Previously, Planet Zi the origin place of Zoids, have some mysterious quake caused by time-space distortion. Young Zoid pilot named Zeru felt the quake. He meets a mysterious lady named Juno. Together they win a tournament Zoid battle. But later she gets kidnapped by bandits led by Leviathe. She promises will return Juno to Zeru if he can beat her in tournament match at Galil Storm Stadion. Zeru prevail however a mysterious man knock him unconscious from behind as he’s about to rescue Juno. What will happen next?
The bartender at Galil Storm stadium tells me about cave on east of the stadium. In fact, it’s very close to the stadium. With no lead where I must go, I decide to enter the cave but apparently, it’s bad idea because I’m heavily outnumbered. Even with relatively good Zoid’s upgrade and weapon, I’m overwhelmed. I don’t think I was meant to go here yet.
Oh, I see. I was supposed to go north until I trigger event where Zeru meet this professor lies unconsciously on the ground. The event’s location is not that far from the blasted cave. So, Zeru takes the professor named Dr. T, to the clinic in Mount Town. Then he asks Zeru which Zoid he likes. Personally, I love Gojulas but alas it’s not in the option. Besides, in the ability list Zeru has proficient with Tiger and Liger type Zoid. Is Zaber Fang also Tiger Zoid? No clue but I pick it anyway because Liger is overrated. I mean seriously. main protagonists in 2 anime series that I watched have Liger as their Zoid. Bit Cloud from previous playthrough is one of the protagonists. Recently, I play this for Retroachievement. Apparently, choosing the Liger option here is unofficial achievement. Thank goodness, I always pick Zaber Fang.
So, we track back to where we found the professor to search for the Zaber Fang that he brought. We’re surrounded by sensible bandits because these ones don’t let Zeru gets on Saberlion compared to previous bandits who always agree on Zoid match. Maybe these bandits don’t own any Zoid so they choose to apprehend Zeru before he gets to his Zoid. However, Zaber Fang appears underground and scare all the bandits. Engineer_thanks01.wav
An Organozoid also appears and joins us. His name is pulse and he’s shaped like big cat so I like him. Organozoid is small Zoid that can boost Zoid’s potential by emerging into the Zoid. Thus, my power is substantially increased. I also obtained Zi Data for Shield Liger in case that I want to build our own Shield Liger. It’s not bad.
Do you notice there’s a list of color in the bottom? So, Pulse can change color depends on dialogue choice that I meet at some point for example: talking to bar waitress or encounter some plot event. If Pulse’s color is white, health recovery and defense stat are boosted the most after unification with Zoid. If Pulse’s color is red, attack and defense stats are boosted the most after unification with Zoid. If Pulse’s color is blue, accuracy and speed stats are boosted the most after unification with Zoid. If Pulse’s color is black, attack and speed stats are boosted the most after unification with Zoid
The professor insists that I test the Zaber Fang and Pulse in the arena on Mount Town. Zaber Fang is certainly stronger than Saberlion. Because it’s large type Zoid, Zaber Fang can carry more equipment and has bigger hitpoint. For God’s sake, it has shock cannon and beam cannon as fixed equipment. Maybe the only drawback is, Zaber Fang doesn’t have smoke unit like Saberlion does but I believe there’s portable equipment for that. But again, smoke unit is not that useful.
After I defeat my opponent that’s relatively easy, these 4 Zoids suddenly appear on the arena and the tournament is canceled. Sniper_sf13_magic_reac01.wav
So, we’re back to laboratory along with 3 Zoid pilots that interrupt our match. Dr T explains how this space-time distortion happens. I explain it as best as I could. So, the professor discovers something that can empower Zoid from ancient writing in runestone. The method is called Zoidscore Overload System and it causes the weird phenomena. Pulse has this ZOS ability. But the professor doubt that this single ZOS can cause the huge earthquake that happen in the beginning of the game.
But forget about that science fiction thingamajig. The more important matter is that Zeru has more companion. Those 3 Zoid pilots that interrupt the tournament are willing to join Zeru’s team to solve this space time problem. Hopefully. You can check any character on database in pause menu. It’s said that Corporal Tita Breeze here good at shooting also getting shot too. Not a good sign. But beggar can’t be picky. Zeru needs party member very badly.
