E3 2015: Playing the Mega Man Legacy Collection with producer Rey Jimenez

One recent project from Capcom that's met some skepticism has been the Mega Man Legacy Collection. Given that the Mega Man Anniversary Collection from over ten years ago compiled more Mega Man games than this one, it's easy to dismiss it as a disappointment out of the gate. However, producer Rey Jimenez is doing his best to make a solid case for the collection and recently had a chance to do so for both Shacknews Showcase's Andrew Zucosky and myself at E3 2015.

"On the surface, it's a compilation of Mega Man 1 through 6," Jimenez explained. "This is our attempt to archive the authentic NES-era of play for now and future generations. So we're celebrating not just Mega Man, the games, we're celebrating Mega Man as the cultural icon. So the Database and the Museum that kinda goes along with this release celebrates and kinda brings you back to that time when you used to go into Nintendo Power and look for all the cool little tips and tricks. So we really want to encompass that kind of feeling, not just the nostalgia, but we want to make sure this is all here in super high resolution for going forward. So the idea is, we're going to port this once... and then when we go forward to new systems, we just port the agent over and the games are going to carry over."

The Mega Man Legacy Collection has been billed as a "Criterion collection" of sorts for the NES-era games and it's hard to argue that, given what I saw at the show. The games are fully intact, warts and all. All of the 8-bit glitches and framerate issues are completely preserved, even though the visuals are re-compiled to run at 1080p. There are some new display options, including an option for widescreen (which Capcom has not recommended) and original aspect ratios. But the more intriguing addition is the game's numerous extras, which include original concept art, Robot Master bios, and more. In fact, some of the Robot Master entries include an option to jump in and fight that particular boss, seamless jumping into a boss battle without any loading time whatsoever.

Catch the full interview between Andrew and producer Rey Jimenez below, in which they discuss the Legacy Collection's new features, like the chopped-up Challenge mode. This mode sees players run across stretches of several stages across the series. For example, I ran through one of the tougher stretches of the Cut Man stage from Mega Man, only to jump through a rift at the end and find myself attempting to run through the Bubble Man stage from Mega Man 2.

The Mega Man Legacy Collection is coming soon to Xbox One and PlayStation 4 this summer. It will also come to PC, which is being billed as the first official opportunity to grab these classic games on that particular platform. The collection will be priced at $14.99.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?