Mega Man & Bass

Mega Man & Bass is a 1998 action-platform game developed and published by Capcom. It is a spin-off game in the original Mega Man series, and was originally released in Japan for the Super Famicom on April 24, 1998. It was later ported to the Game Boy Advance in 2002, and released internationally the following year.

After defeating the evil Dr. Wily many times, the robot hero Mega Man is called into action once again when a powerful robot known as King steals the blueprints to the creations of Dr. Wily and Dr. Light in order to create an army for robotic dominance over humans. Having learned of the threat, Mega Man's rival Bass decides to take matters into his own hands. Gameplay is similar to previous entries in the series, in which the player advances by completing stages and defeating bosses to acquire their signature weapons. Mega Man & Bass lets the player choose between either of its title characters, who play differently from each other.

Mega Man & Bass debuted on the aging 16-bit Super Famicom despite the series having already transitioned to the PlayStation and Sega Saturn with Mega Man 8. Several characters and sprites from Mega Man 8 were reused for Mega Man & Bass. Producer Keiji Inafune claimed Mega Man & Bass was created to target younger players who didn't yet own one of the more advanced gaming systems. The game received positive remarks from critics for its graphics and use of a tried-and-true gameplay formula, though many found the difficulty to be too steep. The game was followed by Mega Man 9 (2008), which returned to the graphical style of the early NES games.