Collection essentials #81: Mega Man 4 (NES)

When I beat the post-2 Mega Man NES games about a decade ago, I came away with the opinion that 4 was my favorite on the console by a slim margin. I felt it had the best combination of catchy music and quality gameplay. Although I’m not sure if I’d hold the same opinions after a second tour of Mega Man’s adventures which I do think I’ll be doing at some point.

The big thing that Mega Man 4 introduces to the series is the “charge shot.” Your basic starting weapon has been upgraded. Now, you can hold down the shot button, and as Mega Man starts flashing and the charging sound effect reaches its peak, you can let go of it to unleash a stronger shot than normal. This makes the early part of the game a little easier when you don’t have other weapons to fall back on, and also is a good fallback when you don’t have the ammo that you need. 

I’ve heard Mega Man 4 receive criticism for having boss weapons that aren’t nearly as useful as in other games, which is understandable since a lot of the fun of Mega man is supposed to come from using the various weapons. I think that didn’t bother me so much personally back when I played it, because as I stated in a previous post, I tend to try and conserve ammo and use the basic weapon as much as possible anyway. It’s still a great game regardless, and a definite essential.