Mega Man (Super Smash Flash 2)

Mega Man is a veteran starter character in Super Smash Flash 2. Mega Man's moveset consists a variety of weapons and adapters from many of his classic games. His sprites are custom-made and based on his appearance in with him receiving some attacks of his moveset from said game but also including some moves not present in the two latter.

Mega Man is currently ranked 29th on the tier list, placing him the B tier. Mega Man's strengths are his strong array of projectiles, giving him decent approach options and allowing him to gain stage control as well as trap opponents into favorable positions. Mega Man has a good combo ability to rack up damage, a good projectile game, good range in the majority of his attacks, and KO moves in his forward tilt, down smash, up aerial, back aerial, up tilt, and fully charged Mega Buster when near a blast line. His Crash Bomber can also pressure shields quickly and effectively, and can lead to earlier KOs thanks to its ability to be detonated on command by the player.

However, Mega Man is susceptible to combos and chain grabs, due to his above average weight and his status as a high faller. His only means of recovery is generally Beat Call, which while having heavy armor and can be cancelled into an aerial, is predictable and can put Mega Man in a bad situation if caught. The majority of his projectiles are linear and can be bypassed or reflected by those who read his movements correctly. Megaman also has trouble with closing out stocks, as his punish game is very strong for dealing damage, but doesn't convert well into taking a stock.

Mega Man appears to have a small player base and has poor representation in online tournaments. The few Mega Man players do not actively participate in tournaments. The few that do participate do not take high placements in tournaments normally.

Attributes
Mega Man is a projectile centered character with great zoning capabilities. He has a great projectile game with having various projectiles in his special moves. These projectiles can also be comboed into each other, leading to high damage output depending on the opponent's weight and hurtbox size. He also has some disjointed range in some of his attacks while can help him space out his enemies or edgeguard from a safe distance. He has reliable finishers in his forward tilt, down smash(the strongest down smash in the current demo), back air, initial part of up air, up tilt, fully charged Mega Buster, Crash Bomber and back throw.

Mega Man's Mega Buster is a chargable move which has a hitbox on frame 1 when released. This gives Mega Man an unreactable kill option in close-mid range for whiff punishing, as well as to cover defensive options like rolling or jumps out of shield (and can lead to shield pokes if the opponent doesn't act for an extended period of time). Mega Buster can also be used as a spammable projectile in its uncharged (stage 1) and semi-charged (stages 2 & 3) states for projectile camping and to rack up damage. As it releases on frame 1, Mega Man can also use uncharged Mega Buster to break out of grabs or interrupt approaches, since uncharged pellets have hitstun for the first few frames that they're out (visualized by the glow around the projectile). Lastly, an underrated mechanic of the move is the fact that the user can change the direction they are facing in midair. This can be done even after Mega Buster is used for a few frames, giving the user the means to do reverse aerials in midair without any other input.

Water Wave is Mega Man's other important projectile, arguably one of if not the best projectile in the game. Water Wave is a transcendent projectile which travels along the ground, giving Mega Man notable stage control and coverage on ground approaches. This projectile also is made up of multiple smaller projectiles, making it extremely difficult to reflect unless the opponent has a long lasting reflector (which can lead the opponent vulnerable to other non-projectile attacks like forward aerial or neutral aerial). Water Wave also can hit opponents hanging from ledge, being one of the few moves with this strength of ledge pressure. Water Wave also pushes opponents upwards, allowing for followups with Mega Man's aerials like neutral air and especially up air. Lastly, Water Wave can deal extremely high amounts of damage by combining the move with Mega Man's uncharged Mega Buster projectile in a close range, since the latter will stun the opponent inside the Water Wave projectile. This can deal upwards of 40% damage against most characters, even up to 60% against large bodies, fastfallers, or heavy characters. This can also lead to follow ups with his aerials or smash attacks for even more damage output.

Beat Call, while linear in recovery, also has advantages while on stage. Since you can cancel the special move with an aerial at any time (known as Beat Cancelling), you can use Beat Call to give yourself a few frames of heavy armor before a move, or outright do aerials out of shield without taking jumpsquat into consideration. You can also, similarly to Mega Buster, do instant reverse aerials in midair. Unlike Mega Buster, you will be forced out of using a double jump through this method, but the timing is much more lax. Beat Call also has very good air control, allowing you to recover using air adjustments in your movement while outspacing attempted edgeguards. Besides air adjustments, a very useful recovery mixup is to do a Beat Cancelled back air, since it gives you a forward boost in momentum, improving horizontal recovery. Landing with a Beat Cancelled neutral air is also very valuable, since neutral air is very disjointed and long lasting. Also, don't forget that you can shoot uncharged Mega Buster shots while recovering with Beat Call, which can interrupt attempted edgeguards and even lead to a Beat Cancelled aerial followup.

