Welcome to VC Weekly, N-Europe’s guide to the wonderful world of Nintendo’s download service. Written by Sam C Gittins

It seems to be a good time for third-party releases on the Virtual Console regardless of the Wii U retail release schedule as we have another two Capcom classics. What better way to start VC Week? The catch-up begins here. Anyway enough from me and on with the games!
 
Available for download this week we have...     

Mega Man Zero 4
Mega Man Battle Network 2

Price: GB £6.29, EU €6.99
Publisher: Capcom
Developer: Capcom
Released: 2005
System: GBA
 
For the fourth and final entry in the Mega Man Zero series Capcom created a fitting send-off for what has since become one of their most successful spin-offs of all time, grabbing the baton from where it was dropped in the previous entry this is another direct continuation as we witness Zero saving some humans from the "Variant" who are your new foes this time around. Upon reaching their caravan base he comes across the "Einherjar Eight" led by "Craft" who's the main villain, so using the caravan as your own hub base - which this time is a lot smaller making it more focused - you set about taking down each level plus the respective boss in whichever order you deem suitable until you unlock the final stage.

Carrying on a tradition you start off with the Z-Saber plus the Buster Shot with your third optional weapon this time being the Z-Knuckle allowing for some interesting gameplay elements including being able to beat up your enemies, stealing enemy weapons, busting blocks and even hanging from specific sections of the stage. There is a new weather system allowing you to choose from a variety of conditions for each stage which will makes things harder but it also allows for new paths to open up exclusive to that particular bout of elemental exposure, new items also become available to this only helps to further bolster the overall longevity of the title should you decide to replay sections.

Anyone who had a hard time with the previous games will surely be happy to learn that there is now an Easy option which although is a legitimate way to play, you may find that it is not exactly representative of the game as a whole because you'll then be missing out on a tonne of unlockables in addition to the aforementioned weather system which seems like a shame to me, but perhaps it's useful for anyone who just wants to blast through the game rather than taking their time with it; personally I think it's better to go with the default difficulty though it's nice to have options. No longer will you need to collect multiple Cyber Elves as in previous games, this time you have the one in your inventory which can be levelled up so you can use more skills while only allowing a few to be active at any one time; gone are secret disks which have been replaced by parts which drop from defeated foes, you can then make items out of them but figuring out which objects make new upgrades is entirely up to you, perhaps an FAQ will be useful for this rather random element of the game as it doesn't do a good enough job of explaining this element at all even though it's rather fun.



Owing to this being one of the last major releases for the GameBoy Advance you can obviously expect this to look like it's at the very zenith of what the system was truly capable of, so you get some rather fantastic looking sprites featuring full animation in additon to a spectacular set of stages which really come to life on the TV screen just as much as they feel at home on the gamepad. The entire soundtrack feels like it has been expertly crafted so that it makes the most out of squeezing every ounce of capability that the small systems architecture could manage, so naturally this comes across really well on the sound systems of today, you're in for a treat if you play on the gamepad with headphones as well because there is another level to the fantastic depth of sound achieved here not to mention the substantial sound effects which you'll likely never tire of.

Mega Man fans would do well to check this out, any newcomers who are interested in the series I would advise starting with the first game but if you genuinely only have time for one title then you might as well make it this one but just be aware that you will be missing out on a lot of the overarching plot from the earlier games. All of the action has been carried over, the main difference is that everything has been streamlined in order to create a more concise experience, all of the stage design is nicely done plus for purists - or should that be masochists? - there is a hard mode hidden away in addition to plenty of reasons to keep playing; in many ways this is one of the best Mega Man games to ever grace the GBA and there are Zero reasons for you to not pick this up.       

Verdict : Mega Man which is all killer and zero filler; an essential purchase.



Price: GB £6.29, EU €6.99
Publisher: Capcom
Developer: Capcom
Released: 2002
System: GBA
 
While it's undeniable that the Mega Man Battle Network series comes across as being rather bizarre, there is a certain charm to its unrelenting absurdity which stems from the intruiging world it's set in coupled with its brilliant battle system. Carrying on from the first game you assume the role of Lan along with Mega Man.EXE via the NetNavi device which allows you to take control of both the "real" virtual world and the cyberspace realm within the game if you follow? In any case you mission is to take on the net-mafia - no really - called Gospel who are causing a whole heap of trouble; cue an excuse for adventure.

Being that this is an RPG of the strategic variety it has to have an engaging battle system, thankfully this is definitely the case as the unique card-based basis fused with real-time actions really hooks you from the start if you let it; for the unaware each side gets a nine by nine grid to move around while you take pot-shots at the enemy with your projectile-based Buster weapon which gradually depletes the health of your foe. But to deal any real damage you are required to use the Battle Chips which are the proverbial "cards" in this game, you can assemble a deck of them to battle with, five are picked randomly from which you then choose from which will give you either more powerful attacks, an opportunity to heal or other varying effects; there are various other intricacies of course but the best advice I can give is just to experiment and have fun with it.

There are a lot of menus within this title which may scare a few people away due to their seemingly unnecessarily overcomplicated appearance, however the game does at least explain everything in a rather vast amount of detailso there's no need to be too concerned so long as you have at least an ounce of patience; just don't go into this expecting a standard Mega Man game. Having said that there are a lot of nods to the main series within the overworld so it's interesting just to see what you can find between battles in addition to building up your chip collection.



On the visual front you get a reasonably well detailed overworld while the virtual areas can seem a little lacking, though they have something of a minimalistic charm and at the very least the animation is on top-form. Even the soundtrack seems to have survived pretty well as it has that futuristic yet whimsical charm to it which many will likely find easy to warm towards even if we're hardly talking classic Mega Man levels of quality here, again don't go expecting that and you won't find it bothering you.

If you're curious to see just what this interesting sub-series has to offer then this offers the perfect point to just jump in, normally with games that have extensive story elements I'd always advise starting with the first game in the series but this offers such a level of refinement that it's hard to not advise just skipping the first entry if you're not too concerned about missing anything. With plenty of items to collect, a nice amount of clever references in addition to an addictive battle system, you really can't go far wrong with Mega Man Battle Network 2 as it's every bit an improvement over the original in addition to being just an enjoyable S-RPG in its own right.    

Verdict : Proof that strategy and Mega Man do mix, albeit only in the correct context.

That's it for another installment of VC Weekly which will return again soon. So until then, enjoy the rest of the week and Game On!