Bad Box Art Mega Man

The Bad Box Art Mega Man, also known as U.S. Mega Man in Japan, is the name given to the rendition of Mega Man on the North American box art from the first Mega Man video game.

Appearance
Bad Box Art Mega Man appears to be an overweight and middle-aged, albeit surprisingly athletic human, wearing an ill-fitting jumpsuit and helmet with a blue and yellow color scheme unlike the basic blue and cyan armor of the standard Mega Man. He also carries a handheld pistol-like gun instead of having the Mega Buster, although he does refer to it as the Mega Buster during his Super Art in Street Fighter X Tekken.

The background of the box art he is featured on does not look like any of the stages in the game, although it could have been based upon Dr. Wily's final stage of the second game, due to there being large cubical buildings and the large "Dr. W" logo.

Video game appearances
The Bad Box Art Mega Man appears in the Secret Disk Legendary Hero from Mega Man ZX Advent, which says that the Legendary Heroes figures on the disk look more like "coal miners in colorful outfits".

Bad Box Art Mega Man was planned to appear as a playable character in the cancelled game Mega Man Universe. Each Mega Man in the game would've had different abilities, the only difference revealed was that Bad Box Art Mega Man could only fire two shots at a time instead of three.

On January 26, 2012, he was confirmed to appear as an exclusive character in the PS3/Vita versions of Street Fighter X Tekken. In the game, he travels to Antarctica to retrieve a mysterious box. His fighting style is relatively similar to the classic Mega Man's from the Marvel vs. Capcom series, with his special moves including the Mega Uppercut, Ice Slasher and Thunder Beam, and a powerful Charge Shot known as the Mega Cannon as his Super Art.

Other appearances
This Mega Man also appeared in the Short Circuits short story from the first issue of Archie Comics' Mega Man series that is used to give the comic's address and e-mail for contact. In the comic, Dr. Light finished changing Rock into Mega Man, but he says that the upgrade process wasn't pretty, Mega Man being shown with the same appearance of the Bad Box Art Mega Man.

Bad Box Art Mega Man also appeared on the Box Art Brawl variant cover of Issue 33, where he is shown fighting Mega Man.

Street Fighter X Tekken biography

 * Mega Man
 * Middle Aged Hero!

Known as a Digger, a person who digs up relics from the past for research. He is a hot-tempered man, but has a strong sense of justice and is also very polite. His weak point is that he is easily rattled when backed into a corner. He is always running around in a hurry due to the demands of his partner Roll, and this time he's been asked to travel to Antarctica to retrieve a mysterious box.

Trivia

 * The reason the North American cover for the first Mega Man game turned out so bad is because the artist of the cover was asked to create it with little to no time before the game was released and had never viewed any of the source material or seen the game, thus creating a cover that almost has nothing to do with the game. It is also rated as one of the worst box art covers in video game history.


 * In an interview, Yoshinori Ono, the producer of Street Fighter X Tekken, states that the reason behind including Bad Box Art Mega Man and his highly exaggerated appearance, instead of any other version, was due to Keiji Inafune's wishes. Ono said that when he asked creator Keiji Inafune about including Rockman in Street Fighter X Tekken, Inafune said "that's not interesting, we have seen Mega Man in fighting games before" and then asked Ono to give him "something original". Ono then decided to use the Mega Man from the "awful" North American box art from the first Mega Man game and "make it even wackier" by presuming that Bad Box Art Mega Man has aged since his picture was taken and used in the US box art 25 years ago. Ono said that Inafune "loved the idea" and that was what lead to his inclusion.


 * Ono included some elements from the Mega Man Legends series into the backstory of Street Fighter X Tekken's Bad Box Art Mega Man, like Mega Man's job as a Digger and Roll's somewhat bossy personality.