The Megaman: Battle Network released for the Nintendo Gameboy and Gameboy Advance in 2001. The story is set in the future where everyone has access to a personal trainer called PET. Each PET houses an AI called NAVI. NAVI help their owners in exploring the cyber world, which is given a physical representation in the game. They are responsible for common tasks such as sending Emails, setting reminders and fight computer viruses that threaten the cyberworld. Each of these aspects is given a physical form. The world also contains the physical representations of software programs such as anti-virus programs, operating system, message boards, help desks, etc.
In this game, we take on the role of Hub whose NAVI is Megaman. You can use Megaman to explore the cyber world. Fight viruses, collect action cards that summon weapons and power-ups that help the player overcome enemies of increasing difficulty and other bosses such as corrupt NAVI of the antagonists. My favorite entry of the game was Megaman: Battle Network 6. The story revolves around Hub and Megaman and their fight against an evil organization that wants to destroy the cyber world using the Cybeasts: Gregar and Falzar.
The game developers wanted players to experience the cyber world as a physical entity and not a bizarre world full of essentially just numbers and electrical signals. To reinforce this idea, they gave the NAVI a humanoid form. The whole of the cyber world is represented as another physical world where NAVI and viruses live similar to our world. Players could interact with this world through Megaman. The gameplay mechanics such as using data chips, ability to decode puzzles and encrypted data files, makes the player feel like a programmer and experience the cyber world as a physical entity. The data chips which have a size specified to them in MegaBytes or MB, reinforcing the experience of fighting in a cyber world. Also, the dialogues between characters drop references to computer networking terms such as HUB, LAN, encoded data, etc. making the player believe in the fantasy.
The experience that I had playing this game was what the developers intended i.e. exploring a world you can only imagine.
Comments