Zero's Sabre - Mega Man X4 (3)

Part three of three.

Individual boss comments:

Sigma: This is what makes X4 famous outside of Zero and a six year old X. Of all the incarnations of Sigma, X4's gets the most flak, and it's pretty deserved, too. I'm not joking, this guy's an asshole. While I maintain that X5's is harder under only my rather excessive restrictions, in any normal run X4's is easily the most trouble you'll have at the end of a MMX game. His first form is nothing; although before you figure out the weakness, he'll still throw some ridiculous to avoid attacks your way.

His second form is yet another example of specific patterns; you can catch him in his behavior in such a way that you'll make it to the final form unscathed every time. If you're an idiot, like me, you let him flex his moves a little. Those boomerangs are dodgeable. It's done the same way, all the way. That still won't stop you from taking arseloads of damage from them.

The third form is the real breadwinner, mostly because of one attack, and we all know which attack I'm talking about. I'll address that in a minute. First, let's look at what else he has to offer, because it's not exactly cakewalk either. His gun form is pretty uneventful; it's tricky to place yourself in between his spread shots and still pick him off, but actually damage risk is low. It basically serves as a breather and an excuse to let you deal with more rounds of those infernal heads.

In between each form, Sigma's heads will invite you out to play for some fun 30 second dodgefests which you, by the way, have nothing to say about. Just tack on more minutes to an already overlong fight and grit your teeth. The blue head is the easiest; simply get out of the way. Any number of methods will do. The red one isn't a problem when you know what to do, but can still catch you off guard. The yellow head is the bitch, and because the battle is so drawn out, you'll be seeing a lot of him. I'd like to call how you dodge his shots something consistent, but honestly, you just need to watch and react.

Sigma's second form in this phase is what inspires nightmares. Let's make a few points clear here: you will see this grotesque skull at least six or seven times with OPTIMAL damage; you will likely see it a whole lot more, because damaging him on his worst attack is suicide; lastly, said attack hurts like a motherfucker, is highly, highly inconsistent to dodge even with the proper strategy, and lasts long. Long enough to hit you two or three times. If you get caught in the suction, you'll be hit moreso.

Did I mention the debris he uses takes gaping chunks of your lifebar away? I'm not exaggerating when I say people come in with two full subtanks and still lose out solely to this attack. It's ridiculous. The optimal solution is... jump slash like a motherfucker when he sucks the debris in, then high tail it to the far corner before he spits it out. This sounds good on paper, but the odds of a rock hitting you from the bottom of the screen are not in your favor. You can eventually consistently beat him with no upgrades. Doing it without damage is a colossal pain in the ass no matter who you are. Incidentally, the end of the battle was not intentional, but that doesn't stop a fluke from being awesome.

Tracks used, in order:
(You say too much Satriani, I say there's no such thing.)

Joe Satriani - Midnight
Joe Satriani - Lords Of Karma
Joe Satriani - Crushing Day

Category:

Gaming

Tags:

• Zero
• MMX4
• No_Damage
• Boss_Rush

[JorgeProduksPorreta1]

snes?

[ohChuppaChup]

fuck this guy man.. so pro LOL

[ThatWoWPlayer97]

"Flawless Victory" :)

[alasdiyes]

i like the music in the first form. what is it?

[XtraZero]

Nice finish.

[julzdedede]

5 stars for using Joe Satriani's songs.

[elysium735]

Epic Fucking Win.

[zombiepuppet]

Dude, this was awesome!

[NonRandomUser]

I've...actually never seen the cloaked Sigma pull that orb attack. Always in a hurry to light him on fire. Only time I ever see even part of it is when X uses charged Rising Fire.