I forget to show you the world map so here it is. It’s pretty handy to have this place list and the place you selected will be located on the map. Unfortunately, the list only for town and dungeon that I already entered. The objective destination place doesn’t exist on the list. The yellow arrow shows you the place that I highlighted while red arrow is my current location. I’m tempted to go back to East Sea ruins now that I have additional party member but I decide to go further north.
Corporal Tita should be in
back row for her own safety. That doesn’t mean she’s safe for enemy’s firing
but at least she won’t be targeted by enemy’s melee attack. Less danger
potential for her. This is something that I realize too late. I should put Juno
in the back row since her Zoid has decent long-range weapon. Tita’s Zoid, Unenlagia also has decent long-range weapon albeit in funny form which is
sniper rifle on the tail.
Before depart from Mount Town, a pair villagers found a mystic stone on the small site in the north. The professor notices that the stone has some language with the ancient record regarding Zoidscore Overload System (ZOS). So, he decides to investigate the site and he drags all us along with. Obviously. So, there’s this mystic dome that prevents us getting through it. If you scour along the dome to the west, you will get to the ancient site eventually. However, there’s group of bandits that claim the site as theirs and you have to fight them.
To build new Zoid you need related Zi data. However, more advanced Zoid requires important part to build. To obtain this part with 100 % chance, you use deck command called “CoreSecurity1” which guaranteed obtain part if you finish the battle on the turn the deck command used.
We arrive at the next town past beyond the ancient site. Albane (Tita’s captain) decides to test on something and make the preparation. Tita will help him while Zan (Tita’s friend) along with Zeru go to bar for lunch. But Bandit mocks Zan’s cool fluffy jacket and he challenges him to 1-on-1 duel. This game has lots of bandit problem.
The Zoids construction is not always about making one from scratch. Sometime, it’s about upgrade or modification from Zoids that you already have. For example: this Zaber Fang Old from the professor can be upgraded to Zaber Fang (new/normal/fresh/whatever) which has bigger health and SR stats (the one that indicate accuracy’s attack and turn’s order. Naturally, you still need Zi data from enemy’s Zaber Fang. Some upgraded or modified Zoids require certain part. But thankfully, I don’t need it to upgrade Zaber Fang. About the duel, Zan can win that easily. No problem.
Then I decide to participate in Albane’s test. He needs the 4 Zoids that his team brought for it. So, I reluctantly tell Zeru to leave the perfectly fine Zaber Fang into owl Zoid called Nightwise. It begs question. There are 4 Zoids when Albane’s group called Blue Unicorn, interrupted that match, but why there are only 3 pilots? Is this 1 pilot on Zoids VS, got left out because they’re unlikable person or something? Or they're supposed to be the player that choose Blue Unicorn team over the rival team? So, these Blue Unicorn’s Zoids can unite into bigger Zoid! It’s like Voltron or Getter Robo. When I first play the game, my mind so blown with this unification or the Japanese term calls it Gattai. Since when Zoids can unite/Gattai? You have to excuse me for my limited knowledge about Zoids. I only know the first 2 anime series and Gojulas. I also remember I had coloring book of Zoids when in my childhood. And that’s it.
Anyway, Blue Unicorn’s rival called Rottiger suddenly appear and also commence the Gattai. Pulse is acting up and roars caused all of us trapped into space-time distortion.
We’re sent into the past where Empire having war with Republic. We enter the nearest town that happen belong in Empire. In the Zoid Institute, I meet familiar boy. I know him! He’s Vahn or Vaan from Zoids Chaotic Century series. Much like Zeru, Vahn also has Organozoid named Zeke which has form of Velociraptor. Zeke is slightly cooler than Pulse.
We encounter Rottiger team at the pub. Later on, they agree to team up with us to solve this space-time distortion incident. But first, we have to help Vahn evacuate the righteous ruler of the empire Rudolf. This is not like in Star Wars where republic is good and empire is bad. At least not in apparent black and white situation. From what I remember, the evil chancellor of empire usurps the throne while Rudolf is too young as ruler and his parents are “gone”. So, Republican force is on mission to evacuate the young prince and take him to safety of Republican. If I remember correctly, Blue Unicorn team is from future Republican and Rottiger team is from future empire. But Rottiger team antagonize the evil chancellor so they’re willing to help us in this mission.
