Megaman: What is the hardest game (and boss)

[Mad Pierrot]

The blue bomber Megaman, and his successors (X, Volnutt, Zero, etc.) have been in a lot of video games that featured surprisingly hard difficulties. But which game is the hardest? Which game has the hardest boss?

I haven't played all but I think the original Megaman was probably the most difficult (although I remember playing a Japanese PS1 port which allowed me to use the charge shot). However, for me the hardest boss from all games I played is Gate from X6. The guy is completely hard since he is not the weakest one of all. To make it worse, the entire fight, happens in plattforms so you have to be incredible careful with how you jump. He even destroys parts of the stage when he is weakend.

So what's your hardest game and or boss from the Megaman series? I'm all ears.

[Kafriel]

Having played all of the GBA installments and the first two games, as well as the PSP spinoffs, the hardest series is by far Rockman's. It's not enough that you die in every single part of a stage, the bosses take their time to learn, too...and if you're going for that S rating? Forget about it!

Honorable mention to Sigma from Maverick Hunter X, his 2nd form needed a lot of well-timed jumps to avoid certain death...and fighting him aaaaall over again.

[Archon_Wing]

Mega Man 7. Dr Wily. Especially considering it's one of the easier titles, the last boss is really makes for up for it in spades. He takes so long to kill, and his attacks track you multiple times and can kill you in a few hits. Even though the game provides 4 energy tanks and a super tank, it's quite the bother. Here's a good let's play of it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOzW...1AF41023D22108


Nightmare Mother. It's almost impossible to predict how it moves. And getting there too. I mean this who the fuck thought this was a good idea for a stage? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxvZUv6u6pY (love the music though).

So here's the thing about the stage:
If you came here without specific parts or weapons, you automatically lose. Yes, you have to deliberately get a game over and go back out. There's a wall of spikes that requires you to use an ice block and jumper so you can barely clear it. Another way is to use the item that increases your invulnerability time and get hit deliberately. Finally, you can also use the Shadow Armor which is immune to spikes. So that already limits your choices. Of course, the Shadow Armor turns out to be not that great against the boss. Go figure.

Norio Wakamoto High Max from X6 was really annoying because of the specific order you have to hit him. And then he just spams death balls whenever. And that's only the middle of the stage. There's the aformentioned Gate. It doesn't help that the best thing to beat him and the first part of the stage is the Shadow Armor, which can't air dash. There's a infamous gap later that requires parts to get through if you are on the Shadow Armor and physics abuse. Don't have it? Well, too bad, you need to do it over again. Borderline romhack design.

At least you can continue indefinitely.

Maybe I should just say X6.

I've also really hated dealing with Sigma's first form in X3 because of that huge shield he has.

Sigma in X4 I thought was pretty nasty because the fight is so long, and the stage itself contains the refights so you can't really use anything beforehand. Getting a game over would suck too. X5's Sigma was pretty bad when he summons purple boxes.

Also, any of the rider sections in 8, X4, X5, and X8 want to make me kick a robotic puppy.

[Mad Pierrot]

Now I remember another one! It appeared in both the original Megaman and X5.

It some kind of monster that splitted in pieces that could reduce your health as it transformed. You needed to be very careful with it and be careful when you had to affect damage.

Also, X5 had a really hard stage where you start in a "motorcycle". Although it looked like the one from X4, you could be simply killed by not going fast as camera surpassed you. This is even harder for the ones needing to get a part of X's armor since in that area there were some small pieces of energy that had to be used to get to Dr. Light's area.

[Archon_Wing]

That would be the Devil type enemy. It's in a few games, but yea it's worse in those.

Oh yea Squid Adler jet bike ;;. It was bad enough that you had to pass it but there was a powerup on the way.

[ZGoten]

Honestly, I really tried liking the Mega Man games, but they are just too hard for my taste. The difficulty and the punishing nature of the series completely ruins the fun for me. As for which boss is the hardest ... I was unable to defeat the Yellow Devil at all, so I guess that's the one.

[Mad Pierrot]

Another one I found hard but possibly due to bad game design is when you leave the coast in Mega Man Legends 1. The mission was protecting Roll's ship from the Bones' robots. I failed that one too many times until I mastered it.

[Guido]

As a kid and teen, I owned Mega Man III, Mega Man IV, Mega Man V, Mega Man X, Mega Man X2, and Mega Man 3 for Game Boy.

Nowadays, thanks that I own a Game Cube and a Nintendo 3DS I owned both Mega Man anthology titles, which the first one for Game Cube includes Mega Man classic, Mega Man VI, Mega Man VII, and Mega Man VIII, as well. The second anthology game pack for the 3DS/2DS only has the first six NES games.

