Rockman Gold Empire! Yet another Taiwan only title for the Rockman series. This game was given to me by Tommy Lee WAY back when I was running Sprites INC. Sorry it took me so long to write up something for the game, Tommy! In terms of rarity, this game is much more common than Rockman Strategy. I've seen this game on ebay a few times.
First off, I'll state that this game doesn't work for my computer, hence the extremely long wait. My machine runs Windows XP. Lee, I think, said it was a different story for him, so who knows? Just note that running the game is buggy. Nevertheless, I have an older laptop and this runs fine on that (uses Windows 95).
So, right when I turn on the game, there's a nice opening video cut from movies from Rockman 8, along with character art of that time (and of R&F too). It's good, right up until the end when it says the game's Rockman 8. Nice going, guys. I guess they thought we wouldn't notice or something.
The game's made by Strawberry Software and Soft-World International and there's a screen featuring their logo after the movie. Okay, not the game. There's a few options. The last option brings you back to the disk option menu. Third option brings up the credits. Second brings up a "Load Game" option. And the first option is, naturally, to play the game.
I click option one. Immediately I see I can have up to three players. Wily is played by the PC. Each one had different, adjustable stats. But, if you make one higher, the rest go lower. So, balance is good.
Among the choosable characters: Megaman, Protoman, Duo, Bass, and .... "the Mayor"!
That's right. The Mayor. From what everyone tells me, that's the only name he has. So, Rockman Strategy gives us the new character Fan and Gold Empire gives us "Mayor".
Whatever.
Right off the bat, I can tell the character art is lousy. And, yes .... it's horribly dithered. That is not my bad, it's dithered in the game itself. The backgrounds appear decent, and the options sidebar is nice. But the characters suck. The music isn't bad, though. It's not a remix of anything, at least not something I recognise. It's a mellow tune for this level.
So I roll the die and land on a question mark. Which brings me to a badly drawn Roll. I pick three and some weird Godzilla type guy runs around! I kid you not. Unfortunately I don't hit print screen in time, so I don't get a shot. So .... my new mission is to get a shot of badly drawn Gold Empire Godzilla....
Next up is the Mayor. A nice touch is that each character has a different sort of dice that he rolls. Proto after that. I'll spare you all the play-by play of me on Rockman GE. But it turns out Print Screen is delayed in each event. Which it too bad because some of the events are interesting. One's the aforementioned Godzilla event. Another is a giant robot bee (carrying a bomb). Meteors fall. Volcanoes erupt. Death is considered an event too, and you die when money becomes zero or your health runs out (you sometimes lose health). Near the end of health characters fall asleep. The Mayor even ended up in jail once!
So, all in all, despite the bad quality of the art, this game's fun. Or at least it WOULD be, if I understood Chinese, but since I don't the appeal of the events loses me and I got bored near the end.
Play-wise the game's a cross between Monopoly and Sim City. Monopoly in the respect of building and going around a board claiming property (with other players paying you to use the facilities). Sim City in that there's many different types of buildings to choose from and the cost between them ranges. All, in all it's kind of fun.
The ending .... at least from what I gather .... consists of a spinning newspaper containing the words "(whoever your character is) wins!" Kinda disappointing. Fortunately, the movies are easily accessible in the game's files, so I don't feel the need to subject myself to endless hours of play to see more.
Tommy Lee has translated the introduction to the game from the manual he has. It reads:
`Because of Rockman’s bravery and wits, all of Dr. Wily’s new creations had fallen. Dr. Wily is very disappointed and decided to quit dominating the world and stop inventing new war machines.
When he was cleaning his Garage, he found a mysterious plan – “Gold Transfer” in his pile of robot plans. The plan shows how to transfer gold into pure energy, and combining with some certain material to form the ultimate alloy. Dr. Wily decided to examine this plan, and secretly plots to conquer the world.
On other hand, Forte left Dr. Wily and gave a part of the plan he had stolen to Dr. Right. Dr. Right told Rockman to collect gold quickly to stop Dr. Wily’s evil plans and he began to build structures to hold off Dr. Wily’s attack. So the adventure begins…
(This is a direct translation, so it may have errors.) So, it's status within continuity is totally in question, even if you consider licensed games in continuity. But nobody really cares about stuff like that within the context of a board game.
So, all in all, it might have been fun if it was in English. You buy lots, build buildings and try to make money. Otherwise, it's nearly unpayable. Sadly, the graphics are all encrypted so, unlike on Rockman Strategy, don't expect me to rip 'em.
Bigger box art
Back of the box
Screen Shots (as scanned in from the back of the box)
The CD
CD Case
CD Case V.2
The Autorun screen
Megaman rolls the dice
Megaman's turn again.
Protoman's turn.
Wily's turn.
Some text.
When you land on a square, you go into a lot.
There's a LOT of lots and the building you build do different things.
This is Wily's lot that was destroyed by some disaster event.
Landing on a "?" tile leads here. Pick a number.
No idea what this means.
Or this.
Rock's end
Blues' end
Duo's end
Forte's' end
Mayor's end
View the Rockman Gold Empire Manual (scans provided by Tommy Lee, although he missed the first couple of pages).