Proto:Mega Man X3 (SNES)/August Prototypes

This article is a work in progress. ...Well, all the articles here are, in a way. But this one moreso, and the article may contain incomplete information and editor's notes.

This page details one or more prototype versions of Mega Man X3 (SNES).

A Japanese sample version of Mega Man X3 found by one C. Davis, rendered and fixed-up by the good people at arduino.cc, and released by the Rockman Corner.

Dated 08/23 in the game itself, the Rockman X3 Sample Version appears to be a nearly-finished build from four months before the commercial release. Almost all stages and features are implemented in some form or another. However, it's pretty clear the game is not quite finished.

(Prototype source: Rockman Corner)

Sub-Pages

Game Start Not a lot of changes from the final, but some things of note.

The Eight Mavericks The bulk of the game's changes.

Vile, Bit, Byte, and Dr. Doppler Oh, and Sigma. Spoilers.

Sprite Changes Old Maverick designs and such.

Unused Graphics

A frame of Volt Catfish presumably getting energized by the bolt of lightning he strikes himself with.

The Dumping Ground

To do: Make these into actual sub-pages. Some day…

Intro Stage

• The intro stage has some differences:
  • Zero's theme does not play when you control him.
  • The screen scroll won't lock movement to the left when you first gain control of Zero, allowing you to backtrack to almost the beginning of the stage. In the final game, the game will prevent you from going to the left.
  • X's sprite is different while being captured. In the prototype, X is in his jumping/midair sprite. In the final game, X is in his "damaged" sprite.
  • The Hangerter that holds X takes more damage to destroy.
  • Two small health capsules appear after Mac's room, despite serving no purpose since X will have full health.
  • The final climb to Maoh the Giant has an additional window.
  • You can go back to the left wall while fighting Maoh, making the fight incredibly easy.

Stage Select

• There are no miniature previews of each stage in the Stage Selection screen.
• Some boss intros are missing, don't play, or glitch up.
• When you defeat all 8 Mavericks, the animation of Doppler's lab emerging from the ground will play every time you go back to the stage selection screen. In the final game, the animation only plays once, and doesn't repeat.
• Having the helmet upgrade won't show the powerups you are missing on each stage.

Blizzard Buffalo

• The final part of Blizzard Buffalo's stage has a simpler blizzard effect than the final version.
• Blizzard Buffalo does not move during his boss introduction screen.
• Blizzard Buffalo doesn't seem to have his infamous wall-hugging glitch in this build.
  • The ice shard graphics created when X breaks free from being frozen by Buffalo's freeze ray are glitched.
  • The foreground blizzard in the city area before entering Buffalo's building has different graphics.
  • The upgrade capsule is shifted a few pixels to the left (?).

Toxic Seahorse

• The toxic waste is opaque rather than transparent.
• The ladders have slightly different graphics. In the prototype, the ladders have two fences at the top. In the final game the ladders feature no fences.
• There is no miniboss (Hotareeca). The miniboss room is not yet there.
• The first boss entrance shutter will sometimes be glitched. It might be linked to going through the previous room(s) quickly.
• There is an entrance to Vile's stage in this level, which was cut from the final.

File:Rmx3 proto seahorse vile entrance.png

The entrance to Vile's stage in Toxic Seahorse's level, accessible from the first pit in the underwater section.

Tunnel Rhino

• Different background elements (large pipes, different-looking crystals, etc). Background is different in general.
• Extra background elements in the beginning of Tunnel Rhino's stage. Spikes also look different, as does the platform where the Heart Upgrade is.
• Tunnel Rhino won't knock you off the wall as easily if he charges into it.
• Tunnel Rhino seems to lack his drill attacks. He only uses his charge attacks.

Gravity Beetle

• Different background.
• Gravity Beetle's giant black hole attack will not always be spawned at the screen's center, it can also completely devour the top of the walls, which makes the fight harder.

