Three months!? Gosh, I've been out for a while. I've been in the mood for prototype/unreleased games again lately. This time, I've taken a listening to a track I've ripped and uploaded on YouTube a year ago, from a prototype version of Mega Man X5 dated May 1, 2000.
The biggest difference to note about this track is in the middle. The first fifty seconds are consistent to the final version, but after that the main verse (or bridge, whatever's the right term for it) becomes different. If you ask me, this version emits the vastness of space much more than the final one (though the stage actually takes place in a planetarium, surprise suprise). Out of all the tracks in the proto, this one is my favorite. The prototype itself contains a large number of rudimentary elements indicative of its progression into it's final form, all of which you can find them documented at the Cutting Room Floor. The US preview trailer, unveiled at E3 2000 convention in Los Angeles, CA that year, appears to be from this build of the game.
If you want to see the whole VHS rip in it's entirety, you can find it here and reminisce about the old days when Mega Man (and Capcom) was a bigger brand than it is today.
Sorry for not updating this past couple of weeks folks, I've had a terrible sinus infection after traveling upstate the last two weekends. I do have something cool and quick to post about though.
The kind folks at GetMeOffTheMoon, the famous Facebook page campaigning for the return of the tragically-cancelled Mega Man Legends 3 (long story), as well as being the number one active place for all cool things Legends and some other Mega Man media, occasionally, had invited me and another friend of mine (PixelButts) to participate in a live stream discussion about a English debug build of Mega Man Legends 2 that was leaked earlier this year at Protodude's Rockman Corner.
I'll elaborate the exact details at a later blog post but earlier this year Protodude had informed me of the prototype he had in his possession and he commissioned me to test it out and document any and all differentiations between the debug build and the final English release. The result was this thirteen-minute video showing off just how much fun I had producing the video, and the start of the English Debug Prototype page at The Cutting Room Floor. Lots a different things detailed in the entry that I'm sure will be of some interest to fans of the game. Despite my inexperience in recording verbal live streams (and how painful it was watching the footage afterwards) its was quite a lot of fun, and I hope I'm invited to another stream with the gang in the future. Here's the link, for some reason Blogger won't play nice with Hitbox.tv embed so you'll have to click that for the steam. Have fun.