Fan-Made Mega Man 2.5D Remake Looks Amazing

It took eight years, but developer Peter Sjöstrand and his team of scrappy fans have finally released Mega Man 2.5D—and judging by the official trailer, it was worth the wait.

Mega Man 2.5D is an unofficial Mega Man game that takes the series' iconic 8-bit graphics and side-scrolling gameplay and brings it into a semi-three-dimensional world, much like the Wii game Super Paper Mario. As in the classic Mega Man games, players still have to guide the Blue Bomber through a series of platforming challenges in order to take down rogue robots and their creator, Dr. Wiley, but now they can do so with dynamic camera angles during single player, or while teaming up with a friend for two player co-op.

While Mega Man 2.5D wasn't produced or endorsed by Capcom, the company that owns Mega Man, the new game is remarkably polished for a fan-made production. According to Mega Man 2.5D's official website, the game should run at a steady 60 frames-per-second on most PCs, and includes three different difficulty settings and a competitive multiplayer "VS" mode that features eight custom-made battlegrounds.

As a fan project, Mega Man 2.5D is available for free: interested players can grab it here. Act fast, too—Capcom has a history of shutting down fan projects based on its original IPs, as the creators of the Resident Evil 2 remake, Resident Evil Reborn, learned in 2015, when the publisher asked developers to can the project in order to make room for an official Resident Evil 2 remaster.

The last official Mega Man game, Mega Man 10, came out in 2010, although Capcom hinted at a new Mega Man installment in 2016's financial report. Hopefully, the new game will finally give Mega Man, who turned 30 last year, the respect that he deserves—the little guy has had a pretty rough life already.