Mega Man Zero 4 review (Game Boy Advance)

Best of all, the developer has greatly simplified and streamlined the cyberelf system. Cyberelves are tiny companions that can be used to do all sorts of things, like extend Zero's health meter, increase his running speed, or make it so that his blaster fires a certain type of elemental shot. In previous games, you had to first collect the cyberelves and then equip them based on whether they were "satellite" or "fusion" types--the latter of which disappeared when used and counted negatively toward your completion rank. Mega Man Zero 4 does away with all of that. In this game, Zero starts out with one cyberelf that can provide various health, weapon, and body enhancements just by activating and selecting different levels. You'll only get a rank penalty if you try to activate more levels than the elf's current maximum. Every time you complete a stage in the game, you can activate one more ability level on the cyberelf without penalty.

While all of these sundry changes are very much welcome, they don't change one bit how the game is played. You can equip three armor type battle chips and maximize the cyberelf's health-enhancing powers, but that still won't guarantee you'll make it through even the game's earliest levels. Zero's main blaster and sword weapons are still the weapons you'll use the most, and being able to jump high or far isn't nearly as important as memorizing when to jump--which is usually in split-second fashion across platforms situated between deadly spike pits and drop-offs. The Mega Man franchise is known for its tough level designs, and this game carries on the tradition.

By the same token, the graphics and audio are almost identical to what we saw in the last two Mega Man Zero games: low on detail but high on liveliness. On the one hand, the backgrounds look bland, because a lot of solid colors were used to draw them. On the other hand, they also jump out at you thanks to all the miscellaneous effects that are constantly happening, such as those used to animate falling leaves, blowing rain, and drifting clouds. It's also nice that each level has two unique weather schemes to pick from. A sunny level may seem relatively peaceful, but it's way more interesting when there are rain showers, blowing winds, and thunderclaps to observe and interact with. The characters also aren't as colorful or as detailed as the characters we've seen in other recent action games, but their Japanese manga-style looks are at least likable, and they're animations are remarkably fluid. As always, it's fun to watch an enemy split in two and then fall over after being cut in half by Zero's saber. The music backing up the graphics is high-energy and generally suits the action. The sound effects are nothing special, though, as they're just the usual assortment of explosions and lasers that Capcom has recycled for four games now.

Due to the lofty difficulty, it'll probably take most players a solid eight hours or so to run through the game the first time. Each level can be completed in a few minutes, in theory, but between multiple retries and going back to gather useful chip parts, those few minutes can easily drag out to a half hour at a clip. Once you master the game, there's also a "hard" mode to tackle and various minigames to unlock and play.

Longtime fans that aren't yet bored with the Mega Man formula will find more of what they like in Mega Man Zero 4. Of course, that also means that anyone who didn't already enjoy Mega Man before won't find anything to change his or her mind here. The core game is still tough-as-nails, even if all of Zero's weapons and abilities are much, much easier to manage here than they were in games past.