After snagging a used copy of Megaman ZX Advent (which either had all its saved data cleared or it had never been touched at all, though I wager the latter) and seeing how there has yet to be a final word on the quality of the game, I decided to play through it as quickly as possible and nitpick it for the good of all 'ploids. That and also I had a hankering to play a supposed bad game (that I know would at least be playable) and the game's much easier than C4 on normal. And as with other MM games of its type, I played it with some stipulations:
1: With most basic form possible or the form that would prove most challenging (in this case, I played it on the hardest mode initially, Normal, and with the female character though both characters are grating in every sense, and kept to A model as long as I can)
2: Picking up the least number of items (except for 1ups b/c I can) and using no other upgrades unless they are needed to progress (because it's not necessary)
3: Not die a single time in any level (which is pretty easy to do)
4: Not take too many hits (it slows you down afterall) or pick up many health or weapon energy (they also slow you down)
Playing the game this way, I play the game as close to a Zero game as I did a couple of months back when I beat Zero 2 (though with Zero games I don't get hit, use only the basic slash and not have to bother with stupid maps). Though a few points I'd like to make:
1: The first ZX was very boring. I quickly plowed through an existing file, sans bosses, just before this write-up and all the levels ranged from only decent to mildly entertaining (in other words, not really worth going through my usual schtick with Zero games mentioned above due to ...). Add in the bosses and you have a crappy game. As I mentioned many times before, whoever thought it was a good idea to have 6 specialized pixels you'll have to avoid hitting if you want 'play well', is a retard and should be shot. Take out the bosses though, and you have a game about on the same level as ICO. Not too hard, not too long, but a relatively decent time waster. Really, I managed to dash-jump my way through almost all the stages in one form in about 20 minutes, skipping bosses and using a map (since I've erased all memory of where all the levels are) with only having to change a couple of times: once to H model to reach a high ladder in order to enter Area O; some underwater parts where you need L model; and instance/s where you need to be human to crawl.
2: Though weak spots weren't taken out completely. Playing the game regularly, you will occasionally hit weakspots (and you can find them with H model of course) but you won't get penalized for hitting them. Later in the game, you will be asked again to battle each boss again (even during the final level rematches count) and you'll get either a Bronze, Silver or Gold medal for their defeat if you do so under certain stipulations.
3: ZX introduced form changes where you can either be Human or be one of five other forms ranging from 'you can stick with this throughout the entire game' to 'useless mode we felt like tacking on' and one secret mode which is not really worth getting. In ZX A, you have all these modes (most given to you mid to late in the game) PLUS 8 more, one for each boss you beat (and more than half of them are generally useless). So fair warning, if there are any levels which require form changes (thankfully ZX didn't have much of this), that level gets seriously marked down. Changing forms within an ACTION game does nothing but break the flow of the game and the concentration of the player. This may work for RPGs but no way in hell will this be accepted in a game filled with 3 minute stages plus boss fights.
4: Thank the Redeemer that ZX A's map has been reduced to the point where the overworld is a tiny hub consisting only of three or four areas and everything else is pretty straight forward. It's nothing like ZX's 10+ levels scattered randomly throughout, loosely connected by random doors and given nondescript letter titles.
5: There are teleport areas everywhere in ZX A, namely there is one before each section of level in every level. Every area consists of four parts and before every one of them is a teleport area that you can pay 100 EC to activate and warp there again from save points. You really only need to active 3 of them at most (for convenience's sake). Also in the middle of the game, you are given 4 levels which unlocks for you and you can zap there immediately (these are the beginning of the fun levels).
6: All charged attacks in the game, except A model's main weapon shot, consume energy. It's stupid but doesn't harm the game in any sense (for now) since you mainly use A's main weapon anyway, unlike ZX where both of ZX model and X's charged attacks are free.
7: Every time you enter a cutscene in any form other than A, the game forces you into A model for the cutscene. Nothing game breaking but this kinda puts forward the point that the game was made with A model in mind and the other forms were tacked on (which should be obvious from the first shots). And when you die, you start at the beginning of the last door you've been in as A model as well, regardless of which mode you were before.
8: ZX A's hard mode is actually something worth playing through again (if you can stomache the general game that is) since the game actually ups the difficulty by giving bosses new moves, made both the bosses and mid-bosses stronger and take less damage, and enemies do more damage. And while I'm not completely sure but subtanks are also taken out. This was not the case for the original ZX where normal and hard are almost exactly the same.
9: The voice acting is terrible. And even worse, it's horribly muffled because it's compressed to hell and back. Capcom should have just did what they did with other MM games and omitted the cutscene VA altogether, saved themselves some cash by using a smaller ROM and left in the JPN sound clips. It's not like the story is anything worth mentioning (ps the ending is laaaaaaaaame).
