It looks like Mega Man 2 (NES) is actually the best selling Mega Man game but MMBN4 is not far behind so the point still stands. Edit: 10k views is insane, thank you!
It's so fun to find other people who had similar experiences with this series sharing theirs these last couple of years and especially now that the legacy collection has been announced. MMBN3 was my first in the series and also happened to be one of my first GBA SP games (along with Pokemon Leaf Green funnily enough) and it still holds as my fav in the series and one of my absolute FAVORITE games to this day. This series was so good and it really deserved so much more than it was given throughout the years. I hope it gains a new wave of fans with this legacy collection because it deserves it.
Dude, I had the exact same experience! We were incredibly spoiled for our first GBA SP games. I remember playing leaf green and being disappointed when I played a game that had next gen of Pokemon (Ruby) but the game was unpolished and I'd been spoiled with Leaf Green. As for BN3, I was lucky they ran out of the first two titles because I didn't like the box art for 3 at all. Game blew me away with the quality and details you get interacting with the environment.
I have such a hard time picking between 6 and 3 as my favorite. I hadn't played 1 or 2 untill recently and 1 definitely surprised me in it's quality. Especially in it's animation. Great video!
Also, you're one of the first people I've heard. Talk about the binaural audio! The split between the left and right channel really does make the soundtrack. Helps You feel immersed in the internet part of the worlds!
Great choices! I actually considered putting 6 in S tier since it's easily top 3 for me, primarily because of the combat. I felt like it would make the tier list a little top heavy though. And I absolutely agree on the binaural audio, music is a HUGE factor in games for me and I'd love to see more games utilize this.
Forlderbak was in Blue version, White version had Navibak Style change in BN3 reduced the number you could keep as options from 2 to 1, and some inherent features of each style were changed into navi customizer program unlockables that could be used even if you stopped using a particular style. In general, style changes occur based on your actions taken over a couple hundred battles between each style change. Guts comes from copious buster usage, Team comes from relying on navi chips, Custom comes from using as many (non-navi) chips in a turn as possible, Shield comes from relying on healing and defense type chips, and Bug comes from fighting with errors in your Navi Customizer. Shadow style (blue exclusive) comes from spamming the invis chip, and Ground style (white exclusive) comes from using chips that change panel types. The element that comes with the style you get is random.
It's great to see that they're bringing MMBN back. LOVED it in my teens (MMBN2 was my favorite). I reeeeeeeally hope Legacy sells well so that we can maybe get a new installment. Who knows, here's hoping ;)
3 > 6 > 2 > 5 > 1 >> 4 MMBN 3 was my starting point as a child, and still my favorite after playing the rest multiple times. Story, gameplay, and cool factor were all there! MMBN 6 is the culmination of all of the games, and I really did appreciate everything the game had to offer, but there was cut content I really wanted to play… Regardless, it was a great game. MMBN 2 is an amazing sequel to MMBN 1! The chip combos were ridiculous in this game and nothing felt hard. Gator on everything was the easy mode button. MMBN5 was… ok. I wasn’t a fan of the liberation missions until I grew older, but some viruses in the post game made it stupidly difficult, especially if you’re trying to 100% the game, and you have to reset your game in the liberation mission to do it again. Apart from that, it’s a big step up from 4. MMBN was the starting point and I played it after MMBN 4, I can see the criticism behind the lack of features future entries made possible, but then OSS mitigated that concern. I hope the Legacy collection inputs those features. I still hate the Elecman chapter as a kid. MMBN 4 is rough. Story doesn’t make sense, tournament repeats, and frankly I don’t want to replay it. However, I do see the pros in the game. Souls are incredibly stylish, and gameplay is really fun, but replaying the game three times to get all of the souls, going through repeat cut scenes and dumb sidequests almost make it not worth it. Air Hockey broke tbh.
@@LefterisTim This is basically my tier list as well, awesome!! I love 2 so much I might place it above 6 but I haven't finished 6 yet so guess I need to wait and see. :)
I love this game I'm still playing now. The nostalgia gets me going but if they get back into it it can definitely be another competitors. I don't know why they stop but I heard more supposed to come
I’m so pumped that the new collection is coming out soon I used to play 3-6 back in the day with my friend and we both had link cables the competitive was so great so hopefully they do more with that. Also having the steamdeck now I have been emulating these and remembering how damn good they are
I think 6 really nailed the unique "armor" and "risk" systems. The Cross and Beast-Out systems is one of the reasons I can come back to 6 at anytime and enjoy a straight beginning to end playthrough.
I’ve played every game in the MMBN series except the first two games and BN3 Blue, and I can’t wait to play the series roots with the new collection. This rivaled Pokémon for me on GBA, I cried when they announced it. Love the video dude! If the collection has online play I’d love to battle you!
Bn3 was insane. The plot. The battle system. The styles. The post game. The codes for the custom. Such a deep beautiful game. Even as the game mechanics improved... it never got better And 4 was so bad. I remember even as a kid how disappointed I was in 4. I was so excited about the character crosses. I always wanted to play as other characters but the execution was terrible
You mentioned the competitive scene is dead, but there is still an active scene look up N1 Grand Prix on TH-cam. They're still doing online tournaments even today.
I just bought the legacy collection. I only ever played bn3 so I'm glad to be able to try them all! (Even the bad ones) I'm so psyched to see this game series still has a following, it's really nostalgic for me
Megaman Battle Chip Challenge. It’s a remake of a Wonderswan game, where combat is much less action-based and more turn-based, and you effectively build a combat “program” more than a deck. It’s so different and I love it.
Loved your vid, super nostalgic as I also grew up playing this franchise and MMBN 2 was my first one. What I will say about 4 is it’s actually one of my favorite OST in the franchise, and 2 had some great hits. Also what was weird and annoying is that you had to clear the game TWICE to get all 6 double souls, which made it so tedious cause it’s replay value was shit. Praying for some great changes in the legacy collection. Thanks for ur vid! Subbed.
So basically 3 was the best, saved the franchise and caused them to rush to get another one out, it sold the most because everyone loved and talked about how good 3 was, 4 was a major let down and ruined the chances of 5 & 6 doin well.
Eh, kind of. These games all released very soon after each other so I don't think 4 was any more rushed than the others. I do think 4 was a let down that may have caused 5+6 to not do as well but Capcom was saturating the market with Mega Man at the time in general so that's probably a bigger contributor. And even though they ended BN at 6, the spiritual successor Mega Man Star Force released just a year after BN6 in Japan so maybe that was the plan all along regardless of sales.
I remember they were gonna make a new Megaman Starforce for the 3ds that was gonna have Lan's descendant team up with the main character (Geo) and was apparently cancelled. I was sad to learn it was cancelled because A. I didn't even know they made a Starforce 2 and 3 and B. it would've connected Battle Network to Starforce (Although I remember an event in game for Starforce 1 where if you had a Battle Network game in the GBA slot of your DS you can meet Megaman from Network and he gives you his blaster!)
Yea there was Operate Shooting Star for DS but it was Japan only. At some point I'll have to replay the Star Force games, I don't remember very much besides the core combat
Going ti start my journey from the first game using GBA emulator I can't wait for the collection on 2023! I will get the collection too even after finishing all the games I really like the game style and mechanics
So fun fact about the battle network series. They didn't stop the series because of poor numbers, but it was a creative choice to "move forward" when they swapped from GBA to DS. (Edit) Also, the opponents for Battle Network 4 were predetermined based on the game format you were on. They'd always be the same on a New Game vs New Game + vs New Game ++. So if you NG++'ed, you would fight XYZ, but if you just NG'ed, you'd only fight ABC.
Good point, I forgot about them moving forward with Star Force even though I literally mentioned it at the beginning of the video lol. I would be interested to revisit those, I did enjoy what I played but I found the limited movement in combat to not be as enjoyable as BN. Interesting tidbit about BN4, idk why I thought it was random. Granted I've only done like 1 playthrough of it lol
@@CobraCodex Okay, so... Apparently I was incorrect about the Tournament matches. There is pseudo randomness involved. Basically: The RNG involved makes it impossible to unlock all Souls until you've played NG++. Additionally, Tournament randomness is determined when the new game save is created, so you need to reset the entire playthrough to reshuffle opponents. Still, a dumb choice to artificially inflate "game" time.
Watching this because I just found out the legacy collection is coming out and I’ve never played this but I remember the show and want to play these games
If the collection sells well I think Capcom could do a 7th. I just really want one with online PvP because I never got to play then multiplayer. I'm excited for the collection because I didn't own them all and there's a chance there will be online pvp
i first played 4 and liked it. then got 3 and loved it. couldn’t beat 3 as a kid though. I didn’t enjoy 5 as liberation missions felt so different. Excited to try 1,2 and 6 soon
@@CobraCodex yeah as a kid I had like, 2 chips that could break Bass' barrier. It was rough. Got through it once then realized I didn't get to save before the boss then quit. I think adult me can beat it though.
A question I have is what would be the best way to play this game in modern times i emulated it on pc and the controls felt wonky then I modded a 2ds xl and the controls still doesn’t feel right I want to get into this game but feel like these are obstacles
Hmm, I guess it depends on what exactly felt wonky. These games were designed for handhelds so maybe they'd feel more at home on a retro handheld emulator of some kind. Of course the Legacy Collection(s) for these games will be releasing sometime next year so assuming those turn out to be quality ports that would be the easiest way!
Bro, 3 and 6 are the best imo. 3 masterfully potential maxed the style change system and made it near perfect game mechanic wise also so much post end content that you'd spend months on completing, also the ending is such a tear jerker tugging on heart strings. By 6 the refinement and especially the beast system really added so much creativity and flare to the game and also the ending as well was a tear jerker it was the end of an era.... 3 and 6 are def my top 2. Also 1 more thing everyone seems to put 4 last....😂 can't say i disagree the music in it was a banger tho especially "peer pressure" and the goat "battle with myself". To be fair to the very 1st mmbn it was the starting point so it had an excuse to be somewhat boring and bad it was new terrain but future games def made a more stronger identity for themselves, 4 got no excuse to suck tho it was def a letdown for me since MMBN 3 was my first game and after beating that and coming to 4 i felt dissapointed. Great video, I subbed!
My question is will you have the options to swap out characters from the 2 versions of battle network 3 or 4 or 5 or 6? So I would say that okay you would have 2 versions of battle network 3 through 6 but I don’t know if there is any other differences from each versions other then the characters and soul abilities and in battle network 6 you have this ability to take on a different character ability I don’t know what it’s called but you press up and select the character ability you wish to use. I can’t remember the name of it but it made mega man battle network 6 my favorite game
My guess is that you’ll simply pick the version you want to play from the start menu. At most, I could see some exclusive chips being transferrable like in the Wii U virtual console versions.
