Format: Advance
Genre: 2d platformer
Developer: Capcom
Publisher: Capcom

SNES port. In terms, probably the best SNES game port I've played so far in this challenge. That's not saying much though considering that all the others have been absolutely hot garbage because of screen proportions. MegaMan & Bass is conceptually a WTF styled game. The story is that a robot named King is out to destroy all humans by making a robot army or something? Turns out he's another Dr. Wily invention sent to destroy Megaman. I can understand Megaman in this regard, but Bass makes absolutely no sense. Bass is an evil robot designed by Dr. Wily to be the ultimate power, more or less, and his goal is to destroy MegaMan. Both of them are playable in this game and run the exact same route of enemies, albeit with different abilities. While Megaman gets the charge buster, Bass gets double jump. More comparable are that Megaman gets slide whereas Bass gets dash. The engine that this one runs on is that of Megaman 7, which means there is a general slowness to it and an awkward almost comic design. Interestingly enough, because of that comic design, there's almost a merging of the worlds in this title. Bass clearly was designed in the concept of Megaman X, whereas Megaman was designed after MM7. There is an item shop in this game just like 7, as well as equipment that can modify gameplay like half-damage, faster charge, or auto-regen. The backstory of the game is that Dr. Wily created a robot named King to go destroy Megaman, however, he goes rogue as all of Wily's machines do and takes over his lab. Upon seizing his lab, he raids a robot museum to hijack and create clones of all sorts of nasty robots in order to destroy humanity. He seemingly forgot completely about his mission and is determined to be the "King" of all robots including Megaman, Bass, and Protoman. Protoman is also in this game as a tool to tell the story a bit. He's more of a mundane cameo than anything else. He shoes up, gets his ass kicked, runs away, rinse repeat. I guess they needed a character that both Bass and Megaman would be friendly towards, haaah. The Green Devil appears in this game, as well as a plethora of new robot masters. Let's hit up the repeats first though, Tengu Man and Astro Man return as robot masters in this game. Initially making their debut in MM8, which apparently this game takes place after in the timeline, they reappear as bosses in this title. The newcomers are 'Cold Man', 'Magic Man', 'Ground Man', 'Burner Man', 'Dynamo Man', and 'Pirate Man'. Yes, that's right, I said Pirate Man. We've gone full circle at this point! I'm sure Wily's next brilliant invention will be Robot Man! The advancement of this game itself is set in the 3-5 style. That means you have 3 choices in the easy stages to unlock 5 choices in the harder stages. Beat all 8 robot masters and unlock the "Crystal Gate" apparently, to unlock King's Castle. King's Castle itself is a 3 stage finale to this game, but it's far from easy. The stages are massive so don't expect something free and easy like Megaman X. The bosses in King's Castle are additional throwback enemies and garbage from previous titles as well. You'll get a real kick out of THAT ONE BOSS that loves to make platforms. Had me raging over it's BS for nearly an hour. It all leads up to, as it naturally does, a Dr. Wily fight which is also similar(or so I hear) to the MM8 Wily fight. One thing interesting about this style of Megaman is that with the Screw/Inventory system, you can change your fighting style on the fly. Like putting up double defense and trying to tank things, or putting on autoheal and avoiding certain attacks to regen, or putting on C.Attack to whop out some massive damage at low health. I believe Bass gets some different upgrades. Something to take note of if you play as Megaman is that due to the fact he doesn't have double jump, you often have to use his Ice ability in order to advance through parts of the game. It seems very impractical, because it is. This game was clearly designed around Bass. There are also CDs throughout the game you can find. When you obtain a CD, it is permanently unlocked and provides some backstory in the database. To get all the CDs you must play both as Megaman and Bass. The music is very good in this title, but depends on the stage/boss. Some songs are better than others. The graphics are also superb, but the game design does feel a bit stretched and weak at times. The resolution issue of porting SNES to GBA is also prominent here, as there are some blind falls and jumps that lead directly into spikes.

All in All, Rockman & Forte(Megaman & Bass) received a solid 8.0 score for it's classic dynamic Megaman style. NO E-TANKS!! Blind Spike Pits/Jumps. Run-Into-You Bosses. King's Castle is stupid. Kind of a Slog. Certain powerups/weapons are REQUIRED.