Dynamo

"You can't retire me no matter how hard you try... I'll give you a little advice... You... Sigma... Everybody is always too hot when they fight. But not me. I am the coolest and wisest of all. If you can't understand, then I'll just have to show you. Come on and fight me!"

- Dynamo

Dynamo (ダイナモ) is a character from the Mega Man X series that first appeared in Mega Man X5; he was hired by Sigma to scatter a virus inside the abandoned space colony Eurasia and prepare it to crash into the Earth.

Personality
Dynamo is arrogant, and has no problem inflicting massive and deadly damage on others if he feels it will benefit himself, as seen when he tried to cause the space colony Eurasia to crash into the Earth just because Sigma hired him to, ultimately resulting in so much devastation that humans needed to go underground for a time to avoid pollution even though the entire colony did not hit the planet. He would speak to them like a friend would, and play his battles out like they were for sport. He dislikes how angry and "hot" Sigma and the Maverick Hunters get in the heat of battle, believing that staying cool and collected is the best way to fight. Although he claims total allegiance to Sigma, he doesn't seem to have anything personal against the Hunters, so it seems doubtful that Sigma infected him with the virus. His running away seems to indicate cowardice, but it also signifies intelligence - other foes that X and Zero faced have died, being unwilling to run away even when things looked slim for their victory. Dynamo was smart enough to live to fight another day, or so it would seem...

History
Dynamo was a skilled mercenary hired by Sigma to help his execution of the plan to spread the virus all over Earth. Once Sigma had executed the plan, Dynamo's job was to slow down the progress of X and Zero as they gathered parts for the Enigma cannon and the Shuttle, both of which were intended to stop the colony's crash, which was an integral part of the virus plan. Despite his arrogant claims, he turned tail and ran when X and Zero brought him to the realization that he could die.

Dynamo appears as a boss twice, being fought near the Enigma and later near the Shuttle in the Hunter Base. The battles against him are skipped if Eurasia crashes before his appearance.

With Sigma no longer around to protect him during Mega Man X6, he tried gathering the Nightmare Souls to enhance his power. However, he still failed miserably at fighting X and Zero, and always ran away to fight again. Ever since the resolution of the Nightmare incident, he has gone missing.

Dynamo appears as a secret boss in Mega Man X6, in the Nightmare areas after defeating both Zero Nightmare and High Max, and unlocking Gate's Lab. Being struck by Rainy Turtloid's Meteor Rain causes him to be stunned and a follow-up hit from it makes him drop 200 Nightmare Souls, for a maximum of 600 per fight. Dynamo is a powerful, defensive, and fast opponent, although the ability obtained by Zero from the aforementioned boss easily makes short work of him. The pre-battle dialogue in the game shows that he is interested in the power of the Nightmare Souls and how they can make him strong enough to defeat X and Zero. Dynamo can always be fought every time the player visits any of the Nightmare areas, allowing the player to quickly farm Nightmare Souls.

Other appearances

 * Dynamo is fought alongside Gate in the X Challenge from Mega Man X Legacy Collection 2.
 * Dynamo is an unit card in TEPPEN.
 * Dynamo appeared as an event character in Elemental Story.

Mega Man X5

 * D Blade - Dynamo throws his saber at the player's current location and it boomerangs back to him.
 * Dynamo can also spin his saber to use it as a shield.
 * Tsubame Gaeshi - Only used when playing as X. Dynamo jumps up and quickly swings his saber downward at X.
 * Trick Shot - Only used when playing as Zero. Dynamo jumps up and shoots straight down. The blast will split when it reaches Zero's horizontal level and the two new blasts will move horizontally until they leave the arena.
 * Earth Gaizer - Only used in the second battle against Dynamo. Dynamo jumps to the edge of the arena and charges energy in his hand. He then slams his fist into the ground three times. Similarly to Zero's Giga Attack in Mega Man X6, lasers will fall from the sky to the floor between each fist slam. Two patterns arise from this move:
 * A) Lasers will cover a whole screen but leave open spaces between each laser and each open space is as wide as one laser. Dynamo will usually alter the place where the lasers land, thus making the open spaces covered with lasers and the previously covered areas open spaces.
 * B) Half the arena will be completely covered with lasers, the other half will be completely safe.

