The Mega(man) Battle Network LP!

I was completely unable to get good shots of Megaman actually cutting the ingredients. Anyways, this is pretty much a rhythm minigame.



Even if you fail completely he’ll say you did well.





This is the equivalent a chef being forced to cook in a room full of flies.



Amusingly enough, Megaman is totally capable of slicing up the Mettaur with his knife. I guess that means he’s using a Sword chip.






Shouldn’t the curry have been the first thing in?



Seems Megaman is using instant curry blocks.




I still don’t see the point of a cooking machine. With it, neither the navi nor the human directly create anything. The human just dumps things in and the navi just directs what will happen to the ingredients. The machine does everything else.



So basically Lan could have just read a manual or something and skipped all of this.

Megaman thanks the navi.

“You’ll need ingredients for curry. Oh yeah! You’ll need the right ingredients.”






Since when was instant curry considered the best?





First off, if this guy only sells stuff to the customers of his choice, how is he still in business? Second, what’s up with the moral of this scenario? Flave was going on about how ingredient quality isn’t as important as skill, but this navi says that if Lan has high quality ingredients he can win.

Megaman declares that he’ll find and impress the navi, because no matter what contest Lan’s in, Megaman won’t let him down.








Park 3 also has a PMD. Color Point removes up to a column of your area to add up to +30 (+10 for each panel lost) to your next chip. It’s not as useful as Mega chip version, Double Point, which adds +20 per panel.

As always, Battle Network’s view of the West is disheartening.



Like damn near every other Hawk/Eagle Tournament scenario, our target is at the back of Park 3.








As you might have seen coming, his test is a three round battle.




Considering the match will presumably start in about half an hour, this must be some really fast shipping.



Did they really not have enough space to write “ingredient”?



Megaman does not respond to the above line. Instead, he just asks who the Cooking Master is.

Megaman angrily asks why the Cooking Master wants Flave to lose.






Following the instructions?





Guess we can add “Natural Food Critic” to Lan’s list of abilities.

The navi hopes Lan will be able to make Flave understand.





This exchange is here in case the player suddenly forgot the conversation immediately preceding it.








I think the Hawk/Eagle tournament is the only time this NPC model ever show up.

Oh shoot, the Cooking Master didn’t teach Lan how to make rice! And seeing how Lan was so pathetic he didn’t even know how to make instant curry, surely this will screw him over!

Good thing the rice part of the dish is never brought up again.







Mami then announces Lan’s arrival.






It’ll be longer too.









Blah-blah-blah, you know how this works.

*sigh*




I think in total I made about three mistakes. I blame the fact that I’m using a keyboard.



The judge tries out Flave’s curry first.



The old man explodes.



Once again, seriously.





This is kind of like saying the ham in a ham sandwich doesn’t make the bread taste bad.

Flave doesn’t say what type of bean paste he used, or how he prepared it, so his triumphant declaration is actually hilariously vague.



I seriously need some kind of emoticon to express my anger at the translators.



The announcer declares it’s time for Lan’s curry.



And Flave just doomed himself. Though to be honest, I’ve not actually sure it’s possible to lose this battle.

A ghost of an old lady descends from above.




Once again, I’m serious.




But you just came down from the sky. Above =/= Aside.




I guess we should add “Natural Chef” to Lan’s list of abilities as well.



Considering the machine prepared it…

The ghost bids farewell and rises back to the heavens. And while she does so, my luck runs out and I fail to get a picture of her while she's on the screen (all of the "souls" in this scenario have been flickering).






So did anyone else see that, or did it just seem like the judge was hallucinating?



The crowd is surprised and Flave freaks out.






What, was his meat too tough? /pun

Flave backs away in disbelief.





Alright, I think Flave’s about to have a breakthrough.




Or not.




I’m fairly certain Megaman was supposed to say one of those lines.

Flave runs off while Lan casually strolls away.

So just as a point of comparison, do you see the little platform at the top of the castle? You know, the one next to two small towers and a ramp leading to it?




This is its actual size.












Sure, sure.



No, I’m pretty sure technique is all you really need. I mean a good folder would be nice too, but it’s not strictly necessary, as BN3’s Time Trials proved.

