What if Sega preferred Eternal Champions?/Mega Man V

Mega Man V is a 2002 action-platform video game developed by Inti Creates and published by Capcom for the PlayStation 2, Sega Dreamcast, Nintendo CameCube, Atari Nuon and Microsoft Windows. It is the first installment in the Mega Man V series, the fifth series in Capcom's Mega Man video game franchise. The game is set 100 years after the events of the Mega Man X series and follows Vent, a humanoid who works for Giro Express, a delivery service. to aid a human scientist named Ciel and her resistance force in a fight against the utopia of Neo Arcadia.

Mega Man V was produced as a commission product by Inti Creates for Capcom, who was given free reign on the project's direction and premise. During development, the developers aimed to make V among the most challenging games in the franchise, and to bridge the gap between the mechanical feel of the X series, and the human feel of the Legends series.

Conception
Mega Man V was developed by Inti Creates, a company established in 1996 by several former members of the game's publisher Capcom. Prior to the game's conception, Capcom had developed numerous games in its Mega Man franchise beginning with its classic series in 1987, then expanding to its Mega Man X spin-off series and two non-platformer series, Mega Man Legends and Mega Man Battle Network. Up until the development of Mega Man V, Inti Creates was not a successful venture. The company's vice president Yoshihisa Tsuda had wanted to create a Mega Man game and would often attend game conventions to express this interest to Keiji Inafune, an artist and producer for the franchise. Inafune eventually called Inti Creates requesting a game proposal, on which the company promptly began working. Mega Man V was developed as a commission product by Inti Creates, who were given a free rein on its design and premise. The game was produced by Inti Creates president Takuya Aiza and was co-directed by Ryota Ito and Capcom's Yoshinori Kawano. Inafune signed on as the game's co-producer.

One goal for the developer was to make Mega Man V the most challenging out of all the games in the franchise up to that point. The gameplay model and characters act as extensions of the Mega Man Legends series, while taking elements from the original and Mega Man X series.Zero was a secondary protagonist in the Mega Man X storyline. However, Inti Creates started developing Mega Man Zero without the character as the game's focus. Inafune had originally intended for the game to be centered around Zero. When Inafune requested that, the company complied and inserted Zero into their draft. Though Zero was mostly depicted as a benevolent hero in the X series, the designers wanted to blur the line between good and evil when drawing up the new game's narrative. This meant having Zero and Ciel's resistance feared by humanity as terrorists and making the Four Guardians and Pantheons protectors of the human race. The game's main antagonist was a popular topic of discussion during production, and the developer often sought input from Capcom in this regard. Tsuda jokingly suggested that they make the original X the final boss, an idea that was carrried through development. According to Ito, Capcom pressured Inti Creates to create a more kid friendly protagonist, so they replaced Zero with the newly created character of Vent. Other parts of the storyline were adjusted towards the end of production to allow for a sequel, as the team felt the characters were "quite memorable in their own right".

The game's characters were designed by Toru Nakayama, while the graphics, concept art, and backgrounds were designed and illustrated by Azuma Honda. Based on Tsuda's ideas, the artists wanted to bridge the franchise's timeline gap between the "mechanical feel" of the X series and the "more human direction" of the Legends series. Inti Creates presented their concept art to Inafune and other members of Capcom at the Tokyo Game Show. Many of the designs were refined at this meeting and, as Nakayama explained, "a lot of trial-and-error ensued".

Gameplay
Mega Man V adopts the action-adventure gameplay prescribed by its predecessors in the Mega Man Legends series. However, some of it's mission structure is prescribed by elements found in its predecessors in the original Mega Man and Mega Man X series.

Plot
In the year 22XX, humans and Reploids now coexist peacefully, successfully restoring Earth's former nations thanks to the technological efforts of Slither Incorporated. The peace is interrupted when several incidents of reploids becoming Mavericks are reported, making several areas dangerous. Trading between nations became obstructed, forcing the nations to become divided into utopian cities. These cities became safe havens for peaceful reploids, humans and the cyborg humanoids.

Still, Maverick attacks occur in the frontier regions, which are more exposed to the enemy. To repel the attacks, the humans and reploids in these areas developed a goverment devoted to the defending their region called Neo Arcadia. their forces defend the Outlands and investigate the cause of the Maverick attacks. However, the heroic Maverick Hunters X and Zero have long since vanished.

A decade prior to the beginning of the story, the protagonist, Vent loses his mother to a Maverick raid on an amusement park and becomes orphaned. He is taken in by Girouette, the owner of Giro Express, which is a delivery service delivering all kinds of items. Giro is contacted by an unknown person to deliver an important package containing a Mega Elf to a rendezvous point in a forest.

