History YMMV / MegaManZero

* CompleteMonster: [[BigBad Dr. Weil]], known in Japan as [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Dr. Vile]], is notable for being one of the most evil beings in the entire franchise. Following the peaceful resolution of the Maverick Wars by the sentient superprogram, the Mother Elf, Weil decided that Reploids needed to pay for their crimes. To this end, Weil corrupted Mother Elf by turning her into the Dark Elf, and triggered the Elf Wars. Weil used the Dark Elf and her children, the Baby Elves, to control Reploids and force them to fight each other in massive battles, which resulted in the deaths of 90% of all Reploids and 60% of all humans. Defeated, exiled and transferred into a mechanical body for his crimes, Weil eventually returned one hundred years later, consumed with a thirst for vengeance directed at all life for the perceived crimes against him. Weaseling his way into becoming the supreme ruler of Neo Arcadia, Weil turns it into a [[DystopiaJustifiesTheMeans dystopian hellhole]]. When he breaks his citizens to the point where they're desperate enough to risk escaping into the wastelands to form their own colony, Weil decides to obliterate their new home with a KillSat. When his KillSat is disabled, Weil attempts to [[ColonyDrop drop it upon the colony]], killing everyone in the region. Cruel, megalomaniacal and displaying an unprecedented level of sadism in the series, Weil reveled in the suffering of others and desired nothing less than to make human and reploid alike feel like their existences were living deaths.

* EnjoyTheStorySkipTheGame: Some fans are taken aback by how NintendoHard it is, but these games generally are considered to have the best story in the Mega Man franchise. Luckily, the ''Zero/ZX Legacy Collection'' has the Casual Scenario mode which eliminates the difficulty altogether for those who just want to enjoy the story.

** At the end of the first game, Cyber-Elf X starts projecting an image of himself in a blue robe when talking to Zero. A Cyber-Elfy halo appears above his head in this form.

* MoralEventHorizon: Copy X crossed the line in the first game by committing genocide against the Reploids.

** The ''Mega Man Zero/ZX Legacy Collection'' has almost the same features as the aforementioned ''Zero Collection''. The lower screen artwork has been reworked into a dedicated Gallery menu. A new Save Assist system is introduced, removing the tedium of losing lives. The ''Legacy Collection'' also features original music and remixes of the most iconic tracks of the series, as well as a speedrun minigame in the form of Z-Chaser. Finally, you can switch between the Japanese and Western versions of the games as you like.

** Neige with Craft and Andrew with his wife, some of the most blatant examples in the entire [[strike: series]] franchise

* RonTheDeathEater: A rare example ''by the creator himself.'' Originally, [[spoiler: [[WhatCouldHaveBeen X was to become a tyrannical]] KnightTemplar [[WhatCouldHaveBeen dictator]], but ExecutiveMeddling prevented this at the last second, as Capcom thought it was too dark. Although Keiji Inafune likely had a reason for X becoming bad... at least, we can see the potential of it from the backstory for this game.]]

** While the Cyber-Elf mechanic isn't bad by itself, the first game punished the player with a lower rank for using them ''at all'' despite them being a major selling point. Later games toned this aspect down by only punishing the player for using the more GameBreaker Cyber-Elves, and finally just giving the player one Cyber-Elf that they can upgrade however they want, and only punishing them for overpowering it.
** The weapon proficiency system in the first game is also considered to be a pain. Because of his memory loss Zero needs to "relearn" many basic techniques, such as multiple Z-Saber slashes. This can require many players to level grind just to stand against early bosses effectively. In addition the retry system is also dated due to lives being very rare. Meaning that if you lose all your retries in a level you will need to either start from the last save point or give up the mission, and in the case of the later you don't get your retries back. Thankfully these were both improved upon in the sequels.
** While the Form System of ''Zero 2'' is most certainly not this, the acquisition of Ultimate Form most definitely is. Like with the first game's Ultimate Mode, earning it requires you to use all Cyber-Elves by the final boss, and this form is earned upon loading that game's save file. Unfortunately, that means that your Cyber-Elf use from the previous game is carried over, and therefore getting anything higher than D Rank is impossible. Worse, unlike the other games, there is no option to start a completely new game with this Ultimate Form, meaning you cannot have both A/S Rank and Ultimate Form ever, no matter how many times you start a NewGamePlus from that same file. Only in ''Collection''[='s=] Easy Mode can you have both Ultimate Form and a rank above D. This is probably why the requirement for Ultimate Mode in ''3'' and ''4'' completely dropped the need to use all Cyber-Elves and simply required collecting each game's respective collectibles (plus fully growing your Cyber-Elf in the case of ''4'').

