Mega Man Battle Network 5: Team ProtoMan[b] and Mega Man Battle Network 5: Team Colonel[c] are 2004 role-playing video games developed and published by Capcom for the Game Boy Advance (GBA) handheld game console. Combined, they make up the fifth mainline installment in the Mega Man Battle Network series, and follows Lan Hikari and his NetNavi MegaMan.EXE, as they attempt to take down Nebula, who have kidnapped Lan’s father and taken over the internet, with an anti-Nebula task force.[9]
Development on the game started during the localization of Battle Network 4, and alongside the development 4.5: Real Operation. It was announced in CoroCoro Comics in August 2004, with Team ProtoMan releasing in December 2004 in Japan; Team Colonel released three months later in February 2005, while both versions were released simultaneously for Western territories in June 2005. Battle Network 5 retains the same gameplay as its predecessor, but with the addition of ”Liberation Missions” where the player must liberate squares with limited time to defeat the boss. The game also includes crossover content with the Boktai series by Konami.
Mega Man Battle Network 5 received a generally tepid reception from critics, with many finding it too similar to previous entries, and criticizing the aging presentation; in mid-2005, both versions were combined and re-released for the Nintendo DS as Mega Man Battle Network 5: Double Team DS[d], which has updated sound and additional content not found in the GBA versions. The GBA versions were re-released as part of the Wii U Virtual Console in 2015, and are included in the Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection for PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch and PC (via Steam), released in 2023. It was followed up by Mega Man Battle Network 6 in 2005, which acted as the finale of the series.
