Sam Woods is TheGamer’s Senior Reporter. He’s been in games journalism since 2020 and has undertaken a variety of roles in that time. These have included roles such as SEO Editor, Managing Editor at DualShockers, and Global Head of Gaming, and he's also been seen on the BBC. He was promoted to the Senior Reporter position in 2025 following a series of high-quality reports and exclusives for TheGamer.
Since 2020, Sam has written over 2,500 articles and specializes in telling the stories of the people behind the games. He’s interviewed the biggest game directors, some of the industry’s top talents, told the stories of how indie games came to be, and spoken to players about what really makes them tick. He’s also interviewed some of the world’s biggest musical artists to find out how the medium has inspired their work, and TV and Film actors about their roles in video game adaptations. He even hosted a PAX panel in 2021 and made a documentary in 2024 surrounding the creation of a Disney game.
Alongside this, Sam focuses on breaking news. He got the scoop on Perfect Dark’s cancellation, got context around some AI drama, and revealed how Lady Dimitrescu’s actress would love to step back into the character’s giant shoes. These articles have been picked up by the biggest gaming sites, including IGN, GameSpot, and PC Gamer. He also loves to dive into the numbers behind the games.
Sam’s journey in games journalism has taken him all over the world. He’s covered Gamescom in Germany, Summer Game Fest in Los Angeles, and Tokyo Game Show in Japan, each on more than one occasion.
He’s been learning Japanese since 2024 with the intention of identifying and translating Japanese-language news and bringing it to English-language audiences first, something he’s done countless times.
Sam’s first review was 2020’s Battletoads reboot, and he’s since reviewed games in The Legend of Zelda, Super Mario, and Pokemon franchises.
After almost nine years, Mega Man is set to make his return in Dual Override. Teaming up with Proto Man, the Blue Bomber is back for his 12th mainline adventure.
Ahead of its release, at this year's Tokyo Game Show, we sat down with four members of the Mega Man team (Shinya Ikuta – Director, Hiroyuki Minamitani – Producer, Yuji Ishihara – Art Director, and Shinsuke Komaki – Art Director) to discuss why now, how Dual Override evolves the Mega Man formula, and how it plans to capture a new audience.
TheGamer: Mega Man is obviously one of the most historic franchises in gaming. It's been a while since the last entry. Why is now the right time to bring it back?
Shinya Ikuta: It's been quite some time since the release of the last mainline Mega Man title, Mega Man 11, so we felt that the timing is very good right now to release one, especially since we will be celebrating the 40th anniversary of the entire Mega Man series next year, and the team wanted to deliver something for the fans that they would really appreciate and really enjoy.
TG: Mega Man is such a huge name; do you put extra pressure on yourselves when working on or with a franchise this big? Does it make things a bit more scary, a bit more pressured?
SI: The dev team has been very anxious and excited to deliver on this project. Rather than putting pressure on ourselves, we focused on making something fun. We focused on making the best game we could, rather than stressing.
TG: The name Mega Man carries a lot of weight for older gamers; how do you try to sell something like this to new gamers?
Yuji Ishihara: Even if they're not super familiar with the IP or the series itself, the team feels strongly that there's a lot of amazing characters and character designs that gamers who may not be super familiar with the overall Mega Man series will enjoy.
Characters like Twinkle Girl were made to be appealing and attractive, so fans of all sorts of gamer types would enjoy them, and the team feels that's one of the series' major strengths.
TG: And how about from a gameplay perspective?
SI: Mega Man has always been a series about clearing a stage. You'd fail, then succeed by practicing and learning the stages, and then you'd feel that sense of achievement. That's an important part of it for us. However, we've added features to help players feel a sense of achievement earlier, even before clearing a stage. We've now split each stage into three parts to help players feel a sense of accomplishment earlier.
We also added systems like the custom chip system and override system, which let players customize their play style and play in a way that suits their needs. These are evolutions of the existing Mega Man gameplay experience that will hopefully help players who may not be very familiar with 2D action games.
TG: Can you talk me through the game's art direction? Was there ever a temptation to go back to the original 8-bit art style, or was this always the vision? Is this Mega Man's future?
YI: From the get-go, we wanted to focus on a more modern art style. We never considered going back to the 8-bit style. We wanted much more detail in the illustrations. If you notice Mega Man's character design, you may see that he's a little taller than in past titles.
Shinsuke Komaki: Overall, it's kind of like a cell-shaded art direction, but the level backgrounds are very detailed, and that contrast between the character and the background makes everything more visible and visually appealing. We really felt that, for a modern-era Mega Man, it was important to go with this evolved style for Mega Man and the overall game.
TG: Mega Man is taller? What was the design reason behind that?
YI: The animation was a major reason. The bigger he is, the easier it is for you to see his animations and cool poses he takes. They become more defined, clearer, and more visually appealing, which is why we designed it that way.
TG: The Mega Man bosses are always some of the most memorable parts of the game. From a design perspective, how fun is it to mess around and come up with these ideas for the different bosses?
YI: It's a lot of fun. Not only the final Robot Master, but as each stage is broken up into three areas, there are a lot more bosses, so we had fun. The second area will also always have a returning boss, so deciding which returning boss should come into the game was also fun and exciting for the team to brainstorm and discuss.
Shinsuke Komaki: They all have a lot of personality, and that personality drives how they play and how they look. We're very confident that those new bosses are very appealing.
TG: Do you have a favorite boss from Mega Man history?
SI: Mine's not a Robot Master, but I like Yellow Devil.
Hiroyuki Minamitani: Mine was Napalm Man from 5; he was cool.
YI: Top Man! I really like the big top on his head. I'm also very proud of Twinkle Girl; she was the first boss character we designed for Dual Override.
SK: I played a lot of Mega Man 2 as a child. I really like Wood Man. The Leaf Shield that protects him makes him pretty much invincible, which was very memorable to me from a gameplay perspective.
The team wanted to make it clear that their answers here are not tied to Dual Override in any way.
TG: Balancing in this game must have been tough. Not only do you have two characters, but you also have all of the upgrade chips and the override system. Did you spend a lot of time balancing the characters whilst also making sure the game felt tough in a traditional Mega Man way?
SI: We're still working on the balancing now. It's obviously a lot of work, considering we're delivering two different characters with two different play styles. We also have a lot of chips that players can use to customize their characters. So there's definitely a lot of tuning and balance work to do, but these are appealing points that make this game special.
TG: How does this impact boss designs? Do you have to look at each boss and think, "This is how Mega Man performs against them, and this is how Proto Man performs against them"?
SI: Tackling a boss will differ depending on who you are playing with. As you are probably familiar, one of the key points of Mega Man is using special weapons against bosses, and some bosses have distinct weaknesses, so certain weapons may be effective against a specific boss.
Just because you have figured out one way to defeat a boss with Mega Man doesn't mean the same strategies will apply when fighting that same boss with Proto Man. So we wanted to keep the discovery at the forefront and make it fun, no matter which character they choose to play with.
You'll be able to read our thoughts on Dual Override here on TheGamer tomorrow.
Source: TheGamer