Obviously, Vahn joins our team along with his legendary Blade Liger. However, since he’s still guest member. He refuses any modification and equipment put into his Liger Zoid. That means he’s hard to get stronger with us though he still can level up.
I think Vahn is meant to be preset strong character before you can get Zoid strong enough for other casts than Zeru, to ride. I mean. Here’s my analysis. 4 slots will be filled with either Blue Unicorn team’s Zoids or Rottiger team’s Zoids. Another slot definitely filled with Zeru with Zaber Fang. That leaves 1 slot empty. You can fill it with 1 Zoid from the counterpart team of Gattai zoid you deploy. But Vahn is definitely stronger than that 1 Zoid. Because any Zoid from Blue Unicorn team or Rottiger team, is not impressively strong on its own. Though it has fairly decent HP. So, my plan is using Vahn to fill the empty slot temporarily. Once we get Zoid that stronger than any of Blue Unicorn team’s or Rottiger team’s ones, I will replace Vahn with it and he will be backup pilot.
I forget to show you the Blue Unicorn Zoids Gattai: The Fuzor Dragon. To activate the Gattai, you have to use the related command deck. There’s requirement for the Gattai command: you have to put Leo Blaze, Unenlagia, Mosasledge. And Nightwise in formation 2 by 2. Either in center and bottom lines or center and top lines. So, the rest of the cast for the formation is Vahn’s Blade Liger and Zeru’s Zaber Fang. Vahn has accuracy boost on melee attack so he must be on the front. Zeru can be placed in the back as shooter. He has ability to fire 2 guns at once, remember?
I think this is the point where I encounter big difficulty spike. Most enemies that I encounter have bigger health than 150 points because all enemy’s Zoid have pilot on them. I mean make sense, because this war era setting and we’re right in the imperial territory near their capital. However, I’m not totally handicapped here. I have something that can be good answer for this challenge. First, we have pilot that have Organozoid. In fact, there are 2 of them: Zeru the main protagonist and Vahn the Zoids Chaotic Century’s protagonist. When they initiate unification with their Organozoid, they lose a turn. But in return, on the next turn and afterward their stats boosted significantly and they can take 2 turns! Second, we have Gattai Zoids: Blue Unicorn’s Fuzor Dragon and Rottiger’s Chimera Dragon. For Fuzor Dragon, it has hand gun that can target 2 enemies on same column on either line. It can generate shield. The big weapons are melee: tail saw and dragon’s bite. The later requires 30 EP cost! You might think that melee weapon is mostly for last resort because it has the least energy cost or even doesn’t cost any EP at all. However, there’s some heavy melee weapon that can deal very significant damage like what Fuzor Dragon has.
Actually, there’s some occasion we encounter wild Iron Kongs. Although they’re unmanned, they still have considerable amount of HP. Besides having big HP, they also have powerful knuckle to throw. They do have rocket launcher for projectile attack. But it’s for multiple targets so it doesn’t deal big damage on individual target.
This is just ludicrous. They throw super weak Zoids at us. I think they can be encountered in very early part of the game. There are pilots on them but that don’t help much. Those Iguans the weak bipedal lizard on front row, they have 80 HP on the base. With pilot manning them, they have 140 HP. Not much improvement, I would say. Or at least they’re very weak, compared to our team.
After hours of grinding in same area…
I said before that Vahn is hard to get stronger because he refuses any modification or equipment on his Zoid. And you can’t even tell him to move on from his Blade Liger. So, I replace Vahn with Zeru for the front row and I put Max on Red Horn into the back row. Red Horn the Styracosaurus Zoid, has large HP pool as hinted by its large body and shielded head. Since it has 3 guns by default, it can be positioned as shooter in back row. I have seen lots of enemy formations that put Red Horn in back row. Look at that tiny rocket launcher on top of the cannon, it’s hilariously bad in visual and technical standpoint. To spice things up, I install 4-gun laser that I just bought on the Imperial Town, on the Red Horn. It can fire laser in a single line with attack power of 150 points which is very good and very decent accuracy. I deliberately painted the Red Horn with green color to make it different from the enemy’s and no to call out Max as Greenhorn. Yep. Definitely not.
