Megaman 4: His First Plot Twist
Brandon g
This one starts out a little differently: a man named Dr. Cossack has created eight new robots to destroy Megaman. Just when I started figuring this series out, Dr. Cossack?
Well, it turns out that Dr. Wily has kidnapped Cossack's daughter, Kalinka, and forced Cossack to fight Megaman for him. Not a bad idea, considering Wily's track record thus far. So Cossack did it. Nevermind that eight robots that could take out Megaman could easily take out Wily. Nevermind that half of Cossack's robots are virtual clones of some of Wily's old robots, and are destined to fail right from the start. These scientists, man... unbelievable.
Megaman 4 is the first appearance of the Mega-Buster. Basically, it allows Megaman to charge up his arm cannon for a more powerful shot. Those of us with turbo controllers started crying when we heard about this. Half of the fun of the game for us was firing as many shots as we could to bring mayhem and deliver justice. Now, we had to charge up and wait for a good shot. I-- I can't go on. This is too hard for me to talk about.
Megaman 4 is also the first Megaman without a musical robot. No rappers, no DJs, no dancing machines--nothing. It goes to show that Wily likes dance music just a little more than the average mad scientist.
Bright Man
"Hey Bright Man, you look like you have an idea!" If you had to put up with that all the time, you'd be pissed off too. Middle school must have been a tough time for Bright Man—his bulb would light up whenever a pretty robot would walk by, and it would flicker whenever someone's cell phone went off.
But I'm sure Bright Man is even more pissed off to be a virtual clone of a robot that Megaman had already defeated: Flashman. Wile E. Coyote did some crazy stuff, and even he knew not to try a bad idea again and expect better results. I mean, he had all that money—why didn't he just buy a sandwich, or something? Anyway, Bright Man didn't really work too much better than Flashman did, despite the addition of a rather large light bulb.
You'd think that if Cossack was smart enough to develop a robot that could freeze Megaman in place, he'd give the robot a suitable weapon to use on Megaman while he's frozen. But Bright Man has no such weapon. He has an arm cannon almost identical to Megaman's, which he seems to use even less effectively. Sounds like a bright idea, Cossack. A real winner.
Pharaoh Man
After seeing Wily's magnificent failures in creating robots with themes like bombs, fire, and wood, Cossack decided to try a robot based on an entire civilization. Pharaoh Man is dressed in traditional Egyptian garb, his evil lair is a pyramid, he has mummy guards and a lot of sand, and there are hieroglyphics on the walls. But Cossack forgot one thing: a themed weapon.
Pharaoh Man's weapon was called the "Pharaoh Shot." Last I checked, pharaohs couldn't shoot things (even the mummified ones that rise from their tombs). And anyway, it's just a normal gun—there's nothing especially pharaoh-esque about it. If I call my car the Pharaohmobile, it doesn't make it an Egyptian car. So really, once we get past all of that Egyptian stuff, we have a robot with a gun in his arm. Kind of like Megaman, but not quite as great (although potentially a whole lot creepier).
Drill Man
A mining robot! Brilliant! That means he can do something other than fight Megaman! This robot can actually burrow into the ground and come up right under your feet. He can also dig for truffles. If this guy and Metal Detector Man went on a treasure hunt, there'd be no stopping them.
There was this one time that Drill Man accidentally burrowed into Toad Man's sewer. There was raw sewage everywhere, it was awful. Toad Man was loving it, of course, but to this day, Drill Man hates toads. And sewage.
Ring Man
This robot throws rings. But wait—the rings are boomerangs. That hasn't been done before. Surely Megaman hasn't encountered boomerangs before. I'll cut Cossack some slack, because he probably didn't know how many lame robots Wily had created (but the game designers have no excuse).
Toad Man
Toad Man's special power involves him doing a hula dance and sending down rain from the skies. Amazingly, he never thinks to send down the rain without doing the hula dance. So I've concluded that his real power isn't sending down rain that somehow damages Megaman (severely), but hula dancing. When Megaman receives this power, he calls down acid rain from the sky—without dancing. It took me a while to figure it out, but I'm pretty sure that Megaman is actually making Toad Man dance using some sort of remote control. That's right: Megaman has a remote control dancing Toad Man. If that's not a marketing ploy, I don't know what is.
Quite a few people are pretty freaked out by toads because of their overall grossness factor; Toad Man plays on this excessively. In addition to hula dancing, he lives in a sewer—a sewer full of rats, weird jellyfish things, and giant snails. All of this raises some serious questions as to the origins of his mysterious brown-colored rain. And the hula dancing—that is totally unneccessary. Creepy pedophile robot. Alright, let's talk about something else. Now.
Dust Man
A glorified vacuum cleaner. Dust Man seems to be left over from the Megaman 2 era, when robots were based on household appliances. Dust Man has the power to suck and blow using that vent on top of his head. So for once, if you and a friend are sitting around playing Megaman 4, and one of you says, "This robot sucks," and the other says, "That robot blows," you'd both be right.
I've done some pretty stupid things and people have accused me of having a large, empty space where my brain should be; but that's really the case with Dust Man—in fact, he has a vacuum where his brain should be. And look at him. He doesn't exactly seem to be Mr. Personality either. It's no wonder he lives in a literal dump. His robot power is throwing trash at you. If I named him, I would have named him White Trash Man.
Think about it: his power is blowing trash at Megaman. He's a leaf-blower. Even a lawnmower would have a better chance against Megaman, because then at least there's a chance that Megaman would put his hand underneath it and get it cut up pretty bad. Besides, Wily had already tried a robot with the powers of a leaf blower, and it didn't work—and that robot also had the powers of a tree! Cossack, did you even try to research this?
Dive Man
A robot submarine with homing torpedos that, miraculously, float around in the air as easily as they do in the water. And why does he have a periscope? For atmosphere?
Also, don't forget that these robots are supposed to destroy Megaman. So shouldn't they be designed to go after Megaman? Would you hire a fish to kill a gazelle? I think not. Seriously, Cossack, do you want to save your daughter? This is the worst rescue attempt ever.
Skull Man
A horrible malignment of robotics and the black arts. If Megaman 4 had a musical robot, it would be this guy—and he'd probably be on tour with this guy. But wait... robotics is a branch of science, and the black arts are a form of religion... Skull Man is what you get when you mix science and religion. So he'd probably be touring with this guy.
Skull Man's lair is actually made of bones. Here, Megaman is so creeped out that he has to close his eyes for a second to escape from the terror. But Skull Man saved the creepiest power for himself: he makes little skulls float around him in a circle. Kind of like what Leafman did with leaves, only with things that used to be attached to people's necks. Megaman seems to have no reservations with practicing this dark art himself, though, which means one of two things: either Skull Man really isn't that creepy, or Megaman is way more badass than we give him credit for.