10: There is actually a puzzle game you can unlock early in the game (called Gem Buster, local wifi multiplayer only with a single cart) that is decently fun, or at least more fun than the first five levels of the game. It kinda resembles a more simpler Puzzle Fighter where you match up falling jewels in columns by switching two around horizontally (d-pad or stylus) as per Panel De Pon/Puzzle League. Though to clear same colour columns of gems, the flat end of the falling gem and the bottom-most gem must be facing each other (the falling gem will be upside down and if it touches a different colour, it flips around). Another decent time waster so as long as you have another DS nearby.
11: And of course the 8 bit level. The first chunk of the level is pretty pedestrian, the second part is nice, and ... I haven't bothered to beat the second form of the boss yet. I'd say overall so far, it's on par with PU generally but the boss is funner to beat (since you generally can't jump over him and he resembles more of an X boss than a classic series boss).
And with that in mind, here is a breakdown of each level in the game (yes I know I am quite petty but I can't care less):
On a level to level basis, the game can either be crap that sucks worse than ZX or resemble, but not quite be, a good MM Zero level (where one level is pretty much ripping off a Z4 level). Though do note that I omitted all comments on boss fights because, like another series (from Capcom no less) that has fallen from its utopian greener pastures, the boss fights are very fun and can be worth trudging to just to play them; otherwise, blahblah blah. Note: I beat the game with Ashe, the female character who has a laser buster that has a charged shot that bounces off walls like MM3's Gemini Laser (very fun to use).
The first five levels can be summed up with just this:
and here is why:
-Intro level (both characters): throwaway intro level;
-Train/Buckfire: takes only 30 seconds to beat and requires no skill whatsoever;
-Ice Flow/Chronoforce: Pathetic, forces you to change forms;
-Tower of Verdue/Rospark: No changes necessary, not bad, not particularly good either;
-Oil Field: Forces you to change to Rospark thus points off of what is merely an average at best level; there's a part where you need to change to restore power but that's negligible; regardless
-Legion HQ: starts off decent with lots of stairs but after you get P model, it pretty much forces you to stay in that form for no reason other than to use only one of his innate abilities (haning onto overhead bars) 5 useless times and nothing else. You can potentially use leaps of faith instead but I haven't had the patience to try that during that time;
The 4 levels that open immediately:
-Floating Ruins: a blatant ripoff of the Floating Gardens in Zero4 but not quite as intense or fun, but one of the better levels;
-Highway: straight forward level, no form changes but really pedestrian; the first midboss may need a form change to beat since you need to shoot upwards to beat it though I haven't tried the homing shot against it, also sprites and background recycled from ZX; otherwise
-Scrapyard/Vulturon: change to P model and stay that way, otherwise you'll be changing forms every several feet, fun despite this but you will need several run-throughs due to its puzzley environment, and since the game changes you back to A model when you reach the boss, you don't have to change manually (bonus);
-Control Tower/Queenbee: Now is where the fun starts, do a quick form change and go on top of the elevator instead, there your vertical platforming abilities are tested as you climb through this area without platforms (take that PU), another facet of vertical platforming takes place after the midboss where it's not as intense but fun either way; the boss is more of a test of endurance than typical MM bosses;
The annoying levels:
-Quarry (underground): requires constant use of P model (dark areas) but not as efficiently as the Scrapyard; the worst part, to get to this area, you'll have to shuffle through all your available forms to open stupid elemental doors and crap; negative fun;
-Waterfall Ruins/Argoyle-Ugoyle: both paths require a lot of shape changing: worthless and unfun;
-Mysterious Lab/Hedgeshock: no form changes needed but fairly boring and straight forward;
-Biolab/Bifrost: dumb form change puzzles ruins what would otherwise be a level based purely on speed where you go in and get out without taking much damage, completely destroying the momentum of the level;
The end:
-Undersea Volcano: as long as you take the path that doesn't require form changes, this level can be fun; the panny/pandy boss here is more fun than the first game imo;
(barely)
-Ouroboros: the final level; no form changes necessary; watch what you do and try not to suck and I wished there was a 3rd boss form ;_; (despite the first form of the boss can be buster spammed to death);
And there you have it, a completely unbiased (as best of my ability) runthrough of Inti-creates' latest offering.
***Read here if you don't want to read all that***
In short, the game can be good but the bad parts severely outweigh the good parts due to the fact the first five levels are really bad levels, all the form changing required to advance and all the other stupid things Inti tacked onto the game just to make it different. In other words: K.I.S.S.! This was what made the Zero series great and the thing that gave new life to older MM games. You start with your buster and you finish with just that; nothing else.
As for others, whether you liked ZX or not, as long as you can stomach the first five levels and the form changing, the game can but fun, but it's a far cry from what it could be.
PS: Don't expect me to be replying to this thread much. I'll either be in books or playing C4 on Hard mode.
