Zoids: Battle Legends

"This game is for fans of the series"

Zoids has been a long running anime in Japan and over the last couple years, it has made it to the U.S. I myself have become an avid fan of the series. As far as video games go, there isn't much here in the U.S. related to ZOIDS because Gundam has overshodowed it. Zoids: Battle Legends for Gamecube is a great first try for TOMY but they might need to work on the overall presentation of this game.

Gameplay: 5/10

The gameplay in this game is kind of lackluster. TOMY had the right idea, actually the controls are perfectly fine, but they moves were so poorly implemented that they can't be seen for what they really are. There are 2 modes in ZBL: Mission Mode and Battle Mode.

In Battle Mode, you play 2 on 2 battles against various pilots in the ZOIDS world. They way it works is that you choose your two pilots at the beginning. Whoever you choose as the first player will determine who you fight. If you choose someone from CC (Chaotic Century) then you will fight CC people. If you choose someone from NCZ (New Century Zero) then you will fight people from NCZ. If you choose someone that you have unlocked from Mission Mode then you will fight people from Mission Mode. You will also fight boss type zoids throughout battle mode such as the Deathsaurer/Death Stinger/etc. You will gain money after every battle based off your performance. You can use this money to buy new zoids/upgrade current ones.

All the pilots use their respective zoids for the most part except for those who use flying zoids. (Jaime will use a Gojulas and Pierce will use a Rev Raptor for example)

Mission Mode will through you into an original story based roughly off Chaotic Century where you will fight many large scale battles. the Mission Mode is done very well and offers a good challenge. In Mission Mode new zoids will be given to you periodically and there is no other way to get more zoids.

Every zoid also has an EX attack which can only be executed when your zoid is nearly dying. You use this move by pressing A+X.

The controls in this game are done very well. Y will cycle through your weapons. X will do a melee attack. A is to fire your weapons. Z is to your booster/shield/etc. B will make your zoids jump.

This game contains every zoid from NCZ and CC (except flyers) and it contains a few Fuzors (Liger Zero Pheonix, Lord Gale) but there is no Fuzors storyline.

The problems with the gameplay are numerous. Sometimes your attacks won't execute. Against boss zoids, if you ram into them, you will be knocked back and take no damage which makes absolutely no sense. EX attacks were poorly implemented and some are horribly underpowered. The CPC (Charged Partcle Cannon) for example is very underpowered because of the damage system. Every time you take a certain amount of damage, you get knocked back and are invulnerable. Sinc the CPC is multiple hits, this makes it useless.

EX attacks also don't execute perfectly. You could press A+X and you will do a melee attack by accident. Also some zoids don't have all their moves. The BF (Berserk Fury) can only have it's shield or it's boosters, it can't have both. It might be overpowered yes, but the BF needs everything. Also, bladed zoids (Blade Liger, Zero Schneider) are heavily overpowered. The blades do too much damage and the zoids are too fast.

There is also a versus mode which allows a 1v1 battle. I wish there would hav been a 2 player co-op which would have been perfect but it is sadly not in here. The versus is mediocre and it might be fun to battle a friend when you each customize your zoids. But there isn't anything deep to it.

But by far, the worst thing about this game's gameplay is the slowdown. It is there in every single fight. It gets even worse when there are more than 4 zoids one the field (during mission mode). The slowdown is the worst part and it just makes the game horrible.

Graphics: 3/10

TOMY did not even try to use the full power of the GameCube. The models are all blurry and blocky. This game looks like a late N64/early DreamCast Game. The beams look half-way decent and the environments are all but boring. The good thing is that the zoids all look like their anime versions. They sport all the similar characteristics as the show and look good.

Sound: 1/10

This is by far the worst score I've given any game in the sound department, and for good reason too. The music and voice acting in this game is either god awful or non-existant. For one, none of the voices match the pilots, none, I repeat NONE OF THEM!!! That is just ludicrous. Just the sound of Bit's voice makes me cringe. The music in this game is original music. The only problem is that they all sound like midis! I would have preferred to have the actual music from the show to get that ZOIDS feel. Every time you do an attack, your pilot yells out a line and after a while it just gets annoying.

Presentation: 1/10

Everything that is in this game just makes it worse. The music, voice acting, graphics all take away from this games presentation and polish. Also, it would be better to have something on the loading screen to keep us occupied. There is nothing on the loading screen and it is so bland and boring. Also, if you lose a battle, it has to load the battle again! After playing F-Zero GX (where contant retrys are needed) companies should learn to pre-load sequences that will be repeated.

Replay: 8/10

One thing this game does very well is in is the replay department. There are three different variations to battle mode (NCZ, CC, and original). Two Mission Mode variations (Empire and Republic) and the many unlockable zoids. The customization is also something that will make you want to come back to this game.

Overview:

Gameplay: 5/10 - TOMY had the right idea but didn't implement it well.
Graphics: 3/10 - Awful looking graphics; very blurry and blocky.
Sound: 1/10 - Bad music, even worse voice acting.
Presentation: 1/10 - This game has almost no polish to it.
Replay: 8/10 - Lots of unlockables, battle variations.

Overall: 18/50 = 36% = F
Bottom Line: This game is not for you if you are not a fan of the series. Most likely though you are the fan of a series. If you are a fan of this series, I will personally add another 15 points because this game is for fans.

For fans of ZOIDS: 33/50 = 66% = D

Reviewer's Score: 3/10, Originally Posted: 01/11/05, Updated 12/19/06