So... What's next for MM8BDM? [Watch out for potential spoilers.]

[Pikachu4Prez]

The most recently released version has been incredible and truly feels like a fitting grand finale to what started off as a simple DOOM mod ten years in the making, and I have no doubts that Version 6 was always intended to be the true ending point for MM8BDM's story line.

So with that being said, there's Wily's letter hinting at his eventual plan to utilize his Double Gear System after completing the final chapter (and that "Wily always wins" utterance before the final Wily Star map), which seems to imply that Mega Man 11 will be happening. I just have to ask at this point: what will happen with Mega Man 11? Will it be meant as a kind of 'epilogue' to the game's story? Will anything special be done for it like it was done for Version 6's last two chapters or will it be simpler? (Though I can't imagine that anything will top the likes of the Eclipse battle and everything prior to it.) Will Version 7 even happen, considering that Version 6 was originally meant to be Mega Man 10 as a standalone expansion before Mega Man 11 was announced?

I'm really curious to know how you guys will tackle this, considering that you really went all out for Version 6 and, as I said above, it'll be really hard to top this (and I sure as hell know that you guys aren't going to make Zero the final boss because...seriously, what's the worth in doing so when Mega Man 11 doesn't serve as a "starting point" for Mega Man X?).

[CutmanMike]

The ending to v6 was planned out a long time ago, unfortunately this was long before Mega Man 11 was announced. Will still don't have many plans for V7, but the story will probably be more light hearted in tone. Don't expect it to be more epic than V6's ending, it won't happen. Still, we don't have much planned so far, there's still fresh soil for ideas and plenty of time to come up with something as we have almost no resources (tiles sprites) for MM11 content.

We're focusing on V6B for now, which is aimed at the core code of the game to make it less of a pain for modders to make new weapons/classes/etc.

[Gumballtoid]

I'd absolutely adore something fun and campy for v7. The first things that come to mind are the police chase boss, and pretty much anything involving the Genesis Unit.

[MusashiAA]

I don't mind a MM11 campaign being an epilogue-like story. V6 feels like a proper finale to the arc set up since V3-V4, so writing V7 in the spirit of, say, Adventure Time's epilogue or Dragon Ball Super's anime epilogue, makes more sense.

"The gang had more adventures later on, this was one of them".

This also feels quite close to how Classic MM games themselves were made and written: no real setup to an arc, no real feeling of a narrative sequence of events (besides MM6 to MM7).

Unless there's suddenly an ambitious attempt to write a new arc from any of you core people, an OVA approach to future core campaigns feels like the best approach: plenty of mod campaigns like Rock Force already felt going this way.Just give me my damn MM&B database-style encyclopedia on every character and we're clear.

[Jedimaster76]

Yeah I honestly wouldn't mind an epilogue chapter. Maybe something like the og MM8BDM v2 MM7 Chapter

[Stardust]

Yes, I agree if a v7 even happens bringing on a new series, it wouldn't be before a long time. The classic series is basically finished ; MM8BDM has a lot of content now and goes through basically all of classic Megaman's story. MM11 is technically official in the classic series, but I'm somewhat not as hyped about it, probably because it's still fairly new next to MM1-8 (and even 9-10 still have that 10 years old gap with the previous episodes).

Going on to other series (MMBN, ZX, Zero) would probably better be starting off a fresh new game than appending it to MM8BDM.

I believe general gameplay modifications/improvements and QoL are more important than content as of right now. The v6 overall damage buff contributes to faster games (in LMS) and less frustration due to fragsteal (in DM), so that does contribute.
For example, Roll's Chaos generator has some nice effects which could be officially added into Vanilla to have more sandbox-style games. Terrain-related effects like jelly world, earthquake , icy terrain could be easy to add without interfering with mods like classes/weapon packs. Some other like spread/double firing could be harder to maintain, mods would have to consider that parameter when DECORATing their stuff.
These gameplay tweaks could add replay value offline (you could unlock them when finishing the campaign) and extend server customisation online.

