Interesting resource there with the gadgeteer runs. Shame youtube destroyed annotations. I used to laugh at quite a few annotated Tim B^Uckley cartoons which are now either removed or ruined because of the annotation deletion.BareKnuckleRoo wrote:Oh absolutely not. It's a decent to average weapon in a game filled with vastly underwhelming weapons, hence why it was Mineyl's pick in the MM5 Gadgeteer (boss weapons only) run as the first weapon to collect. I can't remember the annotations, but out of all the weapons in MM5, it's the one that works most reliably in a variety of situations, and also allows you defeat the boss it's weak to without any ammo issues in the stage itself, but it's certainly by no means good compared to other genuinely good weapons:Gyro Attack is not that great.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9f_qkiJil0
Mineyl's got boss weapon only runs of all the games, and had very detailed annotations which since got destroyed by Youtube (hence why I'm a firm believer in hardcoded subtitles for posterity).
Bouncy weapons are cool in theory, but because you can't fire it at an angle at a floor or ceiling, its uses are limited largely to direct damage. It's Gyro Blade without the control. Its speed makes it considerably better than the near-useless Gemini Laser, a previous bouncy weapon which was slow as to be outright cumbersome (but does one-shot a few key enemies like the porcupines?).I will stan for Crystal Eye a BIT.
I agree with your comments about the boss weapons feeling rather bad against the bosses they're supposed to be weak to, aside from Stone Man maybe (Napalm worked decently well vs Stone for me). Stone vs Charge Man can be awkward if you don't have Power Stone's firing arc memorized.
I can't say I like what the SNES era games did with boss weaknesses though. Bosses that were weak to weapons would not only take major damage but would go into a stagger animation that often interrupted whatever they were doing, meaning having the weapon specific to that boss REALLY trivialized certain fights. The NES games felt better balanced. Stronger weapons, but you couldn't get out of outright dodging attacks either unless your weapon was super strong against the boss as several are in MM2.
The thing with Napalm is the only way Stone Man can hurt you is to touch you (power stone is as useless for him as for you). The charged buster can hit him from anywhere on the arena. Napalm Bombs can only hit from short range. I found I was more likely to get hit when using the Napalm Bombs, although that could also be my greed at work. By MM5 standards yeah, it's practically a masterpiece of a boss weakness. I still think it's kinda bad though because it doesn't really gel with the boss. The explosions don't do anything to Stone Man's crumple i-frames. The boss counter weapons should ideally be something that counters the boss. Like how Air Shooter aims upwards to hit Crash Man. Or Tornado Blow removes Magma Man's fire. But at the same time, I do agree with you that boss counter weapons should not amount to an instant win button. I've seen boss fights of MM7 and MM8. Haven't played them myself, but I did notice the boss weaknesses allowed you to stunlock them from full to dead.
I finished MM2. I did pop down a save state in the boss door for that damn crash bomb boss. Fuck that thing. The final jump you have to make is so difficult I thought it was actually impossible. The amount of lag generated by the boss is insane and the knockback when you get hit by nearly-unavoidable bullets is so powerful it will almost certainly knock you off a platform if you are standing on one. No idea how that boss got past the testing phase. The technical performance alone should have convinced them to remove a few objects from the arena.
However, aside from that one speed bump, MM2 was great fun. I definitely underrated this game the first time I played it. I was overly harsh back then, probably because MM2 is over-praised in popular culture. But it's a damn fine game. A solid 8/10 or 9/10, docking a point for some shitty Wily bosses. Fun weapons, mostly excellent boss designs, enjoyable robot master stages (minus Heat Man and Quick Man) etc. MM2 is a nice length for replaying too.