Parish: 'Mega Man 9 may save video games'
When someone leads off an article like that, it's hard not to highlight it. 1up's Jeremy Parish thinks Mega Man 9 is a great idea, but not just because it looks neat, and not because of nostalgia. In his estimation, the return to the style of Mans 1-6 signals an admission on Capcom's part that NES-era technology suits the series best in gameplay terms. Mega Man X and other spinoffs worked well on other systems, but Mega Man is best on NES. "The inescapable truth is that Mega Man, at least the incarnation represented by a plucky little Astro Boy knock-off fighting googly-eyed robo-critters, works best as an 8-bit game."
He admits at one point that the 8-bit design could simply be an appeal to nostalgia or a budget-saving tactic, but it's a lot more fun to believe that Inafune et al. are doing what they're doing for an artistic reason. Even the ugliest Wii games are attempts to represent games in a "modern" way -- generally the best 3D that the budget will allow. While No More Heroes uses 8-bit elements for flair, the idea of intentionally regressing, of making a game look "worse" than the technology will allow in the interest of gameplay, seems bold and clever. Of course, some people happen to think the style of NES Mega Man games is every bit as attractive as any modern game on its own merits.