Either way MM8BDM devteam deserves a well-rested break 

[NES Boy]

I don't mind a MM11 campaign being an epilogue-like story. V6 feels like a proper finale to the arc set up since V3-V4, so writing V7 in the spirit of, say, Adventure Time's epilogue or Dragon Ball Super's anime epilogue, makes more sense.

"The gang had more adventures later on, this was one of them".

This also feels quite close to how Classic MM games themselves were made and written: no real setup to an arc, no real feeling of a narrative sequence of events (besides MM6 to MM7).

Unless there's suddenly an ambitious attempt to write a new arc from any of you core people, an OVA approach to future core campaigns feels like the best approach: plenty of mod campaigns like Rock Force already felt going this way.

This reminds me of fortegigasgospel and Magnet Dood's The Forgotten Adventures Project, which was a an unofficial MM8BDM continuation taking place after the MMV chapter. It has its own chapters based on the Rozner DOS games, the Wonderswan game, Rockman Strategy, and it's even implied that a there's a chapter based on a certain Archie Comics storyline. This was started in 2014, back before even the idea of a giant mecha battle against an assimilated Wily Star was conceived. Not much had been done with this expansion since at least 2015, aside from some DOS game content.

[Ivory]

Been a long time since I posted something, but I suppose it's a fitting time now.

To a lot of people, V6 is this super cool closure to a game that has been in development for the last 10 years. For me, it's been something else entirely. Even though the final product definitely had some great ideas from a lot of different people, it puts a smile on my face knowing that the general script I came up with for MM8BDM's Evil Energy arc years and years ago has come to a closure. The dev team has done wonders expanding on the script and bringing it to the product you experienced in V6. While my own contributions weren't nearly as major as my time with the game in V3/V4, I'm still honoured to be apart of the dev team and still be able to do the odd map or two for this game.

But as far as that script went, I didn't write anything for past MMV (since you know, MM11 wasn't even a thing back then.) MM11 and anything beyond is being written by a new generation.

There is your random trivia from a semi-retired MM8BDM developer.

[fortegigasgospel]

This reminds me of fortegigasgospel and Magnet Dood's The Forgotten Adventures Project, which was a an unofficial MM8BDM continuation taking place after the MMV chapter. It has its own chapters based on the Rozner DOS games, the Wonderswan game, Rockman Strategy, and it's even implied that a there's a chapter based on a certain Archie Comics storyline. This was started in 2014, back before even the idea of a giant mecha battle against an assimilated Wily Star was conceived. Not much had been done with this expansion since at least 2015, aside from some DOS game content.

WRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY
Man TFA has been on such hiatus for reasons of, no one to work on maps for ODOS. Plenty of ideas I had intended to do for it actually got into core, though without the people doing it even realizing (A fight on the back of Auto's truck, a falling battle to the unused song from MM7, the bonus boss).
TFA was going to be a collection of the expansions me and Dood were working on together in one spot; DOS, &B2, Strategy, and Worlds Collide. With Archie, PB/PF, and Dreamwave sprinkled in.
But now years have passed, standards have changed, and my final boss needs to be changed. As well as a few extra things to potentially sprinkle in. But of course, it needs to get off the ground for that to happen.

[MusashiAA]

I personally think the only Classic chapters worth exploring are MM11 by a long shot, then distantly followed by R&F2, Strategy and a blending/retelling of both DOS games using some of the redesigns supplied. The last two sadly don't have a lot going on for them to warrant a full blown update to core in terms of content, lest we go with fanon.

I think MM11 is more than deserving an update, but in terms of storytelling, there's not much needed to do in my eyes other than properly represent the following chapter in Classic.

[Pikachu4Prez]

Well, holy crap, I didn't expect this topic to get as much attention as it did. I just expected CutmanMike to chime in and that would've been the end of it, but it's neat to see other members of the community bounce ideas off each other nonetheless.

