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Mr. Match (Ken'ichi Hono in the Japanese version) is a human operator and a recurring antagonist in the Mega Man Battle Network series. He operates FireMan.EXE, HeatMan.EXE, and FlameMan.EXE throughout the series, and while he was a WWW agent initially, he left the organization.
Mega Man Battle Network
Mr. Match appears early on in the first game in the series. In this game, he disguises himself as a repairman to investigate a recurring incident in ACDC where ovens suddenly catch and spread fire. He goes to the Hikari residence, presumably to investigate and prevent this incident in their place. As it turns out, however, their oven catches fire still, and after Lan and MegaMan investigate this situation themselves, they discover FireMan.EXE, and that this unassuming repairman was actually causing this incident to begin with, doing so for the WWW. Lan and MegaMan defeat Mr. Match and FireMan. However, in this whole scenario, FireMan was still able to obtain a certain superprogram and send it to Lord Wily, which he considers a victory still. He does not appear for the rest of the game as he already accomplished his goal this game.
Mega Man Battle Network 2
Mr. Match appears in the airport in this game. Unlike the first game, his appearance here is completely unrelated to the plot. He does, however, provide a boss fight with a new navi, HeatMan.EXE, who incidentally only appears in this game
Mega Man Battle Network 3
Mr. Match appears in this game to seemingly congratulate Lan for another heroic action. In this game, he pretends to have abandoned the WWW and turned over a new leaf, and even starts working at SciLab to show his new colors. When a few weak Navis show up at SciLab, Mr. Match fights them with FlameMan.EXE, selling it further. Unbeknownst to SciLab, however, these weak Navis were sent to SciLab just for Mr. Match and FlameMan to defeat and appear heroic. He later tricks Lan into plant viruses in various parts of SciLab. After the temperatures at SciLab reach sweltering levels, Mr. Match reveals that he was indeed still evil, but that Lan was the one to do the damage to SciLab. After Lan and MegaMan fix the mess that Mr. Match used them to make, they accept Mr. Match's and FlameMan's challenge in the Undernet. At the end of their battle, however, Bass.EXE shows up, asking for a battle with the strong. When Mr. Match and FlameMan accept this challenge, Bass deletes FlameMan instantly, referring to him as a mere peon, and this forces Mr. Match to retreat. He later appears in the endgame, defending Wily's tower with the restored FlameMan. He achieves Full Synchro with FlameMan, powering him up. He is also shown to brainwash Anetta, who accepts his lies and fights alongside him. Lan and MegaMan defeat them both.
Mega Man Battle Network 4
Mr. Match appears in two scenarios here.
The first of these scenarios occurs in both versions of the game. In this scenario, he forms a rivalry with new character Atsuki Homura and his navi BurnerMan.EXE. He claims that Atsuki lacks the burning spirit that all fiery NetOps should have. This in turn leads Atsuki to calling Mr. Match an old guy who knows nothing about controlling his candor. Their rivalry literally erupts in flames as they take their squabble to the Net, setting many areas on fire as their Navis, Mr. Match's FireMan.EXE and Atsuki Homura's BurnerMan duke it out. Eventually, Lan and MegaMan catch up to them, ending their squabble by notifying Atsuki and BurnerMan that they're about to miss their official match and letting them know that they already defeated FireMan in the past despite a clear lack of a burning spirit. This escalates FireMan's anger while BurnerMan loses interest in fighting an opponent who supposedly lost to a little shrimp. As BurnerMan and Atsuki get ready for their match, Mr. Match demands that Lan and MegaMan give this duo a more humiliating defeat than they got. Later, after Lan and MegaMan emerge victorious, Mr. Match taunts Atsuki from the sidelines for such an underwhelming performance, which leads Atsuki to be so furious that the threatens to burn the whole place down to the ground before promptly lighting his own shorts on fire instead and being forced to leave the premises.
His second scenario appears only in Red Sun. This one begins when Lan and MegaMan are set to battle against Mr. Match and FireMan. They immediately suspect that this returning duo is up to no good, given their past actions. However, they all meet each other near a hot dog stand, where the owner thanks Mr. Match for saving her business by using FireMan's abilities to fix her hot dog cooker. Shortly after, two thugs threaten her, but Mr. Match drives them both away. It's implied at this point that Mr. Match has feelings for the hot dog lady. Later, it's revealed that Mr. Match had plans with the two goons to bomb the building during the match. However, when he sees his love in the audience, he tries to stop the attack, but the two goons proceed with the attack anyways, leading MegaMan and FireMan to team up and stop the attacks by attacking the detonators before the bombs blow. After they save the building, they have their official match. Although Mr. Match and FireMan lost, the hot dog lady is so in love with Mr. Match that she asks to marry him. While Mr. Match shows feelings for her as well, he ultimately turns her offer down, claiming that he would have to choose his old lifestyle of battle with this relationship, and his love for battle ultimately won out.
Unrelated to the second scenario but still exclusive to Red Sun, Mr. Match plays a role in the ending in which he raises morale for people on Earth to cheer for Lan and MegaMan, which leads to them being able to divert a planet-ending meteor away from their planet.
Mega Man Battle Network 6 Cybeast Gregar
Just as in his previous appearance, he has a version-exclusive role in this story. In this case, Mr. Match works for Cyber City Elementary School, revealing that he cut his ties with WWW for good this time. He helps Lan and MegaMan by introducing them to the system of Link Navis and Cross System. He sends various Kettle viruses to the net to test Lan's virus busting abilities, and after seeing his success, he has Lan and MegaMan battle with him and HeatMan. After this battle, Mr. Match and HeatMan reward MegaMan with HeatCross.
Role in the Anime
As in the games, Mr. Match begins by committing arson for World Three as it's called in the anime. This time, however, he is more closely related to Ms. Madd, Count Zap and Yahoot than in the games, forming a small 'partners in crime' team of sorts. Eventually, the group as a whole reforms their ways and leaves World Three after it gets taken down, though they still stay as a team. Mr. Match wishes for Lord Wily to return to power and reinstate World Three, though in this version, this never happens as Wily doesn't want that as well. They also gradually get more and more amicable to Lan and the other protagonists, growing from a group of antagonistic misfits to a group of odd allies of sorts. The group decides to start their own curry place, named Number 1 Curry, to support themselves.
