Mega Man Maker #6 - Everything in Review (+ MAGMML2 thoughts)
28--Scroll further down for level comments--
Welp, I finally finished all the contest levels in MAGMML2 (have not started the Wily stages yet, literally just beat Identity Crisis so no spoilers). It was... interesting. It went differently to how I expected, I thought the beginning would be a drag but it would gradually get better. Actually though, I found myself coping okay with the tier 1/2 levels, and starting to feel fatigued by the mediocre tier 3-4 (some of 5 too) levels.
I think it's because the really bad levels are interesting in their own way, they're complete opposites to what you'd expect of good Mega Man levels, and they end up presenting you... unique challenges, to say the least. It kept me engaged, but not because I was actually enjoying the levels for their design. Does that make sense? Probably not.
The mid tier levels though... these are mostly stages which have an idea of what they want to be, but the designer just hadn't quite carried out the execution, or the idea itself was good but everything else let it down. It's really hard to describe why I enjoyed that portion of the game the least, but I think it's because they felt like actual completed, but very flawed stages, as opposed to the early tiers which were basically experiments.
As for my favourites and least favourites... well, least favourite was Yggdrasil. I didn't even finish that level legit, but I saw Roahm's playthrough and that looks like something I could never bring myself to enjoy. It was super ambitious and could have been neat if it had the time, but the bosses and the gimmick setups really just made it overly punishing and frustrating.
My favourite however... probably Quarantine Woman. I totally get what Pyro meant about style over substance, but I can't really help the way that I judge levels since it's a personal thing, but I rank atmosphere and the way a level feels almost as highly as the actual gameplay and how it works. The whole stage just had a very hectic and dangerous vibe, and the hazmat joes felt threatening because of their AI and the way they act not being too dissimilar to Mega Man. Quarantine Woman herself was a brilliant boss and I had so much fun learning the pattern and learning the right times to jump, etc. A close second for me would be Identity Crisis, a lot of the setups in that stage were really creative.
So anyway, that's my thoughts on MAGMML2 right after beating Tier 10. I still have the Wily stages to go, so I might address those in another video. Still debating whether I'll be recording it. I'll probably be fine with it myself (so long as I skip 1 or 2 stages) but I just hope you guys are okay with 20+ videos of the same game.
--Level Comments--
202356 by Rogue Trainer
This was basically where I got the title for the video from. It felt like this was a mix of aesthetics and enemies from the first 5 games. It's a cool idea but I don't think enough was done with some sections to be truly memorable. Take the MM2 section for example. You took the triple Hot Dog attack, but didn't really do too much with it that made it feel very different. The third dog could have been interesting but the enemies didn't really do much and couldn't affect you before being killed. I did really like the last segment with the footholders and spinning platforms though. As for the boss... I get the idea of having extra challenges to complement the boss, but this was overkill. Tone it down a lot and you could have something decent.
225714 by Thomas Johnson
I really wonder how somebody other than myself might have judged this level... I apologise in advance that this probably won't be a very fair critique since picket man are one of my most hated enemies in the series, but I'll try. The concept of this level was based around navigating through the moving platforms whilst dealing with enemy threats... while I'm thankful you didn't use guts lifts (because I hate those too), there were parts where this felt super frustrating mostly due to the enemies feeling kinda unavoidable, especially like the picket man while you were riding the platforms. Sometimes the platforms took forever to come back and I had to scroll back and forth several times for them to return, but I'm guessing that's on the engine. Overall, some decent ideas, but brought down by some frustrating enemy placement.
114068 by Gerd Simon
This was actually kinda neat, aside from the (unintended?) issue at the beginning. I felt like the checkpoints were fair and it made it feel like it was a series of mini levels that got more difficult over time. I think making it entirely platforming based and removing the buster did restrict the level design a little. I felt you could have had some creative enemy setups, and definitely could have mixed in some gimmick platforms to really make it more interesting.
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