Interesting list. I appreciate your differing perspective of the games and your insight has altered my own personal ranking slightly. That being said, I thought 4 was pretty good actually, surpassing 1 and 5. The concept of each version have a selection of different scenarios that you would only see 9 of. And the endless combinations that could come from it was a very cool idea and gave a lot of replayability. But I will admit that the park/ShadeMan was very tedious. Especially after doing it for the 5th plus time. My ranking would have been: 6 > 3 > 2 > 4 > 5 > 1. 6 was fantastic and ended the series off superbly. Also the different versions fhad some major differences. ( Best Boss: Gregar, Worst Boss: Circus Man ) 3 was pretty great with only a few minor stumbles. I also don't think there was enough of a reason to spilt into two different versions. ( Best Boss: King Man, Worst Boss: Japan Man ) 2 was really good as it fixed a lot of the issues with 1 and had fantastic music and bosses. ( Best Boss: Knight Man, Worst Boss: Gate Man ) 4 was repetitive to be sure and you had to play it multiple times to see everything. But the idea of rng scenarios from a set amount was really cool and well implemented. Also two versions added to the complexity of possible scenarios. ( Best Boss: Search Man, Worst Boss Video Man ) 5 had some neat ideas as well like the RTS stuff and let you play as other navis.. But the encounter rate is ridiculous in that game. And the whole story felt pretty weak. Also both versions were very different so there was plenty of reasons to play both. ( Best Boss: Dark Colonel, Worst Boss: Dark Mega Man ) As you said, 1 is not a bad game. It's just very rough and limited. It was built upon by later games in the series that made it a great starting point and it created a whole new concept of gameplay. But some of the ideas in the game are highly questionable. The biggest issue being the need to get every regular chip the fight Magic Man and finish the game. ( Best Boss: Proto Man, Worst Boss: Color Man or Shark Man ) This is all just my opinion of course. Wanted to share in the appreciation for this series and give my own personal perspective.
Glad my perspective was able to spark some thought about your own ranking. I’m always interested in hearing other people’s opinions, especially when they take the time to go into some detail
I also enjoyed 4 though more for some of the game element improvements rather than story and level design. I loved that it finally introduced normal navi battles rather than having to fight viruses like a regular random encounter. I think they could have made these battles more difficult though by either improving the ai or giving them more advanced chip variety to use. I can’t agree with you about 6 being the best game though. 3 will always be the best in my mind bar none. It had the best story in the series, some of the best new navis (including my favorite navi in the franchise Serenade) and the best post-game content where you don’t even get physically introduced to Serenade until the post-game content. 6 had the worst navi design in the franchise in my opinion and deviated in art design from the rest in a way I did not find favorable to the overall look of the characters. The story was good but not as good as 3; having to work your way up the undernet ranks was so iconic. That’s just my personal take 🤷♂️
@@disillusioned8686 Thank you for giving your take on on 3, 4, and 6. Also I've gotta appreciate your politeness in disagreeing. Same as to the video creator. SPOILERS ⚠️ DO NOT READ PAST HERE IF YOU WANT TO BE SURPRISED BY MMBN 3, 4, AND 6. Going into my reasons a little deeper on these three games, I will completely agree that it was very intriguing to see some of the standard modesl of the Navi in combat for onceduring the course of 4. In game, we are told that most people use the standard models and thus why custom Navi's are so rare. But only in this game fo we get to see how they would fight in combat. And while they are pretty easy, it's still a cool bit of world building. ( However, I swear that if I'm forced to fight that effin chef in the park one more time when the collection is released. I'm gonna go Gordon Ramsay on his ass! ) The Dark chip is also a interesting choice to utilize in your first playthrough because the Custom Navi's in 4 have been amped up a bit so as to pressure your use of it. MMBN 4 can throw some nasty boss fights your way ( Like Video Man. Haaaaate Video Man. ) So the lure of the Dark Chip can be hard to ignore despite the draw backs. This all comes to a head when you lose the use of the Dark Chip right before the final boss and will thus get your butt destroyed by Duo. That reliance on the Dark Chip ends up costing you big time if your addicted to its power, so for future playthroughs you never touch the Dark Chip knowing it's more like a drug than a cure. Which I found to be a great addition in the game. One big negative towards 4 however. I have never found the chip needed to unfreeze the 4th satellite in Cold Man's mission. Wherever that chip is, there needs to be a direction on where to get it given its rarity. The internet wasn't as accessible as it is now after all. 3 and 6 are both very good games, and while I still think 6 is better than 3, I hear your points on them as well. For me, the combat is at its best with 6, the story is really good and it's inclusion of Gospel from MMBN 2 was a interesting collaboration to add tovthe overarching plot. The villains in 6 are also pretty great from Blast Man's User secret identity and their reasons to join the up with Wily, to Circus Man, Judge Man, and Elemental Man's users becoming a villainous trope after beating each of them in combat. There are other aspects to talk about like some of the overworld locations and the ending to the series. But in my opinion these reasons are good examples of why 6 is the best, for me that is. I also want to quickly mention a few minor gripes with 3. Before I do, keep in mind that I still feel 3 is second best. King Man's and Dark Man's bosses, the story, and the whole section with the Hospital are very big highs l. Serenade is also cool post game boss that really alters your normal strategy, just like Dark Man and Japan Man before them. But despite the good parts of the game, I found a few sections that lower my opinion of 3 enough to set it below 6. A few examples are the erroneous "Mega Man Style" system that is hard to get it to do what you want and getting new styles can take a lot of time if the system works properly. Another issue is a mandatory chip you need to progress the story near the end of the game. While it's not as bad as the one in 4, I still remember getting stuck and even resetting my game to the start because I could not progress without the chip. A final issue to bring up is the different version which is largely uneeded. Other than 2 or 3 Navi's and a few chips, there is almost no real reason to play MMBN White if you've played Blue or vice-versa. I have several other small complaints, but these are the bigger issues imo. Regardless, thank you for taking the time to read my silly little opinion and being respectful of our differences. Regardless of where we all stand, we can all be thankfully to finally get our hand on all the main line games in 2023. And I hope you all have a great time with it. I know I will!
@@CobraCodex Hey, wanted to make sure you were aware of the game: One Step From Eden. It's combat is absolutely inspired by MMBN and might be a interesting game to cover during this hype for the collection.
I agree with everything, but I would switch BN5 and BN6. BN6 would be S tier because like you said, it has the best combat system with the cross and cybeast system. Also the chips choices are so good while being balanced. Because of that, it has the best competitive yet balanced scene compared to BN3 and BN5. The competitive scene for BN6 is still alive today, and we’re so excited for the Switch legacy comeback. Cross fingers for the multiplayer over WiFi being back. As for BN5, I would put it in A tier. I agree with BN5’s liberation being new and really interesting. It’s pretty hard for me to understand why people didn’t like it, when it’s fun. The thing holding back for BN5 was the limitation on double soul and the Chaos unison and chips. Chaos unison was really cool, but being only for 1 turn doesn’t leave much impact. The chip choices were nerfed, so BN5 competitive scene isn’t great. But overall great tier list. Cheers for the legacy collection!!!
i loved MMBN 4... the dark chips were what i dreamed of because i saw the anime before i played the games. i no lifed 4 and played it the most out of all of them.
Battle network 3 was the only one i played as a lad and it was GAS. watching this video now to figure out which ones i will be playing on my miyoo mini
I actually agree with your tier placements 100%. And can confirm, BN 3 is but just nostalgia bias, it is actually just that good from a story and gameplay perspective.
Mega Man has easily become one of my top favorite franchises of all time, and it all started with Battle Network! I would play the games with my best friend just like the Pokemon games as a kid! I haven't played them all, but I do know, I beat the sixth game and absolutely LOVED it! Can't wait to play the whole saga!
Just gonna throw this out there regarding the sales because I find it interesting and I don't think enough people are aware of this. Sales started to drop because Capcom was just making way too many Megaman games at a certain point. I did some math a couple years ago regarding how many Megaman games were being released a year On average, from the year 2000 to 2009/2010, Capcom released 3 Megaman games per year if you didn't count alternate versions of the same game, Japan-exclusive games, and mobile games. If you did include all of those, it was an average of *7 Megaman Games A Year for an entire decade, wtf Capcom* It was too much, so Megaman sales as a whole fell off, so even games that were received well didn't sell well just because there were just too many games coming out at once. MMBN5 and 6 were victims of this, as they were released around the time sales started to fall off. The X series also suffered from this, as well as basically everything else Megaman related.
Absolutely, between X, Zero, and BN it was way too much. Capcom also entered a dark age following those years until Monster Hunter and Resident Evil started surging just a few years ago.
I got reeeeally lucky with Battle Network 4. It was the first game in the network series that I ever played on my Gameboy Advance SP. Then I went on to 3, 5, and 6. I'm waiting on the Legacy Collection to play 1 & 2.
Man I love these games. I remember after the Zero/Zx collection had been announced I had hoped they'd release an MMBN collection but not thinkin they actually would because even though I loved the series I didn't remember it being that popular, must have been the fallout from BN4 killing nay interest that I remember no one caring about the series, so when the collection was announced I practically crapped myself in disbelief, I'm so excited and I can't wait to jump back in. 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼
I think the series flew under the radar due to the shift in genre as well as maybe the comparison to Pokemon. Capcom was also oversaturating the market with Mega Man titles around that time so I think it turned into white noise for a lot of people.
@@CobraCodex Very true, I also remember this was still during the period in gaming culture where the general interests were in "mature" games with more adult themes, dark stories, gritty characters, and realism where anything that was kind of aimed at an ostensibly younger audience was seen as less than or outright ignored, even Pokémon for as huge as it was back then was still looked down upon as an "uncool kiddie games", I'm just glad that those garbage takes almost completely died out a decade ago and are long gone.
MMBN3 was my first and I feel that it still holds up. I could never defeat the final boss of that game back then. (I'm better at video games now so I can say I have beaten it.) MMBN4 is terrible. I replayed Red Son and I got roll and gutsoul. Man, I hated those souls. Guts man is okay but Roll is the worst! (Like her as a character, hate her as a soul navi.) I enjoyed MMBN5, Colonel is the better version, IMO. WIth MMBN6 it's hard to say as both Falzar and Gregar are both powerhouses and useful. I like the navis in Gregar better but Falzar gives you floatshoes and a tri attack.
It's funny you say that about Roll Soul since it's widely considered the best in the game for PvP at least. Looking forward to playing Falzar thoroughly for the first time since I've only really dabbled with it before now
I never played 1 through and never played competitively/PVP, and started with 5. My tier list is then going to be based on how much I currently remember liking the story/gameplay. so in S tier I put 2 and 3. A tier - 5 and 6. B tier - 1. That about wraps that up.
@@ramsesjfg7668 I like CosmoMan a lot, but I tend to prefer the more humanoid navi designs than ones like BlizzardMan and CloudMan. They're solid adaptations of their robot master counterparts though!
CobraCodex: it's a shame these games aren't more accessible Capcom: y'know I'm in a good mood today... Also personal opinion: I never knew that BN5 was controversial. The story and gameplay was really good. Its definitely a better version of 4. I'd say just skip 4 and go to 5. Also colonel is the cannon game
Starforce was definitely a different beast, and I understand you stopping at 2 but if you're a battle network fan I HIGHLY recommend Starforce 3. The noise system they introduced in that was really awesome and they even implemented their own versions of program advances
@@CobraCodex hopefully all of the hype I've seen for the BN Legacy Collection will translate into enough sales for Capcom to consider putting time into something like that. Reworking some of the DS gimmicks would take time I'd imagine but hopefully it wouldn't be much more challenging than what had to be done for the Z/X series.
The only change I'd make is swapping out 5 and 6. For me personally, it goes 3 > 6 > 2 > 5 > 1. What? "Where's 4?" What is this "Mega Man Battle Network 4" of which you speak?
Not sure anyone mentioned it but you said MMBN 3 white had folderback, it did not, white lacked a few extra bosses, didnt have mr famous,. White had serenade chip, which I think is the most damaging chip in the game if all the setup is done. Blue had folder back which was a literal get out of jail free card with unlimited uses. Also they had style change unique ones, but both unique ones sucked, just stick to custom or bug style.
White was trash compared to Blue. Glad I got Blue. Although MMBN 3 Black version should have been localized. It was Japan exclusive so we never got it here it was both black and white with extra content shame it never released here.