Also, my apologies for not looking at the topic for a few days; I was busy playing through the Make a Good Mega Man Level Contest series (just started Episode Zero as of this post!). In any case...

@ Gumballtoid, MusashiAA, Jedimaster76
That seems to be a kind of idea everyone agrees with; a more light-hearted romp after the drama-heavy final chapters. Mega Man 11's release definitely threw a spanner in the works, so I can understand why Version 6 wouldn't have been able to release as it was originally intended (as a standalone MM10 update rather than being folded into a release alongside the MMV chapter), but if it has to be adapted at all, then it should absolutely be as an epilogue of some kind...unless Capcom suddenly announces a Mega Man 12.

@ Stardust
I can understand wanting to not push the development team too hard now that the general gist of the story has concluded and for what it's worth, I can see where you are coming from. Mega Man 11 kinda came out of nowhere and still has had only about two years to set in compared to the decades of the previous titles; that Mega Man 10 almost seems like a natural end point given the implications of Roboneza leading to the eventual emergence of the Maverick Virus seals the deal. That said, MM11 does make it a point to try and go further into the history between Light and Wily and giving the two some much needed development, so make of that what you will. But whatever the development team decides to do, I'll support it...and besides, if this game's modding community is still going strong, there's always fan-made expansions that could come about. Speaking of which...

@ NES Boy, fortegigasgospel
It's a pity that so many fan expansions have so little steam behind them. I would think that with a game that's practically a standalone DOOM mod that's had ten years worth of polish the modding community would be a little more robust (ironic, considering the mod's source). There could be so much potential to be had in making all sorts of new expansions based on other Mega Man games both official and not. Hell, I'd even settle for even making bots based upon the various Mega Man fangames that have popped up in the years since the MM8-MM10 period if I could sprite worth a damn (or at all).

@ Ivory
It's always satisfying to see something you've fostered and created finally come to a close. It's sad, sure, but it's also quite nice to see something to its completion regardless. You've done an amazing job with this story and I'm really happy I've followed this project back when it was first announced because I don't think anyone could've imagined just how great this would turn out.

Suffice to say, I really hope that, now that the major updates are all but finished - and if Mega Man 11 doesn't get a full official update - the modding community will be able to pick up the slack and make some more content based upon some of the other canon Mega Man games (perhaps even - as Stardust mentioned - the later parts of the Mega Man timeline) and even some of the fan games (of course, I'm repeating myself now). Even more so now that the game has since been updated and a LOT of the older modifications hasn't been updated in years, therefore lacking future-proofing and being less-than-functional in newer iterations of the game (presumably because they were coded to work in Skulltag and not Zandronum).

[Hunters120]

Unrelated topic here, but the wiki page about the weapons, the Boss Attack, a stage named Unknown, and 2 more chapters after chapter 11 are not updated as of now.

[Pikachu4Prez]

Unrelated topic here, but the wiki page about the weapons, the Boss Attack, a stage named Unknown, and 2 more chapters after chapter 11 are not updated as of now.

Not to be rude, but you might want to take this complaint somewhere else on the forum. Replying with an unrelated issue on a topic where some members of the development team has been posting in regards to my opening question when they might be pretty busy with other things at the moment (they have lives too) won't make the Wiki any more active.

[CutmanMike]

Not to be rude, but you might want to take this complaint somewhere else on the forum. Replying with an unrelated issue on a topic where some members of the development team has been posting in regards to my opening question when they might be pretty busy with other things at the moment (they have lives too) won't make the Wiki any more active.

The forum is pretty quiet, no need for that.

Unrelated topic here, but the wiki page about the weapons, the Boss Attack, a stage named Unknown, and 2 more chapters after chapter 11 are not updated as of now.

As anyone can sign up to the wiki, you can volunteer yourself to update it if you like. See this thread: https://cutstuff.net/forum/index.php?topic=9740.0

[Pikachu4Prez]

The forum is pretty quiet, no need for that.

Sorry about that. Like I said, I wasn't trying to be rude.