1/17/99 Juraiprince (juraiprince@hotmail.com) revised: 1/19/99 HAVING TROUBLE BEATING THE BOSSES IN MEGAMAN 8? HAVE NO FEAR, THIS GUIDE IS HERE! THE FIRST SQUADRON! THE IMMATURE QUARTET! CLOWN MAN: Weapon Needed: Mega Buster/Tornado Hold Weapon Gained: Thunder Claw Opening Taunts: 1)Yo, geeky! 2)You don't have a chance 3)Watch it, dweeb Closing Taunt: See you in my dreams Strategy: This is usually the first boss you should go after. You may want to try frost man first, but, why would you if this way is easier? O.k., Clownman's primary attacks are swinging from the pedestal in the upper center of the screen, and Thunder Carnival, an attack where Clownman jumps all over the screen and is invulnerable for a short time. To avoid taking MAJOR damage from the swing, run to about five steps away from the left or right walls(depending in which direction he will swing towards), and when he swings at you, dash slide towards the wall. You shouldn't get hit. Run away from clown man while charging up, turn and fire. If he uses the Thunder carnival attack, run and look for an opening, dash slide away from the attack and wait for him to appear. Another attack(although somewhat weak) is the Thunder Claw attack. He will ram his hands through the floor and they will pop up next, or under you. Just keep jumping until the hands pop out and keep shooting him. Repeat until he dies WITH THE TORNADO HOLD: Wait until clownman starts swinging, fire the tornado directly in his path and wait for him to come down from the attack, then just shoot him with the mega buster. If he recovers, wait for him to start swinging again, and repeat the process all over again until he dies. GRENADE MAN Weapon Needed: Thunder Claw Weapon Gained: Flash Bombs Opening Taunts: 1)Ha ha! 2)I will destroy you! Closing Taunts: 1)Hmph! That felt good!(If you're having trouble understanding what this means, it means that he thinks so much of himself that him being beaten didn't hurt him. He's very arrogant, so it makes sense, I just wish COA had chosen a better taunt though) Strategy: Grenade man's primary attacks are using his flash bombs, or a triple slash attack(!?). If you have the Thunder claw(if you don't, you can pretty much call it a day), you can shoot his flash bomb back at him, so keep this in mind. Basically, grenade man will only jump all over the place, either with a flash bomb attack when he's up against the wall, or a triple slash if he's jumping across the screen. Just keep hitting him with the Thunder claw, and run away from him when he's about to jump so that you're close to him when he lands, that way, you won't take damage from the triple slash. Do this, and you'll gain the flash bombs. Oh, and about 2/3 way into the battle, he'll do an attack called Platform Crusher, don't worry about it, it does exactly what it means(crush the platform), but it's just a bluff attack, meaning, you won't take damage. FROST MAN Weapon Needed: Flash Bomb/Mega Buster Weapon Gained: Frost Wave Opening Taunt: 1)FREEZE 2)*moronically*I will crush you, I will turn you into a popsicle! Closing Taunt: OUCH! Strategy: If you're using the mega buster, just shoot him 'till he dies, while avoiding all of his attacks, because there's no way you'll stop him from doing his ice rush and frost strike if you don't use the flash bombs. With the flash bombs in hand, keep firing at the big lug while dashing away from his jumps. If he starts doing either his ice rush(exactly what it implies), or frost strike(he kicks a big ice block at you) and you have hit him with the flash bomb, he will be knocked back and he will start to cry. Now's the time to..ahem....ICE HIM!(pun intended). Use your flash bombs accordingly. You will get the frost wave, an ice attack that goes through the ground, creating little ice waves(hence the name) ASSAULT ON WILY AIR FACTORY! THE FINAL OPPONENT OF THE QUARTET, TENGU MAN! Weapon needed: Frost Wave/Mega Buster(recommended) Weapon Gained: Tornado Hold Opening Taunt: 1)Ha, it's only a kid 2)Are you a worthy challenge? Closing Taunt: You'll be regretful! Strategy: Let me start off by saying, FORGET THE WEAPON PATTERN! DON'T USE THE FROST WAVE UNLESS YOU'RE CERTAIN IT WILL HIT! Not only does the frost wave NOT HIT him, but he flies away from it if he's not in the proper position! Just use charged up mega buster blasts. If he uses the attack where he says "Tellahalasee" jump over it, it's a multiple slash that does the damage. IF he does the Tornado hold, run away from it. If he does the attack where he says "HERE YOU GO!" jump over him and wait for him to land behind you, this is the only time, repeat, the ONLY time where he will stay put long enough for you to hit him with the dang blasted Frost Wave! Just repeat the mega buster blasts, and you'll win the first half of the game..... PHASE 2: Assault from the Iron Warriors!...minus Astro Man Rock Stage: DUO!! Weapon Needed: Mega Buster/4previous weapons Weapon Gained: None, but you gain a friend, Duo Opening Taunt: None Closing Taunt: Huh?