Yea I simply misremembered/said the wrong version. Blue has more going for it, but some of the changes felt out of place to me. Could be because I played white first tho lol
I've gotten into Battle Network kinda backwards I played starforce 2 first and I looked up Battle Network games because they had similar battle systems so I found B.N 5 but I didn't get far because my DS went kaput so I haven't been able to complete it but with the B.N collection on horizon I'm excited to play not only 5 but all the others. P.S I'm really hoping for a Starforce collection to release not too long after.
With the way Capcom has been releasing these collections I wouldn't be surprised if we got a starforce collection. It gets tricky porting DS games to modern platforms though since many of them relied on the second screen. Haven't played ZX or ZX Advent though so idk how those were handled in that collection.
@@CobraCodex They made the right analog stick control the touchscreen mechanics in ZX and ZX Advent. The size of the touchscreen was also adjustable. Wouldn't be suprised if they did something similiar for a Starforce collection.
Comment section story time: Blue Moon was my first Battle Network game and I actually played the shit out of it as an 8 year old. Obviously as a kid, I didn't really have a concept of good or bad games, I just found the gameplay very enticing. Fast forward like 4 or 5 years and I had the sudden urge to revisit the series so I downloaded an emulator on my high school laptop and searched up "megaman battle network blue" not realizing Blue and Blue Moon were 2 completely separate games. To my pleasant surprise, Blue completely blew my mind with how good it was, even more so that I remember the game being and only a few years after that did I realize I downloaded a different game. I went back to try and replay Blue Moon and, now that I was older, realized it was a pretty bad game in comparison to the rest of the franchise.
I agree that complain for mmbn 3 with the required chips, but like it doesn't feel that intrusive to me. I only ever sacrificed some plus 1 chips and then reworked the whole thing, idk it's satisfying for me to do that shit
For me, my favorite of the franchise tends to change between BN3, 5, or 6 depending on my mood with BN2 following behind those and BN4 being behind that. BN1's not a bad game but like you said, since it's the first game in the series it shows its age more. Honestly, even with BN4 being the elephant in the room that it is, this is really a series where you can play any game and still have a pretty good time. I can't say that any of them are bad, just varying levels of good with the high's being really high and the low's being pretty low yet still enjoyable enough to still be worth playing.
I also love 3 and 5 the most, though my issue with 3 is kinda trivial but it really bother me with how the Megaman's sprite in combat look, regardless of what style you are in when you attack with Battle Chip or doing any action, Megaman's sprite will revert back to the normal style, look like the devs didn't made the sprite animation for each style.
For me, 3 > 6 > 2 > 5 > 4. I never played 1 3) was also my first game in the series, but overall story and combat it was the best. Main criticism is that I do think the middle game is weak, with the plantman and flameman arcs being incredibly tedious, but it has such a strong early and late game that it offsets that. Alpha is by far the best final boss, both from gameplay design and story. One other thing is that MMBN3 has the best postgame imo, where it still ties into the story but has accessible goals that aren’t overwhelming while still being very challenging. Serenade in particular is probably my favorite secret boss of all the postgames. 6) controversial, but I think that this game had the potential to have both the best combat and best story. I do agree that the cross system wasn’t the best, but I think this game introduced allowing you to play as other navis in a far better way than 5 did. The biggest criticism to me is that the game was too short and the arcs never felt fully fleshed out (and the cybeasts never felt impactful as their own villains, rather just as a tool for the actual characters of the story). 2) I thought 2 was the most consistent. There were no parts of the game that truly felt tedious (which even 3 did), and I thought this game had better pacing than any of them. Of course, they were still figuring out the combat system, and once you had access to gater halfway through the game was essentially completely trivialized, but story and gameplay it was really solid. 5) there’s a drop off, but I still enjoyed the game. I think the liberation missions were a solid gimmick and I didn’t hate them, but I do wish they weren’t such a core aspect of the game - it felt almost cartoonish the way they were integrated into the main storyline. Very little replay value and the story was definitely on the weaker side - this game was definitely one where a version split was a terrible idea, as if you played team protoman, canonically MMBN6 makes no sense (MMBN6 introduce Barry and colonel as these fan favorite characters that everyone should know but if you never played team colonel you’re like who tf are these people and why should I care about them) 4) truly horrendous in every aspect. terrible story, terrible gameplay, tedious throughout - instead of taking the good of the previous entries and building on it, it took everything that made MMBN bad and made a whole game out of it. The forced replay, the dark chip system being such a core part of the game but being way too punitive to ever utilize, the nonexistent plot and pacing… Christ it was so bad. I understood the desire to move away from the broken PA system and revamp the folder building mechanics, but they absolutely obliterated any cohesion when it came to folder building in this game, and if ever there was a game where they needed to keep a broken system to make the game quicker, this was it. Even the OST and other small supporting parts of this game were the worst of the series. like you said, there was absolutely no excuse for MMBN4 to be as bad as it was considering how amazing 3 was.
Hey, thanks for this ranking. I agree that 3 was definitely the best in the series. 2 was probably my second favorite because some of the boss battles were really memorable (like shadowman with his ghost clones). I know everyone seems to hate 4. I didn’t think it was so bad when I played it but can see the complaints about the story elements and forcing people to play multiple times for all the content was bad design. What I mainly noticed about 4 (which is probably why I had a less negative opinion of it) is that you finally got to fight normal navis for the first time instead of enemy characters just attacking you with viruses. Sure they might have been a little too easy in combat but I still appreciated being able to fight the actual navis. Also I thought it had good enemy boss designs (Cosmoman and some of the others were cool). I wasn’t a huge fan of the liberation missions in 5 and I thought 6 had by far the WORST navi designs in the franchise. Did you ever play MMBN 4.5? There is an english translation mod available for the emulation. It is a bit tedious but still cool to get to play as different navis (something I liked about 5)
Good point about 4 having generic navis to battle instead of just viruses. I thought that was cool too when I first saw it. I haven't played 4.5 or operation shooting star, but I might check them out when I replay the series next year.
I also hate the different versions both Pokémon and Battle Network do, but I'll give BN this... Having BN5 and BN6 give you COMPLETELY different Navis to play and fuse with I think is enough to warrant version differences. They have their own different scenarios and minigames too, which makes each version actually unique. Compared to only a handful of differences with Pokémon versions. Usually just a few scenes, colors, Pokémon, and maybe a Gym or 2.
I mostly agree, especially in comparison to Pokemon. But as we saw with Star Force and 5 Double Team, they could have just allowed you to pick which version to play within one cartridge.
1 < 4 < 2 < 6 < 3 < 5 for me. I've played through Battle Chip Challenge and a bit of 4.5 as well. BCC is a decent distraction. Good to play while watching TV. 4.5 is interesting, kinda hard to make good progress without the Battle Chip Gate since getting new chips in game is so tough.
5 > 6 > 4 > 3 > 2 > 1 I personally thought EVERY sequel improved upon its predecessors. Although 5 is still my favorite due to being easily the most well rounded entry plus building a team, making Megaman stronger, and going on missions was an awesome experience. 6 easily had the best combat and some cool new features but was held back by the noticibly blander plot / navis (I think they were out of ideas by that point). 4 gets WAY more hate than it deserves, best Navis by far and the best setting by far (tournaments AND fighting around the world was AWESOME). If it wasnt for the stupid end game / restrictions it could have easily been the best entry (a few gameplay aspects would best be tweaked a bit too like dark chips lol). 3 is great but overrated, still didn't quite hit the "modernized" feel 4,5, and 6 had. Also I hated style changes. Possibly the best end game though, cool navis, and nostalgia factor for being my first battle network game. 2 and 1 are what they are, they were the prototype for the rest of the series and were still fun games imo.
5's dynamic between dark and light is amazing of how it brings choices for PVP. Basically dark is a "OG" build allowing you to have 3 dark chips which are giga-chips in all but name. You are allowed Muramasa and Anubis too. For light you can have soul/chaos unison with unique mechanics per version which are powerful but needs charge time. My only gripe about 5 is how colonel soul is so damn useless and how Protoman's team is absurdly strong with searchman, Napalmman, medi and magnetman. They could have balanced it out a bit.
5 was my first game in the franchise and I loved it and still love it. After playing a majority of 2, finishing 3, 5, and 6 it's not the best one imo but I liked liberation missions and being able to actually play as other Navi's besides megaman.
I agree with most of this, though I don't think 4 is actively bad after replaying it. It is very bad compared to 3 which it immediately follows. If it was the 2nd in the series it might be seen more favorably. Also I don't think 5 is S tier, A seemed more appropriate. It's no 3. And I think 6 is definitely in 2nd or even 1st. 3 is really great but I think if you take nostalgia out of the equation it's not as good as 6.
I'm interested to see how I feel about 4 once I get to replaying it. My gut says I was too harsh on it in this video but I guess we'll see soon enough. Also, I've gone back and forth on whether 3 or 5 is my #1. I think 3 edges it out even though I've probably played 5 more thanks to the DS version, whereas 6 is pretty definitively in 3rd place for me but is a contender for S depending on the day.
They don’t even have to go all out on many new features. Please just make multiplayer accessible. I would play the shit out of 3 and 6 Would be even cooler if you get rewards for winning online games. Like points that let you craft chips or let’s you automatically change styles. Or you can have more than one style at once per file So much potential. So many classic games in the late 90s anf early 2000s have gotten legacy/ definitive editions to modernize and improve the games. To be honest this shouldn’t be that hard for a company as big as Capcom. Just make a universal online multiplayer menu that you can go into. Choose your game. Have the same reward system where the more you play the more rewards that you can get to spend across all games. This online community is already solid as is. And a lot of people would love to get back inti it who didn’t as kids.
5 trumps 6 by a smidge because the double souls you get feel more plot driven and i felt more attached. My big complaint with 6 is that the link navis are so meaningless to the plot excpet 1 time you need them.
Having to play through BN4 three times to get everything wouldn't be so bad if the game wasn't god awful. If 3 & 6 (my personal favorites) had three playthroughs worth of content in them I'd be elated. Definitely too the reason why the members of Team Colonel fits better is because BN5 in japan did the same thing BN3 did. Team Protoman was released first and Team Colonel released a while later. In BN6 you can for a fact just choose to only get the first cross and ignore the rest. It's interesting that getting the other crosses is optional as I read that the minigames for the cross missions take up large portions of both version's filesizes. I can't wait for the collection. I've yet to buy any of these Megaman collections aside from owning the Zero Collection that released on the DS years ago. The music for these games is god tier. It's a shame the speaker for the original gba is so bad so some people don't realize how good the music is, especially the boss themes.