* ThatOneAttack:
** Fenri Lunaedge from ''4'' shouldn't be that bad. Sure, he has an icy floor that can make dodging his wheel jumps a little tricky, but he constantly leaves himself open to punishment from the buster. The fight might take a while because it just simply isn't safe to be next to him and combo him with the Z-Saber (he has an attack with very little wind-up where he just stabs you if you're too close), but it should be easy, right? '''No'''. Fenri has two attacks that are pure and utter hell to avoid:
*** The first, Tenrō Shikku, is described on the actual wiki as ''looking impossible to avoid'', mostly because it absolutely does. Fenri leaps diagonally towards the wall away from him, letting out an energy slash in front of him, before dashing to the other wall unleashing two more slashes, before jumping to the opposite side from where he started while throwing out another energy slash. There is no way a player will ever figure out how to dodge the attack short of looking up a video of Fenri's fight online, because the 'solution' to it is so backwards. You have to ''dash towards him during the first attack'', [[ViolationOfCommonSense which looks like it's the absolute last thing you should be doing]], dash back, then dash jump between Fenri and the last attack. Good luck figuring that out on your own. You won't.
*** The other attack is his EX Skill attack, White Fang. It's deceptively simple; he unleashes two energy waves, one from the ground, one from the air. All you have to do to dodge it is climb the wall and then fall. Problem is, falling from the wall can be a little finicky to do given it's more than likely you'll hug it again as you go down, getting yourself caught by the second energy wave. Not only that, Fenri can spam it as many times as he wants - it's not unusual for him to do it three times, and there's no real tell for when he's going to do it again and when he's going to stop.

** Kuwagust Anchus from ''Zero 2'' becomes nigh-impossible on Hard Mode if you have an A or S rank. He moves quickly and his grab moves are hard to avoid, especially one that comes after he sucked you in with his tornado. His A/S rank attack is really hard to dodge: He has to be attacked, ''in-flight'', to avoid taking damage, while you're troubled with the wind blowing against you. You have to attack him ''enough'' or you'll eat quite some damage. [[GuideDangIt The game doesn't hint at that at all.]] Or you can just hit him once with chain rod with right timing to derail his attack, as shown [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiQm2R4PcXQ here]].
** Phoenix Magnion from the same game is also positively confusing. He'll avoid your initial attacks and then counterattack with one of his own, at random. He's fond of TeleportSpam, especially after you attack him. He can only be attacked while he's launching an offense of his own. Worse, the area has "holes" where blasts of magma will shoot out at intervals; during your first fight, depending on which room you're fighting him, the holes are either scarce or covering the entire floor. During the rematch, the design is ''always'' the latter one.

** One of the most infamous missions in the series is a Protect the Factory section from the first game. After beating the boss, you need to find and disarm 8 bombs scattered around the level. Finding the bomb locations isn't a hard task by any means, but three of them are placed in a very tricky spot - a section with floating platforms and lots of [[GoddamnedBats flying enemies]]. The main problem comes from the small field of view and inability to look around, all of which leads to constant leaps of faith and mission retries after yet another failed landing. It's also the only level in the game that starts right from the boss fight, which more likely means developers ''knew'' that the mission is already hard as hell, so they save players trouble of completing the bomb section from the start after losing the boss battle.
** Neo Arcadia Shrine, part 1. The [[GoddamnedBats annoying bird enemies]] are bad enough, but there are also {{Temporary Platform}}s that have no side grip, shoot bullets downward, leave no margin for error, and are placed above enemies which you will likely land on should you fall. There's also ''three bosses'': Pantheon Aces, Asura Basura, and Herculious Anchus.

* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: Some fans aren't too fond of Zero's new human-like design, or at the very least feel that [[spoiler:Omega's final form should have resembled Zero's ''Mega Man X'' appearance instead of his redesign]].