(this is what Duo says, not what I'm saying) Strategy: Most strategy guides call for you to use your mega buster or the Tornado Hold. While it does work, it's only enough for two of Duo's attacks. Duo's attacks: Duo basically just shoots, or rams you, I haven't had much of a chance to analyze all of his attacks(like I'm really going to let the computer kick my butt just to see what Duo does), so bear that in mind. My strategy is simple, fire a flash bomb at the beginning of the battle, he'll then fly towards you, fire another, and dash under him. Switch to tornado hold. Wait for him to fire his "buster" and shoot the tornado hold, while that's happening, charge up your mega buster and fire away. Duo will once again fly at you. Switch to Frost wave. Duo will stay high up and close to the walls. For some reason or another, if you use the frost wave on him in this phase, it will keep him there on the wall, if not, he'll charge at you, maybe this was supposed to be a weapon-based idea(i.e. Duo's rockets would get frozen) but not implemented fully. Finally, Duo will fly back at you and shoot and shoot and shoot. Charge up your mega buster and continually fire the Flash bombs until you prevail. He shouldn't be too hard. I think there's another boss, if so, tell me so I can remember how it was I beat him. SWORD MAN Weapon Needed: Mega Buster/Water Balloo Weapon Gained: Flame Sword Opening Taunts: 1)Nothing personal, but I've got orders 2)I won't hold back. Closing Taunt: 1)Good shot. Strategy: With or without the water balloon, this will prove to be an easy battle. Charge up that megabuster and fire it for more damage. Sword man has four basic attacks. To avoid the Fire Slash, dash under the uppe half and wait for it to come back. Dash under it again and fire at the upper half(the lower half is invulnerable). After some shots, sword man will lose the upper half and it will fly over your head, jump over the lower half and keep a good range away from Sword man, otherwise you'll be hit by his second attack. The attack immediately following that is called Bracer, but for some reason, Sword Man calls it Lexing-on. Anyway, it's a punishing sword attack that does damage. Stay away from it. After some shots, Sword man will cling on to the wall and aim the sword at you. Wait in one position for about half a second, and immediately dash away, because a giant stone will fall on you. Repeat until sword man dies. By the by, the attack where sword man engulfs himself in a red-orange tornado won't do anything to you, so long as you stay away from him. You will gain the Flame sword for this match. Search Man Weapon Needed: Flame sword Weapon Gained: Homing Sniper(a missile, don't go thinking a sniper will appear and start killing all the enemies for you). Opening Taunts: 1)Don't be afraid 2)Come On Closing Taunt: Owww.... Strategy: If you have the flame sword, this will be a very quick match. At the beginning of the battle, Search Man will either leap up and fire missiles, or jump to the background and appear from one of the three bushes that fall to the screen. As for Search Man's attacks, he'll either send three missiles toward you(you can destroy these by the way), or leap up and send a storm of missiles down on you(harder to destroy, so just stay between their gaps). Either way, they don't do major damage. Use the flame sword and wait for him to jump to the background. Now, three bushes will appear. Pay NO attention to the lock-on indicators, because they're meant to distract you, Search man will tend to appear somewhere other then where the lock-on lights tell you. Just be ready for anything and have your finger on the "special weapon" button ready. About 2/3 into the match, he will leap up and say something like "Final fire", he means it, for it will be a salvo of missiles that don't do much damage on their own, but do massive damage together, just use the flame sword before he opens fire so that he stops. Beat him and you'll gain the Homing sniper. Astro Man: The Coward From