Game Review: Mega Man Zero/ZX Legacy Collection (Switch)

One of my favourite games as a kid was Mega Man X for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. I would play this game religiously but for some reason, I never played any of the other Mega Mega games. Thankfully over the last few years, Capcom has been releasing ‘Legacy’ collections, which cover the entirety of the Mega Man games onto major consoles. Now, Capcom have moved onto releasing legacy collections for the Meg Man Zero collection which I have to say, I’ve never even heard of before.

Mega Man Zero ZX Legacy Collection contains the first four Zero games along with a new mode Z Chaser. As someone who has never played the Zero games before, I was expecting the game to play pretty much like the games starring the Blue Bomber. But the Zero games are actually quite different, less stage based and much more focus on exploration and progression. And while I was initially disappointed in this as I love the setup of the Mega Man games, I appreciate that the whole point of the Zero games is to provide something a bit different.

What I can tell you from playing this game is that the gameplay is quite different and also a lot more difficult than the classic Mega Man games. The first game is setup with a more mission-focused structure where you choose from a selection of tasks that have been assigned to you by a NPC called Ciel. There’s a lot of back and forth as you explore the game completing these missions, it kind of reminded of dungeon crawler games like the classic Metroid games. With the other three games, they are a little more traditionally structured with mission based levels with a boss fight at the end. I did prefer these games to the first one so if you aren’t really feeling the first Zero game in this collection then just jump into one of the other games included.

In terms of difficulty, I found Mega Man Zero to be harder than the Mega Man ones which is saying a lot. The games starring the Blue Bomber are notoriously difficult and unforgiving a lot of the time. Mega Man Zero adds to that by making the enemies stronger and you weaker. Zero is weaker in the sense that he just takes more damage from enemies but his weapons also just feel weaker than Mega Mans. He has a blaster which can be charged for stronger shots but it doesn’t have the same impact as well as a laser blade which is pretty good but doesn’t have much range – close combat only. Knowing that these games are more difficult, Capcom have included a decent amount of checkpoints throughout each stage. Nothing worse than having to restart an entire level is there?!

Graphically, the games still contain all the charm of the original titles. There may have been some minor graphical improvements to make the games slightly less pixelated but one of the big draws of these sort of games and the Mega Man games in particular is that old-skool graphical style. It’s becoming really popular again with new games like River City Girls and Streets of Rage 4. The soundtrack is really great too, bringing players that nostalgic feel from the 90’s.

Along with 4 main games, Mega Man Zero ZX Legacy Collection contains a few extras to sweeten the deal. The Z Chaser mode is a time trial mode with online leaderboards and a two-player versus mode available.  There are a number of achievements that you can unlock throughout the game too which is pretty cool. All these little additions do a pretty neat job of making this feel like a compilation and not just a bunch of games thrown together.

Pros

• Great value
• Solid gameplay
• Lots of neat additional to boost the offering

Cons

• Some may be put off by the more exploration concept compared to the mission based Mega Man games

Verdict:

This soup has a lot of great ingredients and fans of this soup will surely lap this up.

A review copy was provided by the publisher.