StenMan's Shotgun J

Hello everyone. How are you all today? Hopefully all well and enjoyed your week. I would’ve posted earlier, but been busy and have had some serious net connection issues… not fun, not fun at all. Anyways, voting is still open for RRF 300, so don’t forget about that too, but onto today’s RRF. Today, we’ll head over to EXE and look there. Today’s RRF is: ‘OldStove’. Well, technically, the game calls these viruses “OldStov", but i’m saving my processor and my computer the agony of correcting me. Anyways, this virus is only found in EXE/BN 6, and quite area as well. You first see them in the school in a plotline battle battle on your first day at CyberAcademy, thanks to Kojirou/Mick’s interference. Even this early in the game, they are very easy to beat. A couple Cannons and Vulcan 1s will take them out. Once you beat them and Kojirou/Mick turns into a whiner, and gets to operate BlastMan… well, if you’ve played EXE6, you know what happens, i’m not mentioning that here. In the first actual area, this place is absolutely rittled with OldStove’s. They look like an old wooden or bronze stove from the late 1800’s or early 1900’s with a steel gate for a mouth… or i guess teeth. It blows a breath of fire at you, 3 panels long. Very easy to dodge, though watch out. In its 2nd and 3rd version… and its “Rare” version, the stream of fire will crack panels, possibly limiting your movement… unless you’ve got FloatShoes or TenguCross. Watching them blow out fire is a bit amusing the first time you see it… or least i found it funny (i have an odd sense of humour i know). Since these guys are fire based, get out any water-based chip like, AquaNeedle and cool them off. Of course, AquaCross or AquaMan himself will do just fine here… not to mention DiveMan’s chip. If you beat them in good time and ranking… which you should… you’ll gain the Hell’s Burner chip, or Fire Burn as they call it over here. Overall, they were a pretty interesing virus, shame only to appear in only EXE6, but they were nice to see nonetheless. They always made me wonder why someone just doesn’t grab a fire extingusher and turn the heat down on them…. oh well, thats my own logic.

That concludes today’s edition of RRF. Hope you all liked it and see you again soon, and don’t forget to cast your vote for RRF300.

Hello everybody. How are you all today? Hopefully all well. Voting is still open for RRF300, so please vote for your 3 favorite entries. If you don’t know them…. either look underneath this post or have a look at AMAKEN. Anyways, onto today’s RRF. For today, we’ll go back to the weapon trend. Today’s RRF is: ‘Ring Boomerang’. Here’s one of my favorite weapons from Rockman 4. This neat little boomerang is gained after defeating RingMan… and early on in my Rockman/Megaman career, this was an absolute nightmare as id always get struck by either his boomerangs, or RingMan himself while trying to avoid them. Anyways, enough of my past pains… this little ring-shaped boomerang has an extremely short range, though it’s a pretty effective weapon in this game. This weapon is effective in some sort against pretty much every enemy and boss… though its very effective against DustMan, Takotrash, and Wily’s 1st form. Also, while only doing 1 bit of damage, it will also pierce SkullMan’s Skull Barrier. It is also only one of 2 weapons from Rockman 4 that will damage Wily’s Final Form. The color scheme looks very similar to the one of Metal Blade from Rockman 2.. another small reason why i like it. This weapon is also nice to carry around all the time in pretty much any stage. The Buster was in it first run in this game, so i usually try to avoid it and use master weapons and the Ring Boomerang is a good one to use. Overall, it was a pretty neat weapon in Rockman 4. While it lacks big time in range, it makes up for it in practicality and effectiveness. Good to use on stage enemies, mini-bosses and Wily bosses.

That concludes today’s edition of RRF. Hope you all enjoyed it and see you all again soon.

Hello everybody. How are you all today? Hopefully all well.
Well, now that both the U.S. and Canadian elections have come and gone, thats doesn’t mean voting has ended. I’m conducting a little poll of my own here on Shotgun J. My Random Rockman Facts, or RRF’s, is approaching it’s 300th edition and to add some fun to it, I’ve decided to let you choose what topic i do for RRF #300. I’ve yet to decide whether i want to do it written or do it “On The Air” like i did RRF 200 and 250, i have decided for the topic for everyone to vote on.