Blast Hornet

• The polygon ninja star enemy, Shurikein, is MUCH easier, being destroyed with 3 charge shots.
  • Its movements are extremely limited, simply rolling across the walls clockwise. The final version also rolls back and forth across the ground, bounces into the air, and even spins horizontally like a top.
• The airship receiving cargo was slightly redesigned, adding a Doppler logo to the side.

Crush Crawfish

• The game doesn't lock the controls during the 'cutscene' with the enemy dropping from the sky and breaking the floor in Crush Crawfish's stage.
• Crawfish's boss room is larger.

Neon Tiger

• Different backgrounds for the second half.
• Neon Tiger's Ray Splasher is twice as fast, in addition to having a different spread.
• It is possible to glitch Neon Tiger's guard move so that it no longer blocks your shots for the duration of the fight.

Doppler Stage 1

• The edges of the horizontal crushing walls become invisible if they're near the vertical edge of the screen. This occurs only while they are in motion, and was fixed in the final.
• Just before reaching REX-2000's boss room, you can see the background of the stage shifting rapidly through a window to the left. This was fixed in the final version.
• During the REX-2000 fight, if Zero has not died and X ends the fight on the right side of the screen behind REX-2000, X will moonwalk to the left and then walk to where Zero is. This was fixed in the final.
• Under normal circumstances, the Press Disposer boss is nowhere to be seen. Destroying Bit and Byte during the Maverick levels in the final game causes the first boss of the stage to be the Press Disposer. In the prototype, destroying Bit and Byte early won't cause the final part of Doppler Stage 1 to change. You will still enter the room where you fight Godkarmachine O Inary (There won't be a boss room at the part of the wall). However, entering the boss room will end the stage without a boss fight.
  • However, by using the checkpoint modifier PAR code 7E1FB503 either before entering or after dying, it is possible to fight the Press Disposer boss. It seems completely finished. However, it has absolutely no invulnerability frames, so you can wail on it with rapid-fire weapons to easily defeat it. (This also includes both Zero and X's Z-Saber blades.)

Doppler Stage 2

• Entirely different background. Water graphics seem to be glitched and don't appear until the game is paused and unpaused. (Seems to be intermittent glitch, need to test more in order to replicate.)
• The sequence for obtaining Zero's saber can sometimes be broken. Sometimes, the screen scrolling will lock in place after defeating Mosquitus, making you unable to escape the room. Additionally, all terrain and background palette animation stops. Other times this doesn't happen. Need to make more tests in order to find out what causes this bug to happen. A related glitch can sometimes make the dialog box during this scene to be invisible. The music of the stage will stop after this scene and won't start again unless the player gets killed. 
• In the final game, Zero takes a knee when Mosquitus crashes into him and begins exploding. In the prototype, Zero will only take a knee after Mosquitus has disappeared after exploding. Also, it's possible that X and Zero won't be facing each other during this cutscene, while in the final game, Zero's sprite will be reoriented to face X. 
• Volt Kurageil's body has strange behavior. If you climb the walls out of the water, the boss' body will follow your altitude. In the final game it cannot leave the water. Deafeating Volt Kurageil will end the game with a "Coming Soon" screen, unless you use PAR codes to proceed further. In the final game, Mosquitus cannot be encountered in the destroyed version of the stage.
• During the fight against Volt Kurageil, the vertical screen scrolling won't lock the upper part of the room out of the screen, allowing you to reach the platform where the entrance door is. In the final game, the screen won't allow you to climb that high during the boss encounter.
• Volt Kurageil has no invincibility frames, allowing him to be easily taken out with rapid-fire uncharged shots. (This also includes both Zero and X's Z-Saber blades.) This was fixed in the final.
• The fight against Vile in his Goliath Ride Armor is reachable, although it requires a special method to do so. First, get to Volt Kurageil in Doppler Stage 1. During the fight, activate PAR code 7E1FAE0E (This will set the stage ID to the destroyed version of Doppler Stage 2) and let yourself be killed by Volt Kurageil. You will be teleported to the hall before the boss, but the stage will be changed. The fight against Volt Kurageil will be skipped and you will be able to advance to Vile's boss room at the bottom. Vile's AI patterns seem to be finished in both his Goliath Ride Armor version and his individual version. However, the Goliath Ride Armor only causes 1 damage per physical contact (Maybe for combat testing purposes?), and Vile's sprites during the second part of the fight are glitched. Defeating Vile, just as with Volt Kurageil, will end the game with a "Coming Soon" screen, after which the game will reset.
• The exit door to the Mosquitus boss room in the destroyed version doesn't work in any way. The only way to access the second part of this version of the level requires to first go to the normal version of Doppler Stage 2, defeat Mosquitus and proceed normally through the door. Activate a further checkpoint, activate PAR code 7E1FAE0E and then let yourself be killed. The checkpoint will reload you in the destroyed version of Doppler Stage 2, just after the locked door of the Mosquitus room. You can proceed further from here in the destroyed version of the stage and encounter Vile Mk-II at the end.

