2027 is a big year for Mega Man. Everyone’s favorite little blue robot turns the big 40. That’s a major milestone, and few active franchises in all of gaming can celebrate that kind of longevity. As part of the festivities, we are getting a new mainline entry in the series in Mega Man: Dual Override. At Tokyo Game Show 2026 we had a chance to go hands-on in this robotic adventure, and found a traditional 2D shooter/platformer like the series is best known for, but with some modern twists.
Similar to Simon Cardy’s excellent preview, I would be taking on Twinkle Girl, and her lineup of stages. But this time, I’d be ditching the Blue Bomber in favor of his older brother, occasional foe, and sometimes ally Proto Man. For those who don’t know, Proto Man was the first of Dr. Light’s sentient robot creations, who long ago abandoned the good doctor to forge his own path. He’s flawed, a bit aloof, and cool as hell. Just look at those built in sunglasses!
Levels are now divided into distinct segments of ascending difficulty. Twinkle Girl’s area is themed after some sort of Robot World’s Fair, with colorful balloons ascending into the blue skies, and cheery, upbeat music pumping through my headphones in this first portion. After so many games returned to the depressing all brown and gray color palette of the late 2000’s, I haven’t to admit the vibrant colors are pretty refreshing.
Proto Man isn’t just a reskin of Mega Man with a cool scarf. Shots from his Proto Buster hit hard, but only travel a short distance ahead, and his charge shots arc out in a semi-circle slash attack, rather than send a big ball of energy all the way across the screen. His blaster also builds up heat, which can interfere with his attacks if he overheats. This dissipates over time or can be manually vented. It’s a different, in-your-face playstyle that needs timing and aggression to push through the enemy robots that litter the path ahead.
I quickly make my way though the first area, blasting through enemies, destroying wall-mounted turrets, and jumping over some indoor fireworks emitters (which seems like a firecode violation.) Each area ends with a boss, and the first, Big Press Don, alternates between flying in the air, then trying to land on me to crush me into robot-paste, or shooting a fist out of a chest cavity, both of which I use the classic Mega Man slide move to evade, and blast/slash ol’ Donny boy into early retirement.
Beating Dom lets me advance, but it also earns me a Bolt. These are essential; similar to Mega Man 11, these feed into Dr. Light’s lab, which in turn allows you to unlock Custom Chips, which can be equipped and used to boost your performance. I didn’t get to unlock any in my run, but I did come equipped with a rapid-fire chip that let Proto Man unleash a torrent of machinegun-like blasts from his Proto Gun, which could quickly turn most enemies to scrap. Bolts are also hidden in each of the levels, offering incentive to explore thoroughly, and I could see myself farming any Bolts I was missing if I got stuck on a particularly hard boss.
As I move to the second location, a behind-the-scenes area of the exhibit, things get tougher, and Proto Man’s other abilities become a factor. While he doesn’t have the range of his blue brother, Proto Man has a powerful shield at his disposal. This can be thrown like a looping boomerang, Captain America-style. Similar to prior playable appearances, he lifts his shield when he jumps. That move saved my life quite a few times, as I jumped over several pits of instant death while birds dropped balls that exploded into a barrage of rockets that would have knocked me away from the platforms had I not blocked the shots.
You don’t get to copy powers from fallen Robot Masters the way Mega Man does. Instead, as best I can tell, the Proto Shield gets new functions or abilities. For this demo, I had two attacks unlocked, a leaping uppercut, and horizontal dive attack. Both were useful in fights (especially the uppercut against the boss of the second area, a knockoff of Astro Man from Mega Man 8), and had some convenient other uses as well. At one point I spied a Bolt in the upper right corner of my screen, too far to jump, but was able to snag it after leaping into one of those horizontal dives. Seems like another series staple, backtracking once you’ve unlocked useful areas to grab all the secrets, is back once again.
سەرچاوەی فەرمی بە زمانی ئینگلیزی: https://www.ign.com/articles/mega-man-dual-override-preview-we-played-as-proto-man-this-time
