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The new issues of Nintendo Power and Playstation: The Official Magazine have hit the stands and with them come articles about Mega Man 9, with Nintendo Power having a full 2 pages in the form of an interview with the game's Producer, Hironobu Takeshita. While nothing new is explained in the interview, it does tell a few tidbits that stem from the game's development such as the bosses being initially too detailed and animation intensive for Keiji Inafune's liking (he had been stressing 'keeping it simple' repeatedly) and that the game's alleged difficulty (NP feels the game is harder than any of the NES releases but is immensely fun to play) comes from the nuances of the level design.

The interview also mentions that during development the 8 Robot Master stages were made first, followed by the boss designs and Inafune specifically wanting a female as one of them along with NP asking if Proto Man will be playable, to which Takeshita doesn't give a yes or no answer to.

Other notable things include Takeshita being asked about his experiences as a gamer with Mega Man, to which he replies that as a kid he played the hell out of Mega Man 5 and constantly had trouble with a specific boss. I'm gonna wager a guess and say it was Gyro Man >_>

As for the Playstation Magazine article, it's more or less a shout out to readers that the game is coming, why it's coming and why it's important. The staff sound very excited for the game, and like the rest of us cannot wait for it to be released.

Last week Capcom-Unity invited fans to send in questions, ten of which selected to be answered by the mega man himself, Keiji Inafune. And word up to all you guys with that "What happened to Dr. Wily in the X series?" signature pic guys in our forum: go find some cute Pokemon or something 'cause you won't need those anymore. Here are a couple choice inquiries to Keiji:

1) Did Zero really "kill" the family between the events of the Classic Mega Man and X series?

KI: No, Zero did not kill them. According to the way I created him, Zero is not such a person--it is not in his profile.

6) What happened to Dr. Wily in Rockman X series? Are Dr. Wily and Dr. Weil the same person? Were they ever supposed to be?

KI: A large amount of time has passed between the classic series and Mega Man X. Dr. Wily had died in the interim but was brought back by the virus. Dr. Wily and Weil are not the same person. It is ironic though, because Dr. Wily created Zero, and Dr. Weil used Zero, but ultimately it was a copy of Zero's original body with a different mind that defeated him.

With one answer he blows away years of careful speculation. 'Course, I have a feeling the hardcore timeline fans will just find other stuff to ponder in its place. Check out the whole select of questions and answers here.

Edit: For archival purposes, we've added the post in its entirety to our Interviews section here. --LBD

Kotaku's AJ Glasser gives her brief report on what he thinks of Mega Man 9 and playing it with a new Nyko controller peripheral. However, as a Mega Man fan, I think the real interesting part is this bit here:

According to Capcom PR dude Tim Ng, there were going to be two female robot villains - but the second girl was scrapped because the developers didn’t want fans to feel like the series was changing too much.

Sounds like Inti Creates really, with their two fem-bosses per lineup in the ZX games. I guess Mega Man just wasn't ready to handle that many women.

A very special post was made by Kramez over at the Capcom*Unity today that may be pleasing to some of the longer-running Mega Man fans among our ranks. Within, he links to a "From Pixels to Plastic" video by Mandalorian32 which looks back at the toys made by Bandai of America as a tie-in with the Ruby-Spears Mega Man animated series, as well as those of Jazwares and the Bandai of Japan Rockman model kits. He seems to have quite the collection of other video game figures and toys as well, including Mario, Street Fighter, Pokemon, Animal Crossing, and more.

But, being a "Mega Man News" post, this needs something more than just a fan's video to keep it out of the Community section, and as luck would have it, Kramez enlightens us to some of his involvement with the RS Mega Man cartoon. For one thing, he was involved in the script approvals for not only that cartoon, but Street Fighter and Darkstalkers as well. Wow, he's been around awhile. I'll need to ask him about the "Curse of the Lion Men" episode and how that ever got by sometime.

Further, he also reveals the origin of the anthem which fans still sing to this day when discussing the Blue Bomber:

"The simplistic theme song ("Super fighting robots! Mega Man!" repeatedly over and over) was picked because the Power Rangers had broken big about the same time the Mega Man cartoon launched and the producers wanted to feed off the success of that show -- including the brain-dead "Go go, Power Rangers!" theme -- as much as possible."

