The character Mega Man is one of the more unique parts of the gaming space. Why? Well, he was there in some of the industry’s earliest days. His first games were on the NES, then the SNES, and then moved to the PlayStation. He became so popular that he got himself a TV show and toys and became a household name. But, after a while, they stopped making console games for him, diving into the handheld market via systems like the Game Boy Advance. The Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection eventually put those titles into a single entity!
These games focused on Megaman.EXE and his owner, Lan Hikari. They lived in a world where cyberspace was much more than met the eye and was constantly under attack by dangerous threats. Throughout their ten games, they did everything they could to save the world many times over, and gamers still have fond memories of those handheld titles. That’s why, in an interview with 4Gamer, Capcom admitted that fan requests, mixed with internal desire, led to the Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection being born! Specifically, director Masakazu Eguchi had this to say:
“For a long time we had received requests from fans to port the Mega Man series. Furthermore we had various departments within the company suggesting plans for the ports, and that’s how we decided on doing it.”
It was further noted later in the interview that when the 20th anniversary of the franchise came about, fans got louder about the ports:
“We already had plans within the company for the ports, but the strengthening of fans’ voices around that 20th anniversary played a part in its realization. We received a great response when we announced the project.”
That’s not surprising, as the fanbase for the .EXE games was large. There’s a reason why that version of Mega Man had ten games produced. They even went the route of Nintendo and developed dual-style storylines and released multiple versions of certain entries to help expand their reach.
The port was a huge success and is currently the best-selling game in the franchise. That might get Capcom to think about putting more titles out, as gamers are clearly hungry for more.
But will that happen? It’s hard to say. Capcom hasn’t been afraid to put Mega Man on the shelf before. However, if this proves anything, they are listening to fan voices and requests. So if you raise your voice loud enough, the Blue Bomber will return.