Crash Bomber is a very strong tool when it comes to KO potential at lower percents, shield pressure, and ledge trapping. Since it can be detonated remotely, it can severely decrease the needed damage to KO an opponent from any of Mega Man's kill moves like back air, back throw, Semi (stage 3) or Fully Charged (stage 4) Mega Buster, or smash attacks. Crash Bomber can also be used to setup into shield breaks or shield pokes, since you can pressure an opponent into shielding using a charged Mega Buster as they are stickied with Crash Bomber. Crash Bomber can also get attatched to the side of stages, allowing you to remotely detonate it as an opponent gets near, causing them to take damage and get stickied again by the resulting explosion (this tech is known as Leech Bomb).

Mega Man has a decent grab and throw game, possessing the sixteen longest grab in the current demo. He can use back throw and down throw at early percents to start combos, but he has to read the opponent's D.I. correctly to use the followup. Back throw can followup into back air or up air, and down throw can be followed with a forward air, neutral air, or up air. Sometimes you can chain a forward air into a neutral air or up air, and you can potentially lead to a down air from a down throw or forward air and meteor your opponent. Forward throw can be used to set up early edge guards and tech situations. Back throw and forward throw can also be used as reliable finisher at high percents when near the ledge, with back throw having higher knockback.

Notable players
Piano - 15th on SSF2Rank 2021 t2. Placed 3rd at Mac and Cheese 4, 7th at BBT 17, 7th at Just Vibin' 6, 7th at Bowler's 4th, and 7th at Last Chance. Wins on HiDa, shirobby (khai), JMi, Godly, Lil_Natey, gunslinger, and Jiracha.

Tier placement history
In tier lists for demo v0.6; Mega Man was ranked 7th of D tier on the first list and ranked 6th of B tier on the second list. On tier lists for demo v0.7; Mega Man was seen as a top-high tier character where he ranked 4th of A tier on the first list and 6th of B tier on the second list. In demo v0.8b; Mega Man was seen as a low tier character ranking 17th of D tier. Mega Man would return to being seen as top tier character in demo v0.9a where he ranks 7th. However, in demo v0.9b would see Mega Man ranking 27th in C tier, returning him to a being low tier character. Due to the changes in the metagame would see Mega Man rising to 18th place of B tier on the second tier list of v0.9b, where he is seen as a mid tier character.

Trivia

 * Originally, X, which was first playable in Super Smash Flash, was meant to return instead of the actual original blue bomber. He would have used his "Model X" design from the Mega Man ZX series.
 * After the "Model X" Mega Man X got replaced with the classic Mega Man, his old appearance consisted of sprites directly taken from Mega Man 7.
 * Mega Man and, in v0.7, were the two characters who could switch their neutral special move. However, in v0.8a, Sora's down special move became , while Mega Man's Weapon Change remained until Beta, where it was replaced by Water Wave.
 * Mega Man, along with, , , , , and are the only characters so far who wear their default costumes in team battle when they are on the blue team.
 * Mega Man along with, , , , , and are the only characters so far who do not go into a helpless state under normal circumstances.
 * Mega Man and Black Mage have normal attacks that act as projectiles. In Mega Man's case his standard attack, forward smash and up aerial.
 * Mega Man,, , , , and are currently the only true "silent characters" in the game, as Mega Man does not say anything. Rather, he makes a bunch of noises from the Mega Man games.
 * Prior to Beta, Mega Man actually had several voice clips, including a grunt when jumping, saying "Let's do it!" (taken from Mega Man 8) upon using his Final Smash and saying "Alright!" (taken from Mega Man Powered Up) in his victory pose.
 * Although Mega Man was originally considered a newcomer in SSF2, as he was included in the game before his confirmation in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U, which retconned him as a veteran following the release of the two later.
 * Mega Man's pose in his current artwork is taken from the Japanese title screen from the original  game. Conversely, the pose is taken from one of his victory poses in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U.