{"id":46015,"date":"2025-03-24T19:13:52","date_gmt":"2025-03-24T10:13:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/?p=46015"},"modified":"2025-03-24T19:13:54","modified_gmt":"2025-03-24T10:13:54","slug":"this-wasnt-something-capcom-forced-me-to-do-mega-man-2-creator-talks-about-why-the-game-was-made-in-only-three-months","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/this-wasnt-something-capcom-forced-me-to-do-mega-man-2-creator-talks-about-why-the-game-was-made-in-only-three-months\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cThis wasn\u2019t something Capcom forced me to do\u201d Mega Man 2 creator talks about why the game was made in only three months"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Releasing on the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1988, Mega Man 2 came out mere months after 1987\u2019s Mega Man, the first game in Capcom\u2019s iconic series. One of the key creators of Mega Man 2<\/strong>, Akira Kitamura, recently revealed exactly why this game had a staggeringly short development time of 3 months. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Quite a lot of games that are considered classics were developed surprisingly quickly, including Final Fantasy VI (12 months), GTA: Vice City (9 months), and The Legend of Zelda: Majora\u2019s Mask (12 months) (Source: GameRant<\/a>). This is often due to the game\u2019s system being based upon a previous title and\/or because they reuse existing character assets. However, a super short development time like Mega Man 2\u2019s three months can raise alarm bells among fans, even prompting concerns that the devs were unfairly pressured by the company.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The development of Mega Man 2 <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"Mega<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Taking to X last week, Akira Kitamura dismissed<\/a> fans’ worries about pressure from Capcom and revealed why Mega Man 2 was made so speedily. He explains<\/a> that sales for the first Mega Man game were not good, and the decision had been made to end the series there. At the time, arcade games were Capcom\u2019s main focus and many of their console games were ports of arcade titles. As a brand-new IP on a console created by a team of 6, including Keiji Inafune, Mega Man did not have this existing name recognition behind it.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Mega<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In order to prevent Capcom from ending Mega Man after one game, Kitamura and the team immediately set out to make Mega Man 2 in between working on other projects. \u201cThis was not something the company forced me to do,\u201d says Kitamura, reiterating that \u201cWe weren\u2019t told to make [Mega Man 2] by the company, rather it was something I wanted to do.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kitamura adds that they were able to make Mega Man 2 so quickly because the foundations of the game\u2019s development (gameplay system, characters etc.) had already been created for the first Mega Man title. Mega Man 2 kept the first game\u2019s system of letting the player choose which order to beat the stages in, with each stage\u2019s Robot Master boss giving up their weapon to Mega Man after being beaten. Each boss is weak against a certain other Robot Master\u2019s weapon – lending a strategic aspect to the gameplay. Mega Man 2 built upon the first game\u2019s 6 stages and Robot Masters, upping the count to eight (in the final stage in both games, the player takes on the Robot Masters again before facing off against Dr. Wily). Mega Man 2 also improved graphical and gameplay aspects, such as adding the Energy Tank item that insta-fills Mega Man\u2019s health and a password system so that you didn\u2019t lose your progress.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Mega<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Kitamura thus describes Mega Man 2 as giving the game\u2019s small team of young devs the chance to redo and rework the first game. \u201cAlthough I created the gameplay system myself, I couldn\u2019t explore its depths [with Mega Man 1], so many parts had to be redone,\u201d Kitamura explains. Although Mega Man 2\u2019s appeal lies in how it expanded upon the first game by adding new elements, Kitamura says that they prioritized perfecting it. \u201cThat\u2019s why we did the level design first- not just the appearance of each stage, but also things like gimmicks and enemy placement.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Mega<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

However, part of the motivation to finish making Mega Man 2 came from the players. \u201cI got all the postcards sent to us by children and read them out to the team,\u201d Kitamura recalls. \u201cEven now, I still remember this moving episode. It was a moment when we felt that we were doing a very important job and became aware of our responsibilities.\u201d This helped the young team to remain focused and not get bogged down in making things overly complex. \u201cThanks to this, we were able to create a very high-quality game in a short period of time.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On X, Akira Kitamura often provides answers to fans\u2019 questions and behind-the-scenes insight, especially on the early Mega Man games, which he seems to get asked about a lot. If you have a burning question about the titles that he has worked on, you may be lucky enough to get an answer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Akira Kitamura sheds light on the super-short development of Mega Man 2, giving insight into the young Capcom team’s aims and inspirations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":46018,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[17,82],"class_list":["post-46015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-japan-related-news","tag-retro-games"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"\n\u201cThis wasn\u2019t something Capcom forced me to do\u201d Mega Man 2 creator talks about why the game was made in only three months - AUTOMATON WEST<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Akira Kitamura sheds light on the super-short development of Mega Man 2, giving insight into the young Capcom team's aims and inspirations.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/this-wasnt-something-capcom-forced-me-to-do-mega-man-2-creator-talks-about-why-the-game-was-made-in-only-three-months\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u201cThis wasn\u2019t something Capcom forced me to do\u201d Mega Man 2 creator talks about why the game was made in only three months - 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