As a portent of things to come the next chapter opens with Lan having a nightmare where Megaman gets attacked by ghostly apparitions of the two Cybeasts. Fortunately it doesn't last long for Mr. Mach wakes Lan up, reprimands him for sleeping in class, and holds him back after school to write a dictionary's worth of vocabulary words as punishment. And Mick calls him a moron.
When he's eventually done we're supposed to go to the Teacher's Room to report in, but as soon as Lan leaves the classroom we get an email from the aquarium manager, who's sent us a new little feature to play with as thanks for the other day. With the Tag Chip System we can “tag” two chips together, so that when one appears on the Custom Screen so will the other, without fail. Very useful. The only limitations are that you can't tag to the regular chip, and the combined memory of the two cannot exceed Megaman's current capacity.
There are some more distractions in the school, like out in the hallway is a little boy who serves as the first quiz-giver of the game, Mr. Quiz. The quiz-givers can be identified in this game by the little jingle they'll sing when spoken to (“It's okay to say! It's okay to play!”).
- Q1: What can't you grab with your left hand? (left hand)
- Q2: What does a Mettaur always have? (pickaxe)
- Q3: Which one of these fish might chase a mouse? (catfish)
- Q4: What walks on four legs, then two legs, then three legs? (a human)
- Q5: What is the color of the tulips in Cyber Academy Class 1-2? (yellow)
He gives us an item called the Quiz Book for winning. It contains a Number Trader code for an HP + 50 program.
In the main foyer we can now jack in to the electronic bulletin board for a Locate Enemy.
In the Teacher's Room Mr. Mach commends Lan for a job well done and tells him no more sleeping in class. He's a pretty reasonable person, all things considered. At that moment someone new enters the room and Mr. Mach decides to introduce Lan to the new student teacher...who's Mr. Match
◊. Of course it would be him. Nice suit though.
Both he and Lan are surprised to see each other, both for different reasons, but this time Mr. Match really isn't up to anything suspicious. After having finally given up a life of cybercrime he's now doing research for grad school, part of which involves working here at Cyber Academy. I imagine no one in Den City would want anything to do with him after all the crap he's pulled over there. Unsurprisingly, the object of his research is to create a system that lets any Navi utilize fire, presumably through on-board means and not battle chips. He tells Lan to visit him in one of the school's labs when he's done talking with Mr. Mach if he's interested in learning more.
Match and Mach, that's gonna get confusing.
When Lan goes back to his classroom to grab his things he finds the mysterious girl there staring at one of the fish tanks. Even though Lan admits that he's still confused as to how the Copybot got there, he thanks her for pointing it out to him during the Diveman scenario and asks if she's a student here. No response, so he asks if she likes fish since she was at the aquarium and this does get a reaction from her, just the statement that fish belong in the sea and wondering if they can truly live on land. Hm, I know I already made a crack at her being a Rei Ayanami Expy in the previous update, but I think Rei actually did say something along those exact same lines in one of the Rebuild movies, with clear metaphorical significance. Hm, hm...
Well, the girl finally does introduce herself as Iris, and she already knows who Lan is, not that that should be much of a surprise given that he's already been making a name for himself in the school. She thanks him for his help with the robot dog at the beginning of the game and as he's about to ask some more questions Mr. Match calls up his PET wondering what's taking him so long. So Lan says farewell and it's time to head back to where Mr. Match is.
Mr. Match is inside one of two side laboratories in the Teacher's Room. Here we are introduced to the Cross System. Crosses replace Souls as this game's transformation gimmick, though they are in essence almost identical in function. Instead of their souls resonating together or such mumbo-jumbo, data from one Navi is grafted onto another. Each version has five unique Crosses.
In order to obtain them we're basically put through a short training scenario by the operator where Lan actually operates their Navi, does some sort of quest, then has a boss battle with them and afterwards obtains their Cross. Sound like Battle Network 4, doesn't it? Well don't worry, not only are these scenarios much, much, much better designed, they're entirely optional. The first Cross is the only mandatory one. You'd miss out on the Navi's Mega chips, but they can still be ignored if you really feel like it.
The task that Mr. Match has for us is to delete a number of Kettle viruses in Central Area, and we will be operating Heatman
◊, back from Battle Network 2. Operating other Navis in this game works the same way it did in Battle Network 5, which each Navi having their own unique charge attack and bonus chip. Heatman's charge attack has him spread fire out to hit the panel in front of him and the column beyond, while his chip, Heat Press H, has him withdraw into his case and leap forward three panels to hit a plus-shaped area with fire.
Heatman starts out in a computer than connects to Central Area 1, at an access point that's right below the Net Cafe, and we're provided with a code to open the security cube that's been there. The Kettle viruses appear on the overworld, and they work a little differently here than they do later in the game when they're encountered normally. Kettles don't have a normal HP counter, instead they have a temperature counter in degrees Celsius. They only take “damage” from Fire attacks, upon which their temperature will rise by the amount of damage listed. When it reaches 100 C, boiling point, they'll be deleted.
