Mega Man 8 - Saturn (1996)

A bit long since those animated scenes are long. A part of me just wants to stop with the CD-based intros and start from the title screen. It makes sense and I'd run into less copyright claims.

This was, and still remains, polarizing. Going in reverse, let's consider the bad. It's not the NES games, so it already has something against it. You might also understandably think that the new robot bosses and the ball show a little bit of creative weakness. For being only the second post-NES Mega Man title and the first 32-bit/CD-based one, it might not feel like this was the improvement anyone was looking for.

But hold up...it really isn't a visual change if you consider that it's damn close to Mega Man 7. It still plays largely the same, which is what really counts if you're going to change the look of things. Also, consider the stage showcased, Clown Man. It's...a clown. That alone seems stupid, right? But look at the stage and think back to Capcom's history like Nemo and Chip 'n Dale. This was a stage they always wanted to make. Look at the background animations. Look at the sprite work. Look at the colors they used. Look at their mechanic with the boxes. This was an excuse to just let their creativity fly without any real limits. They weren't putting 3D in, so they could pretty much do whatever they wanted with pixels given the power of the new systems.

The sound of that stage....ok, I'll give you that. I'm not a fan of that.