I forget to tell you that you can view your party’s stats and HP by pressing R button during 2nd phase of battle. The one where you pick action, wait, or use item. You can view enemy party’s stats and HP by pressing left direction button when you view your party’s stats and HP. Or you can press L button.
I also upgrade Zeru’s Zaber Fang into Zaber Fang AT that has initial rocket pod. I feel like the previous version of Zaber Fang has too many existing guns that felt too inefficient. Besides, I can put quite similar equipment with them. On the other hand, the rocket pod is different from any equipment sold at shop. Besides, I can upgrade its attack power.
I encounter another group of Zaber Fang AT but that’s not the thing. Instead, I I want to show you the deck command. I deliberately put a space between the Blue Unicorn Gattai and Rottiger Gattai so I don’t make mistake. The empty space is used to be filled with 2-arms dragon Gattai which is small combination of only Leo Blaze in the front and Unenlagia in the back. It was made by Dr. T. He surely has talent.
So, here’s Rottiger Gattai Zoid: Chimera Dragon. It looks imposing and horrible at the same time. Chimera Dragon has all weapon but no shield at all. It has missile pod for group damage. Railgun to snipe single enemy in any position. Hard Knuckle and Hell’s Gate as melee weapon. I remember using Chimera Dragon for Retroachievement run for this section and it went well thanks to Hard Knuckle. I thought Chimera Dragon has better melee weapon than Fuzor Dragon but I was wrong. Fuzor Dragon’s saw tail has 210 attack power. Meanwhile Chimera Dragon’s hard knuckle has 190 attack power. 20 attack power difference there. As for Vahn Blade Liger’s laser blade, it has 220 attack power. It seems more superior than any of Gattai’s melee weapon. But I think it’s better to leave the high damaging melee attacker to either Gattai Zoid, replace Vahn with Zeru and put anyone else with decent Zoid in the back row. That way, I can maximize the attack potential on our team.
Apparently, either Gattai Zoid only piloted by anyone who pilot either Leo Blaze and Demon’s Head. Claudia is slightly better melee-type pilot than Zan so she’s on the charge of Leo Blaze or Demon’s Head even though Leo Blaze belongs to Zan. But I’m not sure that’s not big of a problem.
After more leveling and venturing further the maze of valleys…
We meet Herman from Republic Force and he joins our team with his Gojulas Zoid! Zan is happy to see Gojulas like I am. We should make Gojulas Fan club, Zan. :D
We arrive at Miletos Castle. There are Vahn’s friends: Moonbay and Irvine being pursued by Imperial troop. According to Irvine, the young emperor Rudolf has been taken by mysterious ally to Imperial Capital: Guygalos. So, we can assume Rudolf is safe but we must fight the Imperial troop.
The Imperial troop is lot stronger than bandit we fought before, as you expected from war era. When I encounter group of durable enemies, I usually focus our attack on one enemy and finish them one by one. Don’t use area attack unless to finish off 1 near-dying enemy while still deal damage to other enemies. Since this is boss fight, don’t hesitate to deploy Organozoid and use healing item. Just throw everything you got.
Their Iron Kongs throw rocket at us quite relentlessly. But since we upgrade our Zoids quite high, the damage we receive is not that bad. It inflicts 5 or 20 points damage which is easily ignorable.
Finally, I can save up enough EP for Chimera Dragon’s ultimate melee attack: Hell Gate. It cost 30 EP. But since Claudia has Conserve-battle ability which reduces EP consumption of melee attack by 10%, the cost becomes 27 EP. Still large cost but it’s paid off as she delivers 310 points of damage to enemy Iron Kong which leaves it near-death. No idea why the attack called Hell Gate. It’s huge lance jousting mounted on Giga Zoid with high speed. It doesn’t look related to Hell but it’s super powerful nonetheless. Fuzor Dragon’s Dragon Bite has same power and EP Cost with Hell Gate, by the way.
