Mega Man IV

At its core, the gameplay is still the same as the previous three Mega Man Game Boy games. The player takes on the role of Mega Man as he traverses a series of two sets of selectable action - platforming stages in any order desired. The player's initial weapon, the "Mega Buster", can fire both small shots and much larger and more powerful, charged blasts. The charge shot works similarly to how it did in Mega Man 5 , except that Mega Man doesn't lose the charge when he gets hit, but he will take a slight recoil, pushing him back a little when he fires the charge shot.

Each stage is populated with various types of enemy robots and its Robot Master boss at the end. Beating the Robot Master will earn the player its special special weapon for use throughout the rest of the game. Clearing 2 of the Robot stages also gives the player access to abilities from Mega Man's dog Rush, who can transform into a springboard for reaching high platforms or a jet for crossing large hotizontal distances. Also, the game's first four Robot stages each house a letter ("B-E-A-T") that spell out the name of the bird Beat .

Collecting all 4 letters endows the player the ability to summon Beat to assist by attacking enemies. On the other hand, the game's latter four Robot stages each house letters that spell ("W-I-L-Y") which would be mandatory to collect in order to enter deeper in the fortress for the rematch with Ballade and then the Wily Battleship at the end of the game. In one stage of the second half of the game, a path leads to Eddie , who will give Mega Man a random item when he enters the room he is in. Some stages of this portion of the game also contain hidden passages where the character Proto Man leaves the player a random item, like Energy Tanks or a special item that refills all weapon energy and health.

Mega Man IV carries on the Game Boy line's tradition of recycling elements from two consecutive Mega Man NES releases, most prominently with its bosses. The first four Robot Masters (Toad Man, Bright Man, Pharaoh Man, and Ring Man) are originally from Mega Man 4 and the latter four (Crystal Man, Napalm Man, Stone Man, and Charge Man) are from Mega Man 5 . Mega Man IV also introduces a shop feature to the series. In addition to various restorative items like health, weapon power, extra lives, energy tanks that can be stored for later use, the player can pick up "Power Chips (P-Chips)" dropped by enemies or in designated spots in the stages.

Dr. Light's lab can also be visited after a Game Over or after completing a stage, and here, the player can use the collected P-Chips to buy items that Dr. Light will create with a machine in exchange for a certain amount of chips. One such item is the newly introduced "Auto Charger" (or "Energy Balancer", which was originally conceived for Mega Man 5 but removed), which automatically takes weapon energy capsules and restores it in the weapon with the least amount of energy left, provided that there is no refillable special weapon selected.

Also, for the first time in the Mega Man Game Boy series, the boss rush against the Robot Masters (where Mega Man must fight all 8 Robot Masters again in a teleportation hatch in Dr. Wily's castle) is implemented, as opposed to the previous three Mega Man Game Boy titles, where Mega Man fought Wily straight on after going through his station.