What Happened to Mega Man Universe?

Five years before Super Mario Maker, Capcom was developing Mega Man Universe, a central hub where users could create and share their own Mega Man levels. In less than a year, it was canceled. What happened?

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[GamingHistorian]

I was really looking forward to this game, despite the criticisms. Anyone else?

[sebastianrosa]

I think Inafune fell into a trap when he began developing his western inspired mindset. Japan wasn't losing shares in the gaming market because they were behind the times, it was because non-Japanese studios had finally built themselves up after almost two decades of Japanese dominance in the gaming world, there was just more competition now. People still LOVE Japanese games, and it's mainly because they are at their core: *Japanese*, not American, or French, or British. You can have Western Inspired, but keep them just that- *Inspired*

[rickylovesyou]

"Inafune felt that there was a growing disconnect between Capcom and it's players"
Indeed there was, and at the very heart of the disconnect was Inafune himself.
He was so out of touch on what made Capcom great to the western audience to begin with, and that was its high quality gameplay and production of the very Japanese centric games that Capcom was known for.

[VicHD]

I feel like Inafune was too arrogant to blame himself here. He was openly critical of Capcom after he quit, then Mighty No.9 happened and that blew up in his face.
Finally, Capcom was like screw it, let's make Mega Man 11, just to add insult to injury.

[TheMindofMephistoXX]

"But the development of Mighty No. 9 was a mess, and a whole other story."

Me: So... future episode? Yes please!

[TSRL_ZZ]

Funny how Inafune was so critical of Capcom being stuck in the past while desperately clinging to Mega Man 2. That mentality was present during 9 and 10's development cycle as well, 9 especially. Inti Creates had big ideas to move the series forward but Inafune told them to make it more like 2 when development began.

[retro_reflections]

What really stands out here is Inafune's ego getting the better of him during the title's development, instead of giving due consideration to what had previously proven successful, then storming off in a huff once it was abundantly clear that his approach wasn't the right one. And therein lies hubris.

[BobbyMiller]

That was a great video. It's interesting how he criticized the higher-ups for being salarymen, and then he outsourced the game to the cheapest company he could find.

[miahthorpatrick]

If there is any positive to this story, it’s that we got the magnificent PC fan-created Mega Man Maker game out of the ashes of Mega Man Universe. Great episode, Norman!

[pictonomii]

Funnily enough, Keiji Inafune also tried to shoehorn online multiplayer into Mighty Number 9 as well.

[AgaiLazen]

I find it really amusing how Inafune's incompetence reared its head pretty early on with MM Universe. Really sad that his leaving led to so many Megaman games getting canned so hard...

[zlink]

Megaman and Gaming Historian? You bet I'm watching this multiple times.

[shayne]

I'd often thought that Capcom would eventually make an offer to the people behind Mega Man Maker that would legitimize it as an official product (like what happened with SF X Mega Man on PC). I've used the program for years and it is AWESOME, easy to use, has full controller support, and sharing levels/playing other's levels works beautifully. It's so easy to use that my son's been making some hilarious Mega Man levels for me to play since he was 5.

[OPLOmega]

Inafune's obsession with westernization of their Japanese market can be marked as a heavy contributing factor behind Capcom's Dark Age. Seriously, just look at how many bad decisions he pushed (including DmC DMC getting greenlit) and you will come to the conclusion that Capcom really is better off without him.

It's been mentioned before in comments here on why Japan was falling behind on game sales compared to the west, but it's key to note that the other reason behind it all was that a LOT of Japanese devs were shutting down or getting merged/bought out by other companies during the mid-late oughts.

HD game development is hella expensive, and many smaller devs either couldn't keep up with the costs or were forced to stick to handheld games. The HD growing pains period saw the closure of many a studio.

[ChaoticMeatballTV]

Geez, 2010-2011 was a weird time. We got Mega Man 10, but then everything Mega Man related was cancelled, Universe, the first-person Maverick Hunter, Online, Legends 3, it's crazy just how many things that were getting scrapped. Really hope one day we see some of this stuff surface. One day.

[baddabaddabaddaswing]

The simpler art style could have worked if it was cel shaded. The lightning and simple textures made it look terrible. I still would have bought it.

[lirfrank]

Inafune is such a weird character, you can kind of tell where some artists come from with their ideas. Miyamoto, Sakurai, Kamiya, you can tell a lot about them by their decisions and the games they work on.
But often, Inafune doesn't make sense. He doesn't seem to really think as a business man, nor as an artist. He doesn't seem to have a clear vision of any kind. And the games he worked on reflect that.

[Octo-Genius]

Mega Man Maker is so fantastic- four playable characters, assets from just about every Mega Man game. Honestly found it more user-friendly than Mario Maker, too. I'm happy to see it get a mention here.

[alexandertheresurrection]

So this game was basically gonna be like Mario Maker, except MegaMan Maker. Not a bad concept at all, but I think where Mario Maker succeeds is that you can literally make a Mario level using the NES, SNES, WII graphics increasing the variety and possibilities.

MegaMan Universe has only one visual look and it looked very bland and it looked unappealing to most fans and press.

[michaellaverty]

"Go with this studio who has no experience in what we need them to do, they're cheap"

Brilliant, always works.