Video games are bad for you? That’s what they said about rock and roll.
– Shigeru Miyamoto
I remember the time when I first played Mega Man X. This was during the time when I’d go to Hollywood Video with my family and my brother and I would look at the upcoming games while my parents looked for that romantic comedy or action movie to watch that night. We loved playing games, still do, and Mega Man was one of those games that had something you’d always come back to all the way from Mega Man II. I personally loved the unique bosses because you take their powers afterwards. Loved that and that’s why Mega Man was as much of a mainstay for me as Super Mario.
When I saw this video above about Mega Man X by Sequelitis, it brought back the memories of such a great game. It was one of those games where you didn’t have to read the instruction booklet. Although, when I started to play a new game, I never read the instruction booklet until I had to since some games were too complicated — you didn’t have that with Mega Man X. Like Sequalitis says, “This game should have been called ‘Jump n’ Shoot Man’” — it was that easy. He does bring a good point that simplicity in gameplay can allow the game to do bigger and better things.
The three points the video makes that startup folks should see are the following:
The Intro Stage and Theming
Mega Man X teaches everything you need to learn about the game in the intro stage. And on top of that it lays down the theme of game as well.
Startup Lesson: Whenever you create a website, it should have the same goal. Once a user signs up they should be able to learn about what this whole site is about in that first visit. Also, they should have an inkling of where need to go to make better use of the site.
Improvements in Movement
From Mega Man II to Mega Man VI, everything was essentially the same — jump and shoot. In Mega Man X, they added two small elements in dashing and wall climbing which changed the whole game for the better.
Startup Lesson: Startups can do the same by doing a couple of well thought out tweaks to change the whole experience for their customers. Think about it, on a large scale Tumblr probably increased the way people interacted with tumblogs substantially by adding the “reply” and “answer” function.
NGGFFFF!!!
Mega Man had a ton of little things that made you say “WOW!”. The game was already amazing, but little things like being able to take over enemies robot body suits took it over the top. This proves it’s the little things that makes a game awesome.
Startup Lesson: Startups should feel the same way. It could be done through customer service, shipping an item overnight for a customer, or even adding a funny video on an unsubscribe page. It builds character and your customers will notice.
