ReplyDeleteI sincerely hope you feel the same way about Sony and Microsoft.
DeleteNo but similarly. Sony and Microsoft don't actively persecute the preservation community, whilst also employing artificial scarcity tactics to then create fake fomo, and put a stranglehold on distribution and storefront avenues to create a perpetual price consistency that they mostly benefit from, while also discontinuing account systems of legacy platforms that held entire libraries of games people purchased faster than any other major entity with no pathway to carry over to the new account system, forcing repurchases of games sometimes decades old, already purchased previously, for higher premiums than highly regarded AAA games go for in a month in the open market on other platforms (such as ones owned by Sony and Microsoft) if you want to carry over whatever select games get carried over to the new platform at Nintendo's whim, then they flip the consumer the bird AGAIN by shutting down the servers prematurely preventing even the redownloading of your already purchased software on said legacy platforms, and has the nerve to attack emulation as a whole because 1 emulator team made it possible for 1 million people to pirate with a download, a game that sold 20 million units in like a month (whispers: at 70 bucks a pop by the by), without any statistics on how much of that million also purchased the product or how much that million caused to effect the 20 million others that bought it... Bro f Nintendo and their underpowered hardware and spell they cast, with the most potent passion....
DeleteSo yes, Sony and Microsoft can go f themselves (for similar and different reasons) but Nintendo can do it a whole heck of a lot harder.
Yes, you get the point. Chadtronic laughing at Sammy.
DeleteHoly run on sentence, Batman!
DeleteMuphry's law got me. Oh well.
DeleteThe run on sentence was the point, it was for slight comedic (ranting) effect. (tone is hard to convey in text)
DeleteIt makes it harder to read, unfortunately.
DeleteFINALLY!
ReplyDeletepersonally, I'd hate a legacy collection with just the GB games. if they're going to give us another legacy collection, then make it worth our while. GB games, MM&B SNES version plz, mega man soccer, and battle & chase, maybe even the two arcade games? saturn version of 8?
ReplyDeleteI would buy a Legacy collection volume 3 if it had the games you listed, I’d also add the Neo Geo Pocket Color version of the arcade games as well. But this would require effort on Capcoms part.
DeleteWell. Alright then. It's not exactly Mega Man Mania, but it's something.
ReplyDeleteMight be time to (re-)buy Mega Man World 2 just to show my supp— oh, wait. That's not how this generation works. You aren't buying the games; you're renting the console packed with games. What rubbish.
fellow Mega Man II enjoyer :3
DeleteIt’s just Capcom doing the bare minimum as usual.
DeleteI fucking hate mega man fans, their just so fucking cynical
DeleteThen don't comment if you hate how people get annoyed at the bare minimum, these games should have been on a collection not locked behind a online paywall.
DeleteIt’s 20 dollars a year! I know some of these people and I know that they have a switch! Compare that to the 40-60 dollars that this could’ve costed!
DeleteOf course we're cynical. Capcom puts absolutely no effort into Mega Man whatsoever.
DeleteI'm honestly just not a fan of "multi-game console devices", much less all-digital interpretations. I mean yeah, I played through The Adventures of Lolo on a week-long Switch trial, once, and it's honestly a great little bonus for people who maintain a regular subscription to Switch Online... Sadly, I'm not one of those people.
DeleteAs I said: I'd rather just buy a Virtual Console copy again — or even a compilation. Again, this is no Mega Man Mania. It's just an afterthought. I don't think Capcom or other companies even profit from this outside of a flat licensing rate.
At anonymous defending locking these behind a paywall, Capcom could have easily put these in a $30 legacy collection instead.
DeleteIt feels like physical collections are going the way of the dinosaurs. :/
Delete"It’s 20 dollars a year! I know some of these people and I know that they have a switch! Compare that to the 40-60 dollars that this could’ve costed!"
DeleteIs that suppose to be a defense or a support statement?
Yeah... I'd rather pay 100 dollars 1 time to keep these than 20 dollars a year to rent. If I wanted to play these once a year for 5 years, that's how much I'd be paying anyway (if not more).
Anon at June 8 9:05PM
DeleteOf course Capcom isn’t doing anything because we show them that it won’t sell well!
There's been a fan project announced called Mega Man Mania in tribute of the cancelled collection that seeks to develop GBC (+DX features for some) versions of the World games, with 1 and 5 being done and 2&3 releasing soon, with 4 and a GBA version planned for later down the line. You might be interested :D
DeleteSprite Recreator, that sounds awesome. I'll definitely be following the fan project you mentioned. I remember being so bummed out when Mega Man Mania for GBA never ended up releasing bitd so the color versions of these games becoming a reality to me is awesome.
DeleteAlready own a GBA cartridge with all of those from ebay even with save state included. Fans did it better once again lol.