I have to bring out everything to win this boss fight. Including the unification with Zeru's Organozoid: Pulse. Zeru will lose a turn when activating the unification but he gets big stats boost, HP & EP recovery, and 1 extra turn afterward so it’s worth it. Zoids Gattai is activated in deck command menu while Organozoid unification is activated in second phase where you pick action, wait, or use item. Using Organozoid is extra option in the most bottom of that second phase menu.
After unification, Zeru’s Zoid has white after-image which is cool visual effect. But what really amazing is the attack power boost even portable weapons that normally have permanent/fixed attack power and can’t be upgraded. For example: this shock cannon initially has attack power of 220 points. But it becomes 369 points! Heavy_positivevocalization04.wav
The fight is not that hard probably thanks to the intense experience and gold grinding that I did. Vahn and Herman leave the party to go to Guygalos. But Irvine and Moonbay join the party to replace them. Not only that, we also got Covering Fire deck command. The effect is the cargo Zoid will bombard the enemies but all of party members will lose a turn. This deck command is hit-and-miss. The bombardment is not that good and quite often miss the target.
Much like Vahn and Herman, Irvine only want to fight with his Zoids unmodified. In case that big cannon on the back of Command Wolf Zoid doesn’t give you hint, Irvine’s Zoid is excellent to fill the back-row shooter role. But I still keep Max for that position. Meanwhile Moonbay doesn’t have any Zoid to ride into. That’s quite disappointing.
As we traverse to the north to search for time-space warp that Pulse detected. We overhear the evil chancellor Proitzen announces that Rudolf is dead and claims the imperial throne for himself. But we can’t do anything about him because the capital Guygalos is surrounded by impassable mountains. So, we have no choice but to continue our journey for the time-space warp that can return us to the home world.
Suddenly, the time-space warp becomes undetected. Here’s the dialogue option that determine Pulse’s color/emotion. Apparently, it’s not “This option will make Pulse change into certain color” case. It’s more like one option will change Pulse’s color randomly while the other option keeps its color and makes the same emotion stronger. Because I remember well that I choose same option of “Don’t panic!” for this playthrough and for Retroachievement playthrough. In former occasion, Pulse’s color is black. While in latter occasion, Pulse’s color is white. In both cases, Pulse doesn’t change its color when I choose same dialogue option.
Eventually, we arrive near the time-space warp but Stinger doesn’t let us approaches it, thinking it was treasure of some sort. I vaguely remember this git. I think he’s a big bandit in Zoids Chaotic Century anime or something like that.
Stinger is not alone. He brings his cronies in Zaber Fang Zoids in the front row.
The real problem is Stinger himself. He’s stink. I mean sting. His Scorpion Zoid Guysack can fire chemical substance that inflicts Freeze and Pilot Inefficient in single line. Fortunately, Stinger only hit Fuzor Dragon instead of Zeru and Max. Afterward, Stinger doesn’t use this attack anymore probably because this dirty attack cost so many EP. I could tell Zeru or Max to use item to remove the abnormal status on Fuzor Dragon but I choose to keep attacking Stinger until we win. There’s important note here. On one occasion Stinger and his cronies focus attacking Zeru and he’s KO in one turn. So, I suggest you also focus to defeat one enemy at a time. That way, you lessen enemy’s ganking potential. Best defense is good offense, afterall.
After finishing the boss fight, Stinger bitterly leaves and he insists the glowing thing is treasure even though Zeru keep telling him that it’s not treasure.
Finally, we’re back to our world. Suddenly, Claudia notice something about Zeru’s pendant. It has emblem of Zenebas Royal Family so Zeru probably has connection with Zenebas. Because of that, Reiner wants to capture Zeru. Damn! This conflict happens when I start to like Claudia. I care less for Reiner because he looks unlikable like Chazz Princeton in Yugioh Tag Force 3.
But Zan calms everyone down by saying we still have to work together to solve this Space-Time warp incident. Dr. T suggests that we keep tailing Backdraft team that may give us clue about the incident and also Juno’s whereabout. Yeah. Don’t forget about Juno! Side note: I can go back to the last town before the time-space warp if we walk to north east direction. So, i can buy equipment that i missed from previous towns/villages/Galil Storm Stadium.
I think I can end the playthrough here but I’m not done yet.