So, it's a pretty simple process. The only caveat is that you need to have Fire chips in your folder, because trying to whittle the Kettles down with just Heatman's charge attack takes forever. Once we're done with deleting all of the Kettles we can jack out and challenge Mr. Match to a Net Battle.
Heatman
HP: 700
Element: Fire
Attacks:
- Heat Wave – Heatman sends a wave of fire down the field that hits each column in sequence for 20 Fire damage.
- Heat Press – Heatman withdraws into his case and throws himself three panels ahead, hitting a plus-shaped area and cracking the point of impact for 20 Fire damage.
- Heat Burn – A flamethrower appears behind Megaman and fires a three-panel-long stream of fire for 40 Fire damage.
Sequences, that's something to remember for this battle. Heat Wave and Heat Burn are always used three times in a row, sometimes even on top of each other. In his later forms he takes to doing the same with Heat Press, leaving the field in poor shape. However, breaking the damaged panels can be to your advantage as Heat Wave, which incidentally moves in the same “rolling explosion” pattern that appeared way back in Battle Network 1, cannot cross over broken or empty panels.
Winning gives us Heatman H, which has him set the panel in front of him and the following two columns on fire.
Having won, not only do we get the ability to use Heat Cross, but from now on we can go over to this room's computer to operate Heatman any time we want. Navis that we can operate are referred to as Link Navis. Link Navis' main uses are to take down the elemental gates out on the Net, and each one can remove two. Heatman can remove the trees and the giant bonfires. Link Navis can be challenged to a Net Battle at any time simply by talking to their operators.
Mr. Match immediately sends us an email with the Cross System tutorial, so on to that. Unlike Souls, Crosses do not need sacrificial chips to activate, all you have to do is press up when on the Custom Screen and a dropdown menu displaying the available Crosses will appear. Select the one you want to transform into and that's all you need to do. Simple as that.
Crosses do not have a turn limit, they last for the duration of the battle. Once activated, the only way for Megaman to return to his default state is if he gets hit by the Cross's elemental weakness, which will break the Cross.
- Megaman becomes Fire element
- The Mega Buster's attack is increased by one
- Charge Shot becomes a three-panel-long flamethrower
- Fire chips are powered up by fifty points
Pretty nice. Crosses are superior to Souls in practically every way.
It's time to finally leave the school. Lan comes across a small group of people in Central Town's plaza, Mick and Tab included. They're all listening to a made-up young woman who's advertising a jamboree event being held tomorrow in Central Area 3. Lan and Mick decide to go, but Tab says that since his family's chip store is reopening he won't be able to make it. Hm, why don't we go and pay it a visit?
The chip store, Aster Land, is pretty much just like Higsby's was, only a little smaller. We can buy chips from Tab at the counter, and he's got the Chip Trader and even his own version of the Number Trader set up for use. Here's his stock:
- Gun del Sol 1 C – 1000z
- Air Hockey N – 3800z
- Drill Arm G – 5000z
- Long Blade M – 6200z
- Wide Shot P – 7000z
- Big Bomb V – 9000z
Aster Land does have one big feature that sets it apart from Higsby's, and that's the return of the Job BBS, which has been missing since Battle Network 3. All the rules from before (only one job at a time, can't cancel, etc.) are still in play but now there's a ranking system. All jobs have a star ranking (1 to 5) and the player starts out with rank C, only allowing him to complete one-star jobs. Lan gains points with each job completed, and when he gets a certain amount he'll be promoted a rank, allowing him to take on tougher jobs.
An interesting thing to note is that a small handful of the jobs were tied to the e-reader in Japan, but since the e-reader never took off in the west they were included in the localization from the get-go, probably to make up to taking out most of the Boktai content. Completing all of them unlocks a Bonus Boss, but we won't have to worry about that for quite a while. For now, I'll just do a few before turning in for the day.
Job 1: Virus Deletion
A simple job. A girl in Class 6-2 wants us to delete a virus that she accidentally released into the classroom's blackboard. Once that's done our reward is ten Bug Frags.
Job 2: Find Keepsake
An old woman in Central Town wants help in finding a pocket watch she lost, a gift from her husband. Humorously Lan thinks he's dead only to have her snap at him that he's alive and not to jinx him. We just have to examine the tree right next to Lan's house to find it, and the reward is a Regular UP 2.
Job 3: Errand Request
A teacher at Cyber Academy wants us to go and preorder an action figure for him since he's busy, and we're given 3000z to cover the deposit. So it's off to the Stuffed Toy Shop Computer in Seaside Area 1 to do the deed, and then back again for the Reference Book item, which contains the Number Trader code for an Unlocker.
While we're in the vicinity, Diveman EX is found in one of the corners of Seaside Area 1's lower level. His chip has him attack with Giga Wave, and like Blastman's it's pretty strong and useful. That's all we can do for now, so it's time to head home and turn in.
Once Lan goes to bed there's a scene in Central Area 3 with some Net Police Navis looking at the Cybeast statues and wondering if the strange Navi attacks and quakes are the harbinger of things to come. Buddy, you have no idea.
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