for those of you who grew up in the 8-bit era this game is no stranger it can be described as an amazing platformer with arguably the best music on the Nintendo even if you did not grow up in the 8-bit era perhaps you recognize these titles Megaman has been in over 100 video games and is the most popular franchise of all time for Capcom but how did the Blue Bomber get started why is he blue who is this guy all this and more on the gaming historian you after getting dozens and dozens of emails about this guy I finally got an email from the consul boy who wanted to know more about the history of Megaman now the history of Megaman is pretty hard to find now there’s tons of information about the timeline of Megaman but I don’t want that information I want the actual history of Megaman well after a few emails lots of hard research and even some phone calls here’s what I found out Capcom which is founded in 1979 in Osaka was looking to expand to the home video game market particularly the popular Nintendo they had previously released a few ports from their arcade games such as 1942 but we’re hoping to create a whole new franchise for the consoles at the young age of 22 Keiji Inafune a joined Capcom he had just graduated from college and was looking to become an illustrator his first project was working on Street Fighter but was then assigned to a new project come up with a hit franchise for the home consoles seemed easy right well not exactly while Takuto Fujiwara was the director of the project inna funa was given a task of designing the characters instruction booklet logo and box art he was even responsible for taking his designs and turning them into pixel form thus Keiji Inafune a is the creator and father of Megaman inna funa grew up on anime and decided that characters were going to be important in the game not just any characters but detailed characters Inafune I noticed many NES games that lacked these qualities we wanted to make sure that the animation and the motion was realistic and actually made sense inna funa was also limited to a 56 color palette knowing that he wanted good detail on this character he chose the color blue since it had the most colors in the NES palette inna funa even admits the blue bomber is really blue because of the Nintendo not anything else platformers inside schools were the most popular games on the NES any sales chart could tell that so they decided to make Megaman a side-scroller game the concept of the game was based on rock-paper-scissors and it every boss and weapon had a different strengths and weakness inna Funes love for music also played a large part in the creation process quote to base characters on that that’s something that we can all understand and we can all buy that concept thus why the Japanese know the Blue Bomber as rock man rock man’s sister is named roll future characters such as treble and bass also had names based on musical references this is also why the music in Mega Man is so incredible it is an important part of the game rockman was released to the Japanese and Americans in December of 1987 however Capcom executives in America made a few changes they didn’t really understand why he was named rock man so they came up with Megaman instead also the yellow devil boss was renamed to rock monster due to Nintendo strict rules of religious referencing and of course the most infamous change of all the cover art believe it or not Magnum was not a huge success in America gee I wonder why look at this it’s an abomination nothing on this cover is accurate mega man looks like he’s having a midlife crisis why is he yellow also Mega Man has a built-in arm cannon he doesn’t hold weapons he is a weapon compare this to the Japanese cover art what was wrong with this now after I really seen a game with that cover art you think they’ve learned their mistake well guess again Mega Man 2 also has horrible cover art it wasn’t until Mega Man 3 that they finally got it right I tried contacting Capcom about this whole fiasco but they declined to comment which is understandable I mean I don’t know how I would explain this either from what I do know it seems that this cover art was made overnight by Capcom USA’s marketing department anyway Mega Man was critically acclaimed and sold more than expected but it was not the huge hit Capcom thought it might become however in a foon a and everyone involved in the project still felt that the series had life Capcom gave them another chance and Mega Man 2 was released in Japan on December 24 1988 and in North America in July of 1989 the second game in the series was both critically acclaimed and extremely popular since Mega Man 2 the series has become Capcom’s leading franchise even beating out Resident Evil now I know there are tons and there are tons of Mega Man games out there but for now I just wanted to show you where the blue bomber came from in the first place but before we go put on those tinfoil hats again it’s time for another theory according to Rockman perfect memories a source book released only in Japan dr. light won the Nobel Prize in the year 2007 thus the first Mega Man takes place in the year 2008 this has been unconformity interesting ah that’s better oh I almost forgot here’s chapter review Rockman also known as Mega Man was created by Keiji Inafune a of Capcom in hopes of creating a successful home console franchise due to the limited color palettes Mega Man was blue and the concept of the game was based on rock-paper-scissors although the first game was not a smash hit possibly due to this box on Megaman 2 was and went on to become Capcom’s most successful franchise remember if you enjoyed this video please rate and subscribe it I’ll see you next time on the gaming historian