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Hard Hat is a series of fan-made games by Damaged Games. Similar to the original Mega Man, the player has to defeat eight bosses (while obtaining their weapons) before facing off against Dr Wily. In this series, you control the Mascot Mook of the games, a Metool known as "Hard Hat". Each of the games has Hard Hat pissed off at Wily for some reason, and hence makes him want to destroy Wily's ambitions in some way or other (though the two usually reconcile at the end of the game).

Unfortunately, the games' website has gone down, but downloads are available on The Internet Archive.


Tropes used for this game:

  • Actually A Doom Bot: In the first game's ending, Hard Hat kills Dr.Wily only for the real Dr.Wily to appear and reveal the one he just killed was a robot.
  • Anti-Frustration Feature: 4 gives the players the option to make spikes and other One-Hit Kill contact substances non-lethal. Bottomless Pits will still kill you, though.
  • Athletic Arena Level: Baseball Man's stage in Hard Hat 2 is obviously set in a baseball stadium, before a canon game did the same thing.
  • Breaking the Fourth Wall: Done in Hard Hat 2. The intro mentions the villain is called Mr. X, Dr Wily remembers he was Mr. X in Mega Man 6. In the ending when played on normal mode, Hard Hat comments he though the game would be harder which causes Dr Wily to reply go and play the hard mode. He says this even if you play the game in hard mode!
  • Breakout Mook Character: You play as a Metool, the series' Mascot Mook. The second and third games do give him the ability to perform an invincible crouch.
  • Bottomless Pit Rescue Service: The Chasm Bounce, the secondary ability given to you by Aerial Man.
  • Early-Installment Weirdness: Hard Hat 1 is the only one to have Robot Masters from the Megaman Classic games. The rest of the series has completely new Robot Masters.
  • Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: Done in Mega Man fashion, no less.
  • Enemy Summoner: In Hard Hat 3, the battle with Halloween Man has Halloween Man spawning familiar Skull Metools.
  • Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Somewhat averted- your hat is only effective in shielding against regular shots.
  • Hack Your Enemy: In Hard Hat 3, the player encounters Mega Man who is reprogrammed by Dr. Wily to fight peace.
  • Modular Difficulty: Hard Hat IV ditches the difficulty levels from the previous games in the series in favour of separate toggles to modify the game's difficulty, such as whether Mercy Invincibility protects Hard Hat from Spikes of Doom, whether enemies have their own Mercy Invincibility or whether running out of Hit Points will instantly consume an E-Tank.
  • Moving the Goalposts: During Sea, Trap Man and Wily's 2nd stage secret level, the propeller cannot be used.
  • Nintendo Hard: All four games. Then again, they are based of the original Mega Man series...
  • Power Copying: As the game was based off Mega Man, it's not surprising that Hard Hat is able to get the weapons of defeated robot masters.
  • Secondary Fire: The third game gives Hard Hat a secondary attack for EVERY weapon.
  • Shout-Out: The whole of Wily Stage 1 in 4 is one to Mega Man 2's first Wily Stage, right down to (most of) the level layout, music, and boss.
  • Superpower Lottery: In all four games, Hard Hat has 10 weapons (9 in Hard Hat 1).
  • The Smurfette Principle: Blaze Gal in 4.
  • Spread Shot: In 3 and 4, Hard Hat gets the Metool spread shot as a secondary fire. Collecting the letters "Hard Hat 4" allows you to spam it indefinitely.
  • Standard Snippet: One of the games levels is set in a baseball field, and it's appropriately accompanied by an 8 bit remix of "Take Me Out To The Ballgame".
  • The Bad Guy Wins: The first Hard Hat Game. Hard Hat kills Mega Man and Dr.Light (although Dr.Light is shown to still be alive in the ending of Hard Hat 3) as he turns out to still work for Dr.Wily.
  • The Unreveal: It is never revealed who Mr.X is in Hard Hat 2: War Ensemble.
  • Villain Protagonist: Not surprising, since you play as a Mascot Mook. Although he gets pissed off with Wily, the two still reconcile in the end (at least in the first two games and the fourth). The third game has you fight Mega Man as a boss. And you get to kill him!
  • Warm-Up Boss: Sketch Man in 4. His stage is very easy compared to the others, and when you face him, he's not even an Art Attacker- he fires weak pencil lead and eraser shavings, and he also takes extra damage from your regular attack.
  • Wave-Motion Gun: The secondary attack for the third game's Plasma Shot is this.


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