Neverminding my opinion of the Power Rangers theme, it's interesting to find out the Mega Man theme song's origins were tied to it. I wonder if Bandai offered any input into that, given they produced the toylines for both Mega Man, and to this day, Power Rangers. Then again, they never seemed to use those themes in the commercials, so who can say?

...and now you know the rest of the story!

You may remember the announcement of Capcom selling promotional E-Tank energy drinks, but chances are you haven't sipped from this cylindrical, aluminum gauntlet. Or seen what the stuff actually looks like. Fear not, as +D Games woos your curiosity with its report on the product. Interestingly enough, the drink is clear as water. But what about the taste? The reviewer states its flavor and ingredients are typical to that of any other sports drink, though it has a strong aftertaste of royal honey - the drinks primary flavoring constituent. Nevertheless, he felt that the beverage does deliver a spot of energy for those laggy days at work or right after giving your all in sport.

I'd considered trying to pick some of these up for our Mega Man 9 contest, but the means to get them probably would have not been timely enough for the contest's scope. Furthermore, after reading up on royal jelly I'm not so sure I want to try it now.

News Credit: GoNintendo, Tiny Cartridge

It's finally here! The Mega Man Network presents: MMN Reset: Mega Man 8. You can check it out on YouTube, or at the top of our front page this week. As for a GameTrailers version, we've been experiencing some troubles with getting things to upload since about Mega Man 2 or 3-- if you're familiar with GT, give us a shout and maybe we can figure out where we're going wrong.

Mega Man 8 is without a doubt the most unique entry in the numbered series, and so had much to talk about... everyone pity and applaud Heat Man for the editing job he had to do on my ramblings to make it fit into YouTube's time allocation.

We hope you've enjoyed our Mega Man countdownup to the release of Mega Man 9. It's been a long journey, and it's now September, and we still don't know when exactly Mega Man 9 is coming out (rumors point to the Xbox version coming on the 24th, and it follows that the others would be released accordingly around that if true), so we're going to keep on going with MMN Reset-- expect Rockman & Forte, aka Mega Man & Bass, aka "Pretender to the Throne of Mega Man 9" to be along shortly, and maybe we will still get to fit a little more Classic fun in before the site goes into hibernation as a result of us all finding out what Wily is up to on WiiWare, Xbox Live Arcade, and PlayStation Network.

...just kidding. We might take a day or two off, but we should have some coverage of the game along in short order.

As for MMN Reset, the staff here at The Mega Man Network has had a good time creating these, so you can expect them to continue... just with a little more lenient a schedule.

Finally, we just want to thank Seth Killian and Capcom for their support, and for bringing the idea to us and allowing us to use the assets you've seen in our site themes and videos these past eight weeks.

Now play, Mega Man Network! For everlasting fun! Lord, someone's going to kill me for that one by tonight, just you watch.

The new podcast page isn't exactly up, yet, but we have the podcast from two weeks ago finished and uploaded for you guys (actually, I finished it like, the weekend after we did it, but forgot to make a topic). Anyway, here you go, and keep in mind we'll be having another podcast real soon, and enjoy.

TMMN Podcast S2: August 22nd, 2008 - 71MB

Why so big compared to the other podcasts, you ask? Well, along with the new format of podcasts, we also doubled the length of shows from a half hour to a hour, so we'd be able to fit more topics in. I think it'll work pretty well.

That's right! If you own a Wii, you can win Mega Man 9 and the Mega Man 9 original soundtrack! And what are we asking of you? Just answer some questions in a quiz! To find out how to enter and win, take a look at our contest page. Good luck!

At the beginning of the month we had a topic about a great group of people wanting to raise money for a noble cause. They were going to play through MM games, and hopefully raise money in the process for the Children's Cancer Foundation.

Well, the playing begins around 3PM Central (4PM for everyone on the east coast, 1PM for those on the west coast). If you have time, stop on by and cheer them on in their chat room, and have a great time watching.

Join in on the marathon at their website. The marathon is to last up to 48 hours, with the hosts playing through Mega Man 1-8 and X1-X6.

Been a little while for me, hasn't it. I elected to do 7 though, since I like it a lot. I don't think it's by any means perfect, but I don't think it gets the credit it out to get for the effort that's put into it. For instance, with the... well, you know, just watch the video!

You can either check it out on the top of the page, if you didn't notice it, or head straight to YouTube. Direct downloading will be available... sooner or later. I hope you enjoy watching it as much as I enjoyed putting the credits together.