** Even if they chose to abandon the original plan where X was the villain of the first game in favor of having Copy X, they still could have made it so that some of the foreshadowing from the ''Mega Man X'' series didn't go to waste. After ''X4'' had Zero be visibly uncomfortable when X wanted him to promise to kill him should he become a Maverick, Zero finds out that the X he will fight is a copy right before the final stage and thus has no qualms about fighting Copy X because he knows that he is not really former best friend, and Copy X freely admits that he is a copy instead of following through with the masquerade that he is the same reploid and using it to try to [[HeroicBSOD break Zero]]. Even then, much of Zero and Copy X's dialogue concerns how Zero feels that Copy X doesn't live up to the original without exploring how the latter is a ShadowArchetype representing a path the real X could have taken (and was going to, [[spoiler:which dialogue from the real X confirms was something he was very close to doing [[HeWhoFightsMonsters after fighting for so long]] and the reason for why he chooses to leave the rest up to Zero]]).
** Harpuia, Fefnir, and Leviathan all [[spoiler: died when Omega's body exploded]] at the end of ''Zero 3'', but unless the player payed attention to WordOfGod, they'd assume they simply disappeared with no explanation. All things considered, some believed they should have had a better sendoff, either in ''Zero 3'' or ''Zero 4''.

** [[BigGood X]]. [[spoiler:The only cure for the virus that they had worked tirelessly in looking for for well over a century is weaponized into a living maverick-maker. His best friend's body is stolen and converted into an ultimate weapon that wipes out most of the planet's already-perilous population, with Zero going into an intended-eternal stasis, leaving X with basically no shoulder to lean on for moral support. He's forced to manage the virtual entirety of the world's remaining population and all maverick activity by himself and effectively kill his body in order to seal the aforementioned corrupted cure which not only leaves him off, but his soul is then split into fifths. X is forced to watch as the Copy made to take his place ruins the haven that he had so desperately fought to create and preserve and his "offspring" are then tricked into being assassins and strongarms for the sociopathic copy. Finally, X is murdered in his comatose state by a villain who just wanted the Dark Elf in a screwed-up and misguided attempt to save all reploids from further retirement and destruction. X did not even get a chance to fight back against his assassin. He finally spends the rest of the following game slowly, slowly dying and using every precious ounce of power for the sake of others.]]

* CompleteMonster: [[BigBad Dr. Weil]], known in Japan as [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Dr. Vile]], only appears in a few games, yet is notable for being one of the most evil beings in the entire franchise. Following the peaceful resolution of the Maverick Wars by the sentient superprogram, the Mother Elf, Weil decided that Reploids needed to pay for their crimes. To this end, Weil corrupted Mother Elf by turning her into the Dark Elf, and triggered the Elf Wars. Weil used the Dark Elf and her children, the Baby Elves, to control Reploids and force them to fight each other in massive battles, which resulted in the deaths of 90% of all Reploids and 60% of all humans. Defeated, exiled and transferred into a mechanical body for his crimes, Weil eventually returned one hundred years later, consumed with a thirst for vengeance directed at all life for the perceived crimes against him. Weaseling his way into becoming the supreme ruler of Neo Arcadia, Weil turns it into a [[DystopiaJustifiesTheMeans dystopian hellhole]]. When he breaks his citizens to the point where they're desperate enough to risk escaping into the wastelands to form their own colony, Weil decides to obliterate their new home with a KillSat. When his KillSat is disabled, Weil attempts to [[ColonyDrop drop it upon the colony]], killing everyone in the region. Cruel, megalomaniacal and displaying an unprecedented level of sadism in the series, Weil reveled in the suffering of others and desired nothing less than to make human and reploid alike feel like their existences were living deaths.

** Copy X. If his first form full of angelic wings isn't enough, in his OneWingedAngel form, he almost literally turned into a seraphic angel. Add to the fact that he's fighting Zero, a crimson-horned reploid.

** In ''VideoGame/MegaMan7'', Megaman tries to kill Dr. Wily, but is unable to due to his programming before deciding to settle for simply capturing him again in later games. Likewise, Dr. Light's fear of X breaking the first rule of robotics was why X was sealed before ''VideoGame/MegaManX1''. While ''VideoGame/MegaManX4'' reveals that Sigma's ego played a part in the events leading to his corruption and resulting wars, this series shows that Dr. Light was misguided: the first rule is important, but people like Dr. Weil or Dr. Wily just don't deserve that kind of protection- the robot hero killing the human villain is what finally ended the fighting here, and would've ended it 200 years sooner, but without the massive death and destruction from the Maverick Wars.