I happen to still have battery save from 2016! I believe the final boss is inside this hole in the final dungeon but alas I can’t enter it. I would like to show you the final boss or the epilogue narration but I simply can’t. This because, the battery save is post endgame and the game doesn’t allow me to refight the final boss. I do have the save state that I believe takes place in the middle of final boss fight. But the save state file is corrupted and the game crashes when I load the game with it. So, this battery save is all I have.
There’s barely anything I can do in this post endgame situation except playing around in this final dungeon. I already did all tournament in all stadium around the world. Anyway, the transport Zoid I have here is called Dragoon. It’s Lobster Zoid that can traverse through water. I can switch back to good old Gustav but it’s not useful to do so.
Next, I want to show you the party at that time. There’s Herman that we met before. He’s in Gojulas Giga. Looks very intimidating. Behind Herman is Leena from Zoids New Century with Shield Liger DCS-J full of guns. She is the temperamental spitfire trigger-frenzy woman. She sucks at early level. Once she’s leveled up enough, she acquires multi-fire1 ability and that’s when she proves her worth. Next on center front is Zeru himself. He acquired Blitz Tiger which is way stronger than the Zaber Fang AT. I will talk about the detail of the new Zoid later. Behind Zeru is Purple Mask with Storm Sworder Zoid. She’s masked vigilante ex-bandit from Zoids Chaotic Century. She and her gang are known to ride on Pterodactyl Zoid. On the bottom front is Vahn from before. He’s on stronger Blade Liger. Enough said. Lastly on corner bottom back is Jack Cisco, a mercenary from Zoids New Century with Konig Wolf. I like this guy. He favors good luck over everything. If you want to recruit him for your team, you have to win dice game with him. He only willing to join you, if you win the dice game as proof of your good luck. If you don’t, he will think you as bringer of bad luck and fighting along with you won’t work at all.
About the Blitz Tiger. Zeru acquire it quite late in the game. I think it’s left by ancient civilization or something. Maybe it’s Zenebas civilization that have been mentioned. Would you kindly look at the weapon list on the bottom. Those weapons are the one that already exist in Blitz Tiger itself. Weapons with [G] on the left, are melee weapon. They’re not the main interest here although Lightning Attack has attack power of 420 points. Very devastating. The one that I want to show you it’s the Volt Cannon. That’s the one that looks like wing plates on the back. It works like Hulk’s Thunder Clap. Both plates clap together and big lightning shoots out. The lighting will hit all enemies in single row. But the more fascinating part is: it inflicts Freeze (stunned) to enemies. Maybe not 100% chance but that’s remarkable enough.
If you are curious about the weapon on top list, they’re the portable weapon. The one that has fixed power and can be put to any Zoids, mostly bought from equipment shop. First is Eprotector which is additional armor that has resistance to Laser and Particle Beam weapon. Second is Sulfur Acid gun. It doesn’t belong to any category: Bullet, Missile, Laser, or Particle Beam. The main use of it is to reduce enemy’s defense power. Third is Napalm Missile. It also reduces enemy’s defense power. I think the defense power reduction is not as strong as Sulfur Acid but it targets all enemies in single row. Knowing that Zeru has multi-fire1 ability, you can imagine that he can just spam these weapons to reduce enemy’s defense power into nothingness and then go for the finishing attack on next turn. I’m sadistic after all. The last is Ion Fielder which is equipment that restore some HP for all allies. Needless to say, it’s very useful. OK. We can finish it now.
I think Amedio’s Zoids Legacy (2004) is RPG intended for young player or Zoids fan. However, the gameplay is very deep yet simple enough. The battle plays like mix of Suikoden because unit’s position and attack range matter, (late) Marvel Avengers Alliance because equipment customization, every action cost energy, and resting replenish energy, and Pokemon because you can utilize enemy you encounter for your use later. The difference is: in Pokemon you catch the monster. While in this game, you must have Zi Data and part then you can develop Zoid for your use. The battle is very interesting and can be done within 2 turns or so. In early playthrough, the factors that determine optimal portable-equipment setting are: energy cost, Zoid’s equipment capacity, and attack power or stat boost. When you reach shop where you can buy weapon that can inflict stun and reduce target’s defense power, the portable-equipment setting takes into new level. Obviously, weapon that reduce target’s defense power is extremely important. You shouldn’t just rely on attack power anymore at that point especially when target’s defense power and armor class really matter in combat. There’s no use if your attack only inflicts 1 or 5 points of damage. That’s really waste of your time or turn in combat. Other combat aspect is accuracy and evasion. Personally, I don’t put much expectation on ally’s evasion because it works too random. I prefer accuracy instead so my ally can inflict damage consistently. Another combat aspect is turn’s order which is very important. Apparently, increasing SR (Sensory Rate) with any mean boosts turn’s order besides accuracy. On probably-related note, I don’t like fight against flying Zoids because their turn is quick and has relatively high evasion.
