Part 1: Computers, Cowboys, and Co-op LPs.

Is it? It is. You'll notice a bit of picture blur here, I kept this as a comparison shot. I actually had to restart the game and recapture a new batch of screenshots after the first update attempt because I'd forgotten to recalibrate my display settings. Because dangit, this is MMBN3, and the true finale to the Let's Play MegaMan Battle Network sequence, so we're going whole hog in making this a quality production.

Did somebody say quality?? I can't provide that. But I can provide awful references and even worse pictures, so let's start off on the right foot!





A brief setting synopsis. Okay, I'm going to assume that the reader knows the basics of Battle Network at least. If you don't, why are you starting with this LP when literally every other game prior is on the archive, linked in the opening post no less?



Anyway, due to the increase in NetCrime, SciLab has established a specialized Virus Lab, and Lan's class is taking a field trip there today!



The usual cast is around, and honestly, after guesting in Astro Nut's MegaMan Starforce LP, I kind of appreciate them a little more now. I didn't think it was possible for there to be worse, but there is.

Lan's cool, Lan's friends are super cool, aw look at everybody again! It's been a while since we've seen the crew.



Lan is all excited, because hey, field trip! It's nice to see kids excited about science. I wonder if MMBN has a Bill Nye equivalent?

Or a Dr Karl. Could you imagine the themed navis? Oh my gosh.



MegaMan nags Lan a bit, as usual. Equally as usual, the blink animation rears its head. Things are all as they should be, overall!

I'm waiting for the long segments of characters giving each other the death glare that seem to pop up in these threads. They add to the experience!



Still, it's time to get onwards with the game's fairly short tutorial segment.



Once Lan gets his act together, that is. He's just being an elementary school kid dazzled by the wonders of technology! MegaMan lectures Lan plenty, but that usually stops when things get serious.

Yeah, if my twin was hassling me about doing some boring tutorial I prolly wouldn't listen either.



First thing to do, as with any MMBN game, is to check the everloving hell out of everything. You'll notice the icon for a CustSword chip on the monitor, but that's just a coincidence.



Can you find chips randomly around in this one like in MMBN2? I guess it doesn't matter either way, since you should check everything anyway. Because some of the random dialogue in these games is hilarious.

Yes, you can. Among many other things!



This room will actually be very useful over the course of the game, because it provides a direct access to one of the game's major "hub" areas. No dice during the tutorial, however.




I won't be showing the conversations for most of the characters here, because they cover very basic things like opening the menus and the interface. More charmingly, Lan basically has the "my dad works for Nintendo" situation, except for real.

Lan's dad is cool.




Dex laments that he wishes they could have gone on that trip instead. Not because a factory would be cooler than a science lab, which it wouldn't be...



But rather because they can't sneak away here to NetBattle GutsMan vs. MegaMan.

Dex is our best bro. Look at how he immediately thinks of us! What a swell guy.



One of Lan's classmates has never had a non-studious fight against a virus before. A bit odd, but not implausible given they're only in...I think 6th grade in this game? MMBN2 took place over summer break.

One of Lan's classmates is a total weirdo, especially by MMBN standards





The Regular Chip system returns from MMBN2. MegaMan has a Regular Memory (RegMem) stat, and you can select any chip in the folder with "MB" less than that number as the Regular chip. It will always appear at the start of battle as the very first chip. Needless to say, utility chips like Invis * or AreaGrab * will be the best choices until FastGauge (doubles the speed of the CustomGauge) becomes available.

Or if you're feeling lazy and speeding through older areas, a semi-decent attack chip speeds up boring battles too. Well, if you've somehow got a folder setup where that sort of chip isn't always an expected draw.

On that note, MMBN3's mechanics are literally "MMBN2's with more customization options". So I'll be skipping over the usual chip tutorial, because once again, this LP assumes you've read my LP of MMBN1 and MissEchelon's LP of MMBN2. Details from both are going to be plot-relevant later on anyway, so I strongly recommend reading up on those games before going anywhere in this thread.

I recommend reading them because they're fun!



Mayl advises Lan to pay attention to things, because they may be on tests later. This is actually very good advice for this game, because MMBN3 requires the player to at least notice particular things across the game world, so that later hints and "gee, what can we do that (performs function)" moments aren't frustrating. I can see how some players would be annoyed by this, but I rather like it because it makes the setting feel more like a cohesive whole. That said, this can cause problems if you're the type of gamer to set down a game and not play it for a while, especially given this was for the GBA.