Originally Posted by ZGoten

Honestly, I really tried liking the Mega Man games, but they are just too hard for my taste. The difficulty and the punishing nature of the series completely ruins the fun for me. As for which boss is the hardest ... I was unable to defeat the Yellow Devil at all, so I guess that's the one.

Mega Man. The first game for the NES that started the franchise 30 years way back, which I finally was able to play for the first time in my Game Cube around 13 years ago, and several years later in the 3DS.
ZGoten, you're on the spot about the games. The first one is ridiculously hard to finish, particularly that: it doesn't feature Energy Tanks, you got killed by spikes even when flashing after taking damage from enemies, you fall off while climbing ladders right after unpausing the game, the only game in the classic series that puts enemies in the corridors that lead right to the boss room, the platforms at the beginning of Guts Man's stage are a nightmare to pass through, the Yellow Devil (a.k.a. Rock Monster), and in the last Dr. Wily stage you must go through a sort of Boss run rematching Bomb Man, Guts Man, Ice Man, and Fire Man one after the other in one sitting without losing no life energy at all before facing off Wily.

For Mega Man 2, I found the deadly beams in Quick Man's stage quite frustrating as you were falling or falling in a bad angle which forced you to take too much time to clear the obstacles just before the next beam zapped you. Following, I do not recommend playing Heat Man's stage until you obtain the jet sled after defeating Air Man, if you're a beginner or inexperienced player with this game. Then, the boss Mecha-Dragon from Wily's Skull Castle stage 1 was quite vexing because the fight first starts in an empty corridor which automatically side-scrolls from right to left as the dragon is pursuing you, and you have to jump from platform to platform in order to make it to the end. Once the battle starts, you still have to time your jumps in order not to be knocked down by the dragons' fireballs or losing a life in the process. Finally, if you do not know how to solve the barrier puzzle of the boss room in Wily's Skull Castle stage 4, then you're f***ed.

For Mega Man 3, oh boy! To me this was the hardest game to clear amongst the classic series from the franchise. It took me three whole months of continuous time playing in order to beat it. It gets tedious once you've beaten the first eight robot masters stages, and then you're left with no choice but play through the next four doc robot stages before, finally, reaching Dr. Wily's Skull Castle levels. That, and let us not forget the Yellow Devil Mark II and the crab-like, Wily Machine.

For Mega Man 4, to be truly honest the difficulty for this game was pretty much tamed, IMO. Probably, Drill Man's stage had tricky jumps with falling debris that did not make my day, as well as going through the crushing presses in Dust Man's stage.
However, I had trouble with the following bosses for this game:
Pharaoh Man, to me if he got to move too wildly or out of control at the start of the fight, then I became toast. I had to freeze him with the Time Stopper right off the bat, and, immediately, tapped the controller like crazy to fire shots in quick succession at him in order to keep the boss frozen while depleting its life energy.
Dive Man, take my advice. The Skull Barrier works no s**t with this boss. He'll just ram you dealing lot of damage while he takes bare minimum damage. The strategy I used against him was delivering fully powered, shots from the mega buster while at the same time jumping him and avoiding his torpedoes which at times became tricky due to him unexpectedly thrusting while I was about to land from a jump.
Wily's machine at the end of the Skull Castle stage 3. Seriously, once you've destroyed the machine's skull face, then the fight becomes messed up. I mean you have to press the jump button in such a way to make a true jump, then landing your shots at the machine's weak spot. It was a desperate experience for me dealing with this boss, because if I did not jump high enough then my shots got deflected. The only strategy I could thought of without resorting to face this boss head on was timing my position from underneath the boss, and then firing the wire adapter from below in hope of dealing two strikes at it's weak spot. However, if I missed then I was wasting that weapon's energy quickly.

Mega Man 5. I will never forget the falling rain of diamonds in Crystal Man's stage. Jeez, that made my head spinning with madness and anger. I mean carefully jumping from one platform to the next in order to clear the pits below while making sure no debris would fall right above you.
As well as always missing the "G" plate every time I played through Stone Man's stage, until I got the power from reading Nintendo Power.

Mega Man 6. There weren't particular bosses that were too strong or stages too hard to clear since this title I've played it the least times. Anyways, the falling, spike corridors from Mr. X' stages gave me moments of intense stress and anguish. The gist was at timing your falls at the right moment in order to use the Rush jet pack to fly briefly enough a safe distance in order to clear the spikes below and on the walls, and then continue safe falling until hitting the bottom.

Mega Man 7. The last Wily, end boss battle was severely punishing, enough said.

For Mega Man 8, until this day this is the only title in the classic series that I've been unable to beat. Again, the last Wily, end boss battle is freaking hard since Sword Man's flame sword is the only weapon in your arsenal able to deal considerate damage, but Wily's machine never holds back with the missiles, the lasers, and thrusting attacks taking quite a lot of my life energy gauge. It doesn't help much that this title in some manner pays homage to the first one in that features no energy tanks at all.