August 4, 1996 Prototype

This is a sub-page of Proto:Mega Man 8.

This prototype is documented on Hidden Palace.

General Differences#

• Still no bolts at this point in development. However, you can set the amount of bolts through hacking. Doing this also shows that the maximal amount of bolts hasn't been finalized yet.
• No cutscenes.

Stage Select#

August 4, 1996	Final (Japan)

More stages are available in this build, although only the intro and Frost Man stages have proper previews, with the other stages using the sliding Mega Man placeholder as the previous build. In addition, Duo is used regardless of which stage is hovered over. The available stages are as follows:

• Page 1
  • Row 1 Tengu Man 1: Tengu Man
  • Row 1 Tengu Man 2: Frost Man
  • Row 2 Skull Island: Skull Island (intro stage)
  • Row 2 Metall: Sword Man
  • Row 3 Tengu Man: Grenade Man
  • Row 3 Skull Island: Clown Man
• Page 2
  • Row 1 Metall 1: doesn't work
  • Row 1 Metall 2: Sword Man
  • Row 2 Metall 1: doesn't work
  • Row 2 Metall 2: doesn't work
  • Row 3 Metall 1: doesn't work
  • Row 3 Metall 2: doesn't work

Weapons#

The only weapons available without hacking are Rock/Mega Buster, Rock/Ball, Flash Bomb, Ice Wave and Tornado Hold. Other weapons can be made available by changing RAM values:

• "Flash Bomb" is known as "Shining Bomb".
• "Flame Sword" is known as "Flame Saber".
• "Astro Crush" is known as "Astro Crash". Whether "Crash" is a misspelling is uncertain.
• None of the weapons have their proper icons.
• None of the inaccessible weapons have proper functionality, they instead all shoot out a small blue plasma blast.

Aesthetic Differences#

• The Capcom logo is the one from the PS1 version of Rockman X3. Strangely, it is followed by a soundless version of the Capcom logo from the final version.
• The main menu's background is blue, since the animation from the main menu is missing.

Audio Differences#

• Rockman's voice is the same as the earlier build and only has one voice clip when selecting a stage. This time it lacks the reverb though.
• The intro and Frost Man stage still use the same music as the previous build.
• The stages for Tengu Man, Grenade Man, Clown Man and Sword Man all lack music entirely.

Stage Differences#

Intro Stage#

It's now identical to the final version.

Tengu Man#

The stage is almost identical to the final version at this point, but there's no boss at the end, and Mega Man can't teleport out of it, so the stage can't be beaten.

It's noteworthy that this is the only stage with a fully programmed midboss.

Frost Man#

The stage has already been redesigned to better match the final version, but there are still some differences:

• The first half has an additional elevator section after the snowboard section where the elevator goes down instead of up.
• The ice floor that blocks off the bottom part of the vertical climb in the second half is absent.
• The elevator section in the second half doesn't have any Battons.
• After the snowboard section in the second half, Megaman teleports away due to the lack of a boss.

Grenade Man#

• The first half has some different bomb block placements.

• The blue bomb blocks with the red orbs are actually purple in this build.
• In the last section before the midboss hallway, the first moving platform is missing, and the Auto-Bombs are placed further apart because of it. The Auto-Bombs after the second moving platform (first in this build) are placed differently as well, with some of them even being of the walking variety.
• The first half of the stages ends just a little before the hallway for the midboss, with no midboss in sight.
• After the first hammer section in the second half, which is identical to the final, the level layout becomes wildly different in this build.

• There are some placeholder tiles located in the second half of the stage.
• The detonating blocks use placeholder graphics, but are otherwise functional.
• From the section with the detonating blocks onwards, the stage is little more than a block out with object placements, using stage graphics only very sporadically to show where the stage collision is.
• No boss door, no boss, no way to get out. Another stage that can't be beaten.

Clown Man#

The first half of the stage is almost done at this point. However, the stage ends right after the first screen with the falling toy pile, inside a glitched version of Susi Roll's boss room. Mega Man actually teleports out of this stage, so you can still beat it.

Sword Man#

Work on the stage has only barely begun as the first room is currently in an extremely rough state. Due to a complete lack of objects, this stage can't be beaten either.

Debugging Features#

• Both of these modes can be initiated anywhere in the game, even the title screen and level select screen.
• Pressing Select in either of these modes exits them and returns you to the spot where you initiated them.
• Pressing Circle on Controller 2 resets the stage.

Pressing L2 + R2 + Circle allows you to look all around the map, even outside of boundaries.

Pressing L2 + R2 + Circle again displays tile data.

To do: See if that mouse cursor is controllable somehow. It is! Now to document it.

Page Select Mode#

Pressing L2 + R2 + Triangle brings up the sprite table.

Controls: