[Fan Game] Mega Man: The Sequel Wars (Wily Wars 2)

[SokZaJelo]

Check out the latest project demo released for SAGE 2022!
https://sonicfangameshq.com/forums/showc...wars.1370/

Mega Man: The Sequel Wars is an upcoming fan-made follow-up to Mega Man: The Wily Wars for the Sega Genesis. It aims to remake the second NES trilogy of Mega Man games, while also introducing new features and challenges for veteran players.

The game is intended to be fully playable on real Sega Genesis hardware. Note that this is NOT a rom-hack of Wily Wars, rather an entirely new game coded in C, and shares no code with it. As such, the game will be distributed as a complete rom rather than as a patch (because there is nothing to patch to).

EPISODE RED will be the first release of the project, coming in early 2023 and containing the full remake of Mega Man 4, as well as a completely new EX Mode rendition of the game!






Features:
Remade levels: All 48 stages from the games will be faithfully remade and given a fresh new 16-bit coat of paint.
Smooth controls: Code written from scratch means Mega Man moves as fluidly as possible, allowing fast screen transitions and eliminating the pitfalls in Wily Wars' controls.
Bonus content: Share weapons between games, play as additional characters such as Proto Man and Roll, and much more, including...
EX Mode: don't feel like playing through the same game again? EX Mode will provide a full game's worth of new content for 4-6 each, complete with new stages, enemies, bosses and more.

For more info check out my YT channel where I regularly post updates!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCh6puDO..._zCiDoD2lQ

(note: comments up to the end of Page 2 discuss the old discontinued 2020 demo release, after which the project had completely restarted development. A demo of the new version can now be found at the top of this post.)

[MrTrippleAAA]

Looks really cool! Just thought I'd inform you that I tested this on an Everdrive and it does not seem to boot so I hope you figure out a way to fix that. I'll let you know what I think of the game once I actually get the chance to play it.

[IrrelevantMage]

So, my first impressions in the project are simple.
Began with Toad Man stage, using vanilla options

Experimented some glitches, for example, the charge sound playing even when i'm not charging, or the game having crashed once when shooting Toad Man with a charged shot at it's second phase. (I have no idea what caused that to happen by the way.) Being able to walk on ladders, certain letters glitching for no reason, but as you said, it's an early demo.

The physics are recreated decently I believe, which is a good work, but I feel that the knockback has a lot of distance compared to the main games, this caused me some problems while advancing on the stages. A little problem was how the sand made your slide just slow as hell, I didn't really enjoy that one part. Also, the damage output is still a little too much. But this last problem is more in the original mm4.

About the new features, I first had contact with the second phases, which concept I liked very much.

Toad Man's was pretty nice, yet it could have a better way to tell when the fish attack is happening.
Skull Man's wasn't of my liking, due to it just being space being cut, his attacks as far as I noticed are still the same.
Pharaoh Man's while seems based a bit on R4MI, it could have some improvements as Pharaoh seems to be on the pyramid for too long, making it very hard to do this buster only, especially when the time he is on the floor feels a bit short.
Drill Man's fight in general feels a bit boring, when he gets to the ground there is not much to do except wait or jump around, some indicator when he gets up should be added, and the second phase felt like a first phase with something to do while Drill Man is in the ground.
Charge Man's feels a bit random on how the coal falls.
Knight Man's is actually okay, not much problem with it.
Tomahawk Man's is good, the eagle idea can be better executed, though.
All these fights are done buster only, by the way.

Also tried an EX Mode stage, this one being Toad Man. While some introduction and pallete changes would be nice, I've enjoy the extra additions and the stage itself was fun. And the extra things like Burst Chaser, Air Slide, Double Jump and Infinite lives were pretty nice additions that could be fun to play with, but I didn't dedicated much time to those.

Also, really unrelated, but, it feels oddly satisfying to be able to slide jump in MM6 levels, please, make this still possible in the final game. Pretty nice demo so far! Played in the Kega Fusion emulator with savestates. I'd suggest some sprites get a bit of polish but that is all here, played the game for around 40 minutes. Definitely looking forward to the development of this!

[SokZaJelo]

Looks really cool! Just thought I'd inform you that I tested this on an Everdrive and it does not seem to boot so I hope you figure out a way to fix that. I'll let you know what I think of the game once I actually get the chance to play it. :D

That's unfortunate. Likely an initialization issue on my part. Game worked on all emulators I tested it on, just goes to show how inaccurate it can be!
Also, did it boot into a black screen? If so did you try pressing start? I just realized I didn't flush the tilemap properly on the disclaimer screen. It may show black but still run once getting past it.