* EnsembleDarkHorse:
** Despite only serving as a recurring antagonist for the first three games, Harpuia is beloved for being one of the most well developed characters in the franchise, as well as for being a NobleDemon that becomes increasingly more sympathetic as the series progresses.
** Pretty much ''every'' Guardian has some degree of darkhorse status; they all have really fun fights, they're all interesting characters, and something unique to each one makes them stand out. Leviathan is one of very few ''Mega Man'' water bosses to combine high mobility with difficult attacks for a fun fight (as opposed to most water and ice aligned bosses, who are dull and slow), Phantom just ''in general'' oozes RuleOfCool (he ''rides a shuriken while throwing more shurikens at you''), and Fefnir is HotBlooded in all the right ways. It's no wonder they functionally became 'playable' as Biometals in the [[VideoGame/MegaManZX sequel series.]] [[spoiler: Plus, three of them (Harpuia, Leviathan, and Fefnir) pull off a pretty cool HeroicSacrifice to help Zero beat Omega, and Phantom has a really fun BonusBoss fight in ''3''.]]

*** Somehow, Harpuia got ''easier.'' Besides his EX attack, he heavily telegraphs every attack he makes, and while his AI isn't as broken as it was last game, he can ''still'' be knocked into a predictable, easily dodged combo. The only way he'll pose any threat is let you set up his Options and do ''nothing'' to immediately destroy them; which more or less means standing there and doing nothing.

* BreatherBoss: In the first game:
** Anubis Necromancess III's attacks are relatively easy to dodge, although both the Zombies and the scepter deal a lot of damage. The technique of the crushing structures is fairly easy to avoid.
** Fairy Leviathan is arguably the easiest of the four Guardians normally. She makes up for it later, while Fefnir actually got somewhat weaker. Harpuia in the first game, however, stands out as being a [[AIBreaker total idiot]] who doesn't know what to do about being hit with ice attacks. He will always respond to one with the same attack where he sends three shockwaves, one low, one high, and another one low. This takes long enough that you can build up another charge, even without a fully leveled weapon (or in Hard Mode where the Shield Boomerang is the only thing you can charge) and weave through to clock him again. Rinse, repeat, and he's down with minimal effort.

* EndingAversion: Over a decade later, there are still some fans who take issue with [[spoiler:Zero's death on the grounds that he should have at least been allowed to live long enough to see the better world his efforts created. ''Mega Man ZX'' having him reborn as Model Z gives him that chance, but some still aren't satisfied.]]

* FoeYay: Three of the Four Guardians have this going on with the titular Zero (the ones that aren't Phantom).

** The Eight Gentle Judges are said to have been built by Weil himself. This explains how they immediately started supporting him as soon as he and Omega returned to Neo Arcadia, and how Omega was simply sentenced to exile instead of being executed (while Weil might have been exempt from it due to [[ThreeLawsOfRobotics human privilege]], Omega is a Reploid and by all manner of laws a Maverick). However, given the drastic personality changes between their time as the Judges and Weil's return, were they [[BitchInSheepsClothing pretending to be benevolent and impartial until Weil returned]], or were they [[ManchurianAgent unaware that Weil created them and their personalities changed on a trigger]]?

* GoodBadBug: The Orbit Shield. Basically, there are two flavors. The first is where you throw the Shield Boomerang, then rush forward and start jumping over it so that you don't catch it and it goes in a circle indefinitely, and the other is the "automatic" version where you jump and throw it against something it'll bounce off of, allowing you to stand idle and let it do its thing (orbit around you, hence the name). While its utility is pretty limited, it makes for a fantastic method of leveling up the Shield Boomerang by making it so you don't have to charge it over and over, as you can do the automatic version in both Zero 1 and Zero 2 (In Z1 on the infinitely recovering tower enemies in the overworld version of the second stage, destroy one block of them first and bounce it off the top, and in Phoenix Magnion's stage in Z2, off the infinitely rising lava buckets). The manual version can also be used to farm kills in Burble Hekelot's stage for the Defense Form without wasting precious time charging it over and over (on the pair of enemies that jump up from the bottom of the screen together and spawn infinitely, before entering the temple portion).

** The Eight Gentle Judges are said to have been built by Weil himself, which explains how they immediately started supporting him as soon as he and Omega returned to Neo Arcadia, and how Omega was simply got sentenced to exile instead of being executed (while Weil might have been exempt from it due to [[ThreeLawsOfRobotics human privilege]], Omega is a Reploid and would have legally been deemed a Maverick). However, given the drastic personality changes between their times as the Judges and Weil's return, were they [[BitchInSheepsClothing pretending to be benevolent and impartial until Weil returned]], or were they [[ManchurianAgent unaware that Weil created them and their personalities changed on a trigger]]?