Vent and Giro are ambushed by Mavericks after meeting up. Vent escape the area while Giro covers their retreat. Here, he meets face-to-face with A human scientist named Ciel, her Cyber-elf Passy, and other Reploid companions that are being chased through the forest. This meeting is cut short when a large Maverick golem attacks the group. The Mega Elf lends its strength to Vent, allowing him to "Megamerge" and transform into Mega Man. With the newfound powers, the golem is destroyed. Ciel, desperately seeking his help, explains they live in a world where Reploids are incorrectly accused of being Mavericks and systematically "retired", apparently under the direction of the once-famed Mega Man X. Shocked at this revelation and filled with doubt about his ability to protect people, Vent helps Ciel escape and joins her Resistance to fight against X and the utopia known as Neo Arcadia.

After finding Giro, in the form of Zero, they board a building deemed the Resistance's base and conduct missions on behalf of the Resistance in order to buy Ciel time to create a new energy source that will provide everyone with a safe place to live. One day, the base is attacked by Neo Arcadia, forcing everyone to flee. In the midst of the chaos, Ciel confesses to Vent that she helped create Neo Arcadia as a utopia where humans and Reploids were finally able to live in peace with X as their leader, but her plans fell apart when an energy shortage crisis began and X's mind was placed on one of his spare bodies. To counter this, she created the Biometals. X still strived for a peaceful world, but had a new moral judgement. Believing that the Reploid race posed a danger to humans, X began an operation to brand any Reploid whom he believed to be a menace to humanity as a Maverick and annihilate them without a fair trial, in order to reduce energy consumption.

Vent anf Giro invade Neo Arcadia and battle their way through the Four Guardians: Sage Harpuia, Hidden Phantom, Fighting Fefnir and Fairy Leviathan. X is eventually defeated, but not before possessing a weakened Giro with the power of a source called the Baby Elf. A fight ensues, mortally wounding Giro. Giro hands his Mega Elf over to Vent during his dying moments and transforms into a Cyber Elf. By "Double Megamerging" with both Mega Elves, he uses the Blade Armor to defeat X. who later self-destructs in an attempt to take Vent with him but not before telling him that he is his own son. Vent escapes just in time from Neo Arcadia as X, and everything around him, is destroyed. Running low on energy, Vent collapses in a nearby desert. A faint figure appears and reveals itself as Giro, now a Cyber-elf, who will be Vent's guide from now on. Giro explains that without a physical body, has left Vent the responsibility of bringing peace to the world. As Giro vanishes, Vent finds himself surrounded by an army of Pantheons. Vent accepts Giro's words and promises to continue the fight against Neo Arcadia. The final scene shows Vent as he dashes into battle against the Pantheons and slices one in half.

In an unlockable bonus mission, an unknown man notes the Baby Elves have been used, and tells an entity known as "Omega" that it is time to take action.

Vent approaches a gigantic Reploid named Omega and a scientist named Dr. Weil — both who were banished to space due to their crimes in instigating the Elf Wars and turning the Mother Elf into the Dark Elf a century prior. Vent later confronts and defeats Omega, who reveals his true form: a body that looks exactly like Zero. Dr. Weil reveals that while Zero was seemingly gone for the past 100 years, he had used the sealed Zero as a host for Omega and reprogrammed him due to his unmatched fighting abilities. Despite this revelation, Vent destroys Omega for good.

Characters

 * Vent (CV: Minami Takayama and Stephanie Nadolny)
 * Ciel (CV: Megumi Hayashibara and Laura Bailey)
 * Passy (CV: Naoko Matsui and Tiffany Volmer)
 * Girouette (CV: Keiji Fujiwara and Vic Mignogna)
 * Cerveau (CV: Yoshito Yasuhara and R. Bruce Elliott)
 * Colbor (CV: Wataru Takagi and Sonny Strait)
 * Sage Harpuia (CV: Megumi Ogata and Chris Patton)
 * Fairy Leviathan (CV: Yuka Imai and Luci Christian)
 * Fighting Fefnir (CV: Kazuya Nakai and Dameon Clark)
 * Hidden Phantom (CV: Tetsu Inada and Mike McFarland)
 * X (CV: Takahiro Sakurai and Sean Schemmel) - the main antagonist of the game
 * Panter Flauclaws (CV: Akio Otsuka and Bob Carter)
 * Poler Kamrous (CV: Kazue Ikura and Linda Young)
 * Phoenix Magnion (CV: Ryo Horikawa and John Burgmeier)
 * Hyleg Ourobockle (CV: Shigeru Chiba and Bryan Massey)
 * Herculious Anchus (CV: Shigeru Nakahara and Jerry Jewel)
 * Blizzack Staggroff (CV: Hidenari Ugaki and Bill Jenkins)
 * Hanumachine (CV: Katsumi Suzuki and Kent Williams)
 * Anubis Necromancess III (CV: Unsho Ishizuka and Christopher Sabat)
 * Dr. Weil (CV: Chiako Otsuka and Ian McDiarmid)
 * Omega (CV: Junichi Suwabe and Christopher Sabat)
 * ? (CV:)
 * ? (CV:)
 * ? (CV:)
 * ? (CV:)

Soundtrack

 * Moonlight
 * The Answer
 * Bodies
 * Looking Down
 * I.D.E.A.
 * What Comes Around
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Reception and Success
Mega Man V has sold 3,130,000 copies worldwide and was met with positive reception.