Many gamers who remember the days before save files, regenerating health, and checkpoints feel that games have gotten too easy.  Nowadays, most action games allow players unlimited continues, provide cover systems to avoid enemy fire, and generally help players through their 8-10 hour stories.  For old-schoolers, these are cheap cop-outs that don’t come close to emulating the reflex-intensive ordeals that existed on the NES, Genesis, and Super Nintendo.  There is one recent game that keeps it real, though; Mega Man 9.

As if Mega Man 9 wasn’t hard enough already, and as if the previous two downloadable difficulty levels didn’t jack up the challenge enough, Sega has released “Superhero Mode” which promises to make the game damn near unplayable on the Xbox 360, PS3, and Wii.  “Superhero Mode” will add additional enemies to every encounter, increasing the difficulty from “This is just ridiculous” to “OH DEAR GOD, ARE YOU F*$%ING KIDDING ME?!?!”

The DLC pack only costs a dollar, so Capcom’s probably not even looking at much profit from this update.  That’s why I believe that “Superhero Mode” was created by a consortium of game controller companies who intend to make you buy additional gampads after smashing your current ones in frustration.