Introduction

X6 is a rather..."unique" Mega Man game.

A lot of Mega Man X players pretend the subseries ended at X5, and for good reason. Series creator Keiji Inafune meant for X5 to be the end of the series so he could move on to the Mega Man Zero series. But no, Capcom wouldn't have that, X was in his PRIME! So they made X6 without him. This game, despite doing certain things better than its predecessor, is well known for horribly designed stages and an even worse translation. Still, the music is pretty good, so you could get the soundtrack and say you've seen X6's best.

I'll be playing the version on the PS2 X Collection instead of the original PSX version. They're very much identical, except the PS2 version has no voice acting. It wasn't great acting anyway.

I couldn't care less for spoilers. Sigma's the end boss, Zero comes back, etc. etc. etc.

One of X6's gimmicks is the Nightmare Effect. Playing one stage changes one to three other stages in a certain way; they all range from minor annoyance to "I'd rather kill myself". And the route I'm taking explores all the worst results of this.

Video links and Nightmare Effect explanations:

Part 1
Intro Stage and Commander Yammark

It had to be bugs. Yammark's effect causes bugs to float around you in Blaze Heatnix and Shield Sheldon's stages, neither of which I've been to yet. Joy. The bugs tend to block X's shots and don't do much else.

Part 2
Infinity Mijinion and ??? (It's Zero)

...Are fleas insects? Anyways, Mijinion's effect causes Commander Yammark and Rainy Turtloid's stages to go dark in some areas with a single rotating light for vision.

Part 3
Ground Scaravich and Shield Sheldon

Ground Scaravich has the second worst nightmare effect: It places blocks in Shield Sheldon and Metal Shark Player's stages. Brown and red blocks are destructible with Scaravich's weapon, the black and blue ones are not. However the red ones fucking explode when hit and take off half your health bar. In Shield Sheldon's stage it's not so bad, but MSP? Oh GOD. It turns the alternate path WHOLE STAGE into Kaizo Man X, so naturally I have to demonstrate.

Shield Sheldon's effect causes these weird reflections of X and Zero to show up in Blizzard Wolfang and Rainy Turtloid's stages. They can be dispatched by touching them with Shield Sheldon's weapon.

Part 4
Rainy Turtloid and Metal Shark Player

Turtloid's nightmare effect makes it rain in Ground Scaravich and Commander Yammark's stage. This rain reduces horizontal velocity a la Toad Man's stage, or Wire Sponge's stage. That's actually pretty cool.

MSP, however, has the honor of causing the single worst nightmare effect ever, and in THREE stages, no less: the stages of Infinity Mijinion, Ground Scaravich and Blaze Heatnix (all 5 seconds of it) are now littered with metal boxes that attempt to crush you against the walls. They're horrific. MSP's weapon can thankfully destroy them.

Part 5
Blaze Heatnix and Blizzard Wolfang

is all I can say. Blaze Heatnix's effect makes it rain meteors in Blizzard Wolfang and Infinity Mijinion's stages. Dodging them is near impossible when combined with the other crap they appear alongside. For added laughs, Heatnix's weapon can destroy them! Oh and here's a real knee-slapper: The section of Wolfang's stage with the teleporter and heart tank is only accessible with this effect active! And guess where the Jumper part (needed to beat Gate's Stage) is? IN. THAT. TELEPORTER.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Wolfang's effect only affects one other stage, and he picked the best one: it freezes the floors in MSP's stage, adding slippery floors to that mess. Wolfang's weapon can melt the ice. Somehow. Don't ask how.

Part 6
Collecting the rest of the items and DYNAMO!!!

Time to collect the rest of the junk. Normally this sorta thing can be boring, but really, you ought to see some of the shit the reploids hide behind. Also, I entered Infinity Mijinion's stage and exited to get his Nightmare effect to show up in Rainy Turtloid's stage. Keep in mind that it persists throughout the entire stage and not just the secondary area. This leaves Wolfang's uninteresting effect as the only one I haven't shown.

Part 7
Gate's Lab

Well, I did stage 1 with unarmored X. I did say I would. But I didn't say a thing about weapon use or E-tank use, so there you are. Just imagine that boss with no E-tanks and frown.

Part 8
JUSDIE, SIGMA!

Here's X6's last laugh: a freakin' long final Sigma.