Trying my best to hold in commenting before you get to the "actively bad entry" to hear you out, and now that I've heard your schpiel on 4 I've gotta argue against "actively bad tier" First off lets admit that 4 was my first mmbn game, there's some nostalgia there, but I've played the full series now and I think that the thing mmbn4 suffers the most from is expectation. mmbn3 is a very good game, and 4 did the same plot (repeated tournament arcs, ending with the winner, you, defeating an "unexpected" big bad). mmbn3 absolutely did a better job here, there's no argument, but neither is what you would call a plot you would play the game for. Similarly, the translation isn't great, but it isn't in the entire series, so once again, I'm calling that a wash. What you're playing the battle network games for is their gameplay, and 4's gameplay at its core is quite good. Double soul set the stage for the systems the rest of the series would use, and gave you the ability to switch between forms on a fly, rather than getting one, MAYBE two forms to try the entire game in 2 and 3. I think this was probably the basis for only giving a player half the souls in their version during their first runthrough, "we're giving them way more than in prior games to use!" Was splitting the forms up between runs a bad move? Yes. Was it a step in the right direction from style changes? Also yes. Meanwhile, mmbn1 is ROUGH. As you said, anecdotally, people have bounced off 1. While I agree SOME leeway should be given as it was pioneering a style of gameplay that hadn't really seen much, if any, exploration before, it has a lot of worst in series. Worst bosses, worst chips (don't forget, we didn't even see * chips until 2!), and don't forget hitting multiple points in the game where you were simply told "You don't have enough chips or upgrades to advance the plot." Given that this is a tier list comparing the games to one another, the forgiveness for 1 shouldn't be that strong. When I recommend people try the series, I tell them to skip 1, I don't tell them anything of the like about 4. I think people bounced after 4 not because it was a big drop in quality, but rather because capcom was putting out 6 games (plus some spinoffs! 4.5, battle chip challenge, network transmission, plus more than didn't make it west) in just 4 years (2001 to 2005) and the audience had become saturated with them. Finally, lets talk about three things mmbn4 did differently than anything else in the series: enemy navis, dark chips, and postgame content. First, enemy navis: In addition to giving roll her only time on the battlefield series wide, mmbn4 also let you fight against generic navis, heel navis, etc. This was a cool mechanic that gave you some unique midboss encounters that used an assortment of chips you may or may not have seen, along with actually fighting entities other than viruses outside of mainstay boss fights. The chip variety made them easy to keep interesting, and they mixed things up more than usual for big fights. Darkchips, ultimately are a mess in 4. The idea of "very strong attack that permanently reduces stats" is cool in theory but bad in practice. Permanently reducing stats in a game with competitive PvP is a terrible idea, and so most players are never using dark chips. They're put in at 5 with less emphasis, but better execution, and most people don't really talk about them outside of chaos unions, which are a cool progression of soul unison. Now, postgame, this is the big one people hit on, and I feel like its hit on by series superfans, not new players. For those who don't know, the battle network games have a lot of postgame content. This content is generally gated behind completionist actions, like getting every chip. In 4, instead, there's a new game plus. Every enemy is harder, drops new and better chips, and you get different plot scenarios. A lot of folks are mad that you had to play through new game plus 2 additional times (3 runs total), to see all the content. Meanwhile, new players may have beaten the game, gone, "That was cool!" and put it down. Given that the postgame content in other games isn't much hinted at, and ultimately results in extremely difficult encounters, much more threatening than anything in the main plotline, I think this was an attempt to guide players up to that level gradually, instead of beating the game and wishing them well on finding the rest and beating it. I think this is, ultimately, the big complaint people have, and something the series veterans didn't need, which is why it's so often derided among series superfans. Wow That was a massive wall of text that I didn't mean to take so far. If you read this far, good on you.
Look honestly, the "actively bad" tier was purposefully inflammatory in a way I usually am not on the channel. I must've been feeling particularly spicy the day I recorded this but that doesn't mean I like 4 any more than I stated in the video. I've commented a few times that I'd probably place BN1 below 4 in retrospect, but I am planning to play all of them again once the LC comes out. I will concede the combat is good in 4, it's basically the same as 5 which I ranked very highly. Despite the highlight of BN being the gameplay as opposed to story, I prefer when a game delivers on both (I have another video in the works regarding this), because when I replay a game I'm typically not content with skipping through the story unless I have a specific other goal in mind like a nuzlocke in Pokemon for example. At least I do say to try all the games since they all have pros and cons to them, though skipping 1 might be a good idea since it could rub people the wrong way on certain things that aren't an issue through the rest of the series.
I've only played through 1, 2 and the DS version of 5 so it's a good chance to actually play them as a cohesive story. 5 was probably my favourite from that bunch and yeah I remember not originally appreciating the liberation missions on my 1st playthrough, however on my 2nd it made me realise how much it shakes up the gameplay in an interesting manor.
Rewatching this video and I don't think it's really fair to say BN4 killed the series at all I remember loving it as a kid and it made me want to get both versions of 5 when I saw them and Ironically I remembered thinking 5 was great but that it wasn't as good as 4 (when I was a kid) I actually loved the multiple playthroughs thing back then and the awesome designs and double souls are dope and I'm a sucker for tournament arcs I also think Starforce and shooting star shows they wanted to continue the series they just wanted to do something different because everyone was burnt out from yearly releases, and they wanted something that took more advantage of the 3D capabilities of the DS
In retrospect I got a little carried away about BN4, Capcom just spammed Mega Man games too much in that time frame in general which led to burn out and decreasing sales
MMBN4 could be so much better if they just condensed the whole thing into one singular play through. There is so much padding and unnecessary unimportant bullshit that you have to do in those games where you fight generic navis who don’t matter and if you just replaced them with the important ones you’d have a full game. It’s so infuriating and was absolutely a decision from higher up in capcom.
I'd rather them code all 6 games into one game, that way all viruses/navis & chips/items are collectable & your able to go back to old areas & enemies from the earlier games, then when you clear one game you move to the next, keep navicust parts & styles/transformations carrying over progress, I'd say all you need to do is reduces the hp+ data crystals to 5hp or so & hard cap at 1000hp, where you just get zennies for the rest of the games if you collected them all in the first 3 games. Additionally getting every navi & cross/beast of every character would just be amazing even if over kill, the amount of transformations chips & everything would make multi-player really slap home. Lastly top it off with a ability to play as every navi in battle/overworld map with their navi owner in a weird replace lan kinda way, which would also be incredibly fun. Also if a ultimate battle style was given to bn3 where you have the feet/buster/helm & whatnot all on megaman at the same time would add to the cool factor sort of like how in megaman x you collect body armor part upgrades.
That would be sick, though I think something that ambitious would make sense to be it's own game/mode separate from the collection itself. It certainly would streamline things as far as multiplayer in concerned though.
However, I do wonder if they're making significant changes which are causing the delay. There has to be a reason, as you'd think Capcom would've just given us a bunch of ROMs by now if not.
@@CobraCodex it's a toss up, people are calling Capcom lazy over some stuff they are doing with Resident Evil, but I don't know, then you have games like the Sega sonic collection that's getting released with less feature than the same collection 20 years ago on gamecube. So I don't put much stock in collections beyond slapping paint on a game few & a high price tag. I'm just thinking there is alot of potential with battlenetwork that could even go as far as paying for navi skins/styles & such, most people would buy a bass style/overworld navi for an easy 5$ do that for most navis & the game will make a killing, just add a way to earn in-game points for the styles if you want to grind them & it'd be a really fair system. Then the possibly of a map editor that let's yiu build/customize the players HP network zone with different tiles & stuff & have it connect to other players building an player made net to explore & battle trade with other players, which sounds insane & alot of work but would be the coolest thing ever done.
Spot on in most regards. I think many would agree that 3 is the best game of the series. But.. 4 is "actively bad"?? 4 was my introduction to the series, so maybe I'm just biased and blinded by nostalgia, but 4 is A tier in my book, although I was incredibly surprised to learn that it is one of the best sellers. Wouldn't have expected that at all.
I may have been harsher on 4 than I should’ve been. I personally don’t care for it primarily because of it’s structure, story, and dungeons; but because MMBN1 is so bare bones I’d probably rank that at the bottom.
This is like saying GT was your introduction to Dragon Ball and being upset when people criticize it when people say it's bad compared to the first two series.
I started the series with 4 and then played 5 and 6. Played through a bit of bn1 on an emulator but I couldn't finish it, it got too boring and I'ma be real the style changes are what turn me on. Also maybe because it was my first I like 4 and don't understand the hate.
Kinda surprised 5 managed to go above 6, but eh. Also, I never really considered these games "JRPGs", just Card battle games with RPG mechanics. Something like Chain of Memories I'd say better fits the "RPG" status. Heck, Ratchet and Clank better fits the Action RPG status than BN. Also, despite being a big fan of the series, I don't want an official BN7. Battle Network ended with a good finale. It didn't overstay its welcome (Unlike standard Pokemon games). Also, why did you call PETs "Toys" as far as what they are in-universe?
I think the only major RPG component missing from BN is leveling up in the traditional sense. Also while I do agree leaving a series be after a fitting finale is nice (and all too rare these days), I think it's been long enough to warrant Capcom revisiting some of their dormant series. I don't mind Star Force being a BN7 in spirit, but I just don't like the over the shoulder battle system as much as the top down one. Regarding PET's I was referring to the IRL toys, not in universe. I maybe could've been more clear on that.
It looks like Mega Man 2 (NES) is actually the best selling Mega Man game but MMBN4 is not far behind so the point still stands.
Edit: 10k views is insane, thank you!
I'm watching this after the collection was announced. I only played the 4th game as a kid (lol), but I'm looking forward to playing the collection.
Oh you are in for a treat 😁
Honestly that may be the worst one, but I still loved it. 2-3 are great
BN4 was my first game in the series, and absolutely love it. Ive always been a fan of Tournament arcs.
oh buddy you are in for a great and wild ride! :D
@@jb0258 agreed bn4 ,6,5,3 are my favorites
It's so fun to find other people who had similar experiences with this series sharing theirs these last couple of years and especially now that the legacy collection has been announced. MMBN3 was my first in the series and also happened to be one of my first GBA SP games (along with Pokemon Leaf Green funnily enough) and it still holds as my fav in the series and one of my absolute FAVORITE games to this day. This series was so good and it really deserved so much more than it was given throughout the years. I hope it gains a new wave of fans with this legacy collection because it deserves it.
Dude, I had the exact same experience!
We were incredibly spoiled for our first GBA SP games. I remember playing leaf green and being disappointed when I played a game that had next gen of Pokemon (Ruby) but the game was unpolished and I'd been spoiled with Leaf Green.
As for BN3, I was lucky they ran out of the first two titles because I didn't like the box art for 3 at all. Game blew me away with the quality and details you get interacting with the environment.
Bn3 was my first too
Ah Battle Network 4 Red Sun's infamous line "What a polite young man she was!"
5DS was probably my favourite. The added map on the bottom screen made traveling through the web sooo much smoother
5 might be my most played BN thanks to the DS verison
I have such a hard time picking between 6 and 3 as my favorite. I hadn't played 1 or 2 untill recently and 1 definitely surprised me in it's quality. Especially in it's animation.
Great video!
Also, you're one of the first people I've heard. Talk about the binaural audio! The split between the left and right channel really does make the soundtrack. Helps You feel immersed in the internet part of the worlds!
Great choices!
I actually considered putting 6 in S tier since it's easily top 3 for me, primarily because of the combat.
I felt like it would make the tier list a little top heavy though. And I absolutely agree on the binaural audio, music is a HUGE factor in games for me and I'd love to see more games utilize this.
Forlderbak was in Blue version, White version had Navibak
Style change in BN3 reduced the number you could keep as options from 2 to 1, and some inherent features of each style were changed into navi customizer program unlockables that could be used even if you stopped using a particular style.
In general, style changes occur based on your actions taken over a couple hundred battles between each style change. Guts comes from copious buster usage, Team comes from relying on navi chips, Custom comes from using as many (non-navi) chips in a turn as possible, Shield comes from relying on healing and defense type chips, and Bug comes from fighting with errors in your Navi Customizer. Shadow style (blue exclusive) comes from spamming the invis chip, and Ground style (white exclusive) comes from using chips that change panel types.
The element that comes with the style you get is random.
