Can You Beat Mega Man X6 on XTREME With NO UPGRADES? 

I feel like this challenge with this game serves as an example that “gitting gud” at a game doesn’t necessarily unlock some kinda understanding that makes a game good or fun when it wasn’t previously. If anything the greater your knowledge and skill at X6 becomes the more apparent it is that the whole game is held together with duct tape.

This video is an excuse for RZ to rant about Nightmare Mother in detail and it's glorious.

Good job on the suffering! :D

Zero is so badass that not even the worst level design or the most overpowered bosses in the franchise can stop him

I would like to add on to the BS on Infinite M that if you're not careful enough he can start regenerating his HP. Not many people talk about it because it really happens but when it does it kills that attempt completely. He becomes invincible while regenerating HP and he regenerates up to half to a full bar

I never stopped to notice how many of the bosses here are based off aquatic life. You got a turtle, a clam, a shark and a water flea.

If I may, I want to thank you for shouting out Yoshi. (At 19:34) He is absolutely thrilled that you gave him a shout out. Thank you for making his day.

Yeah that whole Gate stage 1 including the boss Nightmare blob is the prime example for game design of what NOT to do, period. Congrats on clearing the challenge and thank you for doing it so we don't have to.

I don't know where people are getting this from, but you can *not* wall jump off the spikes in Secret Lab 1 with a damage boost from the wolves. I've verified this multiple times over, so if you believe otherwise you're gonna have to show some video evidence of it.

3:16 "Commander Yammark is smokin' hot with her flirty eyes" Who wants to tell him?

Thank you so much! It's only been a year since I pulled it off for the first time, and it brightens me to see that people are doing it now! You keep going, dude!

Retro, Yanmark is a guy. He even has a guy for a VA. He just sounds similar to X, which is why you probably never noticed.

God I can feel the frustration of playing this game WITH save states (in the fortress) and on normal with ALL upgrades is coming back to me already. The idea that you cleared it without any upgrades on a harder difficulty on native hardware makes me respect your patience to the upmost degree. Boy, do I wish I knew about the Gate cheese back then.

To be fair, you don't obtain the falcon armor after unarmored X, so it isn't really an upgrade honestly. I appreciate you going the extra mile though, that's dedication.

Yammark is still a guy, no matter how cute you may think he is.

X6 has such a good concept. They really should remake this game, but good.

I legit thought X9 would come out before you were to post anything Mega Man X related again, much appreciated, Retro

Sigma was shouting "Useru!", or "disappear!" In Japanese during that attack in his second phase.

fighting nightmare mother without any upgrades is one of the worst types of torture out there

The game may not be intended to be played this way, but it still should be possible. The upgrades are all optional and no armor x is a choice they give you to use. Not being able to beat with a character in the game is just bad design. X5 extreme you can beat the entire game with regular x; it’s hard but it’s doable and you don’t have to resort to weird maneuvers like you had to in gate 1. X6 is just trash. Yet for some reason I still enjoy it lol. Idk why

A madlad 10 years did all this without taking a hit , and had some very funny commentary to hide his suffering

I believe that one of the worst things X6 does is simply how it bretrays the "any%" spirit of the franchise, none of the upgrades were a requeriment to completing the game. Curiosly enough X5 actually goes full-on this mentallity by giving you access to the final stages without even having to fight a single Maverick if you were brave enough. Whereas X6 demands to find the secret boss room twice, defeat High Max who is immune to the X's plain attacks, and the rest of the level design in the Gate's Lab clearly suggests it intends the player to have a very especific set of upgrades, pretty counter-intuitive they would want to give players the freedom to access the endgame earlier but immediately show them the roadblocks telling them to go back immediately.

A lot of people tend to defend X6 and its impossibility for a no-armor X, because it straight up gives you a barely-neutered Falcon armor for free and therefore the game's platforming and terrain are built around that. That's no excuse, though, because it that were the case, we wouldn't have been given the choice to go Armorless. It was very apparently intended as possible but certain jumps are a few pixels too high or far between safe landings and were obviously rushed builds that never got proper testing. Great effort on finding out-of-the-box solutions where perseverance wasn't enough! Armorless at all is a victory, it's just a shame that "naked" X is impossible to do a buster-only run with.

Keep in mind, even after this man "got gud" many of his victories still hinged on RNG.

Good shit as always RZ. Love the smooth transitions from one thing to another. It was also pretty cool to see the whole process on stream, and even contribute to how the video turned out. Now how much do you wanna bet people are gonna find tricks for the game that'll make this possible as X?

