Mega Man Zero

"Proves that Zeroes can be heroes."

I'd hate to see the back yard of Capcom HQ. It must be full of dead horses that are still being beaten every day. The people at Capcom have taken ''if it ain't broken, don't fix it'' from a saying to a religion. One has to wonder how long people will pay to play the same game over and over again. That is to say, if you've played a Megaman game before then you've played Megaman Zero.

Megaman Zero starts a new story arc in the series. Megaman, the legendary reploid, is long gone. Zero's been resting for quite some time. Without these two around the world's fallen into disarray. Reploids are being innocently ''retired'' (read: killed) because of an energy shortage in Neo Arcadia (It's the future, everything begins with ''Neo''). An underground (laterally) resistance movement desperately seeks out Zero, their last hope. As they make their way to his resting place they're attacked by some of Neo Arcadia's reploid soldiers and the resistances inept forces are quickly wiped out. Thankfully, the leader of the resistance revives Zero before she's turned into swiss-cheese. Zero leads the lovely resistance leader, Ciel, to the exit and the two make for the resistance base. So the story begins. In all honesty, the story is rather interesting but it's over all too quickly, which is my main complaint here. Despite the games (as well as the series') inherit difficulty, you can reach the end of your little journey in a surprisingly short amount of time.

Capcom added a few features to try and give the game a touch of replay value, but it turns out to be a wasted effort. Aiding Zero in his battles are Cyber-Elves. These elves are living computer code that can boost the red reploids abilities, give him health or damage foes. There's a catch though; every time you use an Elf it kicks the bucket. Pretty rough existence, isn't it? Still, there's even more to it. The better Cyber-Elves (health boosting, ability boosting) need to be ''fed'' crystals you collect in each stage so they can mature before you even use them. It's just too bad that most of them need an ungodly amount of crystals to mature and it would take you hours to collect enough of the stuff to get all of the better Elves to grow up. It's too bad, because this means you'll probably be stuck with Zero's health bar at it's default, pathetic level while your average boss robot has a full two bars of health. Even with one or two Vitality boosts he still has a fairly low amount of energy and some bosses can take rather large chunks out of it at a time. This is where the true difficulty comes from, because, like in all Megaman games, fighting bosses is just about having the right weapon and memorizing the boss' attack patterns. The controls can be customized to make your trip through Megaman Zero easier, and at any time you can pause the game to switch weapons or use a Cyber-Elf. No problems there.

The problem is that, like I said above, it's the same old Megaman game, just dressed different. You'll fight a few bosses, then re-fight them all over again numerous times and finally go on to the big showdown with the final boss who (of course) has more than one form. While the game play, sound, graphics and everything is fairly solid it's just that you've seen it all before, and not just once. Megaman Zero is fun for a quick play through and can keep you entertained for a short time, but there's no real reason to keep playing again and again. While the Cyber-Elves are something new it's a chore to get them to mature, especially if you don't feel like replaying the same level over and over again gathering crystals in teeny tiny amounts. If you're a big Zero fan though, I can recommend this game for a play through. There are also two sequels (Megaman Zero 2 and Megaman Zero 3) that both make improvements on this title, but those are different reviews entirely.

To sum it all up; the game play is still solid and it's still fun, but it's the same type of game you've played ten times over already and it's getting stale. The game itself is rather short, but difficult, though that's mostly because Zero has a minuscule life bar and bosses usually have two. Controls, audio and visuals are good, but Megaman Zero lacks replay value because raising your Cyber-Elves is a chore and the extras aren't worth the hassle. Despite it's failures I can still recommend the game for Zero fans, as it's still an above average game. Give it a try if you enjoy the Megaman series or just like dicing up robots.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 05/03/04