Month: April 2014

The Anatomy of Mega Man | 7 | Slippery slope

While I will defend the honor of the Magnet Beam to the death, there is really no justification for Ice Man’s level. It is not a good or fun level. It combines one of the infamous worst things about platformers – low-friction iced surfaces – with the game’s two most irritating unique mechanics. By far, […]

The Anatomy of Games: The Game: The Sequel

When the original NES Remix came out, back in December or so, I referred to it as Anatomy of a Game: The Game. It almost felt like Nintendo took all those game design ideas I’d been writing about and turned analysis itself into a game. By breaking down old NES titles into their constituent components and […]

The Anatomy of Mega Man | 6 | Current events

The chain of weapon effectiveness versus bosses can be a tricky thing in Mega Man games. Sometimes it makes perfect, logical sense; other times, not so much. For example, Mega Man 6. How do you determine what the Yamato Spear is good against? It’s basically a pointy stick that embodies ancient Japan, which isn’t really a weak point, […]

The Anatomy of Mega Man | 5 | Cut to the chase

About all Cut Man’s stage has in common with Guts Man’s stage is assonance. In terms of design – and particularly as a starting point for a newcomer to Mega Man – it proves to be far more effective. It doesn’t front-load unreasonably difficult platforming challenges, it offers a variety of hazards, and it offers […]

The OG of Anatomy returns

After a year of silence, the Critical Look at Mega Man Stages thread that helped inspire this entire site is alive again. For a good read, go check out Glass Knuckle’s latest post on Talking Time, or, heck, just read the whole thread from start to finish.

The Anatomy of Mega Man | 4 | That means you have huge guts

As I mentioned before, Guts Man’s stage is a terrible place to begin playing Mega Man if you’re a first-time player. It’s a great starting point for an experienced pro, because it’s a good jumping-in point on the rock-paper-scissors ring of enemy weaknesses. I also like it because of the tricky lifts in the opening […]

The Anatomy of The Goonies | 4 | But I’m not a Goonie

After a short interlude stage crammed full of hidden diamonds and skeletons – or else after leaping over a giant cliff with Data’s spring shoes – Mikey Walsh reaches the fifth stage. The game continues to do a nice job of taking key story moments and scenes from the film and turning them into action […]

The Anatomy of Mega Man | 3 | Color my world

Why, hello! Let’s talk some more about Mega Man. And its weapons. Ice Slasher Easily the most misleading weapon name in the game, the Ice Slasher does not in fact slash. Unless you use it against Fire Man, who is weak to its icy stylings, the Ice Slasher inflicts no damage whatsoever on foes. Instead, […]

Late realizations about Super Metroid

I haven’t posted here in a while because my usual Anatomy time has been spent assembling Super Metroid into a book. Unlike Metroid Vol. I, Metroid Vol. II will contain a fair amount of supplemental material. Nothing amazing, just a dozen entries or so of descriptive or summary text about bosses and regions. Still, as […]