I’m guessing Lan’s just one of those naturals who can’t explain why he’s so good at what he does.

He taught you how to use the machine, not how to cook in general.





Lan asks why Flave knows about him.



Lan’s very surprised.

Lan continues his policy of befriending random people he meets. You just know that by the time he’s an adult, he’ll have connections everywhere.




That seems like something that can’t be taught.

Flave leaves.




Too bad you’ll never see Flave again.

Anyways, inside the Net Battle machine is a HP Memory.

*insert “Round 1 is over” speech*




Next time: Eco Terrorism! Glitches! And yet another crappy Soul!

Current Folder

Cannon * x2
Heat Shot C x4
Wide Shot 1 C x4
Sword S
Wide Sword S x2
Long Sword S
Air Hockey 1 F x4
Air Hockey 3 V
Area Grab S
Blinder *
Invisible * x4 - REGULAR
Attack +10 * x4
Gun Del Sol EX G

Total codes (not counting * code): 5

I take it this is the appropriate place to make a Flava Flav joke, right?

Park3Vst:'
And another instance of time messed-upness. Still nothing on Coldman's scenario, of course.
No, because Yakitate!! Japan is hilarious.
It's attached to the net! You can cook on the way home.

Except for that putting-ingredients-in bit. oops. At least there's a precedent in the BubbleWash. Still, if you fixed those bits, it could be convenient. I believe it's just that that's the way the separate ingredients are sold-meat is cut, curry in blocks. I think it's a mistranslation of "high-quality ingredients". that Flave is a young upstart and not a Master Chef? All items are 8 letters or less.

The error here is actually(if I recall correctly) that the Ingrednt is an event flag and not a key item, so it shouldn't have been shortened.
Well, he and Hub are the master of just about anything that begins with Cyber- or Net-. Thus, the cooking machine makes it so that they can dominate the match. Well, networking begins with Net. And the power of Networking is what lets Lan beat Wily, etc. at fortress in the end each game, it seems. (Is it he or his brother who is named Net in the Japanese?)

Yeah, Lan's JP name is Netto.

The problem I have with the moral is that though it's supposed to be "If you don't put your heart into it you'll lose", what it actually comes out to is "If you have high quality things it doesn't matter how bad you are, you'll win".

EDIT: God damn it I missed a post.












At Beta level, Normal Navis upgrade their attacks to High Cannon and Cross Bomb.




They also start using Fanfare and Wind chips.








Lan cheers, Flave mopes.

So as a complete side note, did you know that the BN series had commercials in Japan?

First off, Battle Network 1's. It's pretty bland, but I guess Capcom didn't want to blow their budget on a series they weren't sure would succeed.

Battle Network 2's commerical is a lot more nifty looking, though I find it hilarious how they try and make Elec Team look like something worth using.

For Battle Network 3, they went all out. By the way, I'm glad that they decided to ditch the Navi Customizer start up screen.

The main reason I did this post was so I could show you Battle Network 4's two commercials. It's amusing how well they capture the essences of BN4: WTF and laziness.

Rockman.EXE 4.5's commercial is just hilarious. Look how serious those two guys are.

Finally (I'm skipping BN5 for now), BN6's was pretty meh.

Protoman had a very short introduction speech. Also, I finally got the time to work.



With the time fixed, the calendar is no longer as slow as sin.



The first button made me choose a date.



Then it gave me a choice.




Both choices combined essentially allow me to write a reminder for myself.



The second and third buttons both bring me to this screen. I assume it’s so I can read and edit my reminders.




Seems they couldn’t be bothered to keep Protoman’s sword on one hand. Also, his BN 4.5 sprite is different from his BN5 sprite for some reason.



Protoman’s two non-buster spam overrides were a Long Sword and his shield.



Interestingly enough, Protoman has a third e-mail list.



It seems the Net slightly changes throughout the week. I guess Monday is garbage day?

Anyways, this is obviously for Junkman.

Okay, I’m just going to skip over to Topman.

Gah.



After that I got the ‘Get a Silver Ticket” e-mail. But it seems Protoman’s third mailbox has also received something.







I guess this guy is asking for help?



