Mega Man

Mega Man is a video game franchise from Capcom, starring the eponymous character Mega Man, or one of his many counterparts. The series is well-known and comprises well over fifty releases, easily making it Capcom's most prolific franchise. As of December 31, 2010, the series has sold approximately twenty-nine million copies worldwide.The Mega Man games began in 1987 with the first Mega Man game released for the Nintendo Entertainment System. This game and those that followed comprise the original series, which has since been followed by several spin-off series in the same fictional universe.

Artbooks

Various artbooks and source books have been released for many years in Japan, often including conceptual artwork, interviews with production staff, and background information on the storyline and concepts that are not present within the games themselves. One of the most well-known is the Rockman Perfect Memories sourcebook released in 2002 which first confirmed the presence of an alternate timeline (for Battle Network), as well as exactly where the Legends series fit into the fictional Mega Man universe.

Recently a series of artbooks called the Official Complete Works has been published for individual Mega Man series, showcasing a large collection of artwork and background information. To date, books for the Zero, Classic and X (released together as R20), Star Force, and Battle Network series have been produced. Although these books have for many years been exclusive to Japan, UDON Entertainment Corporation has begun translating the Official Complete Works series for the North American market.

Comics and manga

Mega Man has also been featured in many comics and manga in Japan, although few have been localized in North America.

The most well-known series is produced by Hitoshi Ariga (who went on to provide character designs and artwork for future official Capcom releases, including the Super Famicom game Mega Man and Bass). The series began with Rockman Remix, followed with Rockman Megamix, and is currently being serialized as Rockman Gigamix. The Megamix portion of the series would eventually be brought to North American shores thanks to UDON Entertainment Corporation, also responsible for the localization of the short Mega Man ZX manga by Shin Ogino. In the original Mega Man series, Dr. Light was known as Dr. Right, so many of his robots featured in Ariga's comic have "R"s in their designs. UDON did not alter this detail in the English version of Mega Man Megamix.

In addition, Viz Media localized the 13-volume Rockman EXE manga by Ryo Takamisaki under the name MegaMan NT Warrior. Takamisaki would later serialize a short adaptation of Mega Man Star Force 3 that was never published outside of Japan.

Some other manga series that have not been localized outside of Japan include a 12-volume Rockman X adaptation by Yoshihiro Iwamoto, over 15 Classic and X adaptations by Shigeto Ikehara, a light-hearted adaptation of Rockman Zero by Hideto Kajima, a slapstick adaptation of Shooting Star Rockman by Masaya Itagaki, another Battle Network adaptation by Keijima Jun and Asada Miho called Rockman EXE Battle Story, and a short series of slapstick Battle Network and Star Force-themed adaptations by Kawano Takumi.

An homage to Megaman exists, which was created for Retrojunk.com in the form of a 27 page comic created by artist Pat Henzy titled "Megaman Fan for Life." Megaman fan for life

Dreamwave Productions and Magnum Press made its own comic books based on the Mega Man Classic game series. The Magnum Press series was sold in Brazil and had a sudden end to production. The Dreamwave Mega Man series lasted only four issues and also ended abruptly, with plot-threads from the first three issues being dropped completely in the final issue and the inclusion of a short story promising a Mega Man X follow-up that never materialized. This was one of several Dreamwave Capcom comics that were cut short or simply never made it to issue #1, including Maximo,DarkStalkers and Rival Schools. A new Mega Man comic series produced by Archie Comics was announced at New York Comic Con 2010.