*** The other attack is his EX Skill attack, White Fang. It's deceptively simple; unleash two energy waves, one from the ground, one from the air. All you have to do to dodge it is climb the wall and then fall. Problem is, falling from the wall can be a little finicky to do given it's more than likely you'll hug it again as you go down, getting yourself caught by second energy wave. Not only that, Fenri can spam it as many times as he wants - it's not unusual for him to do it three times, and there's no real tell for when he's going to do it again and when he's going to stop.

** Fenri Lunaedge from ''4'' shouldn't be that bad. Sure, he has an icy floor that can make dodging his wheel jumps a little tricky, but he constantly leaves himself open to punishment from the buster. The fight might take a while because it just simply isn't safe to be next to him and combo him with the Z-Saber (he has an attack with very little wind-up where he just stabs you if you're too close), but it should be easy, right? '''No.''' Fenri has two attacks that are pure and utter hell to avoid:
*** The first, Tenrō Shikku, is described on the actual wiki as ''looking impossible to avoid,'' mostly because it absolutely does. Fenri leaps diagonally towards the wall away from him, letting out an energy slash in front of him, before dashing to the other wall unleashing two more slashes, before jumping to the opposite side from where he started while throwing out another energy slash. There is no way a player will ever figure out how to dodge the attack short of looking up a video of Fenri's fight online, because the 'solution' to it is so backwards. You have to ''dash towards him during the first attack,'' [[ViolationOfCommonSense which looks like it's the absolute last thing you should be doing,]] dash back, then dash jump between Fenri and the last attack. Good luck figuring that out on your own. You won't.

*** The ''worst'' part about all this is if you fight him at a rank where he'll decide to use White Fang; both Tenrō Shikku and White Fang have pretty quick wind-ups, meaning you need to begin dodging them almost as soon as you see the tell. The problem? ''The tells for both attacks are almost identical.'' The only difference is that Fenri will lift his head slightly for Tenrō Shikku. This sounds like it should make it easy to preempt the attack, but in practice the player will be so on edge about getting the actual dodge for each attack done correctly that it can be easy to choke and begin the wrong dodge for the attack Fenri uses. ''Mercifully,'' Fenri is incredibly fragile, so if you take out Sol Titanion first you might be able to whittle him down quickly enough to where he doesn't use these two attacks often, and Fenri won't actually enter a stunned animation from getting hit with fire if he's about to use Tenrō Shikku, so that makes the tell a little more obvious.

** Neo Arcadia Shrine, part 1. The [[GoddamnedBats annoying bird enemies]] are bad enough, but there are also {{Temporary Platform}}s that have no side grip, ''shoot bullets downward'', leave no margin for error, and are placed above enemies which you will likely land on should you fall. There's also ''three bosses''.
** Neo Arcadia ''Tower'' due to the abundance of SpikesOfDoom all over the level.

** Harpuia, Fefnir, and Leviathan all [[spoiler: died when Omega's body exploded]] at the end of ''Mega Man Zero 3,'' but unless the player payed attention to WordOfGod, they'd assume they simply disappeared with no explanation. All things considered, some believed they should have had a better sendoff, either in ''Zero 3'' or ''Zero 4.''
* ToughActToFollow: Not the games, but the music. The Classic and X series became so remembered by their awesome music that the music of the first ''Mega Man Zero'' was perceived as forgettable because it could not measure up to those of the other series. The sequels sought to have better music.
* TrueArtIsAngsty: The ''Mega Man Zero'' series is by far the darkest the franchise has ever gone, and yet it's often held up as some of the finest the franchise has ever offered in terms of writing and characterization, with little of the {{Narm}} that made some of the ''X'' series attempts fall flat.

** Polar Kamrous, despite the matching build and deep voice, is female. Weirdly enough, the Complete Works book refers to Kamrous as [[FlipFlopOfGod male.]]

* WinBackTheCrowd: The first game impressed after the disappointing ''VideoGame/MegaManX6'', and the ''Zero'' series continued to improve despite the ''X'' series declining even further with ''[[VideoGame/MegaManX7 X7]]''.

* {{Woolseyism}}: Some of the boss' names are changed overseas. In particular, Dr. Weil's name was originally Dr. Vile. There's already [[VideoGame/MegaManX another guy who's named Vile]] (who is originally called [[Franchise/StarWars V]][[ShoutOut A]][[WritingAroundTrademarks VA]]), so the name change is to avoid confusion. If pronounced in German, it can still be read as "vile". There's also the fact that it's quite meaningful in its own right (being the BigBad, Dr. Weil is the Dr. Wily of the Zero series).

