Mega Man X5

"Not a very good Mega Man X game, still a decent platformer"

Following up on Mega Man X4, Capcom produces another sequel in the series, Mega Man X5. At first blush Mega Man X5 looks like it should be exciting. It opens with Sigma rampaging around town, a mysterious Reploid crashing a space station on the Earth (or planning to at least), and lots of potential PWNing to be had, if you'll pardon my Internet-ism there.

X actually starts the game equipped more or less fully upgraded to the gear accessible in Mega Man X4. This means that he has a lot of nice tricks available right from the start. Zero on the other hand is Zero, he doesn't need any upgrading to be a beast on the battlefield.

In the intro stage, you put sigma down... only to learn of his new nefarious scheme! By defeating him you've spread the Sigma virus, allowing it to run rampant and take over every Reploid it finds. But while this threat is tragic enough, in sixteen hours the space station Eurasia is going to crash into the Earth and wipe out all life!

However, the Maverick Hunters have a weapon available that could stop the crash, but only if they upgrade it. Enter, the Mavericks. There's eight of them, as always. Four of them have the needed parts, four of them are there to drop other power ups basically.

And that's where Mega Man X5 diverges radically from previous games. The bosses, when defeated, drop special parts depending on when and how well they were beaten. You're actually scored on your performance. These parts, of which there are too many to name individually, range from the common sorts of upgrades one might expect from previous Mega Man X games on up to new suits of armor with new abilities.

These parts and such cannot be all worn at the same time. X and Zero can be equipped with them, mixed and matched at will, to customize the sorts of abilities they have. In addition, of course, every Maverick also drops a new weapon that can be equipped and used, and changed to and from on the fly while playing.

Unfortunately the gameplay simply doesn't hold up compared to Mega Man X4. The level design is uninspired at best, and horrible at worst. The areas are pretty much a stock rundown of the sorts of stages that have been seen in previous Mega Man X games, only this time with the creativity sucked out of them and shipped off to the Andromeda galaxy where it currently is feeding a race of small aliens who were nearly extinct for lack of creativity. Sadly, Mega Man X5 leaves such a sucking void in the fabric of Earth's creativity-sphere that it threatens to destroy us all.

The control scheme comes to the rescue, still as tight and perfect as always in Mega Man X games. Despite the poor level design, it's still plenty of fun to play through the game, trashing Reploids and robots alike.

The Mavericks and other bosses aren't particularly well designed. When you resort to a Whale-based boss, it's a sign that your franchise might need a slight infusion of new design staff. While they aren't very interestingly designed, the bosses are often a pretty tough challenge. Though I will maintain here that the intro-level boss is terribly lame.

Now for a quick scoring summary for those of you keeping track of the numbers:

Gameplay: 6

It's tight Mega Man X series gameplay stuck in a cheesy and cheap competitor's knock off. I don't understand what happened. How did we go from the great stage designs of Mega Man X4 to this? And those bosses... There's just something wrong with fighting a robo-whale.

Story: 7

The story is actually pretty awesome for a side-scrolling platformer. I liked the impetus on getting things done fast that it put on the player.

Graphics: 9

Barring the bosses' character designs, and just looking at how things look, the graphics are great for a platformer. With smooth animation, bright and vivid colors, it's great.

Sound: 6

The music is okay. The sound effects are satisfying. The voice acting, what there is, isn't so good.

Replay: 10

There are tons of things to do in the game. If you like the way it plays, then you'll come back for more. There are many items to collect, many strategies to try out with different item combinations, and of course both X and Zero to play as.

Other: 0

Duff. McWhalen. Seriously, I'm not making that name up. It's horrible, but that's what happens when Capcom names the Mavericks after members of Guns N' Roses. And Duff McWhalen's stage is simply the worst stage I've ever played through in any Mega Man game, from any series.

Overall: 6

I did not enjoy playing through Mega Man X5. This isn't because it's a very bad game, but because Mega Man X4 exists, and is superior in several key ways. Your mileage may vary, but I suggest giving the game a shot. If worse comes to worse, you can always just turn it off.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 09/20/06