Beyond The Galaxy Weapon Needed: Homing Sniper Weapon Gained: Astro Crush Opening Taunts: 1)I've found you, but I don't know what to do! 2)You've found me....how embarrasing Closing Taunts: 1)Mommy 2)Oh great Strategy: If you don't have the Homing sniper, don't bother fighting him unless you're very good. The astro crush alone does obscene amounts of damage. If you have the homing sniper, wait until he dives down enough for you to hit him without having to lock on. Just wait for him to barely recover from the last shot, and fire again. Repeat this easy process and you'll get the strongest(as well as least in amount of uses) weapon in the game, the astro crush. ASSAULT ON THE WATER REFINERY! WILY'S LAST STAND! AQUA MAN Weapon Needed: Astro Crush Weapon Gained: Water Balloon Opening Taunts: 1)I'm aquaman, but you can call me "handsome", dude! 2)Run away while you can! Closing Taunt: THAT WAS LUCK! Strategy: Do NOT, I repeat, DO NOT use the astro crush immediately after having used one before. Shoot Aquaman with the megabuster before he recovers completely from the previous astro crush shot. Then, if you see Aquaman about to begin the Water Geyser(it's plainly seen forming in the water beneath you), THEN use the Astro Crush again. Otherwise, you'll run out of it too little too soon. Repeat this process and you'll be rewarded the worst weapon in the game, the Water Balloon!...... THE FINAL WAR FRONT! INFILTRATING THE WILY FORTRESS!! DROP PENGUIN: Weapon Needed: Mega Ball Weapon Gained: Nothing Opening Taunts: None Closing Taunt: None Strategy: This boss isn't very hard once you get the hang of it. The only real hard part about this is to aim the mega ball properly so that it will hit the penguin droid. But, before you can aim your mega ball, you have to wait for the other three containers to drop, destroy them, then get those flashbacks(or previews) of geometry class and angle the megaball so that it hits the penguin container. He should then drop a small penguind doppleganger, destroy it with a couple of mega buster shots. About 2/3 into the fray, another Penguin will appear, this time, it won't have the anime style eyes(meaning, big and wide). DON'T HIT IT! If you do, then a shockwave will bounce off of it and tends to do serious damage. Repeat the process and go on to the next Section. Airship Solstice Weapon Needed: Astro Crush Weapon Gained: None Opening Taunt: None really, it just opens up it's wings, revealing the weak point Closing Taunts: None Strategy: Destroy the red mines it spits out at you and wait for the wings to extend. Don't fly up to them though, because they fire lasers that do damage. Stay in the center portion of the ship and fire the astro crush. Then, wait for it again. After the 2nd shot, the center portion will extend along with the wings. If the ship moves up, it's an indicator that it will ram you and won't let you go until you're about 1/4 life bar energy. This time, DO move up to the path of the wings, they won't fire. Do the astro crush and wait again. When the wings open up one last time, fire the astro crush. Unfortunately, the ship still isn't dead. So you'll have to repeat these stips about 2-4 times with the flash bombs. Do so, and go on to the next stage. Cyclops 1.2k(what I like to call "Gel Man") Weapon Needed: Flash Bombs/Laser Shot that you get in Light's Lab Weapon Gained: None Opening Taunts: None Closing Taunts: None Strategy: Pretty straightforward boss. Wait for the "eye" to go back into the large green body mass and to blink before you fire the Flash bombs at it. If you fire too soon, the eye will become invulnerable again. Attacks include: - The "eye" will radiotransmit so that green goo forms all over the floor. If it's directly above you, it will turn the goo into a spike that does minor damage, but it does it about 6-7 times, so watch out. - The eye will dash above you with a green tidal wave behind you. You should be able to see a fold in the wave, stay in front of it and dash across the screen WITH the current, not against it. - The "eye" will call the big monster back. When the monster is recompleted, and you've done about half it's life energy in damage, new attacks will form, only from the green bubbles though. These are: a)The goo will drop and start moving across thes screen, one bubble at a time. Wait for the opportunities to either jump over the 1st bubble(the bottom ones), or dash under the 2nd. When the monster reforms, fire the flash bumbs and do this whole process over until it dies. BASS: Space Armor "Cavalry" form Weapon Needed: Flash bombs | Astro crush(accessory) Weapon Gained: None Opening Taunts: 1)Let's Go, Treble! 