One of the best and most unique battle mechanics in all of jrpgs ive played, very very fun mechanics
It's great to see that they're bringing MMBN back. LOVED it in my teens (MMBN2 was my favorite). I reeeeeeeally hope Legacy sells well so that we can maybe get a new installment. Who knows, here's hoping ;)
3 > 6 > 2 > 5 > 1 >> 4
MMBN 3 was my starting point as a child, and still my favorite after playing the rest multiple times. Story, gameplay, and cool factor were all there!
MMBN 6 is the culmination of all of the games, and I really did appreciate everything the game had to offer, but there was cut content I really wanted to play… Regardless, it was a great game.
MMBN 2 is an amazing sequel to MMBN 1! The chip combos were ridiculous in this game and nothing felt hard. Gator on everything was the easy mode button.
MMBN5 was… ok. I wasn’t a fan of the liberation missions until I grew older, but some viruses in the post game made it stupidly difficult, especially if you’re trying to 100% the game, and you have to reset your game in the liberation mission to do it again. Apart from that, it’s a big step up from 4.
MMBN was the starting point and I played it after MMBN 4, I can see the criticism behind the lack of features future entries made possible, but then OSS mitigated that concern. I hope the Legacy collection inputs those features. I still hate the Elecman chapter as a kid.
MMBN 4 is rough. Story doesn’t make sense, tournament repeats, and frankly I don’t want to replay it. However, I do see the pros in the game. Souls are incredibly stylish, and gameplay is really fun, but replaying the game three times to get all of the souls, going through repeat cut scenes and dumb sidequests almost make it not worth it. Air Hockey broke tbh.
Dumb
Totally agreed. Also 4 is extremely short.
@@LefterisTim This is basically my tier list as well, awesome!! I love 2 so much I might place it above 6 but I haven't finished 6 yet so guess I need to wait and see. :)
I love this game I'm still playing now. The nostalgia gets me going but if they get back into it it can definitely be another competitors. I don't know why they stop but I heard more supposed to come
I’m so pumped that the new collection is coming out soon I used to play 3-6 back in the day with my friend and we both had link cables the competitive was so great so hopefully they do more with that. Also having the steamdeck now I have been emulating these and remembering how damn good they are
I'm curious to see how they handle multiplayer for the LC, and excited to maybe battle some of y'all on stream when the time comes lol
I think 6 really nailed the unique "armor" and "risk" systems.
The Cross and Beast-Out systems is one of the reasons I can come back to 6 at anytime and enjoy a straight beginning to end playthrough.
To me it takes 6's combat a while to get going. Once it does it's awesome, but I guess the same could be said for 5 which I placed above it.
@@CobraCodex Yeah 5 lives and dies by Liberation missions. I personally don't like them at all, but it did pave the way for other playable Navis.
I’ve played every game in the MMBN series except the first two games and BN3 Blue, and I can’t wait to play the series roots with the new collection. This rivaled Pokémon for me on GBA, I cried when they announced it. Love the video dude! If the collection has online play I’d love to battle you!
Bn3 was insane. The plot. The battle system. The styles. The post game. The codes for the custom.
Such a deep beautiful game. Even as the game mechanics improved... it never got better
And 4 was so bad. I remember even as a kid how disappointed I was in 4. I was so excited about the character crosses. I always wanted to play as other characters but the execution was terrible
You mentioned the competitive scene is dead, but there is still an active scene look up N1 Grand Prix on TH-cam. They're still doing online tournaments even today.
I should’ve figured something like that existed. Will definitely check it out when I get a chance.
Great review!!!! :) so happy with the new release!!!
I just bought the legacy collection. I only ever played bn3 so I'm glad to be able to try them all! (Even the bad ones) I'm so psyched to see this game series still has a following, it's really nostalgic for me
Megaman Battle Chip Challenge. It’s a remake of a Wonderswan game, where combat is much less action-based and more turn-based, and you effectively build a combat “program” more than a deck. It’s so different and I love it.
I should probably check that one out at some point, I feel like people don't really talk about it
Loved your vid, super nostalgic as I also grew up playing this franchise and MMBN 2 was my first one.
What I will say about 4 is it’s actually one of my favorite OST in the franchise, and 2 had some great hits. Also what was weird and annoying is that you had to clear the game TWICE to get all 6 double souls, which made it so tedious cause it’s replay value was shit.
Praying for some great changes in the legacy collection. Thanks for ur vid! Subbed.
You manifested the collection.
I try to use my powers for good lol
So basically 3 was the best, saved the franchise and caused them to rush to get another one out, it sold the most because everyone loved and talked about how good 3 was, 4 was a major let down and ruined the chances of 5 & 6 doin well.
Eh, kind of. These games all released very soon after each other so I don't think 4 was any more rushed than the others. I do think 4 was a let down that may have caused 5+6 to not do as well but Capcom was saturating the market with Mega Man at the time in general so that's probably a bigger contributor. And even though they ended BN at 6, the spiritual successor Mega Man Star Force released just a year after BN6 in Japan so maybe that was the plan all along regardless of sales.
Nice Battle Network Legacy collection prediction
I remember they were gonna make a new Megaman Starforce for the 3ds that was gonna have Lan's descendant team up with the main character (Geo) and was apparently cancelled. I was sad to learn it was cancelled because A. I didn't even know they made a Starforce 2 and 3 and B. it would've connected Battle Network to Starforce (Although I remember an event in game for Starforce 1 where if you had a Battle Network game in the GBA slot of your DS you can meet Megaman from Network and he gives you his blaster!)
Yea there was Operate Shooting Star for DS but it was Japan only. At some point I'll have to replay the Star Force games, I don't remember very much besides the core combat
Going ti start my journey from the first game using GBA emulator
I can't wait for the collection on 2023!
I will get the collection too even after finishing all the games
I really like the game style and mechanics
Delta dropped on iOS and I’m finally going to complete BN3 and work my way up to BN5
So fun fact about the battle network series. They didn't stop the series because of poor numbers, but it was a creative choice to "move forward" when they swapped from GBA to DS.
(Edit) Also, the opponents for Battle Network 4 were predetermined based on the game format you were on. They'd always be the same on a New Game vs New Game + vs New Game ++. So if you NG++'ed, you would fight XYZ, but if you just NG'ed, you'd only fight ABC.
Good point, I forgot about them moving forward with Star Force even though I literally mentioned it at the beginning of the video lol. I would be interested to revisit those, I did enjoy what I played but I found the limited movement in combat to not be as enjoyable as BN.
Interesting tidbit about BN4, idk why I thought it was random. Granted I've only done like 1 playthrough of it lol
@@CobraCodex Okay, so... Apparently I was incorrect about the Tournament matches. There is pseudo randomness involved. Basically: The RNG involved makes it impossible to unlock all Souls until you've played NG++. Additionally, Tournament randomness is determined when the new game save is created, so you need to reset the entire playthrough to reshuffle opponents.
Still, a dumb choice to artificially inflate "game" time.
Watching this because I just found out the legacy collection is coming out and I’ve never played this but I remember the show and want to play these games
so, should i play battle network 3 blue or white? like, which one is more "preferable"?
White is like the vanilla version while Blue is the enhanced version, so to speak. So I'd go with Blue.
If the collection sells well I think Capcom could do a 7th. I just really want one with online PvP because I never got to play then multiplayer. I'm excited for the collection because I didn't own them all and there's a chance there will be online pvp
MMBN7 would be rad
There's a fairly large PvP community on discord, also, all 6 games can be played online with rollback netcode through a modded emulator
Same i wish i could have done pvp qwq
i first played 4 and liked it. then got 3 and loved it. couldn’t beat 3 as a kid though. I didn’t enjoy 5 as liberation missions felt so different. Excited to try 1,2 and 6 soon
3 was tough, can't wait for the LC to drop
@@CobraCodex yeah as a kid I had like, 2 chips that could break Bass' barrier. It was rough. Got through it once then realized I didn't get to save before the boss then quit. I think adult me can beat it though.
A question I have is what would be the best way to play this game in modern times i emulated it on pc and the controls felt wonky then I modded a 2ds xl and the controls still doesn’t feel right I want to get into this game but feel like these are obstacles
Hmm, I guess it depends on what exactly felt wonky. These games were designed for handhelds so maybe they'd feel more at home on a retro handheld emulator of some kind. Of course the Legacy Collection(s) for these games will be releasing sometime next year so assuming those turn out to be quality ports that would be the easiest way!
Bro, 3 and 6 are the best imo. 3 masterfully potential maxed the style change system and made it near perfect game mechanic wise also so much post end content that you'd spend months on completing, also the ending is such a tear jerker tugging on heart strings. By 6 the refinement and especially the beast system really added so much creativity and flare to the game and also the ending as well was a tear jerker it was the end of an era.... 3 and 6 are def my top 2. Also 1 more thing everyone seems to put 4 last....😂 can't say i disagree the music in it was a banger tho especially "peer pressure" and the goat "battle with myself". To be fair to the very 1st mmbn it was the starting point so it had an excuse to be somewhat boring and bad it was new terrain but future games def made a more stronger identity for themselves, 4 got no excuse to suck tho it was def a letdown for me since MMBN 3 was my first game and after beating that and coming to 4 i felt dissapointed. Great video, I subbed!
April 14th they are releasing the megaman legacy collection with trading and online functions.
Can't wait!
My question is will you have the options to swap out characters from the 2 versions of battle network 3 or 4 or 5 or 6? So I would say that okay you would have 2 versions of battle network 3 through 6 but I don’t know if there is any other differences from each versions other then the characters and soul abilities and in battle network 6 you have this ability to take on a different character ability I don’t know what it’s called but you press up and select the character ability you wish to use. I can’t remember the name of it but it made mega man battle network 6 my favorite game
My guess is that you’ll simply pick the version you want to play from the start menu. At most, I could see some exclusive chips being transferrable like in the Wii U virtual console versions.
We’ll we got what we wanted, they’re adding the online battling aspect 🙌🏼🙌🏼👏🏼
Interesting list. I appreciate your differing perspective of the games and your insight has altered my own personal ranking slightly.
That being said, I thought 4 was pretty good actually, surpassing 1 and 5. The concept of each version have a selection of different scenarios that you would only see 9 of. And the endless combinations that could come from it was a very cool idea and gave a lot of replayability. But I will admit that the park/ShadeMan was very tedious. Especially after doing it for the 5th plus time.
My ranking would have been: 6 > 3 > 2 > 4 > 5 > 1.
6 was fantastic and ended the series off superbly. Also the different versions fhad some major differences. ( Best Boss: Gregar, Worst Boss: Circus Man )
3 was pretty great with only a few minor stumbles. I also don't think there was enough of a reason to spilt into two different versions. ( Best Boss: King Man, Worst Boss: Japan Man )
2 was really good as it fixed a lot of the issues with 1 and had fantastic music and bosses. ( Best Boss: Knight Man, Worst Boss: Gate Man )
4 was repetitive to be sure and you had to play it multiple times to see everything. But the idea of rng scenarios from a set amount was really cool and well implemented. Also two versions added to the complexity of possible scenarios. ( Best Boss: Search Man, Worst Boss Video Man )
5 had some neat ideas as well like the RTS stuff and let you play as other navis.. But the encounter rate is ridiculous in that game. And the whole story felt pretty weak. Also both versions were very different so there was plenty of reasons to play both. ( Best Boss: Dark Colonel, Worst Boss: Dark Mega Man )
As you said, 1 is not a bad game. It's just very rough and limited. It was built upon by later games in the series that made it a great starting point and it created a whole new concept of gameplay. But some of the ideas in the game are highly questionable. The biggest issue being the need to get every regular chip the fight Magic Man and finish the game. ( Best Boss: Proto Man, Worst Boss: Color Man or Shark Man )
This is all just my opinion of course. Wanted to share in the appreciation for this series and give my own personal perspective.
