Screenshots from Game Spot for Playstation version

Screenshots from Game Spot for SEGA Saturn version

Year released: 1996 (Playstation and SEGA Saturn)

Number of Players: 1

Two spirits come down from outer space and land on Dr. Wily's secret base. And there's probably some sort of story.

Graphics: Wonderful. It conveys whatever environment it wants (jungle, amusement park, snow land, etc.) perfectly. Sometimes you have to acknowledge the background without the game telling you to, and since the game is so lush in graphics anyway, it's hard to distinguish what to pay attention to. That might have been what the makers of MM8 were going for, though, since it's a way to present a platforming puzzle.

Play control: (for Playstation version) Left and right to make Mega Man walk in that direction, X to jump, and square to shoot from your buster gun. Hold down and press jump to slide. I found myself jumping instead of sliding and sliding instead of jumping at crucial moments, and all it comes down to is rehearsal. The bigger the thumb you have, the bigger this will be a problem.

Sound: CD quality, as one would expect for a 32-bit generation game. Music stays in step, sound effects aren't anything you wouldn't expect, but voices... I don't really like the voice acting, it just sounds weak. Not to mention that half the "men" sound like women.

Challenge: Well, there's shooting. You gotta shoot a lot of enemies, all of which take away health from your health meter upon contact, some of which will shoot at you, too. A few enemies require a little bit of ingenuity to overcome. However, Mega Man 8 spends more time working on other stuff. There's all sorts of platformer puzzles and challenges. The only real shooting challenge are the bosses, which make you analyze what they do and stay in step with them (dodging their attacks while attacking them). You risk immediate death (by touching spikes, by falling off of the bottom of the screen, or getting squished in levels where the screen automatically moves forward) in almost all platform (jumping from one place to another--it gets a lot more diverse than it sounds) challenges. There are also rare every-now-and-then challenges where you have to figure out just what to do to get farther.
The game almost immediately hits you with immense challenge as compared to other games, and it only gets harder.

Gameplay: Mega Man 8 is a standard platformer, but then tosses in shooting action. The mix works harmoniously as one game. There are also puzzles which make you stop shooting, look around, and think for a second. These keep the game fresh, though they do take out the shooting somewhat.
When you defeat one of the first 8 bosses, you get a special power. These powers are all different, and some will help you to defeat another boss easily. When you get to the second set of four bosses (the game's first 8 bosses are divided up in two sets of four), you have to think about how to employ the powers you got from the first four bosses to get through the next four stages and bosses.
Oh, yes, and if you are able to reach these things in the stages called "bolts"--they're hard to find and harder to get to--you can collect them. Have enough, and you can buy different weapons and abilitites on the stage select screen. For instance, there's the Arrow Shot, which allows your charged up shot to split into five different shots that move up, down, and forward.

Bottom line: Ristar + shooting. Only 14 stages in Mega Man 8. Well, with three Mega Man games, you might have one whole game. Mega Man 8 is enjoyable, don't get me wrong, but it's really short.

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