It seems this is a timed mission.



Cue easy battle against two Mettaurs and a Mettaur EX.



Well, the timer’s disappeared. Does that mean I’m already done?

Jacking out got me another e-mail.







Seems Protoman raises his health by accepting missions.

Alright, to the tournament. Remember that tournament board from Bass’ update?



To get a Silver Ticket, you have to go there from either 9-10 AM, 1-2 PM, 4-5 PM, or 9-10 PM.

Oh joy.






The pictures of Aquaman and Gutsman are exploding. This represents their fight I guess.




Gutsman won. What a surprise.

Yeah, I’m just going to skip ahead to my battle.













Because Protoman will not use his buster, in order to dodge Number Ball I need to abuse the Shield. This has the unfortunate side effect of rapidly depleting my Custom gauge, so no chips for me.



God damn it Protoman.

Ugh, this is humiliating.




A reset pit me up against Aquaman. Hopefully Protoman will do better this time.




He did.



These little battle animations are all completely unskippable.




Alright, can Protoman beat the guy who beat Numberman?



Damn right he can.

In hindsight, I think the Numberman battle would have been much easier if I tried changing Protoman’s target to the stuff Numberman summoned. I’m not sure if I actually can do that, but it would make sense.




Okay, here we go.



I managed to use two Air Hockey 1’s at the very beginning, so this fight went very smoothly.



So in the span of like five minutes BN 4.5 did what took BN 4 an hour.

After Ribitta congratulated me some more, the screen shifted to something more interesting.

A roulette.



How fitting.




Next time: I don’t know.

Current Folder

Cannon x3
Air Shot x3
Vulcan 1 x3
Heat Shot x3
Thunder 1 x3
Sword
Wide Sword x2
Air Hockey 1 x3
Recover 10 x2
Recover 50
Area Grab
Barrier
Attack +10
Roll
Gutsman
Numberman

Now that I’ve got a good feel for the battle system, I can honestly say it sucks. A lot.

The main problem with it is its biggest draw: you don’t control your navi. Sure, it sounds nice to have your navi think for itself, but the fact is that your navi is an idiot. They will do everything in their power to stay in the same row as their target, so right away all chips that are not simple “attack the row” chips are made useless. Not only that, but the auto dodge is flawed in that your navi is unable to comprehend how to dodge certain attacks.

A perfect example would actually Topman. You know how he has an attack that has him turn into a top and attack a row? Any sane person would simply change rows. You want to know what Protoman did? He repeatedly backed up until he was at the back of his area, THEN sidestepped. More than that though, in general the navis all have trouble dodging attacks that require you either to destroy things or dodge more than one obstacle.

The worst part, though, is how they implemented the Custom Gauge. The basic concept of limiting what chips you can use seems sound, but the fact is that most of the time you start battles being unable to use chips at all, as you need to wait for the gauge to fill up to a reasonable level so you don’t have to wait five seconds every time you use a chip.

Also, the overrides I‘ve seen so far. Megaman and Protoman both have their own little shield function. These things are completely worthless. If they’re used too soon the shield fades and the attack hits the navi. If they’re used too late (“late” being defined as the time you’d normally use a Shield in the main series), your navi will just dodge the attack then throw up their shield. Next up, all of the charge up attacks. Megaman’s charge shot gets points for filling up his Custom gauge. Bass’ are slow but effective. Roll and Protoman’s… well, I’ll admit that Protoman’s Long Sword charges up surprisingly fast, but it’s weak and has the same weakness as the other sword chips: if the target leaves acceptable range, Protoman will freak out and wildly move around his area.

In fact, the game seems to know that your navi is incredibly incompetent; the standards for high Busting Levels have gone down significantly and viruses do much less damage.

In summary, if this is what every operator but Lan in the main series uses, I can see why Lan can beat anyone.

As it happens, I got the same first scenario as Blitz. Again.


Haven't finished it yet. Should be done tommorow.


All my banners.



In the meantime, I beat up Topman Alpha:


Now, here is some more trivia about DarkChips and going Dark:
-It's important to note that the HP loss from using DarkChips is one per battle, not per chip; You're free to use as many as you want to, you'll only lose 1 max HP at the end.
-I'm going Dark. I'm also not using lotto numbers from FAQs. Yes, it's stupid, but you guys need to see this.

