Which Mega Man robot masters were worth the risk?

The Mega Man robot masters weren’t meant to be evil. Most were built to do important tasks, like creating non-polluting energy, before Dr. Wily turned them on humanity.

Capcom

But some, like Centaur Man, were meant to be tour guides.

That led me to ask: which of these sentient robot masters were really worth the risk of a robot uprising? Could no one see that Blade Man, a sentient robot with swords for arms, was a bad idea?

So I decided to once again don my suit and lock myself in a studio (as I have done for the Zelda timeline and Skyrim’s books) to rank all 200+ Mega Man robot masters from most to least useful. Spoiler alert: about 15 of them are actually worth it. Sorry, Snake Man, you didn’t make the cut.

Make sure to subscribe to Polygon’s YouTube channel for more Unraveled, the series where I try to make sense of absurd amounts of video game lore.