Glad my perspective was able to spark some thought about your own ranking. I’m always interested in hearing other people’s opinions, especially when they take the time to go into some detail
I also enjoyed 4 though more for some of the game element improvements rather than story and level design. I loved that it finally introduced normal navi battles rather than having to fight viruses like a regular random encounter. I think they could have made these battles more difficult though by either improving the ai or giving them more advanced chip variety to use. I can’t agree with you about 6 being the best game though. 3 will always be the best in my mind bar none. It had the best story in the series, some of the best new navis (including my favorite navi in the franchise Serenade) and the best post-game content where you don’t even get physically introduced to Serenade until the post-game content. 6 had the worst navi design in the franchise in my opinion and deviated in art design from the rest in a way I did not find favorable to the overall look of the characters. The story was good but not as good as 3; having to work your way up the undernet ranks was so iconic. That’s just my personal take 🤷♂️
@@disillusioned8686 Thank you for giving your take on on 3, 4, and 6. Also I've gotta appreciate your politeness in disagreeing. Same as to the video creator.
SPOILERS ⚠️
DO NOT READ PAST HERE IF YOU WANT TO BE SURPRISED BY MMBN 3, 4, AND 6.
Going into my reasons a little deeper on these three games, I will completely agree that it was very intriguing to see some of the standard modesl of the Navi in combat for onceduring the course of 4. In game, we are told that most people use the standard models and thus why custom Navi's are so rare. But only in this game fo we get to see how they would fight in combat. And while they are pretty easy, it's still a cool bit of world building. ( However, I swear that if I'm forced to fight that effin chef in the park one more time when the collection is released. I'm gonna go Gordon Ramsay on his ass! )
The Dark chip is also a interesting choice to utilize in your first playthrough because the Custom Navi's in 4 have been amped up a bit so as to pressure your use of it. MMBN 4 can throw some nasty boss fights your way ( Like Video Man. Haaaaate Video Man. ) So the lure of the Dark Chip can be hard to ignore despite the draw backs. This all comes to a head when you lose the use of the Dark Chip right before the final boss and will thus get your butt destroyed by Duo. That reliance on the Dark Chip ends up costing you big time if your addicted to its power, so for future playthroughs you never touch the Dark Chip knowing it's more like a drug than a cure. Which I found to be a great addition in the game. One big negative towards 4 however. I have never found the chip needed to unfreeze the 4th satellite in Cold Man's mission. Wherever that chip is, there needs to be a direction on where to get it given its rarity. The internet wasn't as accessible as it is now after all.
3 and 6 are both very good games, and while I still think 6 is better than 3, I hear your points on them as well. For me, the combat is at its best with 6, the story is really good and it's inclusion of Gospel from MMBN 2 was a interesting collaboration to add tovthe overarching plot. The villains in 6 are also pretty great from Blast Man's User secret identity and their reasons to join the up with Wily, to Circus Man, Judge Man, and Elemental Man's users becoming a villainous trope after beating each of them in combat. There are other aspects to talk about like some of the overworld locations and the ending to the series. But in my opinion these reasons are good examples of why 6 is the best, for me that is.
I also want to quickly mention a few minor gripes with 3. Before I do, keep in mind that I still feel 3 is second best. King Man's and Dark Man's bosses, the story, and the whole section with the Hospital are very big highs l. Serenade is also cool post game boss that really alters your normal strategy, just like Dark Man and Japan Man before them. But despite the good parts of the game, I found a few sections that lower my opinion of 3 enough to set it below 6.
A few examples are the erroneous "Mega Man Style" system that is hard to get it to do what you want and getting new styles can take a lot of time if the system works properly. Another issue is a mandatory chip you need to progress the story near the end of the game. While it's not as bad as the one in 4, I still remember getting stuck and even resetting my game to the start because I could not progress without the chip. A final issue to bring up is the different version which is largely uneeded. Other than 2 or 3 Navi's and a few chips, there is almost no real reason to play MMBN White if you've played Blue or vice-versa. I have several other small complaints, but these are the bigger issues imo.
Regardless, thank you for taking the time to read my silly little opinion and being respectful of our differences. Regardless of where we all stand, we can all be thankfully to finally get our hand on all the main line games in 2023. And I hope you all have a great time with it. I know I will!
@@CobraCodex Hey, wanted to make sure you were aware of the game: One Step From Eden. It's combat is absolutely inspired by MMBN and might be a interesting game to cover during this hype for the collection.
Red Sun was so much better than Blue Moon though so the balance is absolute trash. Roll Soul too damn powerful.
I agree with everything, but I would switch BN5 and BN6. BN6 would be S tier because like you said, it has the best combat system with the cross and cybeast system. Also the chips choices are so good while being balanced. Because of that, it has the best competitive yet balanced scene compared to BN3 and BN5. The competitive scene for BN6 is still alive today, and we’re so excited for the Switch legacy comeback. Cross fingers for the multiplayer over WiFi being back. As for BN5, I would put it in A tier. I agree with BN5’s liberation being new and really interesting. It’s pretty hard for me to understand why people didn’t like it, when it’s fun. The thing holding back for BN5 was the limitation on double soul and the Chaos unison and chips. Chaos unison was really cool, but being only for 1 turn doesn’t leave much impact. The chip choices were nerfed, so BN5 competitive scene isn’t great. But overall great tier list. Cheers for the legacy collection!!!
Fair points all around, in retrospect I'd put 6 in S tier but I still prefer 5. Cheers!
i loved MMBN 4... the dark chips were what i dreamed of because i saw the anime before i played the games. i no lifed 4 and played it the most out of all of them.
That's fair! I just find 4 lacking in important factors for me compared to most of the series
Battle network 3 was the only one i played as a lad and it was GAS. watching this video now to figure out which ones i will be playing on my miyoo mini
Mmbn legacy collection gonna be very competitive and I’m so ready for it
Same here, I can't wait!
The only thing i want from Legacy Collection is these 2 things.
1. Chips are handed down from game to game.
2. Proper Multiplayer.
I actually agree with your tier placements 100%. And can confirm, BN 3 is but just nostalgia bias, it is actually just that good from a story and gameplay perspective.
Battle Network Legacy Collection will have online battles both private and public
Can't wait!
Mega Man has easily become one of my top favorite franchises of all time, and it all started with Battle Network! I would play the games with my best friend just like the Pokemon games as a kid! I haven't played them all, but I do know, I beat the sixth game and absolutely LOVED it! Can't wait to play the whole saga!
Just gonna throw this out there regarding the sales because I find it interesting and I don't think enough people are aware of this.
Sales started to drop because Capcom was just making way too many Megaman games at a certain point. I did some math a couple years ago regarding how many Megaman games were being released a year
On average, from the year 2000 to 2009/2010, Capcom released 3 Megaman games per year if you didn't count alternate versions of the same game, Japan-exclusive games, and mobile games. If you did include all of those, it was an average of *7 Megaman Games A Year for an entire decade, wtf Capcom*
It was too much, so Megaman sales as a whole fell off, so even games that were received well didn't sell well just because there were just too many games coming out at once. MMBN5 and 6 were victims of this, as they were released around the time sales started to fall off. The X series also suffered from this, as well as basically everything else Megaman related.
Absolutely, between X, Zero, and BN it was way too much. Capcom also entered a dark age following those years until Monster Hunter and Resident Evil started surging just a few years ago.
Great video man, I’m really looking forward to trying the series with the new collection. I 100% the entire X collection 😎
I got reeeeally lucky with Battle Network 4. It was the first game in the network series that I ever played on my Gameboy Advance SP. Then I went on to 3, 5, and 6. I'm waiting on the Legacy Collection to play 1 & 2.
Man I love these games. I remember after the Zero/Zx collection had been announced I had hoped they'd release an MMBN collection but not thinkin they actually would because even though I loved the series I didn't remember it being that popular, must have been the fallout from BN4 killing nay interest that I remember no one caring about the series, so when the collection was announced I practically crapped myself in disbelief, I'm so excited and I can't wait to jump back in. 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼
I think the series flew under the radar due to the shift in genre as well as maybe the comparison to Pokemon. Capcom was also oversaturating the market with Mega Man titles around that time so I think it turned into white noise for a lot of people.
@@CobraCodex Very true, I also remember this was still during the period in gaming culture where the general interests were in "mature" games with more adult themes, dark stories, gritty characters, and realism where anything that was kind of aimed at an ostensibly younger audience was seen as less than or outright ignored, even Pokémon for as huge as it was back then was still looked down upon as an "uncool kiddie games", I'm just glad that those garbage takes almost completely died out a decade ago and are long gone.
MMBN3 was my first and I feel that it still holds up. I could never defeat the final boss of that game back then. (I'm better at video games now so I can say I have beaten it.) MMBN4 is terrible. I replayed Red Son and I got roll and gutsoul. Man, I hated those souls. Guts man is okay but Roll is the worst! (Like her as a character, hate her as a soul navi.) I enjoyed MMBN5, Colonel is the better version, IMO. WIth MMBN6 it's hard to say as both Falzar and Gregar are both powerhouses and useful. I like the navis in Gregar better but Falzar gives you floatshoes and a tri attack.
It's funny you say that about Roll Soul since it's widely considered the best in the game for PvP at least. Looking forward to playing Falzar thoroughly for the first time since I've only really dabbled with it before now
I never played 1 through and never played competitively/PVP, and started with 5. My tier list is then going to be based on how much I currently remember liking the story/gameplay. so in S tier I put 2 and 3. A tier - 5 and 6. B tier - 1. That about wraps that up.
I've played every single game to death, and imo this is a perfect tier list
21:15 Highly disagree with this point, however. CloudMan and CosmoMan both have amazing villain designs. BlizzardMan has a great one too.
@@ramsesjfg7668 I like CosmoMan a lot, but I tend to prefer the more humanoid navi designs than ones like BlizzardMan and CloudMan. They're solid adaptations of their robot master counterparts though!
CobraCodex: it's a shame these games aren't more accessible
Capcom: y'know I'm in a good mood today...
Also personal opinion: I never knew that BN5 was controversial. The story and gameplay was really good. Its definitely a better version of 4. I'd say just skip 4 and go to 5. Also colonel is the cannon game
Lol 😂
Ive only ever played 5 and 6. And yes team Colonel ! Seeing 3 on the same tier as 5 makes me wanna try it out for sure
After a playing Mmbn6 and having access to crosses and beasting out, I don't think I could go back to any of the other games
Starforce was definitely a different beast, and I understand you stopping at 2 but if you're a battle network fan I HIGHLY recommend Starforce 3. The noise system they introduced in that was really awesome and they even implemented their own versions of program advances
I'm actually planning to revisit the star force games once I'm done replaying BN. Might wait and see if Capcom does an LC for those games too
@@CobraCodex hopefully all of the hype I've seen for the BN Legacy Collection will translate into enough sales for Capcom to consider putting time into something like that. Reworking some of the DS gimmicks would take time I'd imagine but hopefully it wouldn't be much more challenging than what had to be done for the Z/X series.
The only change I'd make is swapping out 5 and 6. For me personally, it goes 3 > 6 > 2 > 5 > 1.
What? "Where's 4?" What is this "Mega Man Battle Network 4" of which you speak?