But since you guys are again not getting a real update from me, I decided to get you something else. Something... Satisfying. MWAHAHAHAHA!

(You're welcome, Blitz)

Also my folder was changed a bit but who cares I'm only using Darkchips and running away (until I'll need money, I guess).
I guess I might get Gutsman DS as well and put those two in my folder on the off chance I get them with DarkStage.

I mentioned this earlier, but I think I should point it out again.

The only way to decrease Karma is to use Dark Chips. If you finish a battle without one, your Karma will rise. Thus the only way to maintain low Karma is to use Dark Chips in every single battle. This is the equivalent of taking a chainsaw to your HP.

Also, I can't believe Alpha Werewolf got the same scenario as me again.

What I do is a little different; I assume that I will never use normal chips again until the final boss, so I just do one battle with a whole bunch of darkchips used before any serious battle. This keeps my HP high, but my money low.

I mean, I guess I could grind as much as I wanted for money and chips, and only then do the above. But that wouldn't be as authentic.

I'm doing it for the final boss anyway, of course.

And one little update so you guys can have something to look forward to after Woodman (who is the sole reason I would always rather play RS on an emulator, and I don't mean the fight against him):

Alright, you're caught up. Woodman's scenario should be up later today .

And I swear to God, you better not get Videoman.



Megaman points out that it’s been a while since they’ve seen Sal.




Lan notes that Sal has to be nearby, so they might as well go find her.

As soon as Lan exits the palace, he gets some mail from Sal.







So I’d like to point out something.




As I said earlier, BN4’s new sprites make it really easy to tell who’s an adult and who’s a kid. You can clearly see that men are a head taller than Lan and that women are slightly taller.



But despite the fact that the anime says she‘s an adult (something also implied in BN1, considering she owns her own stall), Sal is the same height as Lan.




Sal’s new mugshot has her mouth perpetually open. It looks really stupid.

Lan laughs that he won’t go easy on Sal during the match. Sal responds that of course Lan wouldn’t.




I still don’t understand why the BN universe even has eco-activists. With the exception of Elec Town, there’s green everywhere.

Lan’s stomach growls.





Was that hyphen really necessary? Also, comma error.

Lan thanks Sal.



Cue fade to black.



Lan thanks Sal again.




I’m not sure what Sal was trying to say here, considering they are outside. Unless she meant to say something like “Doesn’t it taste better when you’re outside?”.

Two NPCs walk over.






Uh-oh.



Er, you’d have enough space for maybe two more houses.



I think you’ve missed the point of suburbs.



Building what up?



Sal’s PET beeps.

This is supposed to be Sal reading her mail. I like to think she’s psychically connected herself to her PET.



Well, that was a waste of a dialogue box.




Sal thanks Lan and regretfully informs him that she has to go.



So they could give her walking sprites but not “look at her PET” sprites?



First line should have been “What’s wrong with Sal?”.



And with that, the cutscene ends.



That seems like an infringement on Sal’s privacy, but it’s not like that exists in RPGs.




He says this even if you didn‘t collect all 66 Points, so if you ask me he‘s just whining.

You do, but unlike 99% of all BN eco-activists…





Sal isn’t a complete moron/absolutely insane.

Sal pleads for the other two to think.




But because every tournament scenario must have some kind of disaster, they don’t listen.

The two walk away, causing Sal to sigh. She then asks what Lan (who’s been standing at the entrance of the square) wants.




After another sigh, Sal answers that those two are eco-activists like her.




Then shouldn’t you have stopped him?





Wasn’t the ACDC Development plan just created? Or did the major only just now decide to actually look at the land he wanted developed?

By the way, I’d comment on the bombs being too extreme, but there’s nothing that can pass Anetta.

Yep.





Ah, the traditional BN pep talk. Even BN4 can not possibly screw this up.








I stand corrected.



Sal resolves to stop her friends. Megaman and Lan volunteer to help.



Lan interrupts her.





I’m guessing that last line was supposed to be “And I still owe you for that lunch, too!”