To be honest, X6 has some good stuff like the music and stages looking amazing but otherwise it was a nightmare to play through for me. I even had much more fun with X7 (probably because it introduced my favourite reploid Axl)

Just goes to show Zero really is the ultimate hunter.

That must of been a nightmare to complete. I 100% the game years ago on Xtreme mode and that was a nightmare. I did a no upgrade run with megamanX 1 and that was really hard, but this one is way way WAY harder I imagine. Plus I would like to ask anyone, does anyone genuinely like X6? I don't think X6 is a good but I think the game has some great things about it like the setting design, music, boss designs and the story, but yeah the overall gameplay and level design is what kills the game.

Congrats on beating this challenge and especially Nightmare Mother ! This is quite an achievement. Very well-made video too.

At this point, I associate Megaman X6 with you more than Clement. I still remember watching your streams of the Minimalist Run of X6 as X. I offered advice a few times in the second half of the run, and I felt so happy when you not only gave the strategies a try, but were able to use them to clear the sections giving you trouble! I noticed you even used a few of them in this video, such as the Rainy Turloid cycle strategy. Granted, by now, you've probably long forgotten about that stream, and came up with that strategy again on your own this time, but it still brought a smile to my face! Anyway, great job on once again making this game yours. An excellent video, as always!

"Watch me torture myself just to prove the point this game is an atrocity of design."

As a megaman player I salute to you, enormous respect to you. I always suffered playing X6 in extreme even with upgrades but enjoyed. Thinking how it was challenging for you playing with those restrictions...man you are a hero.

This game was designed for Zero who's an unlockable Character... Let that sink in...

sigma is easy here because that is the aftermath of the battles from X5 thats why he looks like a zombie...and still recovering...his final form even looks like a terminator....X5 is his complete form...

So you know what is really stupid about the Gate fight? In the prototype he can be fully damaged by X and zeros weapons, but their was a bug related to beating him too early so to fix it, they made him fully invincible rather than fix the bug. Really shows the polish in this game.

"Commander Yammark is hot" this guy's speaking my language "Her" oh... _he doesn't know_

i recently tried xtreme mode, no challenge run, just xtreme and i couldnt defeat nightmare mother. you are a god

You must be right about X6 being something that gets views with youtube, because I clicked on your video without realizing you were the one who made what is possibly the best review out of this game (so good that I watched a second time to show it to my brother), as well as others (I really like Quickies don't cut it), and... as I watched this with my brother he said "pause" occasionaly just to ask "why..." why did they make such objectively bad design choices, like... you not being able to finish the game with X without... getting some specific part or whole armour that is spread out across half the levels, when so many people are NOT completionists... But it is such a thing to me that some games,no matter how bad they are; what it meant to me makes it so that it will ALWAYS mean something great to me, as is "X2: Wolverine's Revenge", that already has the bestest review from Purposeless Rabbitholes , and I finished this game more than a dozen times, watched his review also twice, and would still love to see you review it. Thanks for the great video and the effort! When I saw the title I wasn't expecting much because I watch X MaverickHunter's runs that makes pixel perfect stuff so crazy stuff but... Not using bosses weapons? Wow. You just... man, you deserve some praise. Cheers!!

That jump with the magma blade being brought to my attention is a God send.

16:34 this scene is a beautiful representation of X6

Now imagine the same challenge, but modding the game to make EVERY SINGLE BOSS have the same health as Hell Sigma (128 HP) and all bosses at Lv.4 from the get-go (well, also having a special save file to have Zero unlocked without the Black Zero cheat, because defeating a Lv.4 Zero Nightmare gives you Black Zero by default), I can say for sure that Mijinion is the worst boss of the game in this condition (because Nightmare Mother is no different because it has the same HP value as Hell Sigma... almost), and for High Max in Secret Lab 2 as X you can use a charged shot to paralyze him in a very specific way and then use a Maverick Weapon (Magma Blade or the Meteor does wonders) and you'll never have to deal with that ballistic trigger happy phase with X and you can pretty much stun-lock High Max once you figure out how to hit the charged shot consistently... if only we could have the X Challenge workaround were they made the "X-Saber" (yeah, I know is just the Z-Saber) have the Maverick Weapon flag for High Max to make it doable a full "No Maverick Weapons" fight in said mode in Legacy Collection 2.

Trying to get the head part on Extreme, going through the entire level to find out "Oh, hey, guess I gotta do this shit again and HOPE the game will RNG me into the room next time". Fuck X6 so much lol

Really cool way to talk through the challenge, the format is quite enjoyable. So I guess the pain was worth, I hope some more videos like this come out in the future.

