Thunder Beam is a Robot Masterweapon first appearing in the original Mega Man, where it is obtained from Elec Man. It has a dark grey and yellow colour scheme and fires long beams of electricity, which go forward, up, and down.
In Mega Man, the Thunder Beam is obtained by defeating Elec Man, who uses it to throw electricity forward. When used by Mega Man, it consumes 1 point of energy to shoot electric beams in three directions - a winding one that goes forward and two straight ones that go upwards and downwards, respectively. These beams are quite large, fast and travel through walls, giving the weapon a lot of coverage. They also continue after hitting an enemy and are able to hit some large targets more than once, which makes the beam very destructive.
The Thunder Beam is the main weakness of Ice Man, dealing 10 damage to him, and the Yellow Devil, who takes 4 damage. As a minor weakness, it also deals 2 damage to Bomb Man and the Copy Robot and 4 to any unit of CWU-01P. It is also a strong weapon to use again the Wily Machine 1, as it can connect and damage the boss multiple times, though it deals only 1 point of damage per hit.
Mega Man: Dr. Wily's Revenge
Sprite from Dr. Wily's Revenge.
The Thunder Beam returns as a weapon in Mega Man: Dr. Wily's Revenge, acting the same as before. It is still the main weakness of Ice Man, though it now deals only 8 points of damage, and all bosses apart from the Mega Man 1 Robot Masters are completely immune to it.
Mega Man 2: The Power Fighters
In the arcade game Mega Man 2: The Power Fighters, the Thunder Beam is again obtained by beating Elec Man (in the Rescue Roll story). It functions similarly, but the forward-going beam now goes straight instead of winding, while the projectiles going up and down are replaced by balls of electricity.
In Ice Man's absence, it is now the main weakness of Dive Man, and also continues to be strong against the Yellow Devil, as well as this game's version of the Wily Capsule. This makes it the weapon with the largest number of strengths, both in Rescue Roll and in the entire game.
A version of Mega Man equipped with the Thunder Beam appears as an independent Hunter Program in the mobile crossover game Mega Man X DiVE, known as Mega Man (Thunder Beam Ver.). Though outwardly resembling Mega Man with the weapon equipped, his attacks work differently, either firing three beams that all move roughly towards a target or performing a spreading lightning attack much more reminiscent of the Lightning Bolt. The beams do not go through terrain or enemies by default, but can be upgraded to do so by unlocking a passive skill on the character.
Related Weapons
Various other electricity-based weapons appear in the Classic era, particularly in later games. Apart from theming, these are large unrelated in functionality.
Alternate Artwork
