Part 34: NPCs that are likable, all allied with me. WHAT!?!

What did I say about those mugshots? Seriously, that's just uncanny.



Into the DrillComp we go, and as promised, the Party Battle System is rendered useless by the magnetic field.



The dungeon gimmick here is unsettlingly similar to that fucking minigame Tamako tortured me with from the last game. For some reason, the DrilProg is used by punching the rocks.

Also, bonus effort points to Capcom for finally making a new boulder sprite five damned games into the series! More than the Liberation Missions and assorted other stuff, the fact that they finally replaced the boulder graphic shows that in this game, they actually gave a damn. It's so beautiful. After MMBN4, I almost didn't want to hope...



There's your gimmick: Boulders, conveyor belts, and boulders on conveyor belts. It's a mine-themed area, what did you expect? The same color-coding applies as in that fucking minigame, brown boulders take fewer hits than grey which take fewer hits than black.



Drixol: All I can think of when I see that name is Osmosis Jones. Or more accurately, that cartoon spinoff Ozzie and Drix that they made and I never paid attention to. Well, they aren't anthropomorphic medication, they're the even more bizarre hybrid of a drill and a squid. Seriously, this is one of the weirder virus designs in the series. They attack by flying at MegaMan when level with him, then flying down the column he's standing in by popping out of a hole.



The rest of that control box goes smoothly.



Although, the second one is a bit less so. This is what happens if you fall off a conveyor, usually pushed by a boulder. You just return to the last checkpoint you passed by in the area, no big deal at all save for the few seconds of backtracking.



Aside from that incident, there's nothing remarkable about the second box. And as usual, the suffering of the Idiot Trio is a little ray of sunshine to brighten my day.



Notice how streamlined my folder's already become this early into the game.

Batty: They'll float up and down on a single panel, and by that I mean they'll rise above the field on the implied Z-axis and be out of range of any and all attacks. They're harmless if you don't move onto the same row as them when they drop down. Once you inevitably do, they'll fire a sonic pulse not unlike the original ShadeMan's Noise Crush attack. If it hits an obstacle, it will spread out and deal paralyzing damage to all surrounding panels.



DrillComp3 introduces this new spin on the gimmick, rock conveyors that move too fast and with too strong rocks to pass through. The solution is to locate and switch off the stupid machine spitting out boulders.



This itself requires detouring through another dense conveyor, only this one can be snaked through.



Now if only you could do this with most of the rock machines and not just this one.



It's so nice of the game to provide these little pick-me-ups between the dungeon areas. On to the fourth and final DrillComp.



...Which is where Capcom stops fucking around. Holy SHIT! Yeah, you remember MMBN4? You missed the dungeons? The dungeons missed you too.



That was just awful and the level designers know it. This is one of those checkpoints that MegaMan will appear at if he falls off a conveyor, immediately after that gauntlet. So we won't have to muddle through it again, thankfully.



DrillComp4 has another impassable conveyor and winding path conveyor combo just like the third area did.



It also has LongSword S, fulfilling the tradition of providing an early LifeSword P.A. to wreck things with. Ephraim mentioned before, but the game really hurls the S-coded chips at you in this game, almost as if it's the 'intended' code.



Princess Pride is really the more likable character between the two versions. Team ProtoMan gets MagnetMan and Tesla, Gauss' bitch of a daughter. In Team ProtoMan, Tesla's just...here, working off stress. With an enormous fucking tunnel boring drill. And she won't listen to Lan at all, forcing us to go through all of this.

Anyway, time to beat up KnightMan! Talk about nostalgic.



I guess I just have a soft spot for Princess Pride. She's got a good character redesign, is sensible and polite, and is named after the vice I've been gleefully inflating this whole LP. Plus, the alternative is Tesla. And she's still the monarch of the only country in the series with a semi-rational name.



I guess it was too much to hope for, wasn't it? Not even stuffing the three of them into what amounts to a Blendtec for bedrock won't rid me of them!



.... That's soul crushing! What the hell, Capcom!? This poor, half-broken program has been left alone in this electric door lock for HOW many years?



On a more positive note, GIGANTIC RED BUTTON.



In hindsight, since when has pressing red buttons larger than oneself ever had positive results?



Agh! It's like the last time I tried to play D&D!



KnightMan fulfills his role of knight in shining armor, thankfully. For once, an in-battle effect has consequences, nay, plot-relevant consequences, outside of the battle! Ye gods, I don't even know what series I'm playing anymore. KnightMan's thick armor makes the boulders trivial.



Pride and KnightMan are grateful for what we did before, as well as apologetic for trapping the Idiot Trio and nearly crushing and splattering them all over the walls. No really, you don't have to apologize...unless you're apologizing for not succeeding, I guess. I'll go with that.