Actually, come to think of it, that may be why players who liked MMBN4 hated this game. MMBN4 was, for all its flaws, very simple to just ditch for a while (likely out of nausea) and then come back to days, weeks, or even months later.

Hey it's Mayl!! Our other good friend! Always full of good advice, always listen to your cool friends, guys!!



Yai doesn't have much in the way of information, merely noting that she worries about writing reports about all this.

Yai's our best friend. Yai is awesome. This is all worth noting in case it's on a test later on.



Ms. Mari is just as enthusiastic as the students, really. This is the computer science equivalent of going to the Louvre, after all. After you've spoken to everybody, the combat tutorial gets underway.

Most MMBN games start like this. Class scene, talk to everyone to proceed. It's... good to get used to a gameplay element they use constantly.



SKIPPING THAT.



And nothing of value was lost



Thank you, generic science tutorial person! Like I said before, the combat system is literally identical to MMBN2's at the start. The things that make MMBN3 unique, and in my opinion the crown of the series, come later. Seriously, this game is a customization nut's wet dream. More BattleChips than any other game in the series, more options for tweaking MegaMan, more everything.

Finally, certain dubiously-usable battlechips become insanely usable customisation options...



Yai brings up a proposal that Lan, Mayl, Dex, and herself (the usual crew) all meet and chat on the net later.

Pretty sure this is how the last game started, and how the next game will start.



This is basically how I respond whenever I have to get involved with Lan's friends. Since this is the last game to be archived, assuming I can actually finish a damn project anymore after the previous two failures, I'm tempted to ask baldurk to list "The Blink Animation" as a co-author when the time comes.

You're probably just overwhelmed with how delightful Lan's friends are. Totally not annoying at all!



Well, it's settled.

Yai's such a good friend.



Ms. Mari is not amused by the chatter in back of the class, however! End scene, fade out.

And it was the best field trip ever, the end.



It's funny how some of Battle Network really does match up with modern day internet tech, while others are practically anachronistic. Who uses CDs anymore for anything but archival? And why bother turning them in when you could just email them, since you're submitting a digital assignment anyway!

You can use CDs for very productive purposes. For instance, if you hang them up they make fantastic toys for chickens. Though I'm hoping by disk they mean 3 1/2" floppy.

...Actually I think I still used those for transferring documents when this game first came out. I don't think I got home internet until much later... ...Which absolutely doesn't excuse MMBN for doing it though, what with the world's machines connected in a worldwide network.

Unless viruses. Those darn viruses!



Ms. Mari specifically names Lan and Dex. No, Lan did not ever do his summer project from MMBN2, it seems.

To be fair, he was distracted. By food. And nothing else.



First order of business: exploration.



Second: Mr. Progs! MissEchelon made a, shall we call it, "contractual stipulation" that I talk to Mr. Progs and show off the charming dialogue in the game as well as I can. So here's that end of the deal. I'll be holding myself to a few other tasks over the course of the LP. Mostly to do with the bosses to ensure that I have something new to present this time around, since the basic boss fights are all on YouTube already. You bet your ass romhacks will be involved.



Mr Progs are cool. Talk to Mr Progs every day!




THE PATRIOTS! Unnecessary information will be removed to create context!




When you live as a sentient blackboard computer program with one singular task, you take pride in cleanliness, I suppose.

Aw, Mr Progs. Always hanging around being cool guys.




We got a skipped tutorial, is that good? Like I said before, however, pay attention to stuff like this. Yes, the fact that the other class got parasols will be relevant later.



Talking to Dex, Mayl, and Yai are all required before MegaMan lets Lan leave, but talking to the former two just tell you to speak to Yai. Park meeting, dead ahead!

Yeah, like I said, a very common "gameplay mechanic" that this game has. But you should be talking to your friends at every instance anyway, right?



Amusingly, I discovered by accident that if you check an object right as you turn around, Lan will be facing the other way as the description comes up. A description for the class hamster promptly gets applied to Dex.



Yikes. Lookin' awfully judgemental there, buddy.