PPS: Keep your irritating "MM2/3>*" crap out of this thread. This is supposed to be a ZX A bashing thread and nothing else. You can take your fanboy goggles to other MM threads to do that.
1: With most basic form possible or the form that would prove most challenging (in this case, I played it on the hardest mode initially, Normal, and with the female character though both characters are grating in every sense, and kept to A model as long as I can)
2: Picking up the least number of items (except for 1ups b/c I can) and using no other upgrades unless they are needed to progress (because it's not necessary)
3: Not die a single time in any level (which is pretty easy to do)
4: Not take too many hits (it slows you down afterall) or pick up many health or weapon energy (they also slow you down)
Playing the game this way, I play the game as close to a Zero game as I did a couple of months back when I beat Zero 2 (though with Zero games I don't get hit, use only the basic slash and not have to bother with stupid maps). Though a few points I'd like to make:
1: The first ZX was very boring. I quickly plowed through an existing file, sans bosses, just before this write-up and all the levels ranged from only decent to mildly entertaining (in other words, not really worth going through my usual schtick with Zero games mentioned above due to ...). Add in the bosses and you have a crappy game. As I mentioned many times before, whoever thought it was a good idea to have 6 specialized pixels you'll have to avoid hitting if you want 'play well', is a retard and should be shot. Take out the bosses though, and you have a game about on the same level as ICO. Not too hard, not too long, but a relatively decent time waster. Really, I managed to dash-jump my way through almost all the stages in one form in about 20 minutes, skipping bosses and using a map (since I've erased all memory of where all the levels are) with only having to change a couple of times: once to H model to reach a high ladder in order to enter Area O; some underwater parts where you need L model; and instance/s where you need to be human to crawl.
2: Though weak spots weren't taken out completely. Playing the game regularly, you will occasionally hit weakspots (and you can find them with H model of course) but you won't get penalized for hitting them. Later in the game, you will be asked again to battle each boss again (even during the final level rematches count) and you'll get either a Bronze, Silver or Gold medal for their defeat if you do so under certain stipulations.
3: ZX introduced form changes where you can either be Human or be one of five other forms ranging from 'you can stick with this throughout the entire game' to 'useless mode we felt like tacking on' and one secret mode which is not really worth getting. In ZX A, you have all these modes (most given to you mid to late in the game) PLUS 8 more, one for each boss you beat (and more than half of them are generally useless). So fair warning, if there are any levels which require form changes (thankfully ZX didn't have much of this), that level gets seriously marked down. Changing forms within an ACTION game does nothing but break the flow of the game and the concentration of the player. This may work for RPGs but no way in hell will this be accepted in a game filled with 3 minute stages plus boss fights.
4: Thank the Redeemer that ZX A's map has been reduced to the point where the overworld is a tiny hub consisting only of three or four areas and everything else is pretty straight forward. It's nothing like ZX's 10+ levels scattered randomly throughout, loosely connected by random doors and given nondescript letter titles.
5: There are teleport areas everywhere in ZX A, namely there is one before each section of level in every level. Every area consists of four parts and before every one of them is a teleport area that you can pay 100 EC to activate and warp there again from save points. You really only need to active 3 of them at most (for convenience's sake). Also in the middle of the game, you are given 4 levels which unlocks for you and you can zap there immediately (these are the beginning of the fun levels).
6: All charged attacks in the game, except A model's main weapon shot, consume energy. It's stupid but doesn't harm the game in any sense (for now) since you mainly use A's main weapon anyway, unlike ZX where both of ZX model and X's charged attacks are free.
7: Every time you enter a cutscene in any form other than A, the game forces you into A model for the cutscene. Nothing game breaking but this kinda puts forward the point that the game was made with A model in mind and the other forms were tacked on (which should be obvious from the first shots). And when you die, you start at the beginning of the last door you've been in as A model as well, regardless of which mode you were before.
8: ZX A's hard mode is actually something worth playing through again (if you can stomache the general game that is) since the game actually ups the difficulty by giving bosses new moves, made both the bosses and mid-bosses stronger and take less damage, and enemies do more damage. And while I'm not completely sure but subtanks are also taken out. This was not the case for the original ZX where normal and hard are almost exactly the same.
9: The voice acting is terrible. And even worse, it's horribly muffled because it's compressed to hell and back. Capcom should have just did what they did with other MM games and omitted the cutscene VA altogether, saved themselves some cash by using a smaller ROM and left in the JPN sound clips. It's not like the story is anything worth mentioning (ps the ending is laaaaaaaaame).
