Mega Man X: Command Mission

I think this is the last game on my to-play list that earned its spot because of insufficiently-concrete memories of playing it as a kid. And I’m grateful for that, because with very few exceptions, all of them were some flavour of terrible. Mega Man X: Command Mission is at least one of the better ones. It certainly didn’t seem like it would be, though; the first few chapters are pitifully easy, the voice acting as a whole is only a step or two above some of Mega Man’s infamously horrendous dubs, and the degree to which the cutscenes avoid showing characters in motion reveals some glaring budget issues. But it did eventually surprise me, firstly by not being nearly as generic as it looks. Yes, there are still clichés like an ice-fire-lightning elemental triangle, but a lot of standard RPG mechanics like healing and equipment selection are given a little twist as well.

The second surprise is that the gameplay simply gets better. As the party is rounded out, combat roles and strategy start to develop. Each character has a limited-use transformation power that starts out as a simple “win battle” button to be used against bosses, but eventually, the timing of it needs to be carefully considered. I also like how characters’ sub-weapons and “Action Triggers” (akin to FF7 Limit Breaks) draw from the same steadily-increasing resource, but how that resource affects each Action Trigger is different, so the optimal charge percentage is always in flux. What ultimately still holds the gameplay back at this point is how sterile it is. The level design exclusively consists of boxy metallic corridors, and the fact that this is a Mega Man X game is occasionally acknowledged through exceedingly dry movement challenges. As for the story, while I understand that the X subseries tries to tackle more complex themes than classic Mega Man, that doesn’t stop it from being extremely goofy, especially when it seems to constantly forget that all of its characters are supposed to be robots.