Doppler Stage 3

• There are 12 capsules in the room instead of 8. The mechanical tower that gives you items when you shoot it in the final game is not present in the prototype. 8 of the capsules take you to the 8 Maverick rematches, but the spawning spot of X is incorrect in several of these rooms. It will spawn you in the top left of the screen and you will be stuck in the ceiling, unable to move. Only 3 or 4 Maverick rooms actually teleport you in correctly.
• The 4 extra capsules take you to empty rooms and you get stuck in the ceiling, unable to escape.
• You can actually open the exit door and continue the stage without beating any Maverick rematch.
• The background is different.

Doppler Stage 4

• The stage background is completely different. It features several Sigma bodies from Mega Man X2's sprite.
• Sigma's energy bar shows the Doppler logo instead of his own personal emblem.
• Sigma's ground-crawling fireballs are a few pixels higher than they should be, preventing them from hurting X while he's on the ground.
• Sigma's final body (Kaiser Sigma) is glitched (His right arm overlaps his chest). Sigma's also more aggressive
• After escaping the rising lava, X walks to the right like in the final version. However, he stops short of the wall and teleports out, bringing you back to the level select screen.
  • Attempting to re-enter the Doppler Stage instead places you in Volt Catfish's stage.
• A proper ending sequence can be activated using the PAR code 00DA390B. It plays out more or less like the final version, though instead of sending you to the ending, it puts you back at the beginning of whatever stage you have active PAR codes for. If you disable any PAR codes for any particular stage, the game will default to Blast Hornet's stage and send you there after the sequence with Zero/Doppler attacking Sigma with the vaccine.
• Some very strange side-effects occur, depending on when the above code is enabled:
  • Enabling the code at the start of the level will disable all enemies on any level, as well as messing up with events.
  • Enabling it before the first ladder will disable the Zero cutscene where he breaks through the wall.
  • Enabling it before seeing the boss room will prevent Sigma from spawning, as well as prevent the door from closing.

Ending

• While the ending can't be reached through normal means, using the PAR code 7E00D106 then starting a new game will allow viewing of the ending. (Thanks, GoldS!)

Prototype	Final (Japan)

• The epilogue has significant graphical differences. Doppler's Lab has an entirely different design. The mountains in the background are also drawn differently than in the final version. The sun has been added on the background behind the mountains with sun rays scattering around. The cliff where Zero and X stand during the final game is nowhere to be seen, instead a blue strip fills the bottom of the scene. The music that plays at this point is the Cast Roll music instead of the Epilogue music that plays in the final game
• X refuses to stop moving during the epilogue.
• What would be the Cast Roll in the final version lasts about five seconds in this one and shows a whole lot of nothing.
• The "Thanks for Playing" screen will play the "You Get" music from when you obtain a new weapon. In the final version this screen simply keeps playing the Cast Roll music.