ReplyDeleteThat sounds awesome, I'm going to have to try to find one of those carts you mentioned.
DeleteI just streamed these games on my YouTube and Twitch channel.
ReplyDeleteFunny, the turn on collections. Last I checked, "the community" thought that the collections were wasted time and the games should've just been put up on NSO... Well, here's a bunch of Mega Man games on NSO and suddenly "the community" wants collections again.
ReplyDeleteYou people are just contrarian for the sake of spiting Capcom, aren't you?
"You people", really dude? Most people aren't against collections. There is a huge difference between locking games behind a subscription paywall and actually releasing them in a form that people can actually own. It isn't a hard concept to grasp.
DeleteThe community that bought the collections en masse that got us Megaman 11 in the first place?
DeleteThere's definitely some contrarians who post here, but I don't think it is who you think it is.
He almost has a point though, it's just that the cynicism in question is mostly condensed to certain youtube channels and on this site. Most Mega Man fans are actually very chill.
DeleteYou know what… you’re right. The Mega Man fans are definitely very chill. No question about it.
Delete@Anon 10:52 AM
Delete"Most people" have no issue with NSO's paywall, but because Mega Man's involved...
@Anon 1:00 PM
I'm not literally referring to the mass MM community at large, just a small but very vocal portion of it.
@Anon 1:51 PM
You'll find that the moment someone defends Capcom, the chill MM fans become decidedly not chill.
Then don’t defend Capcom. Just enjoy their output if you like what they’re doing. They are flush with cash. They don’t care what anyone says cause they’re making bank and it doesn’t matter what anyone says. They are more financially lucrative then they’ve ever been.
Delete"Most people"....
DeleteYou telling me most people would rather be a part of monthly active premium subscription services as their sole means of access to titles on a platform, for rentals of their favorite games? How's that working out for Xbox which has a far more robust version of it?
Half the time people who justify that kind of thing don't even think it's ideal and oftentimes cite the fact that they don't have capital or time in their lives to afford to video games as said justification. It seems like something people resort to rather than idealize. The other half is people who tolerated it because it gives them better online/networking for the main games that they play, and see the rest of the games as a bonus. No one (at least the vast majority of people) wants to actively rent games especially those that seek specific ones, and want to support particular franchises. At best it is something corporations incorporate and consumers passively tolerate, no one roots for stuff like NSO to be a thing. And even if they do, even if the majority does, that doesn't make their opinion valid and people who don't like it not valid, at least not to me.
Nah most MM fans aren't like that. Again, it's mostly just focused to certain youtube channels and here. I've met many other Mega Man fans who aren't so quick to pounce on the brain rot "crapcom" bandwagon, and who are actually optimistic about the possibility of things like a new Battle Network or X game or etc. coming out eventually. There's plenty of people who are more than happy to talk about who their favorite characters are or what their favorite storylines are or what playstyle they like best or etc.
DeleteDon't get me wrong, Capcom is far from perfect. Their recent nonsense with Enigma DRM is just one of many examples of their history of being rather out of touch and nonsensical, but the vast majority of people don't take it to the ridiculous extremes that the particular subsection of the Mega Man fanbase in question do. It's just a loud and vocal minority around here and certain youtube channels and maybe a few other places as well.
@Anon 3:37 PM
DeleteReplying to comment about 1:51PM Anon
I know right. The moment that someone (myself included says anything good about Capcom, most of this sodding site starts screaming “Crapcom” or “Inafraude” at the top of their lungs! God, I hate a good majority of this community.
@Anon June 8, 9:53 PM
DeleteFunny thing is, I don't really feel like I'm ever strictly defending Capcom. From my perspective, there's always a somewhat sound reason for most of their activity that doesn't add up to, say, actively being malicious towards Mega Man as an IP.
@Anon June 9, 2:45 AM
If you're indirectly accusing me of being facetious, try not to fall into the same trap yourself in the process.
@Anon June 9, 10:15 AM
They're a vocal minority, I agree. Unfortunately, they're usually first on the draw on any potentially Mega Man-related news, and also have a tendency to drag in general Capcom news as a part of their own "Crapcom hates Mega Man" narratives.
As for Enigma, I chose to look into what it does as a DRM to know that it really only hurts certain kinds of modding scenes for Capcom games, and what I found was that the thing everybody assumed Capcom adopted it for (the Chun-li skin incident during a SF online tourney stream) was a kind of mod that Enigma does not cover whatsoever.
most people are just the ignorant masses. mega man fans are not those, this is their hobby, their fandom. they care about mega man and gaming in particular.