Mega Man X6

 * D Blade Kai - Depending on his level, Dynamo throws three to five spinning blades to the player that return to Dynamo after a few seconds. If the player attacks one of the blades, it will fly off the screen.
 * D Blade Ran - Dynamo jumps at the center of the screen and spins his saber in front of him and fires up to eight spinning blades, which sometimes return to Dynamo or home in on the player.
 * Tsubame Gaeshi - Dynamo jumps up and swings his saber downward at the player.
 * Earth Gaizer Kai - Dynamo jumps to one side of the screen and punches the ground, causing lasers to shoot up in front of him.

In-Battle Quotes
Some of these quotes are only present in the Japanese version of Mega Man X5.

Archie Comics
Dynamo was revived by Sigma-1 as part of his Maverick Army during Worlds Unite, and joined in the attack on the Sky Patrol. However, he was one of the Mavericks to run afoul of the newly arriving Street Fighter heroes, suffering a devastating blow from Ken Masters that impressed Knuckles the Echidna and being destroyed by a double Tatsumaki from Ryu and Ken.

Dynamo is the only Reploid from Sigma's army whose fate was unknown in the games. Although killed during Worlds Unite, his ultimate fate remains unknown as most events from the crossover where undone by Xander Payne.

Production Notes
Developer Comments "This time, on top of the story, one of the main themes is the destruction of Earth and ****, so I felt there was less necessity for new characters and rival characters than there'd been to date. However, I thought it'd be lonely without ANY rivals, and thus Dynamo was born. To make him stand out, I set my sights on a character that hadn't been in the series before. He's halfhearted in personality, so he doesn't know if he wants to fight or not. It's not that he hates X or Zero; he fights because it's his job. He may appear irresponsible at first glance, but in fact, he's an adult of the late 20th century, philosophically viewing X and company, who give free rein to their enthusiasm when they fight. I also quite like him design-wise. It feels like an explosion of Sensei's design sense. Please treat my dear Dynamo well." (grin)

Designer Comments "Established as a character who uses both a buster and a saber, the American cavalry flickers across his face. We settled on him being a rival for X and company even as we expanded on all sorts of ideas about what kind of past he has. His red visor is a high point of his design." -Haruki Suetsugu

"Since Dynamo uses both a sword and a gun, I modeled him after mounted cavalry and other western movie sources. His buster is shaped like the cylinder of a revolver, his color is navy blue, he has yellow lines going up either side of his legs, and he has a buckle on his belt. Also, since he is able to use both kinds of weapons, I also gave him some features from both X and Zero." -Haruki Suetsugu, Mega Man X Official Complete Works, 2009

Trivia

 * Dynamo is the only enemy who doesn't show signs of going Maverick. Unlike typical Mavericks who fight until they are destroyed, Dynamo, in both Mega Man X5 and Mega Man X6, retreats instead.
 * Dynamo is the first non-primary boss to receive his own "Boss Selected" introduction.
 * Dynamo's Tsubame Gaeshi (Swallow Return) is also the name of the famous sword technique created by Sasaki Kojirō.
 * Interestingly, in both Mega Man X5 and Mega Man X6, when Dynamo is defeated, he explodes like other bosses, but after the explosion, he reveals himself intact.
 * Dynamo's appearance in Mega Man X6 completely recycles his sprites from Mega Man X5, but reconstructs his attack patterns rather than re-use them, including throwing multiple spinning sabers that stay suspended in the air and changing his charge animation cycle to a suspended single-pose charge.
 * Dynamo's appearance (long silver hair, visor) and higher battle ranking than Special A (SA), makes him reminiscent of Char Aznable's expies of the Gundam series. Causing Eurasia to descend to Earth is reminiscient of Char's Counterattack, where Char Aznable tries to drop the giant asteroid Axis on Earth, so humanity migrates to space in order to evolve to the next stage.
 * Dynamo is the only boss in the Mega Man X series whose strategy changes with the current player character, using attacks that are the opposite of the Hunters' fighting style. He uses fast, aerial, and wide slashes when playing as X, while using slow, splitting, but difficult to evade on the ground buster shots when playing as Zero. In Mega Man ZX Advent some bosses also do this, with the concept probably taken from Dynamo.
 * The first half of his battle theme is similar to the first two X-Hunter Stages' theme from Mega Man X2.