No, no you haven't.



Baryl interrupts. Nebula is planning to retake ACDC Area! We need to nip their plans in the bud and liberate Oran area, fast.



You can almost hear the 3 or so brain cells in his head sputtering and wheezing, or perhaps grinding together like a jammed set of gears while steam pours out.



Princess Pride! You have DefensiveNavi! We need your help!



Honestly, it's like a some kind of trippy what-if dream sequence. "What if the NPCs on our side didn't completely suck?" Except I'm actually playing it! We have Baryl and Colonel, who pretty much fulfill the badass quota for the whole damned game, and now we have Princess Pride and KnightMan, who are politely helpful.



Alright, begin Operation Meatshield!



Colonel teleports right in front of the turrets and slashes the guns apart, begging the question of why he couldn't do that before.



Yup, time for the second Liberation Mission!



Oh god DAMNIT!



Fucking ShadeMan. Whatever, it's been way too long since I've been able to show off!



Colonel is my offensive powerhouse, more or less, and even surrounded he manages to get a 1-Turn Liberate.



The item panel he liberated thanks to that contained more Order Points, but you'll notice that KnightMan doesn't have a special command.



This is because KnightMan blocks all damage on the field as a passive ability. If there are allies nearby, he'll even move into the way and protect them. Team ProtoMan gets the inferior MagnetMan, who must spend Order Points to use his Magnet Barrier ability. Although, MagnetBarrier protects the whole team regardless of proximity to MagnetMan.

Also, ShadeMan is much more offensively dangerous than BlizzardMan, being able to strike at any Navi adjacent to a DarkPanel on the field. KnightMan shrugs it off.



These guys are the second type of DarkGuardian. TinHawks have a much wider offensive range than BigBrutes, as you can see. KnightMan does not give a damn.



I want that item panel, so I'll send in Colonel and use an Order Point. It'll be a bit tough, given the flanking DarkPanel, but-



Damnit, Colonel, I appreciate your reliable awesomeness, but you made me waste an Order Point!



Ahaha. Accessing the BonusPanel with KnightMan grants green invincibility for the whole team over the course of this phase.



You saw the BigBrute with the surrounding DarkPanels in front of the DarkHole. The thing is, that's ideal circumstances for a 1-Turn Liberate. BigBrutes are just so easy to take down fast, the only problem usually is range.

KnightMan is especially suited to this, as his charge shot is the Royal Wrecking Ball, a swing of his mace to all panels surrounding him in a circle. It deals very high damage as well, the BigBrute luckily moving into it for a second hit after the first one killed it almost instantly.



MegaMan, overshadowed by his substantially more awesome teammates, takes out the DarkHole.

TinHawk: They look more like penguins with that white flap in front, and really have a sort of dumb name in general. They fly too high to be attacked, the only way to damage them is to wait for them to swoop down to attack and counter.



After that, it's just a brief stroll up this corridor with KnightMan and Colonel.



What can I say, this sort of arrangement is just really, really easy to work with.



I'm kind of proud of this little trick here. See that BigBrute? MegaMan LongSwords a way to it.



Remember what I said before about KnightMan? Tada, both DarkHoles are now vulnerable to attack.



Colonel mops up that particular DarkHole, leaving the remaining one for next phase.



MegaMan takes care of that, leaving ShadeMan open to attack.



KnightMan clears the way forward, enabling Colonel to ScreenDivide this set of DarkPanels. The item panel nets him a heart, restoring his HP to full. Handily timed as well, considering how his HP was getting a bit low and the confrontation with ShadeMan is next.



Next phase, and Colonel uses the last Order Point to make sure we at least have an even field when fighting ShadeMan.



No need for DarkChips in this game, so ShadeMan gets a good old-fashioned beating.



My goal of showing the hell off has been satisfied.



And it's in S code, no less. In 4, the ShadeMan chip was for some freakish reason in X code. The only other chip with that code was Bass' GigaChip in each version, rendering it useless.

I swear, MMBN5 just wants me to snap it in half. And this is without the game breakers.



KnightMan and Princess Pride officially join Team Colonel!



And about time. KnightSoul! We'll go over the myriad of ways that it can be used to make complete mockeries of whatever defies you next update.



Regal, meanwhile, is torturing Dr. Hikari for information. He wants the location of that damned cereal box prize, how else is he supposed to have a complete set!?



Yuuichiro insists that he has no idea.



Electroshock therapy time is Regal's response. I dunno, Regal, it didn't seem to bother you very much when that power cable broke.



Okay, fine, I'll admit that Regal's improved as a villain since MMBN4. It'd be kind of hard not to. Sure, it isn't on screen, but torture is still one of the nastiest things anybody's done in this series. I still hate his stupid writing.



At least he can identify threats properly.