Unlike other RPG. When pilot gains level up, their attack and defense power doesn’t increase. Pilot only boosts Zoid’s stats: HP, accuracy, and evasion. So, to upgrade your attack power you have to upgrade your Zoid or install more powerful equipment. You can also consider to change your Zoid into more powerful one. As for the pilot roster. It ranges from Anime series to OC video game. Judging by the abilities/perks they have, most pilots are good. Some have flaw. Then there’s few just exceptionally bad. Vahn and Zeru who have Organozoid, are definitely the strongest pilot because how overpowered Organozoid unification is. Tita is fine. Harry Champ’s robot assistants: Benjamin and Sebastian. They don’t have any ability/perk at all. You can’t go wrong with them as back-up pilots. They are better than those pilots that have more negative skills than positive ones. I think each pilot’s ability/perk is quite appropriate canonically from the anime series. The characters in roster are more than 25 persons while the active party member only for 6 slots. But I think pilots on reserve seat get the same amount of exp points. I wish there’s pilot’s ability that increase attack power even it’s just for 15% for balance’s sake.
As for Zoid. I believe most of them that in early game, they're too weak for your use thus I don’t recommend you to develop them. Plus they have small equipment capacity limit. Mind you! I did try using Cannon Tortoise, thinking it’s appropriate for back-row shooter role. But the base HP is below 100 points and the main attraction: the big cannon on its back only deal measly 30 damage. You can see Zoid’s stats before the manufacture. My quick check will be looking at the Zoid’s HP and Zoid’s existing weapon. If you see the Zoid is not good from the quick check yet you still want to manufacture it, the fault is entirely yours. So, for the early game you better just stick to Zeru’s Saberlion and Juno’s Gun Tiger. Don’t be creative in early part of the game! Around finding Dr. T, is you may allow to be creative on making Zoid with decent result. Making reserve Zoid is not bad idea. When any Zoid on battle destroyed, the pilot survives. So, you can transfer them into reserve Zoid temporarily so your party’s strength doesn’t go back to square one. As for Gattai Zoids, they’re definitely strong in early part of the game. However, they have preset attack and defense power which can’t be upgraded. Although their HP grows according to their pilot’s level. You can upgrade weapon on the individual Zoids of the Gattai Zoids but that doesn’t increase Gattai Zoid’s attack power, sadly. Maybe you can utilize Gattai Zoids to explore later dungeon then you replace them with the main force when you’re about to fight the boss of the dungeon.
The combat is not that hard. Maybe not in that first time-space warp that I mentioned it could be huge difficulty spike. Then in later match in stadium, you need certain Zoids on formation. For example: only 3 flying Zoids or Liger/Tiger with no portable equipment only. Thankfully, you can save your game anywhere from pause menu but only 1 save slot. The deck command is helpful especially the Friendship which heal ally Zoids by 50% max HP. There’s healing item that heal for 50% max HP but it’s very expensive. I really like the music for the battle. Other music is fine too. The graphic is pretty good for GBA, I reckon. The game certainly feels better if you know the character from other game or the anime series.
Amedio’s Zoids Legacy (2004) is one of the best RPG on GBA in my list. I know there’s Mario RPG and various Final Fantasy in GBA. But at least you agree that Zoids Legacy is better RPG than Eragon, right? :P
By the way, in opening narration” Bringing back the normal world now depends on a young Zoids pilot “. It’s a lie. Zeru doesn’t restore the world to normal self. Everyone trapped in this scrambled world. Well, at least Zeru and his allies have defeated giant evil Zoid. That counts for something.