The RRF 300 topic poll includes:
1: Intermissions - X8
2: Boobeam Trap - MM2
3: Sniper Joe - MMClassic
4: Cruiser 1001 - X1
5: Red Striker - MM B&C
6: Green Biker Dude - X2
7: Muramasa - EXE/BN
8: Mu Continent - RnR 2
9: Giant Laser - MM2
10: Serpent - ZX

And there you have it. You want to participate? Well, you sure can! It’s very simple. Send me, StenMan.EXE, an e-mail. My e-mail is ‘kwas71@hotmail.com’. You can choose any three (3) of those entires you see there. In order for your vote to count, please PLEASE, include “RRF300″ OR “Shotgun J” in the subject. You can vote only once per e-mail address… if you want to vote again… you can, just use another e-mail address.
Please do keep in mind that if you don’t include the proper subject or vote more then 3 entries, then you’re vote can (and probably will) be nulled.

Anyways, hope to see a nice turn-out. Vote away!!

EDITED: Nov. 13

Hello everyone. How are you all today? Hopefully all well, and gave a moment of silence for Remembrance/Veteran’s Day. For today’s RRF, we’ll head back on over to the Classic series and go back onto the newer trend of stage names. Today’s RRF is: ‘City Reservoir’. Here’s an interesting stage. Judging from the name “reservoir", it’s a little safe to assume it’s water related, and it is. This is WaveMan’s level in Rockman 5, and generally the first one i tackle whenever i play this game. The first bit is pretty simple and boring, but the second bit is much more fun. For the first bit, you’ll be dodging some water that comes out of the ground and some Teckyun’s, which i covered before (RRF258), and some slide-like tunnels in order to proceed. There are two of these tunnels and if you take the right one, you can get a 1-up. After the tunnels, youll be avoiding more water from the ground and have to ride on some bubbles. The smaller bubbles go very fast, but are weak and will burst after standing on them for a second or two, while the bigger ones travel considerably slower and will hold your weight. Be careful though… there’s spikes up ahead. After you get past this part, then the real fun begins. You’ll get to ride on the Hydro Cycle (I dont know if there is any other name for it, but it calls it that on the box), and ride on the waves. Here we have an 8-bit version of the Ride Chaser stages from the X series. This part is auto-scrolling with a few enemies, but it isn’t too difficult. Once you get about half way in this part, you’ll have your one-on-one fight with Octoper OA (RRF111). He’s an easy mini-boss, just no charged shots on the cycle… just single shots. Afterward you beat him, you’ll continue onwards and fight some more enemies and find the E piece in MEGAMANV. You may miss it the first time since it’s in the air and some enemies are coming just before it appears. After you get to the end of this auto-scrolling water ride, you’ll get to have your fight with WaveMan. He’s very easy, especially if you have ChargeKick with you… just be careful for his spears and the water on the ground. The ChargeKick may go right through WaveMan, but you’ll still get hurt from the water. Overall, it’s a pretty cool level, nice little Ride Chaser-style level for the most part and very nicely designed.

That concludes today’s edition of RRF. Hope everybody enjoyed it and see you all again soon.