The physics are recreated decently I believe, which is a good work, but I feel that the knockback has a lot of distance compared to the main games, this caused me some problems while advancing on the stages. A little problem was how the sand made your slide just slow as hell, I didn't really enjoy that one part. Also, the damage output is still a little too much. But this last problem is more in the original mm4.

Yeah several people commented about the knockback, I forgot to reduce the player's speed during it. Will be fixed. Regarding the damage output, it should be 1:1 with the originals, though mm4 does have some high values (all of its bosses deal 8 in contact damage for example).

Also, really unrelated, but, it feels oddly satisfying to be able to slide jump in MM6 levels, please, make this still possible in the final game.

All levels will work on the same base code, so this behaviour will be retained.

Also thank you everyone for the bug feedback. I'll be busy for a while but before then I'll still issue a small update today to fix some critical bugs.

EDIT: Update has been issued.
-fixed "stage clear" flags not being properly reset
-fixed knockback speed being too high
-fixed imprecise ladder detection
-fixed possible sprite overload crash in toad man bossfight (splash visuals are removed)
-fixed colton projectiles being too fast
-fixed missing sound in fake man defeat scene
-fixed first skeleton joe in skull man stage not appearing
-fixed some controller objects becoming visible after pausing
-mousubeil hitbox size increased in hard difficulty so they can be hit by the small charge shot
-included list of credits with the download

[Beed28]

Pretty nice work so far. My only gripes so far is that bosses probably shouldn't do their pinch mode attacks in the original stages (i.e. should only do them in EX Mode), and the fact that the controls can't be changed (i.e. I want to map the jump button to C and shoot button to B).

[SokZaJelo]

Likely a final update for now, but the demo has once again been updated to fix the checkpoint before charge man midboss being broken.
Also fixed pharaoh man EX mode fight loading wrong graphics when pausing.

[UlticraftMTT]

This is legit one of the best homebrew games i've ever seen. I love rushing through the EX stages (and all of the stages in general) with Double Jump, Burst Chaser, and Air Slider on. There are a few complaints i have as of now but they're mostly minor:

Was kind of disappointed the Drill Man stage midboss wasn't Quint, but i guess a Ghost Guts Man works too.

As stated by Beed28 above, the bosses should only have their upgraded attacks in EX mode.

Currently, the Cyber Gabyoalls are pretty glitchy in the normal Knight Man stage, as they can begin to move in midair.

Climbing ladders feels a bit slow.

I think the MM4, MM5, and MM6 charge shots should be seperate from the Difficulty option, i know this will be changed later on most likely, but it would be nice to play in, for example, Easy Mode with the MM4 Charge Shot, or Hard Mode with the MM5 Charge Shot.

Napalm Bomb falls through the floor in the weapon demonstration.

And the only major problem, the entire game lags when a pretty low amount of enemies are onscreen, and i'm not talking 6 or 7 enemies which is understandable if it lags the game, but rather, 2 or 3 enemies onscreen cause the game to lag.

Other than those, this demo is a lot of fun! I can't wait to see it finished.

I'm also going to just go ahead and give some of the all-new EX mode enemies some names:

Coalcarry
Giddiu-P4
Sisi Curser
Pharein
Metall Bomber
Jumbig Potton
Returning Kerog
Skeleton Goro

[kuja killer]

Dont know if your already aware of this but i'll post anyway. I was in pharoah man level just regular normal, "not" EX. i just got the balloon, and i was just testing it out playing around, and...somehow i got stuck in the ceiling and just flat out "soft locked" the game.

No way out, the game infintely loops scrolling the screen back and forth diagonally up/left then down-right forever... so i had to reset the game.

here:
https://i.imgur.com/ZzvbcH1.png

[N-Mario]

Oh my gosh! I didn't know this was a thing! :O
It looks pretty good from the trailer TBH. Though My gripes are the boss explosions are too close to Mega Man X boss explosions. And there's too much MM7 sound FX as well. I prefer the original explosions IMO.

[SokZaJelo]

The demo is quite rough, more than I expected as pointed out by some people. In retrospect I should've focused way more on polish. However I will make sure to address all of the complaints as my end goal is to make the game as good as possible. That includes inaccuracies, slowdown, unfinished art, ugly .jpgs and unfitting sfx.
Art is currently very rough with lots of borrowed assets other MM titles. I plan to replace all of these, however I'm not talented as far as art goes.
Since the scope of the project is quite big, any contribution is welcome. If you wish to help with art, music, testing, etc. feel free to PM me and I'll fill you in on the details.

[SuperVGBoy]

I am psyched for this! I especially like how the robot masters use something similar to the Gear System in 11, though that may be best suited as an EX mode exclusive feature. I've also taken some notes in regards to moments that may cause unfair difficulty.