Deletemost people in this group don't like DRM. Period.
most people in this group don't like games as a service. Period.
not only is it a paywall for whenever you want to play, but when the service goes done, those games are gone.
people don't want only collections, but people prefer collections over this. it's "don't give us collections! give us a new game!", to "oh man, this is waaaaaay worse, we'd rather have a collection than this!".
this is why people are pesimistic about capcom. when we think they can't do us worse, they hit us even harder with something worse. They haven't shown that they care about mega man in anyway, and have messed up most things they've given us.
like, they continually prove that they don't care about mega man. they give us the worst mobile ports known to man of the classic games. they give us a shitty flash game with Xover, and then give us an even worse version of X on mobile.
they give us the legacy collections which gives us siginificantly less than the collections in the PS2/GCN gen. we had one collection that had mega man 1-8 along with the arcade games then, and it included the complete works versions. now we got the original 6 nes games in a bare bones package.
then we get number 2! and we get 4 games. 7-10. no arcade games, no alternate saturn version of 8, nothing.
and then, nothing shows their lack of care than the X collections. most games have significant input lag, they give us 3 GB of the day of sigma movie on both games (2 copies of the movie, on each copy of the game, making 4 copies between the two taking up 6 GB of space), to justify splitting it into two 5GB games when they could very easily fit all 8 games on 1 game with the tiniest switch cart.
we don't get the PSX version of X3 either, which the PS2/GCN era X collection gave us, along with battle and chase. though I personally hate that version, it would have been nice to have both on the skimpy collection.
X challenge is like the laziest slapped together thing ever, horribly balanced between the difficulties too. easy is childplay, and normal is insane, with hard being masochistic.
and they split it into two version. 1 with the games people like, and 2 with the games people generally don't. this really shows that they know nothing about these games, and just slapped them into two games whatever way.
they turned things around with ZX collection. they gave us all 6 games in one collection and give us the e-reader functionality. and then gives us a gacha game. most of the fanbase was pretty divided on the gacha game.
we got 11, which was a neat game which felt like another reboot (no bass nor protoman in this one). it was good, but it's been what? 6 years since then? the game sold like hotcakes, but we're not getting any DLC nor sequel. why? what game has capcom released in the past 6 years that didn't have DLC?
@Erik the Red
DeleteIf you have this many problems with Mega Man's recent activity, maybe you should accept the brand isn't for you anymore.
@Anonymous June 12th. Eric isn’t wrong in his opinion, a ton of Mega Man fans are just sick of Capcom doing the bare minimum with the franchise. Maybe you and a select few others are fine with the bare minimum and will gladly take any scraps Capcom tosses you but most of us aren’t and want the franchise to keep getting new games.
Delete@Anon June 15, 1:08 AM
DeleteI would agree with you if it weren't for the fact that what counts as "the bare minimum" seems to scale only with how irritated one is on any given day. Whether it be a special collab event, merchandise, collection, or even game release, it is always "the bare minimum" and Capcom is always at fault for *something* you didn't personally like.
So the GB games ended up on NSO. What's the big deal? Oh, they could've been in a collection. But as I said, I thought you people said collections were a waste of time. Why the switch up? Is it because you have an anti-Capcom bias you want to defend tooth and nail against anybody who calls it out? Is that why you resort to calling anybody who disagrees with you a Capcom garbage receptacle, to put it kindly? You're the one with the argument that can't stand without dragging some external issue in there.
Your side have basically backed what Capcom can do with the brand into a very specific corner. Capcom can't do collections, they can't do merchandise, re-releases of any kind are out, collabs of any kind are out as well, remakes aren't it either, soundtrack releases are pointless, and even the time Capcom was actually making new games, they weren't making them correctly, and let's not even mention a TV show: Apparently you have to follow the games by the letter or it's bad, which is why people love the Ruby-Spears and BN\SF anime series despite them breaking from the games in some big ways. Yet any time you see any other company do something, you're quick to say "wow I wish Capcom would give us THIS" as if you hadn't sabotaged the entire avenue by which it could have happened.
You hold Capcom to standards unrealistic, expect them to make plays based on your whims, and overall fail to recognize even the slightest hint of how much of a C-tier property that Mega Man has become. You're so out of touch that you think Mega Man still has a substantial fanbase, and all you've done is mistake the echoes in your chamber for unique voices. Try actually promoting the franchise, rather than pushing your own headcanon for why Capcom does thing.
Keep up the good fight defending Capcom I guess, you really love to assume people don't want collections. It's not that people don't want collections, they also want new games to go with the collections. It isn't a hard concept to grasp that both collections and new games are welcome. Locking the Gameboy games behind a subscription paywall is pure bs, but sure keep assuming and defending your Capcom overlords.
Delete@anon June 15th 11:50 am. What exactly is your issue? You are assuming everyone is against collections when they aren't, collections are better than putting these on a subscription service any day. Locking these games behind a paywall is just lazy. But yes, you go ahead and just assume you know what everyone is thinking.
