Promo artwork by MidniteW, logo design by MegaRockEXE

Intro

The Rockman EXE Zone is proud to present its English fan localization patches for Mega Man: Phantom of the Network and Mega Man: Legend of the Network!

Rockman EXE Phantom of Network (PoN) and Rockman EXE Legend of Network (LoN) were two Japan-exclusive Mega Man Battle Network games originally released in the mid-2000s. These MMBN spin-off titles were notable for not only fully replicating the battle system from the GBA games, but also containing full-length stories complete with new characters and settings.

PoN and LoN were only ever playable on specific models of Japanese mobile phones, and were considered lost media for a long time. Towards the end of 2023, preservation group SciLab Secrets managed to free the games’ data from their pocket-size confinement; for the first time, this allowed fans outside of Japan a chance to play these hidden gems for themselves.

In addition to localizing all text in the game to English, the patches also includes the following changes and updates:

• Added Buster MAX Mode, similar to Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection.
• Restored the online ranked virus battle mode in Phantom of the Network.
• Restored the animated backgrounds from the EZweb version of Legend of the Network.
• Added in-game methods to obtain BattleChips required to 100% the game, which were previously Chip Trader-exclusive.

Mega Man: Phantom of the Network (2004)

Set after the events of MMBN3. During what should be a routine virus removal, Lan and MegaMan come face-to-face with a resurrected version of a previously-deleted WWW Navi. The danger quickly escalates with more cloned Navis sparking incidents all over the world, seemingly orchestrated by some mysterious entity. It’s up to our heroes to pull back the curtain on this phantom and save the Cyberworld from the looming threat…

Mega Man: Legend of the Network (2006)

Set before the events of MMBN6. Lan and MegaMan are recognized as ACDC Town’s first official NetPatrollers, but their inaugural mission is suddenly cut short by a mysterious Navi with the power to control other Navis. With new partners at their side, our duo quickly find themselves at the center of an international crisis that threatens to destroy global Net society, as foretold by the legend of a highly advanced ancient empire…

Credits

• MegaRockEXE: Logo Design
• MidniteW: Editing, Promo Artwork
• Midori Woodley: Translation
• Prof. 9: Programming, Editing

Download

Grab the complete English patch and all bonus content from the link below! Be sure to read the included README.html first before playing!

You will need to obtain the original Japanese i-αppli game files for Rockman EXE Phantom of Network & Rockman EXE Legend of Network in order to apply the patches. These files are not included in this download. Please refer to SciLab Secrets on how to obtain these game files.

DOWNLOAD

Head on over to TREZ Forums to discuss the release in the project’s topic!

If you’re looking to EM Wave Change into a fresh new outfit, The Yetee has got you covered. The Mega Man collection on The YeteeMart has just been updated with two new Mega Man Star Force t-shirts. These are officially licensed by Capcom.

Both tees will run you $32 and are expected to ship in late May. While you’re at it, the MegaMan vs Bass acrylic standee is also still available in the collection. Unfortunately, these and other items on the YeteeMart ship to North America only.

Source: The Yetee

No, this is no April Fools joke! Following the preservation of arcade games Rockman EXE Battle Chip Stadium and Rockman EXE: The Medal Operation a few months ago, preservation group SciLab Secrets has now managed to get a hold of the final arcade game: Medal Network Rockman EXE.

Medal Network Rockman EXE was the first arcade Mega Man Battle Network game, having been released exclusively in Japan in 2002. Like The Medal Operation, you play the game by inserting arcade medals, which lets you roll dice and advance MegaMan on a game board, possibly netting you more medals.

Compared to The Medal Operation, the gameplay in Medal Network is fairly simplistic, though almost no information or footage about the game exists today. The team at SciLab Secrets is currently working on getting the game to a playable state; they are already able to boot into the game on MAME, though many of the graphics are corrupted. You can see some screenshots below.

Source: GoodTofuFriday

It’s been a long wait, but two Japan-exclusive Mega Man Battle Network arcade games are finally on the cusp of being playable by international fans. Hardware preservationist and friend of the site GoodTofuFriday has managed to obtain what many considered lost media: ROM dumps of Rockman EXE Battle Chip Stadium and Rockman EXE: The Medal Operation.

In order to dump the ROMs, Tofu and DemiDyourMC flew all the way out to France to meet with a private collector who had acquired the two arcade cabinets, and was willing to let the team dump them. The whole process has also been documented by Demi, who plans to release the video on his YouTube channel later.

As for playability, there’s good news and bad news. The games do appear to boot on the arcade emulator MAME, but since both games rely on various unique physical hardware features, they’re currently not in a playable state. The preservation team plans to release the ROM dumps once new plugins for MAME have been developed emulating these hardware features. While playing the games in MAME won’t fully replicate the experience of playing on the real arcade cabinet, it should at least give fans the opportunity to see the games’ contents.

For more pictures and details, check out the full breakdown over on Rockman Corner!

Source: Rockman Corner

As many have speculated would happen, Denuvo Anti-Tamper DRM seems to have now been completely removed from the Steam version of Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection; six months on the dot after its initial release.

Capcom has not made any official announcements regarding the removal of Denuvo from MMBNLC, but in the past has removed it from their other games after their initial release window. The Steam store page for the games no longer makes any mention of third-party DRM, and the size of the games’ executables has dropped by more than 300 MB.

We can also confirm that Capcom did not add Enigma Protector, a different type of DRM recently added to Mega Man Zero/ZX Legacy Collection, which is also used in some other Capcom games. UPDATE: In a later Steam update for Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection, Capcom has now integrated Enigma Protector into the game after all.

If you’ve been meaning to grab Legacy Collection for PC, but Denuvo was a deal-breaker to you, now might be a good time to check it out!

Source: SteamDB

In their official live broadcast, Japanese mobile game #COMPASS has announced to have a collaboration with Battle Network Rockman EXE. The collaboration event will start on September 25th and ends October 15th. A trailer for it can be seen below.

For the event, Rockman.EXE and Netto Hikari will join in as a Hero with the Gunner role. The original Japanese voice actors for Netto and Rockman also return to provide new lines for the game! Additionally, there will also be 6 kinds of collaboration cards, and collaboration costumes for the original heroes based on Rockman EXE characters.

As seen in the trailer, Rockman will also have different costumes including Normal Style, Saito Style, Dark Rockman, Shadow Style, Forte Cross Rockman, and Glaga Beast.

Source: Famitsu App, #Compass Official Twitter

To promote their Tokyo Game Show 2023 lineup, Capcom is holding a big sale on many of their games; Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection included! If you’ve been meaning to pick up the collection on Steam, Switch or PS4, this might be a good time.

During the sale, the collection is 34% off (¥3,953 / $39.59 / €39.59 / £32.99) for both volumes combined, or 25% off (¥2,992 / $29.99 / €29.99 / £24.73) for the individual volumes. This sale will run until September 30th for the Nintendo eShop in the US and October 9th in other regions, until September 27th for the PlayStation Store, and until October 4th for Steam.

Source: Capcom

Capcom has just announced the release date and pricing for Mega Man X DiVE Offline, the upcoming standalone version of Mega Man X DiVE which was announced a little while ago. The game will release for Steam, Android and iOS starting September 1st, 2023, and can now be pre-purchased on Steam for $29.99 / €29.99 / £24.99 / ¥3990.

Additionally, Capcom has announced the minimum system requirements for the game on each platform. Curiously, it is noted that an internet connection is required to play Mega Man X DiVE “Offline”. It’s not clear at this time whether this is only required for initial install/activation, or whether you need a constant connection.

Read More