2)Hold it, Megaman! Closing Taunt: YEAARRGGGGHHHH! This isn't over, Megaman! Strategy: you'll probably need the Astro crush as an accessory(meaning, it's not at all necessary, only needed to avoid an attack). This is because Cavalry(he's no longer called Treble, or Bass, since he's a fusion of both) has an attack where he fires two shots into the air. Down will come two waves of energy. You can jump over the first wave by jumping in between the gaps between each, but you can't avoid the second unless you use the astro crush to do damage to Cavalry while at the same time staying in the air long enough for the wave to die out. The other attack Cavalry has is the Phoenix Laser. He'll move to one side of the screen and fire a vertical laser down and moving to the opposite side, to avoid being hit, just slide while staying in front of it. When Cavalry stops, keep firing you're Flash bombs. Cavalry will be dead when you're flash bombs reach about 14, so be ready for a long wait. No other weapon does alot of damage to him, so be warned in advance. Beat Cavalry, and even though he warns that he will be back, he won't. FINAL PHASE!!!! WILY'S PAYBACK TIME! Wily Ship Alpha/Wily Vessel Beta Weapon Needed: Flame Sword for Alpha, Mega Buster for Beta Weapon Gained: None(it's the final boss for Pete's sake!) Opening Taunt: nyahahahahahaha! Closing Taunt: Arrrrggghhhhhhh! Strategy: You'll definitely need to have Rush Aide: Heal Ready for this match, because Wily will do damage, regardless of how good you may think you are. The first part is quite difficult, but keep your cool and you'll get through it in no time. The real thing you should worry about is that frustrating wheel he fires at you. It'll either bounce towards you, or spin at you once, and come back at you. Either way, it can't be destroyed! :( Other things to look out for is the blue wheel, which shoots slow pellets at you, even though they go slow and seem easy to avoid, the other wheel may be active, making it more hard to dodge. And the Purple wheel, which fires purple pellets into the sky, which, if they touch the ground, will separate into two and you'll have to dodge either one. Now, you're focus should be on the mad Doctor. You'll have to hit the glass window that he can be seen through(i.e. the "eyes" part of the skull). When the mouth of the skull opens, it means it will fire a high energy laser, so close it by using the sword. Keep attacking the glass windows with the sword, while avoiding that pestering wheel. Do this until the ship is destroyed. Now, you'll face the smaller, and harder to hit, Vessel Beta. VESSEL BETA: Here, you should have the astro crush as a special weapon(if you didn't already know it, you can use your mega buster WHILE still having a special weapon in use). Shoot the vessel(it doesn't matter where, as long as you do), and it will disappear and reappear. Before it disappears though, it will fire either the purple balls that separate on the ground, a spinning projectile of purple balls, or purple balls that if you avoid them with a jump or dash, will stop about half way, wait for you to stop, and then move in on you. The best way to avoid these stopping projectiles is to use the astro crush when they stop, that way, they'll go right through you. If the projectiles manage to hit you, you'll notice you're life bar(even if it's at full) will be significantly lowered; Now's a good time to call Rush aide: Heal. Pick up the power pellets, and the life pellets and continue the battle. Shoot the vessel with a powered up mega buster for about 10 times, and you win the game. WITH DUO BADLY HURT, MEGA MAN IN THE CENTER OF THE EVIL FORCE, AND BASS STILL ON HIS TAIL, WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT? I'd tell you, but then I'd have to kill you. j/k. Seriously though, it will be explained in the ending. I hope you enjoyed this game, I know I did. Ja ne, min'na san! DISCLAIMER STUFF That's right, you can't copy this and put it on just anyplace and call it your own. You'll have to get my permission to do that. Unless you put it somewhere inconspicuous, per say, you're computer. If you put it in a magazine and I notice it's the exact same wording, with some changes here and there, I think it's a little too BLATANTLY obvious. Besides, this is here for everyone. Copyrightc1999 Juraiprince All rights preserved....er...I mean, reserved.