Great playing and breakdown/commentary. The most brutal challenges are always the most satisfying.

X: ¡I'm a man! Zero: You baby little bud.

You sir are a legend, I tried to play the game on xtreme mode but I gave up after two hours because the nightmare viruses corrupt the hostages all the time and the fourth donut, but you have done the impossible with no upgrades as well you truly deserve my respect keep it up 👍

When I was young I thought I was just very bad at this game and had a tough time beating the gate stages. Turns out they are just horrible stages, with my skill being less of a factor.

This just proves that the game was barely play tested, and that it was basically only play tested as Zero.

You're a friggin hero for having done this. (Commander Yammark is still male tho)

Man, I'm subscribed just because you went through hell to make this video. Thanks for the content. You're awesome! I'm gonna try the challenge with Zero 😁

I think Commander Yammark is a boy 😐 Also fun fact, the donuts are ouroboros, snakes that bite their own tails

X4, X5, & X6 has the best art style imo. Not overly cartoonish, & doesn't feel like a 2yr old toddler's game in which Megaman looks basically like a kid. It feels more mature, and reflects more that you're basically a soldier shooting & killing stuff.

I think this game has the best soundtrack in the series. Who agrees?

Somecallmejohnny said it best... "This game clearly wasn't playtested with X". You're literally stuck in impossible situations with X unless you have the right stuff. Even High Max can be impossible if you take an alternate route after unlocking Zero. Cause no boss weapons means no High Max win for X

i wish this video got more attention, i love challenge videos and you're my fave 'mmx youtuber'' please make more please oh please

Maybe we didnt get it, Gate did everything to be "Anti X", so X should be screwed just going in base form without any upgrades against Gate... what made X win this time is that he is capable to adapt and learn new tricks. Everything in this game was made to be anti X... deep lore shit xD

Also, friendly reminder that you can still enjoy and even love a bad game without being blind to its many glaring flaws. I have to admit that I, too, have a certain fondness for X6.

I was cackling at your suffering until you got to the Nightmare Mother part. Then my PTSD kicked in. I could feel your rage; I was getting angry with you.

that's a big chad energy from you for doing this playthrough huge respect for you

Good video RZ! It's nice having you back on YT again.

even i who like x6 and completed the game many times in different ways, i have to admit you are brave, nice video

What a devilish challenge here, but your experience with the series does indeed shine through! Also 15:06, lol

I literally watched all your vids and when I finished I was sad lol, but finally the king has returned! Welcome back sir😀

My man Yoshi getting recognition in the best spotlight possible, nice!

Hey thanks for coming back, after watching this I had a hidden catalogue of great entertainment to watch through

Central Museum is the stuff nightmares are made of.

I gotta tip my hat off to you for beating X6 which is already a annoying difficult game, using almost no upgrades, weapons/techniques, and other collectibles in this game. You must’ve went through hell to beat this challenge, congratulations Retropolis Zone!

Amigo, desde lo más profundo de mi corazón te digo que disfrute mucho este video, en muchas ocasiones pensé que hasta ahí se podía llegar con X pero me demostraste que si es posible, hasta me dió pena por ti la parte de la Nightmare, excelente video amigo 100% entretenido te ganas un nuevo sub de Ecuador jaja 🎉

Holy shit!! Dad got his smokes from the store.

Watching this again after binging the whole X series minimalist playlist. What a journey. I know it's been forever, but I'd love to see you finish the series.

WOW! This is insane. And I thought seeing former Gamesradar member and at the time Capcom Unity member Brett Elston beat Wily Machine 7 without using any tanks in 2012 was impressive (Cause in an interview it was supposed to be impossible to beat without a full supply of tanks as I learned from Exo) THIS is something that I think would take a level of patience not possible for someone like me with ADD. So kudos for doing this and finally putting a demon from your past to rest once & for all.

Amazing video/great job on working hard to do that. 10/10.

ho wow, didn't except this to come back, last time i watched this channel was with the X8 review!

"Gotta pay the bills with the skills" I'm writing that down.

Respect, I did xtreme with falcon armor and I was thinking it was hard. You did the game with an harder difficulty!!!

Bravo retro, It was very satisfying seeing you complete x6 like this. If you set your mind of something and have perseverance, you will complete it, no hell on earth can stop you... Unless you are X.

He made Infinity Majinion way harder than he actually is as X. You can lure him to the top of the screen in order to make the clones. They can’t make bubbles when they’re off screen so you can easily deal with only having to fight the normal boss.

