Capcom’s Mega Man turned 33 on Thursday 17 December. And to commemorate this momentous occasion, the official Rockman Unity Twitter account will post Mega Man illustrations for 33 days straight!
The art fest began on Thursday morning (Japan time), and will continue through the middle of January. The first illustration posted was this one by Shinkiro:
メットール！今日は12月17日
1987年に誕生したロックマン！33周年と言う事で本日から過去にロックマン ユニティアプリで配布していた待ち受けを33日間連続でプレゼントします！保存してお使いください！まずは「森気楼」さんのロックマン！ https://t.co/JLR0eFh1Z5 pic.twitter.com/W1XK7zfEpF— ROCKMAN_UNITY (@ROCKMAN_UNITY) December 17, 2020
Shinkiro is the pen name of Toshiaki Mori, an illustrator who made character designs for Fatal Fury and other SNK games before joining Capcom in 2000. Since then, he has done art for Dead Rising, Tatsunoko vs. Capcom, Super Ghouls n’ Ghosts, and others.
His Mega Man illustration appears to show the heroic blue robot, as he might have looked on the day that he was activated in Dr. Light’s lab. Or, I suppose, possibly recharging after a hard day of fighting Robot Masters. Either way, it’s a good start to the 33-day celebration.
Mega Man? Rockman?
If you’re outside of Japan, you probably noticed that the Japanese-language account uses the character’s original name, Rockman. But whatever you want to call him, Rockman/ Mega Man first came into existence on Nintendo’s Family Computer/ NES in 1987. For 33 years, Mega Man (and his Mega Man X descendants) has been fighting Dr. Wily and other villains. That’s an accomplishment worth celebrating with some art.
The art will also be available on the Rockman Unity blog. The blog and Twitter account are run by Uchida (no first name given), a Capcom employee and Rockman fan. The blog has a lot more information than the Twitter account. So, it’s useful if you’re interested in Mega Man games, live events, gacha game capsules, music, gag manga, etc. Of course, the art could get buried, as Uchida has a lot to say about Mega Man on his 33rd birthday.