General:
Some of the hitboxes in general seem too big, like Pharoah Man's body & Pharoah Wave Attack, enemy explosions, and the Merserkers, or disjointed, like the Yudon's bodies and heads.

Stages:
Knight Man's normal stage is the glitchiest one so far
The bouncy area has the Gaboyalls stuck in midair, and there are chances where the player has no control, when they could keep some control in the original.
The spikes in Tomahawk Man's Stage could be better telegraphed, as they blend in too much with the safe ground.
In EX Skull Man's Stage, the spikes are just the rib bones with flat tops. They can easilly be mistaken for safe platforms as well.

Enemies:
The Cannons in Skull Man's Stage end up initially shooting down rather than up.
The shots of the Metall Cannons are off-center.

Normal Robot Masters:
Drill Man's burrowing attack is hard to telegraph. There is shaking when he's about to surface, but it's almost right when he comes up, so you could still get damaged. It's a little better in his "Power Gear" state, where the timing is consistent with the last boulder dropping.
Sometimes, Knight Man's mace floats away from rather than towards Mega Man, especially in the corners.
You can exploit Skull Man by not moving after entering the boss room and he won't react at all to buster shots.


EX mode Bosses:
Where you battle Mega Water S, it is very cramped! You can't really tell whether he's going to land on the upper or lower platforms coming from the center or from the opposite side.
Enker's absorption move is also almost unavoidable because of the damaging electric balls randomly moving in at a pace too fast to react to normally. Combined with being pulled in, you can't really escape without taking a lot of hits.

Sounds (Not related to difficulty, but a minor nitpick): It's weird hearing sounds from MM7, MMX, and Sonic, when some of the sound clips from Wily Wars could be used.

[UlticraftMTT]

Sounds (Not related to difficulty, but a minor nitpick): It's weird hearing sounds from MM7, MMX, and Sonic, when some of the sound clips from Wily Wars could be used.

I think Mega Man 7 sound effects are kind of fitting with Wily Wars graphics, but i agree on the others.

[pianohombre]

Hi,
I just tested this game today looks pretty great. There's a couple things worth noting though.

1) I couldn't get the rom to play in Pgen on a soft-modded ps2. You may not care about getting it to work for such a small audience, but I thought I'd point that out. I got it to work in Sega Pico though on my PS2.
2) There's a bug in Skull Man's stage during the boss fight. Once the fight starts if you spam your mega buster you can kill him without taking any damage. He won't move one square or ever fire his weapon.
3) In Pharoah Man's stage near the E-tank when you use R-coil there is a bug that prevents the tool from coming down, so you cannot get the extra item, but you can get this item later on such as with the "charge jump"
4) In Pharoah Man's stage there is also an area that is inaccessible. This area is accessible in the "original" NES classic game
5) Because each boss is pulled from different games you don't get to use any boss weaknesses to defeat them (which is part of the fun). So you may as well just use the buster or charge shot.
6) Sometimes when you beat a stage the "T" (trailblazer medal) shows up on Tomahawk man's stage, even if you didn't beat the stage yet.

Also, I have some experience rom hacking. I'm used to doing it on the SNES, but I worked on one game for the Sega Genesis so a lil familiar with the programming language, hex editing, graphics and stuff. If you want any help for some small things like assembly you can message me. Thanks.

[SokZaJelo]

I've realized I haven't updated this thread in a while, so a quick post for project news:
First, I've completely scrapped the old code (the one the demo's running on) and am currently recoding from scratch. It's not a light task, but a complete rewrite helped me greatly optimize many aspects of the engine and eliminate tons of bugs. You can see gameplay of the new engine here:


With the new engine also comes an overhaul in terms of graphics and general presentation. Tiles and backgrounds will now be much more detailed and animated. For comparison, here's how the demo looks vs. the above footage:


The way sprites work has been changed and allows for way more details, you can see the sprite improvements here:


Sound effects have also been changed to suit the console better.

I've updated the OP to reflect these changes, expect more news soon.

[N-Mario]

Huh, neat. Looking pretty good there.

[Gracavera]

Olá,muito bom seu trabalho,a Demo está jogável atualmente em flashcard???

[azoreseuropa]

Cool.

[spotanjo3]

Awesome. I really love it. To my understanding: Wily has created three new robots specifically designed to destroy Mega Man to act as guardians of the tower. These robots are known as the Genesis Unit, since the game was released for the Sega Genesis, and are patterned on characters from the Chinese novel, "Journey to the West".

Now, all they have to do is getting a new 3 more Japanese warriors for Genesis Unit 2 maybe from A Supplement to Journey to the West sequel. Do the research, I guess.

[Gufighter]

it didn't work on the flashcard, it just goes to black screen once the game is selected

[Gracavera]

É, infelizmente não temos ainda uma solução jogável em flash card