Not sure anyone mentioned it but you said MMBN 3 white had folderback, it did not, white lacked a few extra bosses, didnt have mr famous,. White had serenade chip, which I think is the most damaging chip in the game if all the setup is done. Blue had folder back which was a literal get out of jail free card with unlimited uses. Also they had style change unique ones, but both unique ones sucked, just stick to custom or bug style.
White was trash compared to Blue. Glad I got Blue. Although MMBN 3 Black version should have been localized. It was Japan exclusive so we never got it here it was both black and white with extra content shame it never released here.
Yea I simply misremembered/said the wrong version. Blue has more going for it, but some of the changes felt out of place to me. Could be because I played white first tho lol
Switch 5 and 6 and this tierlist becomes perfectly accurate.
I've gotten into Battle Network kinda backwards I played starforce 2 first and I looked up Battle Network games because they had similar battle systems so I found B.N 5 but I didn't get far because my DS went kaput so I haven't been able to complete it but with the B.N collection on horizon I'm excited to play not only 5 but all the others.
P.S I'm really hoping for a Starforce collection to release not too long after.
With the way Capcom has been releasing these collections I wouldn't be surprised if we got a starforce collection. It gets tricky porting DS games to modern platforms though since many of them relied on the second screen. Haven't played ZX or ZX Advent though so idk how those were handled in that collection.
@@CobraCodex They made the right analog stick control the touchscreen mechanics in ZX and ZX Advent. The size of the touchscreen was also adjustable. Wouldn't be suprised if they did something similiar for a Starforce collection.
Pretty sure Folder Back is from the Black Version, which would be the Blue Version in America...? Oh well.
Yeah, it’s blue
Comment section story time: Blue Moon was my first Battle Network game and I actually played the shit out of it as an 8 year old. Obviously as a kid, I didn't really have a concept of good or bad games, I just found the gameplay very enticing. Fast forward like 4 or 5 years and I had the sudden urge to revisit the series so I downloaded an emulator on my high school laptop and searched up "megaman battle network blue" not realizing Blue and Blue Moon were 2 completely separate games. To my pleasant surprise, Blue completely blew my mind with how good it was, even more so that I remember the game being and only a few years after that did I realize I downloaded a different game. I went back to try and replay Blue Moon and, now that I was older, realized it was a pretty bad game in comparison to the rest of the franchise.
I agree that complain for mmbn 3 with the required chips, but like it doesn't feel that intrusive to me. I only ever sacrificed some plus 1 chips and then reworked the whole thing, idk it's satisfying for me to do that shit
Nintendo switch legacy collection happening soon! We will also be having online access so FINALLY PVP BATTLES!!!
For me, my favorite of the franchise tends to change between BN3, 5, or 6 depending on my mood with BN2 following behind those and BN4 being behind that. BN1's not a bad game but like you said, since it's the first game in the series it shows its age more. Honestly, even with BN4 being the elephant in the room that it is, this is really a series where you can play any game and still have a pretty good time. I can't say that any of them are bad, just varying levels of good with the high's being really high and the low's being pretty low yet still enjoyable enough to still be worth playing.
That's fair! I used to bounce between 3, 5 , and 6 as my favorite too. Pinpointing a number 1 for this video took a lot of deliberation lol
I also love 3 and 5 the most, though my issue with 3 is kinda trivial but it really bother me with how the Megaman's sprite in combat look, regardless of what style you are in when you attack with Battle Chip or doing any action, Megaman's sprite will revert back to the normal style, look like the devs didn't made the sprite animation for each style.
Interesting, I never noticed that. At least the color scheme remains the same but that's weird
1:35 Coincidentally enough, 3 Starforce games on the DS matches the 3 first X games that were on the SNES.
if you've seen the bn6 ending, i think bn7 should follow Lan's son Patch. if they ever make a bn7.
For me, 3 > 6 > 2 > 5 > 4. I never played 1
3) was also my first game in the series, but overall story and combat it was the best. Main criticism is that I do think the middle game is weak, with the plantman and flameman arcs being incredibly tedious, but it has such a strong early and late game that it offsets that. Alpha is by far the best final boss, both from gameplay design and story. One other thing is that MMBN3 has the best postgame imo, where it still ties into the story but has accessible goals that aren’t overwhelming while still being very challenging. Serenade in particular is probably my favorite secret boss of all the postgames.
6) controversial, but I think that this game had the potential to have both the best combat and best story. I do agree that the cross system wasn’t the best, but I think this game introduced allowing you to play as other navis in a far better way than 5 did. The biggest criticism to me is that the game was too short and the arcs never felt fully fleshed out (and the cybeasts never felt impactful as their own villains, rather just as a tool for the actual characters of the story).
2) I thought 2 was the most consistent. There were no parts of the game that truly felt tedious (which even 3 did), and I thought this game had better pacing than any of them. Of course, they were still figuring out the combat system, and once you had access to gater halfway through the game was essentially completely trivialized, but story and gameplay it was really solid.
5) there’s a drop off, but I still enjoyed the game. I think the liberation missions were a solid gimmick and I didn’t hate them, but I do wish they weren’t such a core aspect of the game - it felt almost cartoonish the way they were integrated into the main storyline. Very little replay value and the story was definitely on the weaker side - this game was definitely one where a version split was a terrible idea, as if you played team protoman, canonically MMBN6 makes no sense (MMBN6 introduce Barry and colonel as these fan favorite characters that everyone should know but if you never played team colonel you’re like who tf are these people and why should I care about them)
4) truly horrendous in every aspect. terrible story, terrible gameplay, tedious throughout - instead of taking the good of the previous entries and building on it, it took everything that made MMBN bad and made a whole game out of it. The forced replay, the dark chip system being such a core part of the game but being way too punitive to ever utilize, the nonexistent plot and pacing… Christ it was so bad. I understood the desire to move away from the broken PA system and revamp the folder building mechanics, but they absolutely obliterated any cohesion when it came to folder building in this game, and if ever there was a game where they needed to keep a broken system to make the game quicker, this was it. Even the OST and other small supporting parts of this game were the worst of the series. like you said, there was absolutely no excuse for MMBN4 to be as bad as it was considering how amazing 3 was.
Only 5 years huh? I guess as a kid, that IS forever but for me that was Megaman in the 2000's.
Checking the dates again it actually wasn't even a full 5 years, which is wild. Certainly felt a lot longer back then lol
i wish preorder bonus was good but still buying since i actuality own now.
Great video, thank you!
3 is easily the best hands down, 2 is my next favorite. i didnt like when they added the emotion thing and the navi combinations
Hey, thanks for this ranking. I agree that 3 was definitely the best in the series. 2 was probably my second favorite because some of the boss battles were really memorable (like shadowman with his ghost clones).
I know everyone seems to hate 4. I didn’t think it was so bad when I played it but can see the complaints about the story elements and forcing people to play multiple times for all the content was bad design. What I mainly noticed about 4 (which is probably why I had a less negative opinion of it) is that you finally got to fight normal navis for the first time instead of enemy characters just attacking you with viruses. Sure they might have been a little too easy in combat but I still appreciated being able to fight the actual navis. Also I thought it had good enemy boss designs (Cosmoman and some of the others were cool). I wasn’t a huge fan of the liberation missions in 5 and I thought 6 had by far the WORST navi designs in the franchise.
Did you ever play MMBN 4.5? There is an english translation mod available for the emulation. It is a bit tedious but still cool to get to play as different navis (something I liked about 5)
Good point about 4 having generic navis to battle instead of just viruses. I thought that was cool too when I first saw it. I haven't played 4.5 or operation shooting star, but I might check them out when I replay the series next year.
2 doesn’t get enough love. Its post-game play in the WWW zone was incredible.
I also hate the different versions both Pokémon and Battle Network do, but I'll give BN this...
Having BN5 and BN6 give you COMPLETELY different Navis to play and fuse with I think is enough to warrant version differences. They have their own different scenarios and minigames too, which makes each version actually unique.
Compared to only a handful of differences with Pokémon versions. Usually just a few scenes, colors, Pokémon, and maybe a Gym or 2.
I mostly agree, especially in comparison to Pokemon. But as we saw with Star Force and 5 Double Team, they could have just allowed you to pick which version to play within one cartridge.
Still can’t get over how bad the overlay in 4 was
1 < 4 < 2 < 6 < 3 < 5 for me.
I've played through Battle Chip Challenge and a bit of 4.5 as well.
BCC is a decent distraction. Good to play while watching TV.
4.5 is interesting, kinda hard to make good progress without the Battle Chip Gate since getting new chips in game is so tough.
For me:
3 = 6 > 5 > 2 > 1? 4?
I haven't finished 1 and 4 for different reasons
5 > 6 > 4 > 3 > 2 > 1
I personally thought EVERY sequel improved upon its predecessors. Although 5 is still my favorite due to being easily the most well rounded entry plus building a team, making Megaman stronger, and going on missions was an awesome experience.
6 easily had the best combat and some cool new features but was held back by the noticibly blander plot / navis (I think they were out of ideas by that point).
4 gets WAY more hate than it deserves, best Navis by far and the best setting by far (tournaments AND fighting around the world was AWESOME). If it wasnt for the stupid end game / restrictions it could have easily been the best entry (a few gameplay aspects would best be tweaked a bit too like dark chips lol).
3 is great but overrated, still didn't quite hit the "modernized" feel 4,5, and 6 had. Also I hated style changes. Possibly the best end game though, cool navis, and nostalgia factor for being my first battle network game.
2 and 1 are what they are, they were the prototype for the rest of the series and were still fun games imo.
5's dynamic between dark and light is amazing of how it brings choices for PVP. Basically dark is a "OG" build allowing you to have 3 dark chips which are giga-chips in all but name. You are allowed Muramasa and Anubis too. For light you can have soul/chaos unison with unique mechanics per version which are powerful but needs charge time.
My only gripe about 5 is how colonel soul is so damn useless and how Protoman's team is absurdly strong with searchman, Napalmman, medi and magnetman. They could have balanced it out a bit.
5 was my first game in the franchise and I loved it and still love it. After playing a majority of 2, finishing 3, 5, and 6 it's not the best one imo but I liked liberation missions and being able to actually play as other Navi's besides megaman.
I agree with most of this, though I don't think 4 is actively bad after replaying it. It is very bad compared to 3 which it immediately follows. If it was the 2nd in the series it might be seen more favorably.
Also I don't think 5 is S tier, A seemed more appropriate. It's no 3.
And I think 6 is definitely in 2nd or even 1st. 3 is really great but I think if you take nostalgia out of the equation it's not as good as 6.
I'm interested to see how I feel about 4 once I get to replaying it. My gut says I was too harsh on it in this video but I guess we'll see soon enough.
Also, I've gone back and forth on whether 3 or 5 is my #1. I think 3 edges it out even though I've probably played 5 more thanks to the DS version, whereas 6 is pretty definitively in 3rd place for me but is a contender for S depending on the day.
They don’t even have to go all out on many new features.
Please just make multiplayer accessible. I would play the shit out of 3 and 6
Would be even cooler if you get rewards for winning online games. Like points that let you craft chips or let’s you automatically change styles. Or you can have more than one style at once per file
So much potential.
So many classic games in the late 90s anf early 2000s have gotten legacy/ definitive editions to modernize and improve the games.
To be honest this shouldn’t be that hard for a company as big as Capcom.
Just make a universal online multiplayer menu that you can go into. Choose your game. Have the same reward system where the more you play the more rewards that you can get to spend across all games.
This online community is already solid as is. And a lot of people would love to get back inti it who didn’t as kids.