Delete@Anon June 17, 2:48 AM
DeleteThere it is. The "Capcom shill" label. You just hate Capcom for reasons you don't want to admit aren't actually their faults.
@Anon June 17, 2:53 AM
My issue is that I'm seeing a lot of the same people who were talking down about the Collections pulling switching up on them and saying that these games should've been on one, and the reasons are "DRM" and "paywall". Would it kill these people to actually celebrate something for once? Because they act like it would destroy them as people to actually be positive about something Mega Man-related that wasn't connected to their own biases.
Well you go on ahead and just take any scraps Capcom gives you then.
DeleteI don't get why it's so hard to understand.
Deletedo people dislike collections? yes. why? because they're not making any new games, just collections, and shoddy collections at that. are collections a bad thing? not in a vacuum, no.
The reason why people are upset about collections is because we get them, they do well, and we get no new games. we want first and foremost new games. we want the series to be alive and healthy. It's not. at least not in the eyes of most fans.
now, for most fans, putting the games on NSO is one of the worst things they can do. people in general don't like software as a service. here are the reasons why:
1) you have to continuously pay for a subscription: you have to pay monthly to play the game. every month you feel the itch to play the GB games legitimately, you have to pay for this service. if you play through the games multiple times, as I'm sure many of us do, you have to pay multiple months for these. these games also won't last us a month either. so currently, it's $4 to rent the games for a month. because that's what a subscription basically is, a rental.
2) the games are locked to the service. when the service is gone, and it will be eventually, just like every other gaming service before it besides gamepass and PSN so far, then access to those games will be lost again, just as access to the 3DS virtual console ones are now gone if you didn't already buy the games. People had the same issue with wily wars being on sega's subscription service back in the day, and it took until the genesis mini for north americans to have a legit way to play that game.
so, subscription services are almost the absolute worst form of giving us games. the only thing capcom can do worse I think is streaming the games. if they have the game as streaming only, then we'd complain that they could at least do the subscription model, because streaming is worse.
get it? it's not hard. we don't want low quality garbo, but we prefer the less bad option. it's like choosing between a turd sandwich and a glass of diarrhea. at least the turd sandwich has bread! no, no one wants a turd sandwich, but we want to drink pure diarrhea even less! if you have to give us one, please, the turd sandwich.
yet still, some people might argue that pure diarrhea isn't so bad. why are you complaining? the turd sandwich, you have to eat slowly, so you'll taste the turd more. at least the pure diarrhea, you can just chug it and barely taste it. you guys complain too much, just chug it like me! it'll be fine! you complained all this time about the turd sandwich! now you want it? you guys are never happy!
Hey, I’m not complaining. I’ve wanted to play these guys for a while now, and now they’re right within reach! Woo!
ReplyDeleteAnd you don't own them either.
DeleteI'm assuming you mean 'legally', hehe. There have been other ways to play them for quite a while.
DeleteI’m aware of that Tiny Proto, it’s pretty easy to obtain them other ways but I’d have loved to see them on another Legacy Collection with the other Mega Man spin-offs they aren’t on the other collections, these games deserve to be on every platform. I might be the only one but I’d love to be able to play Battle & Chase on modern systems without having to dig out my older systems.
DeleteI apologise if I seemed like I was being a smart aleck.
DeleteI didn't take it that way, I know I could play these any day through other methods. I was just hoping to get a modern physical release with all 5 in a collection with the rest of the spin off games.
DeleteThe funniest part about this whole collection issue is that the games are so small that the entire franchise fits in a Blu-ray. No need to drag them out to multiple collections when you realize that, it is clear they are made for pure greediness.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I definitely agree with you there.
Deletewhile it pains me to defend capcom in any way, to be fair, it's more than just space involved. the games are from many different consoles and need to be made to run on like 4 somewhat different platforms. There's also all the interface work and whatever work they put into the shoddy extra game modes that most people don't even like.
Deleteso, like legacy collection 1 having all NES games, and legacy collection 2 having non-NES games. makes sense. they got SNES, PSX and 9 and 10 working on modern platforms.
but then the X collection. they got SNES and PSX games working, and added PS2 games. unless getting PS2 games running took a monumental effort, not really justified in splitting them.
I don't see the point in renting a digital file, at least with physical games(in theory) you get the box, manual(digital manual ain't the same) and any extras that come with it.
ReplyDeleteAgreed, while it’s good they are available in some form this is just the lazy way to do it. We should have gotten a Legacy collection 3 with the other remaining Mega Man games included.
DeleteLove these games, I'd rather have them in a collection but whenever I have switch online I'll definitely play them. One thing that kind of bugs me though is no option to play the enhanced Super Gameboy version of V.
ReplyDelete