I can't quite get what Capcom was going for with this boss, which is a statement I've uttered so many times it doesn't hold much meaning anymore. Honestly though, he has more health than anything has a right to, follows a strict, short loop for the entirety of the battle, and if there was supposed to be a vestige of challenge to this, it's lost by the fact that the enemies give you health. Frequently.

...Where have I heard this before...? ...Anyways. The fight lasted NINE MINUTES because I decided to use Unarmored X when Zero or the Shadow Armor would have demolished him in seconds. Therefore an annotation will appear in the video. Please click it to skip to the end. Speaking of which, I also rage at the credits, because the X Collection removed the black outline from the white letters on white backgrounds. Charming.

That will conclude Mega Man X6. Thanks for watching!

Powerup Parts

Normal Parts (usable by both characters)
Speedster - Increases walking speed. Fun to use, borderline required in certain areas.
Jumper - Increases jumping height. Needed in Gate's Lab, or else.
Hyper Dash - Speeds up and lengthens the dash. Needed for a particular...jump...and to evade the first Gate boss's attacks.
Energy Saver - Halves the cost of special weapons. You know, the weapons that fully recover when you die.
Super Recover - Increases health regained from health pickups.
Buster Plus - Increases buster damage for both characters.
Speed Shot - Speeds up both characters' buster shots.
Shock buffer - Halves damage and recoil. X's armors have this by default, and it doesn't stack. Hooray.
D. Barrier - Doubles invincibility frames.
D-Converter - Turns damage into weapon energy. That's cute.

X only
Rapid 5 - Lets X have 5 shots on screen.
Ultimate Buster - Makes all of X's attacks charge shots, even the special weapons.
Quick Charge - Halves the time it takes to charge shots.
Weapon Plus - Raises the power of special weapons.

Zero only
Saber Plus - Increases Zero's attack power.
Saber Extend - Extends the range of the saber slightly. SLIGHTLY.
Shot Eraser - Allows the saber to erase certain projectiles. Wasn't this an upgrade from a boss in X4?
Master Saber - Increases the power of Zero's techniques.

Limited Parts
When you hit GA rank you can equip one of these. You can only equip one and it's usable once per stage. (Equip Life Recover and never unequip it. Ever.)

Hyperdrive - Increases defense for 6 seconds.
Powerdrive - Increases attack power for 6 seconds.
Weapondrive - Gives infinite weapon energy for 6 seconds. Isn't that the length of a Giga Attack, now that I think about it...?
Life Recover - Recovers your entire life bar, like a Sub Tank.
W. Recover - Refills all your special weapons. It's like they think these are actually useful.
Overdrive - For 10 seconds you can rapidly fire charge shots and make fun of people playing on easy mode.

Cutscenes with voice acting
There is no one else is left to fight. Get up now! X!!
The "NIGHTMARE" is upon us.
It's shameful they can't beat that mysterious old robot...
I hid myself while I tried to repair myself.
X defeats High Max
Zero defeats High Max
X meets Gate
Zero meets Gate
X collects 3,000 souls
Zero collects 3,000 souls (NOTE: this is nearly the same as X's version.)
Gate and X have a chat
Gate and Zero have a chat
X meets...guess who.
Zero meets...guess who.
X's ending (without Zero unlocked)
X's ending (with Zero unlocked)
Zero's ending (This one would lead into the Zero series, but then...you know...X7.)

Effort posts from others
Simon talks about Commander Yammark's stage
Violen's thoughts on the game
Simon talks about Infinity Mijinion's stage
Violen describes Xtreme mode
Simon talks about the building that used to be the Central Museum
SHELDON HAHAHA
Meteor Rain stinks.
Simon talks about MSP's stage
Simon talks about Blaze Heatnix's stage
Simon talks about Wolfang Amadeus Crapstage
Violen adds his own comments on Wolfang's stage
Simon's ode to Gate Stage 1
Simon gets HIGH and takes Gate Stage 2 to the MAX and my jokes suck

More X6 "goodness"
TCRF's X6 page. Contains info on the leaked prototype of X6 and some other unused content in the final version.
Violen's minimalist speedrun of X6 on Xtreme mode. He's certainly a better X player than I am.
This shows all the ways you can pass the spike wall in Gate Stage 1.
This shows all the methods of passing the jump in X's version of Gate Stage 3.
The TAS of this game has a few tricks you might be interested in.
Isoc is clearly the kind of all cosmos.

One last thing,

DYNAMO!!!