3 is the best, is not only nostalgia. 2 was my first and i could easily put mmbn2 on S, but objectively, 3 deserves to be S.
5 trumps 6 by a smidge because the double souls you get feel more plot driven and i felt more attached. My big complaint with 6 is that the link navis are so meaningless to the plot excpet 1 time you need them.
I can agree with that
Capcom heard your wish
Having to play through BN4 three times to get everything wouldn't be so bad if the game wasn't god awful. If 3 & 6 (my personal favorites) had three playthroughs worth of content in them I'd be elated.
Definitely too the reason why the members of Team Colonel fits better is because BN5 in japan did the same thing BN3 did. Team Protoman was released first and Team Colonel released a while later.
In BN6 you can for a fact just choose to only get the first cross and ignore the rest. It's interesting that getting the other crosses is optional as I read that the minigames for the cross missions take up large portions of both version's filesizes.
I can't wait for the collection. I've yet to buy any of these Megaman collections aside from owning the Zero Collection that released on the DS years ago.
The music for these games is god tier. It's a shame the speaker for the original gba is so bad so some people don't realize how good the music is, especially the boss themes.
Trying my best to hold in commenting before you get to the "actively bad entry" to hear you out, and now that I've heard your schpiel on 4 I've gotta argue against "actively bad tier"
First off lets admit that 4 was my first mmbn game, there's some nostalgia there, but I've played the full series now and I think that the thing mmbn4 suffers the most from is expectation.
mmbn3 is a very good game, and 4 did the same plot (repeated tournament arcs, ending with the winner, you, defeating an "unexpected" big bad). mmbn3 absolutely did a better job here, there's no argument, but neither is what you would call a plot you would play the game for.
Similarly, the translation isn't great, but it isn't in the entire series, so once again, I'm calling that a wash. What you're playing the battle network games for is their gameplay, and 4's gameplay at its core is quite good.
Double soul set the stage for the systems the rest of the series would use, and gave you the ability to switch between forms on a fly, rather than getting one, MAYBE two forms to try the entire game in 2 and 3. I think this was probably the basis for only giving a player half the souls in their version during their first runthrough, "we're giving them way more than in prior games to use!" Was splitting the forms up between runs a bad move? Yes. Was it a step in the right direction from style changes? Also yes.
Meanwhile, mmbn1 is ROUGH. As you said, anecdotally, people have bounced off 1. While I agree SOME leeway should be given as it was pioneering a style of gameplay that hadn't really seen much, if any, exploration before, it has a lot of worst in series. Worst bosses, worst chips (don't forget, we didn't even see * chips until 2!), and don't forget hitting multiple points in the game where you were simply told "You don't have enough chips or upgrades to advance the plot." Given that this is a tier list comparing the games to one another, the forgiveness for 1 shouldn't be that strong. When I recommend people try the series, I tell them to skip 1, I don't tell them anything of the like about 4. I think people bounced after 4 not because it was a big drop in quality, but rather because capcom was putting out 6 games (plus some spinoffs! 4.5, battle chip challenge, network transmission, plus more than didn't make it west) in just 4 years (2001 to 2005) and the audience had become saturated with them.
Finally, lets talk about three things mmbn4 did differently than anything else in the series: enemy navis, dark chips, and postgame content. First, enemy navis: In addition to giving roll her only time on the battlefield series wide, mmbn4 also let you fight against generic navis, heel navis, etc. This was a cool mechanic that gave you some unique midboss encounters that used an assortment of chips you may or may not have seen, along with actually fighting entities other than viruses outside of mainstay boss fights. The chip variety made them easy to keep interesting, and they mixed things up more than usual for big fights. Darkchips, ultimately are a mess in 4. The idea of "very strong attack that permanently reduces stats" is cool in theory but bad in practice. Permanently reducing stats in a game with competitive PvP is a terrible idea, and so most players are never using dark chips. They're put in at 5 with less emphasis, but better execution, and most people don't really talk about them outside of chaos unions, which are a cool progression of soul unison. Now, postgame, this is the big one people hit on, and I feel like its hit on by series superfans, not new players. For those who don't know, the battle network games have a lot of postgame content. This content is generally gated behind completionist actions, like getting every chip. In 4, instead, there's a new game plus. Every enemy is harder, drops new and better chips, and you get different plot scenarios. A lot of folks are mad that you had to play through new game plus 2 additional times (3 runs total), to see all the content. Meanwhile, new players may have beaten the game, gone, "That was cool!" and put it down. Given that the postgame content in other games isn't much hinted at, and ultimately results in extremely difficult encounters, much more threatening than anything in the main plotline, I think this was an attempt to guide players up to that level gradually, instead of beating the game and wishing them well on finding the rest and beating it. I think this is, ultimately, the big complaint people have, and something the series veterans didn't need, which is why it's so often derided among series superfans.
Wow That was a massive wall of text that I didn't mean to take so far.
If you read this far, good on you.
Look honestly, the "actively bad" tier was purposefully inflammatory in a way I usually am not on the channel. I must've been feeling particularly spicy the day I recorded this but that doesn't mean I like 4 any more than I stated in the video. I've commented a few times that I'd probably place BN1 below 4 in retrospect, but I am planning to play all of them again once the LC comes out.
I will concede the combat is good in 4, it's basically the same as 5 which I ranked very highly. Despite the highlight of BN being the gameplay as opposed to story, I prefer when a game delivers on both (I have another video in the works regarding this), because when I replay a game I'm typically not content with skipping through the story unless I have a specific other goal in mind like a nuzlocke in Pokemon for example.
At least I do say to try all the games since they all have pros and cons to them, though skipping 1 might be a good idea since it could rub people the wrong way on certain things that aren't an issue through the rest of the series.
You should play the remaster on Switch!
I actually have streams of all 6 games in the Legacy Collection on the channel if you're interested in checking those out!
Ok, have fun destroying me, here goes...
I'd swap 2 with 3 in this list.
You must be excited for the battle network collection.
I’m glad it’s confirmed now, but waiting till 2023 kinda sucks. Trying to clear my backlog as much as possible before then lol
I've only played through 1, 2 and the DS version of 5 so it's a good chance to actually play them as a cohesive story. 5 was probably my favourite from that bunch and yeah I remember not originally appreciating the liberation missions on my 1st playthrough, however on my 2nd it made me realise how much it shakes up the gameplay in an interesting manor.
I need to replay BN3. Played it once after 2-1-4 and didn’t enjoy how fetch-questy the main quest was
The first 3 all have some odd backtracking/story progression things, so it's understandable
Rewatching this video and I don't think it's really fair to say BN4 killed the series at all
I remember loving it as a kid and it made me want to get both versions of 5 when I saw them and Ironically I remembered thinking 5 was great but that it wasn't as good as 4 (when I was a kid) I actually loved the multiple playthroughs thing back then and the awesome designs and double souls are dope and I'm a sucker for tournament arcs
I also think Starforce and shooting star shows they wanted to continue the series they just wanted to do something different because everyone was burnt out from yearly releases, and they wanted something that took more advantage of the 3D capabilities of the DS
In retrospect I got a little carried away about BN4, Capcom just spammed Mega Man games too much in that time frame in general which led to burn out and decreasing sales
Especially given the fact that the hardware(I think according to negative legend) was new and they decided to make a new Megaman series.
MMBN4 could be so much better if they just condensed the whole thing into one singular play through. There is so much padding and unnecessary unimportant bullshit that you have to do in those games where you fight generic navis who don’t matter and if you just replaced them with the important ones you’d have a full game. It’s so infuriating and was absolutely a decision from higher up in capcom.
I agree 100%, that alone would make me more willing to forgive any other problems I have with it
Actually Meganman bn5 had a DS edition
Indeed, probably my preferred way to play BN5!
I'd rather them code all 6 games into one game, that way all viruses/navis & chips/items are collectable & your able to go back to old areas & enemies from the earlier games, then when you clear one game you move to the next, keep navicust parts & styles/transformations carrying over progress, I'd say all you need to do is reduces the hp+ data crystals to 5hp or so & hard cap at 1000hp, where you just get zennies for the rest of the games if you collected them all in the first 3 games. Additionally getting every navi & cross/beast of every character would just be amazing even if over kill, the amount of transformations chips & everything would make multi-player really slap home.
Lastly top it off with a ability to play as every navi in battle/overworld map with their navi owner in a weird replace lan kinda way, which would also be incredibly fun.
Also if a ultimate battle style was given to bn3 where you have the feet/buster/helm & whatnot all on megaman at the same time would add to the cool factor sort of like how in megaman x you collect body armor part upgrades.
That would be sick, though I think something that ambitious would make sense to be it's own game/mode separate from the collection itself. It certainly would streamline things as far as multiplayer in concerned though.
However, I do wonder if they're making significant changes which are causing the delay. There has to be a reason, as you'd think Capcom would've just given us a bunch of ROMs by now if not.
@@CobraCodex it's a toss up, people are calling Capcom lazy over some stuff they are doing with Resident Evil, but I don't know, then you have games like the Sega sonic collection that's getting released with less feature than the same collection 20 years ago on gamecube. So I don't put much stock in collections beyond slapping paint on a game few & a high price tag.
I'm just thinking there is alot of potential with battlenetwork that could even go as far as paying for navi skins/styles & such, most people would buy a bass style/overworld navi for an easy 5$ do that for most navis & the game will make a killing, just add a way to earn in-game points for the styles if you want to grind them & it'd be a really fair system.
Then the possibly of a map editor that let's yiu build/customize the players HP network zone with different tiles & stuff & have it connect to other players building an player made net to explore & battle trade with other players, which sounds insane & alot of work but would be the coolest thing ever done.
Spot on in most regards. I think many would agree that 3 is the best game of the series. But.. 4 is "actively bad"?? 4 was my introduction to the series, so maybe I'm just biased and blinded by nostalgia, but 4 is A tier in my book, although I was incredibly surprised to learn that it is one of the best sellers. Wouldn't have expected that at all.
I may have been harsher on 4 than I should’ve been. I personally don’t care for it primarily because of it’s structure, story, and dungeons; but because MMBN1 is so bare bones I’d probably rank that at the bottom.
This is like saying GT was your introduction to Dragon Ball and being upset when people criticize it when people say it's bad compared to the first two series.
@@jupiterofthemonkeyii5569 Wish I would have watched DragonBall when they were released. Truly feel like I missed out on something great.
I started the series with 4 and then played 5 and 6. Played through a bit of bn1 on an emulator but I couldn't finish it, it got too boring and I'ma be real the style changes are what turn me on.
Also maybe because it was my first I like 4 and don't understand the hate.
i'm from the future
it happened
Kinda surprised 5 managed to go above 6, but eh.
Also, I never really considered these games "JRPGs", just Card battle games with RPG mechanics. Something like Chain of Memories I'd say better fits the "RPG" status. Heck, Ratchet and Clank better fits the Action RPG status than BN.
Also, despite being a big fan of the series, I don't want an official BN7. Battle Network ended with a good finale. It didn't overstay its welcome (Unlike standard Pokemon games).
Also, why did you call PETs "Toys" as far as what they are in-universe?
I think the only major RPG component missing from BN is leveling up in the traditional sense. Also while I do agree leaving a series be after a fitting finale is nice (and all too rare these days), I think it's been long enough to warrant Capcom revisiting some of their dormant series. I don't mind Star Force being a BN7 in spirit, but I just don't like the over the shoulder battle system as much as the top down one.
Regarding PET's I was referring to the IRL toys, not in universe. I maybe could've been more clear on that.
Are you a fortune teller?