Unless you've been living under a rock,you know what Megaman is all
about....simple jumping, shooting ,sliding NO DUCKING! and a group of
bosses to make the blue guy's life miserable ! Oh and of course that
unstoppable, diabolical Dr. Wily.

{here's my first impressions after about an hour of play and another
hour of watching someone else play}

	Once again you take on the role of that blue heror that looks and
talks like a boy {actually sounds more like a girl} but is called a 
man....Megaman!  And once again Wily is up to no good.  And once again
you take on a slew of bosses in their own unique worlds.  BUT this
time it's in beatiful, slow-down free, flicker free, zillion colored,
ultra-polished, pixel free, next-gen 32-bit glory!  That's right,
Megaman has jumped to the 32-bit world and done so with style. And
instead of fixing what's not broken in the
transition{coughCONTRAcough}Capcom have used the new power to polish
the game NOT change it.

	THE GAMEPLAY: is carbon copy Megaman action platforming. Jump 
on this, shoot that, learn the bosses' pattern beat him, take his 
weapon, use it against the next boss {for those of you who WERE 
under a rock} etc.Classic, entertaining, addictive, FUN!

	THE CONTROL: it's Megaman...jump, shoot slide, change weapons...
that's pretty much it. It is fully configurable allwoing you to choose 
which button should be used for what.  Changing weapons has been
simplified....L1 and R1 scroll through the outfits/weapons, and you
change instantly no pause, no stutter--instant! I find running a tad
slow,  but that could just be me.

	THE INTRO:  The first next-gen enhancement you encounter is the
incredible intro....an anime style intro showing the blue guy himself
and some of his classic foes and partners presented in a hype-inducing
fashion....by the end of it you want to get in and play!  So the intro
ends...or so you thought!  After selecting "start" you are treated to
another more story introducing video...that's right, you have a hype
inducer, AND a story video...two-for the price of one!  The second
clip is as good as the first, also presented in the incredible anime
style {don't want to reveal what happens}.  The voices are pretty
horrible, but those who watch dubbed anime will feel at home:) {see
sound for more}

	THE GRAPHICS: No polygons here kids, it's all hand drawn 2-D 
beauty. But 2-D doesn't have to mean primitive 8-bit nintendo-style 
blocky 2-D...no siree this is one hundred percent next-gen art in 
motion! There is, as mentioned,no slow-down, flicker and all that fun 
that plagued the original.  As a matter of fact this puppy crams the 
screen at time with sprites without any trouble {that I've 
encountered}. Those little hard hat guys are back, but they travel 
in rather large groups, dropped off by large flying fish!!!  There's 
animation to spare in the game as well....walk by a bush and out flies 
a flock of harmless birds.  The characters all seem to be animated 
well, and the blue bomber runs with a slightly humourous exaggerrated 
run...yeah!   This has to be without a doubt the most colorful Megaman 
which IMO is a good and bad thing.  By having so much color {and there 
is alot} this episode seems to have lost some of the mechanical 
futuristic feel. The levels lookdownright gorgeous, just not 
Megaman-ish enough. Overall the game is gorgeous, bombarding you with 
tons of colors, animations, sprites and all the 2-D beauty you can 
throw a polygon at :)

	SOUND:  Like the gameplay, Capcom stayed true to the orginal,
polishing the music for the 32-bit world but retaining that familiar
mega-feel.  The level intros brought a big grin to my face when I
heard the familiar tune.  
	Along with the polished music Capcom has given voices to the
characters...the voices aren't exactly the greatest -- megaman sounds
more like megagirl! but it's nice to hear the characters speak.the
bosses taunt you before the battle and Megaman himself, shouts and
speaks throughout the game. Some of
the translation is horrible and a few sentences just don't make sense,
but it continues the anime feel.

	OVERALL: This game is a winner....it's gaming gone back to it's
basics--No 3-D polygons, no controllable camera, no 360 degres of
freedom, no high-tech lightsourcing--just plain simple 2-D {thumb
blister inducing, hair pulling} platforming fun wrapped up in a
gorgeous hand-drawn package.Kudos to Capcom for having the guts to
stick with what works...

For those looking for FUN this comes highly recommended

JASON