The Nightmare Police and Vile Mk-2

• Dr. Doppler's symbol in the Mavericks' life bars is slightly different to the final version.
• Bit's homing fireball is faster, and thus harder to dodge.
• Vile just appears at the start of the fight in the prototype instead of having a warp-in effect like the final game
• Vile's first Ride Armor is blue instead of gray like in the final game. It also lacks sound effects.
• Vile stops in mid air to throw his fire bomb attack. In the prototype, the fire beam generated by the bomb absorbs shots, while it doesn't in the final game (need to confirm which weapons are absorbed).
• Even when defeated using the Ray Splasher, Vile teleports away after his death speech instead of exploding like in the final game.
• The timer for X to escape from the abandoned factory is set to 60 in the prototype vs. 50 in the final.
• Byte's magnetic mine is nowhere near as effective as in the final game.
• When Vile is defeated using S. Blade, the game treats it as if you've completed the stage. This is complete with an extremely glitched weapon-get cutscene! This cutscene can be viewed only if you defeat Vile with S. Blade, and if you have not beaten the Maverick whose stage you entered the Vile teleporter from. If you've beaten the Maverick, the level will still end after defeating Vile in this way, but no cutscene. Either way, afterward you will be ejected to the stage select. This does not count as beating the Maverick in the stage.

The glitched 3D model displayed after defeating Vile with S. Blade

You get... um... what?

Weapons, Armor and Items

• X's picture doesn't change color during the "You get" screen. Also, there is no demonstration of the weapon. The wireframe of the weapon is always white instead of a unique color like in the final version.
• The usage of Sub Tanks is glitched in the weapons menu. It works, but the graphics don't reflect it.
• The Charged Shot with the upgraded arm cannon is glitched. If you fire a fully charged shot, X will remain in "charged status". You can continue to fire normal bullets, but you cannot charge. You have to switch to a weapon and then back to fix it. This is also fixed by obtaining the Z-Saber.
• The helmet part's radar detects more than upgrades. It also marks mini boss and boss rooms. However it doesn't show missing items on each stage on the stage select screen.
• X gets locked out of switching weapons with the trigger buttons every time you get a new armor upgrade. Pausing and unpausing fixes this.
• Zero's Z-Saber is not an instant-kill attack on bosses with invulnerability frames, like it is in the final. It instead does a flat 4 damage.
  • Similarly, a direct hit using the Z-Saber with X seems unable to do more than 4 damage to most bosses. In the final, it does a whopping 16 damage to most bosses.
• X's Z-Saber beam surrounds normal enemies as it does to the bosses. In the final game, the saber goes straight through the normal enemies and destroys them.
  • X's Z-Saber energy wave only does 2 damage to most bosses, rather than continual damage. It sometimes immobilizes certain bosses, as well.
• The charged-up S. Blade can only be swung up using the D-pad. In the final, you can also swing it down.
• Use the Pro Action Replay code 7E1FCEFF to enable I. Tracer from X2 in weapon select, though it will crash the game if you try to use it.
  • The icon for the I. Tracer's weapon energy uses the VRAM placeholder graphic, due to not having a special graphic to load. Said graphic is a "W" (weapon) and is present in Mega Man X1-3.
  • Additionally, when quick weapon switching is used (L/R shoulder buttons) it will simply use whatever icon is currently loaded to that slot in VRAM.

Other Differences

• Zero's death lacks sound effects.
• No password screens after beating the bosses.
• If X or Zero are hit by an attack that does 6 damage or more, they will take a knee and be stunned for about 3.77 seconds (or 226 frames).
• Some bosses, like Gravity Beetle or Blizzard Buffalo, will pause their assault and let X/Zero recover, should they take a knee in their presence.
• Unlike the final, Zero can collect Sub-Tanks and Heart Upgrades. When Zero collects a Heart Upgrade, his max HP actually increases! X will also receive the upgrade when you switch back to him. Unfortunately the upgrade to Zero's max HP is not permanent, although it will last until you switch back to X.
• Zero can enter the Vile stage teleporters. Entering the teleporters as Zero will predictably teleport you to the Vile stage. You will enter the Vile stage as X, and for an instant you'll have a much larger HP meter. This was fixed in the final, as Zero cannot activate the Vile stage teleporters.

(Research/PAR codes: GoldS)