Hello everybody. How are you all today? Me? I’m great, especially in the world of Sinnoh, aka Pokemon Pearl. Lots happening in my Sinnoh world as of the last update. I’ve battled my way through Team Galactic HQ in Weilstone, and in and on Mount Coronet, and totally owning all of the Grunts and even having a relatively easy time against their leader Cyrus in both battles, at their HQ and on Mt. Coronet. After beating all of them, I get into my big battle against Palkia. The battle was a fair challenge… including losing Empoleon, Staraptor and Luxray who, at the time, were my toughest ranked/leveled pokemon, though Bibarel weakened Palkia enough for me to capture him… and with only one Ultra Ball. Not bad! In terms of capturing, i’ve also captured Uxie and Azelf… much much more harder to capture and was only able to do it with the help of Blissey and her Sing ability. I haven’t used them, but i immediately put Palkia into my battle 6. I also tried out a couple other pokemon before hand. I traded out Sudowoodo for Marill/Azumarill and Mantike, but once i got Palkia, i was a bit partial to Dragon Claw. After some more battling and leveling up, i battled and easily took out Volkner and obtained the 8th and final gym badge and then got ready for the pain and suffering that is known as Victory Road. Luckily, i was levled up high enough to get through this area without dying too much… though i did have to use a fair amount of revives and restores in order to get through it. After doing so, and battling my “friend” for the last time in the League, i decided to do a small upgrade before taking on the Elite 4. So, i did fight them, had a realitively alright time against the first 3 of them, tohugh the 4th one was a pretty big challenge… especially draining my team and my reserve of revives and restores. After beating the 4th one, i managed to get to Cynthia… only to lose about 35% of the way. Yes, it sucked, but good thing i didn’t save, otherwise id be a little mad. After my little lesson learned, i managed to get a somewhat gameplan and strategy and leveled up my pokemon… and bought almost 40-50 revives and numerous HP restores. After a day or so, i re-challenged the Elite 4, and breezed through them… though still had to use some revives. Once i got to Cynthia, i got some sweet revenge and defeated her. Once again, it was a pretty difficult battle, but this time around, i came in better prepared with revives/restores and higher leveled pokemon and a semi-game plan with my previous fail. Now, im the new champion in my copy of Pearl and in the ‘hall of fame’. Now, im going to battle on the extra quests on the battle island and battle on more. My current team consists of: Lv.58 Bibarel, Lv.58 Empoleon, Lv.58 Luxray, Lv.58 Staraptor, Lv.54 Blissey, Lv.55 Palkia. Thats all i have to report right now. Stay tuned for more.

Hello everybody. How are you all today? Hopefully all well and enjoying your weekend. I’m a day behind here… due to a very nasty headache, so get ready. For today, this particular numbered RRF has been planned for almost a year, and its topic has been requested a number of times, but i’ve planned it for this specific number, and you’ll find out why. Today’s RRF is: ‘Black Weapon’. Yes, it’s finally time for this one. This is one of the rarest battlechips in physical format, for all 4 sets, and is only available in Advanced… and its chip number just so happens to be #289… hence the main reason why i was saving it for this one. Gamewise, this chip is only available in the JP exclusive Rockman.exe Real Operation 4.5 and can be used by all of the navis in that game. Where exactly it is, i’m not sure as i’ve never gotten that far in that game, due to my extreme lack of understanding japanese letters/symbols. This Mega-class chip, though looking very sinister, is neither a Dark Chip nor an Evil Chip, therefore, it’s not going to massacre your total HP or require you to be dark in order to use it, though there are some flaws that come with it. While it maximizes your buster abilities, including the base Attack at 10 and incredibly strong charged shots, it also plants a very strong and brutal HP bug on you, similar if not stronger than Lv2 poison. It’s essentially a version or re-mix of BusterMAX, but crossed with Geddon 3 or Anubis. It sounds nice, but having such a bad HP bug is basically using DarkRecovery without Chaos MediSoul. The chip icon is very nice as well, it shows Rockman holding his buster with a very evil look on his face and a dark blue and black energy-like field around him. Looks awesome i might add. As for the physical chip, its numbered 289 in the Advanced library (like i mentioned earlier), and is one of the rarest chips to get ahold of… and very expensive as well… i know my bank account is probably still hating me for that. Oh well, i’m not going to rant much on my big win and my blow to my bank account… that would be a little uncalled for. Overall,… well, what can i really say? I’ve never actually used it in 4.5 or on my ChipGate, so i can’t exactly judge it, but it’s definitely an awesome physical chip with an awesome icon.. and expensive.