Outside the class, calligraphy has been drawn of each character's name. Dex, Mayl, Lan, and Yai's are the bottom row, the top row represents the rest of the class. I'm a little curious about what the unnamed NPCs get for names, actually. All the pictures seem to be roughly the same image, however. Maybe it's just "Name Here" or something? That sperm-looking character is "no", I can only recognize that much. Anyway, Lan gives Dex's calligraphy 2 points, tops, Mayl's 7 points, his own 8 points, and Yai's a perfect 10.

It's true, Yai is perfect in many ways.




Just off screen to the top-right is one such light-blocking parasol that another student left behind because he didn't particularly want it. This'll be handy about 2 updates from now, but we can't collect it presently.

"PARASOL", you say? At least these games aren't subtle with their hints.



The rest of the school isn't notable. What is notable is that Higsby's shop will be back in this game! As usual, it is a fountain of game-breaking and absurdly powerful chips and items. This game, in fact, introduces a little something called the Number Trader. I'm swearing off using that thing until the postgame, because it is ridiculous in how powerful you can become the second it's available.

Higsby's shop is game-breaking, and Higsby himself is an awesome guy. There is nothing not to love here!



As soon as you arrive in the park meeting place, it's time for, you might be surprised, a major facet of the game to be introduced. If you press L for MegaMan's advice before you come here, he amusingly says something to the effect of "Let's try to be on time for something for once."

There's a surprising wealth of lines in these games you'll seldom see.



You have to wonder what the logic is behind chatting online later when all of these people live within 2 minutes walking distance of each other and are having a meeting in the first place. I think I read a Dilbert comic along these lines, once...



There it is! This is basically the same situation, don't you think?



Before things can really get underway, however, a man dressed in a cowboy outfit interrupts!



His name is Mr. Sunayama, and he's a TV producer!





Yai, narcissist that she is, jumps to conclusions immediately. This game does a good job of making the characters likable in spite of their neediness, honestly.



Now now, we can all see Yai's obvious star material



"Count to ten, Sunayama, count to ten, deep breaths." Rolling with this and brushing Yai aside, Sunayama continues.



It's a NetBattle tournament! This was the first game to really use this idea, and Capcom decided to rehash it for not one but two games, three if you count distinct versions, after it. The original is fun. The later knockoffs are most certainly not.

This game is awesome. And let us not speak of the sequel right now.



It gets interrupted by a Laharl cameo halfway through broadcast, believe it or not. Why a news outlet is sponsoring this is anyone's guess, but maybe DNN is like FOX and has an entertainment channel as well.



Squares return from MMBN2, and continue to function as community focal points. Dex, Mayl, and Lan each sound off "Us? In the preliminaries?" one to two words at a time in response to this.



Yai however is rather disappointed.

Oh Yai, I'm sure it's coming.



And indeed, we'll be seeing global participation in the N1, including a few cameos from MMBN1 and MMBN2 about halfway through the main game, or about 1/3 through the LP.

Unfortunately there are no more cowboys. SORRY GUYS.



Off Sunayama goes, to oversee things. Marketing takes a very direct approach in MMBN-land, probably due to how advanced AdBlock Plus has become over the years. Spam is no more, marketers prefer to just get personal with potential audiences instead.

Considering the proliferation of viruses, it's probably best that they don't tend to use the Net for that.



Lan and Mayl are unsure at first, but Dex is fired up and eager to get things going.



A nice play on words, it makes me wonder what the original Japanese line was.

As far as I'm concerned, GutsMan's lines are just a long string of "GUTSSSSS". He's rather like a pokemon that way.




And much like Lan and MegaMan...whaddaya say, MissEchelon? Shall we give this LP our all, and go for the gold thread?

Let's finish off this game series! With the best game, and our best effort! For everlasting peace!!




Mayl and Roll do better than you might think, based on precedent.

They're capable but lazy.




Annnnd I'll spoil things right away by saying that Yai does so atrociously in the N1 she winds up in the hospital later in the game. For context, Glide is the only customized Navi in the series you never fight. He's that mediocre. You even fight Roll in MMBN4: Red Sun, for crying out loud.

... well.... they try their best.



Off everyone goes, and that means Lan and MegaMan should be getting going as well!




MissEchelon, you heard the two! Let's give it our all! Let's Play MegaMan Battle Network 3: Blue!

Let's rock!