10: There is actually a puzzle game you can unlock early in the game (called Gem Buster, local wifi multiplayer only with a single cart) that is decently fun, or at least more fun than the first five levels of the game. It kinda resembles a more simpler Puzzle Fighter where you match up falling jewels in columns by switching two around horizontally (d-pad or stylus) as per Panel De Pon/Puzzle League. Though to clear same colour columns of gems, the flat end of the falling gem and the bottom-most gem must be facing each other (the falling gem will be upside down and if it touches a different colour, it flips around). Another decent time waster so as long as you have another DS nearby.
11: And of course the 8 bit level. The first chunk of the level is pretty pedestrian, the second part is nice, and ... I haven't bothered to beat the second form of the boss yet. I'd say overall so far, it's on par with PU generally but the boss is funner to beat (since you generally can't jump over him and he resembles more of an X boss than a classic series boss).
And with that in mind, here is a breakdown of each level in the game (yes I know I am quite petty but I can't care less):
On a level to level basis, the game can either be crap that sucks worse than ZX or resemble, but not quite be, a good MM Zero level (where one level is pretty much ripping off a Z4 level). Though do note that I omitted all comments on boss fights because, like another series (from Capcom no less) that has fallen from its utopian greener pastures, the boss fights are very fun and can be worth trudging to just to play them; otherwise, blahblah blah. Note: I beat the game with Ashe, the female character who has a laser buster that has a charged shot that bounces off walls like MM3's Gemini Laser (very fun to use).
The first five levels can be summed up with just this:
and here is why:
-Intro level (both characters): throwaway intro level;
-Train/Buckfire: takes only 30 seconds to beat and requires no skill whatsoever;
-Ice Flow/Chronoforce: Pathetic, forces you to change forms;
-Tower of Verdue/Rospark: No changes necessary, not bad, not particularly good either;
-Oil Field: Forces you to change to Rospark thus points off of what is merely an average at best level; there's a part where you need to change to restore power but that's negligible; regardless
-Legion HQ: starts off decent with lots of stairs but after you get P model, it pretty much forces you to stay in that form for no reason other than to use only one of his innate abilities (haning onto overhead bars) 5 useless times and nothing else. You can potentially use leaps of faith instead but I haven't had the patience to try that during that time;
The 4 levels that open immediately:
-Floating Ruins: a blatant ripoff of the Floating Gardens in Zero4 but not quite as intense or fun, but one of the better levels;
-Highway: straight forward level, no form changes but really pedestrian; the first midboss may need a form change to beat since you need to shoot upwards to beat it though I haven't tried the homing shot against it, also sprites and background recycled from ZX; otherwise
-Scrapyard/Vulturon: change to P model and stay that way, otherwise you'll be changing forms every several feet, fun despite this but you will need several run-throughs due to its puzzley environment, and since the game changes you back to A model when you reach the boss, you don't have to change manually (bonus);
-Control Tower/Queenbee: Now is where the fun starts, do a quick form change and go on top of the elevator instead, there your vertical platforming abilities are tested as you climb through this area without platforms (take that PU), another facet of vertical platforming takes place after the midboss where it's not as intense but fun either way; the boss is more of a test of endurance than typical MM bosses;
The annoying levels:
-Quarry (underground): requires constant use of P model (dark areas) but not as efficiently as the Scrapyard; the worst part, to get to this area, you'll have to shuffle through all your available forms to open stupid elemental doors and crap; negative fun;
-Waterfall Ruins/Argoyle-Ugoyle: both paths require a lot of shape changing: worthless and unfun;
-Mysterious Lab/Hedgeshock: no form changes needed but fairly boring and straight forward;
-Biolab/Bifrost: dumb form change puzzles ruins what would otherwise be a level based purely on speed where you go in and get out without taking much damage, completely destroying the momentum of the level;
The end:
-Undersea Volcano: as long as you take the path that doesn't require form changes, this level can be fun; the panny/pandy boss here is more fun than the first game imo;
-Ouroboros: the final level; no form changes necessary; watch what you do and try not to suck and I wished there was a 3rd boss form ;_; (despite the first form of the boss can be buster spammed to death);
And there you have it, a completely unbiased (as best of my ability) runthrough of Inti-creates' latest offering.
***Read here if you don't want to read all that***
In short, the game can be good but the bad parts severely outweigh the good parts due to the fact the first five levels are really bad levels, all the form changing required to advance and all the other stupid things Inti tacked onto the game just to make it different. In other words: K.I.S.S.! This was what made the Zero series great and the thing that gave new life to older MM games. You start with your buster and you finish with just that; nothing else.
As for others, whether you liked ZX or not, as long as you can stomach the first five levels and the form changing, the game can but fun, but it's a far cry from what it could be.
PS: Don't expect me to be replying to this thread much. I'll either be in books or playing C4 on Hard mode.
PPS: Keep your irritating "MM2/3>*" crap out of this thread. This is supposed to be a ZX A bashing thread and nothing else. You can take your fanboy goggles to other MM threads to do that.