That concludes today’s RRF. Hope you all enjoyed… especially those how’ve requested this topic. See you all soon.

Hello everyone. How are you all today? Hopefully all well and enjoyed your day… even though it gets dark much much earlier. Anyhow, onto today’s RRF. For today, we’ll go away from the stage trend and go back to the weapon trend. I know its a touch old, but whatever. Today’s RRF is: ‘Danger Wrap’. Here’s an interesting weapon from the Classic series. It may be a bomb-style weapon, but it’s a little different compared to other bombs in the Classic series up to this point. It appears in Rockman 7 after defeating BurstMan. Your version and BurstMan’s version of this attack work a touch different as well… or at least the way he uses them in his battle room. His version seals you in a bubble and throws you at the ceiling, which is covered with spikes… if want to stay alive, slide just before it hits. The bomb will stick to you, and it can hurt, but it sure beats instanst death. As for your version of this weapon, you still get a little bomb or mine or grenade or whatever, incased in a large bubble projectile. It’ll float around and will encase some enemies into the bubble and will eventually explode, killing the enemy. Some enemeies die instantly upon contact with it and others just take minor damage until the are weak enough to actually be able to kill or encase into the wrap, then kill. This weapon is also extremely useful and abusive against CloudMan. He is the only robot master that actually gets trapped in it and it deals him pretty severe damage… not to mention the spritework of him falling out of the sky and onto the ground and temporarily losing his cloud. Hitting him with it is extremely easy too, let him fire off his first Thunder Bolt, then jump and hit him with it. Overall, it was a pretty interesting bomb weapon in Rockman 7, a neat little side-effect to it, though i prefer to use it in choice situations, particularly when battling against CloudMan.

That concludes today’s edition of RRF. Hope you all enjoyed it and see you all again soon.

Hello everyone. How are you all today? Hopefully all well… and enjoying more of dark in night and less of light in day… bad joke/visual, but oh well. For today, we’ll stick with the little trend of stage names, official or not. Today’s RRF is: ‘Transport Train’. Another stage from Classic and im assuming you’ve already made a guess as to who’s level this is. Yes, it’s ChargeMan. For the majority of this level, you’re on a moving train, though you don’t actually see the train physically moving, but you do see the background moving and hear the train going along the tracks and when you’re inside the train, you can see it move up and down on intervels. At the very beginning of the level, you see the engine/front of the train and you climb up the first ladder and go to the next screen, the train will somehow go from standing still to top-speed and flying along the tracks in mere seconds as you go fron one screen to another. Once the train is in full swing, you’ll start battling numerous baddies, including Mettools riding locomotives and some flying enemies. There are 2 “overworld” areas here so to speak, technically you’re riding onto of the train. There’s also 3 “underworld” areas which basically means you’re inside some of the rail cars. 2 areas in the car are full of giant hens and rats and other enemies.. and in the 2nd of them, you’ll find the second “A” in MEGAMANV in order to create Beat. It’s easiest to obtain it using Rush Coil. In the 3rd of the underworld areas, you’ll have your battle with ChargeMan, and having the Power Stone is extremely nice to have when fighting him… even though that weapon is random and unreliable. Overall, it was a pretty interesting level. Riding along on a train isn’t exactly original… considering some of the previous endings, but in an actual level was interesting.

That concludes today’s RRF. Hope you all enjoyed it and see you all again tomorrow.

