Video Game / Mega Man (DOS)

aka: Mega Man 3 The Robots Are Revolting

Mega Man is a PC game in the Mega Man (Classic) series released in 1990. Despite its title, it is not a port of the original game, but rather a whole new game. The game centers around infiltrating Dr. Wily's base of operations and defeating three Robot Masters to gain access to key cards they're guarding, which open an entrance deeper in the base where Dr. Wily and the supercomputer CRORQ are waiting.

Two years later, the game would get a sequel titled Mega Man 3: The Robots are Revolting. What little plot there is in this installment seems to be borrowed from the NES game of the same game; six Robot Masters have gone berserk, and it's up to Mega Man to defeat them and find energy crystals (not that the latter actually appear in the game itself, anyway) before confronting Dr. Wily.

The first game was made entirely by Stephen Rozner, with the second having his brother William Rozner involved with making graphics. Both games are notorious for their awkward controls and physics, awkward sprite work, and overall lack of polish. However, the first game was able to achieve relatively smooth horizontal and vertical scrolling on DOS even before the original Commander Keen, which was a fairly impressive accomplishment, and Rozner would later go on to do the MS-DOS port of Mega Man X with only the audiovisual assets, having to code it entirely from scratch.

Both games can be played on the Internet Archive. A Fan Remake combining the two games, known as Mega Man: DOS Remake, is also available.

Both games provide examples of:

• All There in the Manual: What little plot there is can only be found on the boxes of the games, which is also the only place where the subtitle for Mega Man 3 can be found.
• A Winner Is You: Both games end with a screen giving a bare-bones ending description (identical between the two games, no less), a sprite of Dr. Wily cowering in front of Mega Man, and a very small set of staff credits.
• Boss Rush: Plays out more like in the original Mega Man; instead of a room with teleporters to all of the Robot Masters, the rematches happen one at a time in certain parts of the final stage.
• Covers Always Lie:
  • The first game's box art shows Rush behind Mega Man, despite not receiving so much as a mention. Spark Man also appears on the back despite also being absent.
  • The box of The Robots are Revolting simply uses a cropped version of the box for the NES version of Mega Man 3, removing Rush, but not Spark Man (who's supposed to be a stand-in for Bit Man, hence the games skipping over 2 altogether).
• Deadly Droplets: Dyna Man's stage in the original has red damaging droplets. In 3, two-thirds of Robot Master stages have the same hazard.
• Hopping Machine: Of the 12 bosses in the two games combined, the only that move through means other than jumping are Sonic Man (who swims), Bit Man (who runs into walls), CRORQ (who walks back and forth in both of his appearances), and Dr. Wily in 3 (who floats in a pool of green liquid).
• Mercy Invincibility: Played straight with Mega Man himself, but surprisingly averted for the bosses, making it possible to deplete their entire health bar in mere seconds.
• Mini-Mecha: CRORQ is a two-legged walking mech roughly twice Mega Man's size.
• Non-Standard Character Design: Most of the enemies look oddly realistic, to the point where you'd be forgiven for thinking they aren't robots.

Mega Man provides examples of:

• All the Worlds Are a Stage: The final level combines elements from all three Robot Master stages.
• Eternal Engine: Every single level is at least partially one of these (Sonic Man's stage doubles as Down the Drain, with Dyna Man mixing in Down in the Dumps). Justified, as the whole game takes place in Wily's lair.
• Excuse Plot: The story is simply "infiltrate Wily's base, get the key cards from the robots, and defeat Wily in the core room."
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Nuclear Detonator damages not just enemies, but also Mega Man.
• Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Volt Man's Force Field, which drains weapon energy as long as its active (but can be de-activated as compensation).
• Non-Indicative Name: Dyna Man and his weapon seem to have swapped names; Dyna Man ("Dyna" no doubt being short for "Dynamite") drops what look like nuclear warheads in his fight, while his special weapon, the Nuclear Detonator, is a bundle of dynamite.
• Non-Standard Character Design: All three of the Robot Masters have unnatural eye shapes and sclera colors.
• Pinball Projectile: Sonic Man's Sonic Wave is a sound wave that bounces off solid surfaces.

Mega Man 3: The Robots are Revolting provides examples of:

• Battle Boomerang: Shark Boomerang, at least when used by Mega Man. Unusually for the series, it is not a Precision-Guided Boomerang, as the boomerang's trajectory will not adjust to match Mega Man's position if he moves.
• Bullfight Boss: Bit Man goes for this strategy as opposed to the Hopping Machine pattern of the other 5 Robot Masters.
• Dolled-Up Installment: Stephen and William Rozner originally developed it as an environmental-themed game titled Eco Man, but Hi Tech Expressions only agreed to publish it if it was turned into a Mega Man game, since they had an exclusive publishing deal with Capcom.
• Down the Drain:
  • Blade Man's stage takes place in some sort of water plant; half of the level is submerged, and pipes are leaking water throughout the rest of it.
  • Torch Man, of all people, is found in an Absurdly Spacious Sewer.
• No OSHA Compliance: Oil Man's stage is absolutely filled with oil, with broken pipes gushing out oil all over the place.
• Palette Swap:
  • The designs of the six Robot Masters are edited from the cast of Mega Man 2 and 3 for the NES, which is most apparent with the mugshots:
    • Torch Man is simply Magnet Man without his magnet, and a different Arm Cannon.
    • Bit Man uses Hard Man's head, with his sprite placing it on Crash Man's body.
    • Shark Man seems to use Crash Man or Snake Man as a starting point, with Gemini Man's body.
    • Wave Man is simply Air Man with water cannons in place of his fan, and the arm cannon removed.
    • Oil Man is a red Flash Man without a visible mouth.
    • Blade Man is Metal Man without his external blades, plus an arm cannon and an extra piece on the back of his helmet.
  • This even applies to the weapons. Torch Arm, Oil Stream, and Bit Cannon have no differences from the buster aside from costing weapon energy and being the weaknesses of certain bosses.
• Under the Sea: Shark Man's stage.
• Ship Level: Wave Man's stage takes place on a floating ship, while part of Shark Man's stage includes a sunken one.
• Spread Shot: Blade Launcher and Water Shooter both fire spreads of projectiles (blades for Blade Launcher, water balls for Water Shooter) at an upwards angle. Blade Launcher's projectiles can fly, while Water Shooter's move in an arc.

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