Oof, I was Dreading the Mother recap. It was one doozie of a stream lolz Also You definitely deserve that Gate yell more than once XD Great video! Enjoyed it and have a nice day everyone!

In Gate stage 1, I think it’s possible to ignore the high jump part entirely and only use one special weapon(magma blade OR ground dash, not magma blade AND ground dash) by equipping the weapon of choice, using it as early as possible, then pausing and switching to another weapon and unpausing to despawn the effects of whatever weapon was used, then immediately pausing and switching back to the used weapon and repeating. I’m talking absolutely frame and pixel perfect, maybe TAS only, but still possible. The way you described it, it also sounds like Nightmare Mother is very possible without any equipment, just extremely, EXTREMELY difficult, but still possible, so that together with the first strategy would mean Gate stage 1 is improved(4 energy increases, two special weapons instead of 4 energy increases, three special weapons/high jump part). I also recall a strategy for Gate stage 2, but I think it’s obsolete. I know for a fact that it’s possible to stun High Max buster only without breaking his shield by being close enough and unleashing a fully charged shot that spawns right on top of High Max, essentially ignoring his shield, though you still have to use a special weapon to deal damage, so no real improvement can be made. Still, if I’m right about the spiked corridor where you use ice burst, that’s Gate stage 1 improved.

I wonder if that spike wall was intentional to tell the player "Don't fight this boss without armor, seriously!"

6:32 steve1989mreinfo: "Let's get this clam out onto a tray. Nice. Mkay"

Simple,this game hates the player,hates more X and loves Zero

Wow! Congrats. I can’t believe you did it!

Great job! I could have sworn the Amazon area had the easier to access portal, but maybe that only appears when under the additional stage effects or whatever. As for the Mother Nightmare... somehow I don't remember it being that tough. Granted, I never did Xtreme difficulty (I usually prefer Normal runs, but I did do XTreme on X5), and now that I'm seeing all this... I think the devs really really wanted you to have actually used nothing but powerups the entire way (though, screw the jumps at the start of the stage. Even without the challenge imposed, I have flat out screwed up my jumps by mistake due to the instant death spikes. I usually have a run where this happens). Oh, and Hobo Sigma is... just, seriously? I forgot there are times he just... doesn't do anything. Usually, I have that fallback energy blast thing happen after a hit (usually the first) but I think only once did I have it happen where he just walked forward asking for spare change. ...now that I think about it... does he even turn around? I never bothered to wait long enough to find out, but now I'm curious.

I was going to mention "It's impossible for X because of that first stage on the final. Those spikes need a weapon or upgrade to get past as X." But you got to it in the video and proved me right. That's just bad design. (though I didn't realize that you ran out of ammo for ice.)

Regarding the Gate attacks with Zero, if I am not mistaken, Zero's saber stays for a bit after the wall slash before he saves it in his back again, similar to Z1 holding the saber in the air and still damage, in x6 the hitbox doesnt dissapear while is still there, so it makes it seem inconsistent with the damage

28:57 Holy Sh*t the DMG!!!!

Here's an idea, a character specific run of the Megaman X games. Here's the challenge. Whenever you play as X, you must: Avoid shooting any enemy unless it's necessary for progression (Bosses, Mini bosses, things you can't jump over, etc.) Avoid taking as much damage as possible. Its okay to get upgrades, except for arm parts. When playing as Zero, you must: Go as fast as you possibly can, defeating any enemy in your path.

Geez, zero really does make this alot easier huh? Good work as always RZ

Awesome playing skills, but even more awesome (and entertaining) narration!

FIVE AND THREE HOURS on Nightmare Mother?? I applaud your determination! Great video!

The design of the Nightmare Mother fight is so absurd its honestly impressive. I can't think of any boss in a game that requires both so much luck AND skill.

haha, the sigma stage 2 impossible jump with base X and no upgrades. I remember cheesing that. Same with using shadow armor in that section; super tight positioning.

Being X is suffering...

Great Video!

My husband asked me what I was watching, I said it was a video about masochism

I really needed to see this because some stages seem impossible to proceed through without using certain character/armor and upgrades.

im not sure about your challenge, but in general on gate 1 you can jump with the ice weapon, get damaged by the wolf and damage boost onto the spikes, thats how i did as a kid because i didnt knew about the upgrades

Excellent video. I can’t begin to fathom the pain and suffering you went through to make this. X6 sure is a masterclass in game design …

14:25 Nice J's Reviews reference!