Hello everybody. How are you all today? Hopefully all well, enjoyed your halloween… and aren’t pigging out too too much on candy. Hey, we all do. For today’s RRF, we’ll stick with stage names in the Classic series. I’ve since come across of some of their names, official or not, so hey! It’s good RRF material. Today’s RRF is: ‘Spinning Greenhouse’. Judging from the name “spinning", it’s pretty safe to assume that this is TopMan’s stage from Rockman 3, and it is. Until i found the name for this, i never really noticed the “greenhouse” theme to it, so just for fun, i played this level in Rockman 3 on my AVCollection, and sure enough… well, it makes sense to me anyways. Okay, onwards… this level is home to TopMan and a lot of top-like enemies. Little tops spinning everywhere, a large hole near the end with spinning top platforms, screws, giant cats spitting out hairballs at you and of course, Komasaburos (RRF 104). This stage is probably one of the more easy ones in Rockman 3, as there really aren’t a whole lot of hazards or obstacles, such as huge pits or water, you won’t need to rely on Rush Marine or Rush Jet. There are some power-ups and secondary routes you can obtain/take via Rush Coil. This level is also a good example of what could be called a buster-level. A level where you don’t need to rely on master weapons, you can simply just use your mega buster… or in this game, the plasma cannon. In some cases, i like to use the Magnet Missile and Needle Cannon on some enemies, though the buster works just fine. As for the greenhouse part to the name, well… just take a good and long look at about 90% of the floor and ceiling here. Lush green plants all over and under glass… or they could be weeds, i dont know… probably plants. Be careful though as some of the glass is broken, exposing spikes. Self-explanitory there. Once you get past the spinning tops that go up and down over the giant hole, you’ll have your one-on-one battle with TopMan, who’s extremely easy, with or without Hard Knuckle. Overall, the design of the level was pretty interesting and nicely done… almost could’ve been done for WoodMan or PlantMan rather then TopMan, but it was still pretty nice, very easy and fun to go through.

That concludes today’s RRF. Hope everyone enjoyed it and see you all tomorrow.

Hello everybody. How are you all today? Hopefully all well and enjoying your halloween, getting lots and lots of candy… and not scaring everyone and everything with firecrackers. For today, since it’s halloween, i figured we’ll have it a little bit halloween based… or in a theory anyways. Today’s RRF is: ‘Horror Fortress’. Here we go, a music title, a stage, and its halloween related. This is ShadeMan’s theme and area from Rockman 7. We all know that this level should just be called “BOO! Haunted House!” (Yes, i know where i got that from, but i couldn’t resist it). Anyways, onto the Horror Fortress. After beating the first 4 robot masters in Rockmat 7, or by using a cheat code, you’ll then be able to battle ShadeMan and his level. At first, the entire level is black, and then the cloud move away and the area lights up, allowing you to proceed. This level is just full of surprises, including, crows, zombies, statues with helmets that fall off and attack you, a nice dark area and the giant pumpkin mini-boss. The pumpkin mini-boss is also the way to get to ProtoMan and acquire his ProtoShield in this game as well… after you’ve found him in CloudMan and TurboMan’s level. Also, you can also the Energy Balancer in this same area… where? Right underneath a picture of Wily… a picture that makes him look more like Dracula. An easter egg at its absolute finest. In order to get to this small area, you have to kill the pumpkin mini-boss by hitting its eyes, not its core. A lot of people suggest the Thunder Bolt… although, its not the best way, i personally find the buster to work just as good. If you avoid the special little path, you’ll be unable to obtain these items unless you die or re-do the level. Of course, you dont HAVE to go that way, if you dont kill the pumpkin via its eyes, it’ll let you proceed the normal way… and having the Scorch Wheel is pretty much mandatory here, since the area is dark and there are a fair amount of spikes on the floor. Once you get past all the stock halloween baddies and the pumpkin and possibly ProtoMan, you’ll be able to fight ShadeMan… A vampire!!… come on now, what were you expecting? A poodle? Having the Wild Coil makes this fight a lot easier then with anything else. As for the music itself, well.. there actually 2 themes to this one. One’s the main one, which sounds pretty good, creepy as well. The other is a hidden one, and i’ve only heard it on the net and never figured out the code to get it in the game. Overall, it’s a pretty cool spooky-style level, the music is quite good, nice level design, cool and suitable enemies, good little extras with Wily’s picture and the fight with ProtoMan. Definitely worth playing Rockman 7 for awhile, halloween or not.

That concludes todays and the halloween edition of RRF. Hope you all enjoyed it and see you all again soon.