*** The ''worst'' part about all this is if you fight him at a rank where he'll decide to use White Fang; both Tenrō Shikku and White Fang have pretty quick wind-ups, meaning you need to begin dodging them almost as soon as you see the tell. The problem? ''The tells for both attacks are almost identical.'' The only difference is that Fenri will lift his head slightly for Tenrō Shikku. This sounds like it should make it easy to preempt the attack, but in practice the player will be so on edge about getting the actual dodge for each attack done correctly that it can be easy to joke and begin the wrong dodge for the attack Fenri uses. ''Mercifully,'' Fenri is incredibly fragile, so if you take out Sol Titanion first you might be able to whittle him down quickly enough to where he doesn't use these two attacks often, and Fenri won't actually enter a stunned animation from getting hit with fire if he's about to use Tenrō Shikku, so that makes the tell a little more obvious.

*** The first, Tenrō Shikku, is described on the actual wiki as ''looking impossible to avoid,'' mostly because it absolutely does. Fenri leaps diagonally towards the wall away from him, letting out an energy slash in front of him, before dashing to the other wall unleashing two more slashes, before jumping to the opposite side from where he started while throwing out another energy slash. There is no way a player will ever figure out how to dodge the attack short of looking up a video of Fenri's fight online, because the 'solution' to it is so backwards. [[ViolationOfCommonSense ''You have to dash towards him during the first attack,'' which looks like it's the absolute last thing you should be doing,]] dash back, then dash jump between Fenri and the last attack. Good luck figuring that out on your own. You won't.

*** The first, Tenrō Shikku, is described on the actual wiki as ''looking impossible to avoid,'' mostly because it absolutely does. Fenri leaps diagonally towards the wall away from him, letting out an energy slash in front of him, before dashing to the other wall unleashing two more slashed, before jumping to the opposite side from where he started while throwing out another energy slash. There is no way a player will ever figure out how to dodge the attack short of looking up a video of Fenri's fight online, because the 'solution' to it is so backwards. [[ViolationOfCommonSense ''You have to dash towards him during the first attack,'' which looks like it's the absolute last thing you should be doing,]] dash back, then dash jump between Fenri and the last attack. Good luck figuring that out on your own. You won't.

* ThatOneBoss:

** Second game: The first level, remembered for its music. Also the [[spoiler:"Elpizo stabbing X" scene and the subsequent TransformationSequence of Elpizo]].
** Third game: The fight against Omega and TheReveal that [[spoiler:he is in Zero's original body.]]

** During the ''Alouette's Good Day'' audio drama, Rouge and Joan starting going at each other over the names they've chosen for the two baby elves. It's mostly meant to be funny, but during the discussion Joan points out that Rouge's simulation for Operation Righteous Strike would fall apart under even minimal scrutiny. Joan is proven tragically correct halfway into ''2'' where the entire operation gets every participant besides Elpizo killed, and reduces Elpizo to [[LaughingMad something much worse.]]
* HesJustHiding: Since even official materials go back and forth on whether or not [[spoiler:Zero]] died on Ragnarok and [[spoiler:he]] has a history of doing this, a common fan belief is that [[spoiler:Zero]] survived somehow and just vanished. Made even more confusing in ''VideoGame/MegaManZX'' since [[spoiler:Zero ''does'' reappear, but as a Biometal. Because of this, it doesn't give either argument anything to work with]].

* ItWasHisSled: Dr Weil and Copy X's very existences are common knowledge by now. [[spoiler: Also, Zero's body being a copy of the original Zero along with Omega's true nature and Zero's DyingMomentOfAwesome.]]

** Phantom is this when compared to the other Guardians. Unlike the others, he's NonElemental, thus he has no weakness. You can interrupt most of the other Guardians' attacks; for Phantom, you can only intercept his DashAttack. He also plays it nasty with said attack - if you jump over it, he'll quickly dash back to you; if you interrupt it, he may sometimes resume the attack. He also has a DoppelgangerSpin attack where, if you hit the wrong Phantom, he'll do a powerful counterattack; he might also quickly dash at you if you're close to the real him. Some temporary phantoms may appear when Phantom is using the doppelganer spin and contact with them causes big damage. During the second fight with him, he has a KaizoTrap attack should you defeat him. In the secret fight against him in the third game, a number of his attacks are upgraded - his FuumaShuriken move shoots spreads of kunai multiple times, and his zigzag floating move has him spamming spreads of kunai while floating. On the ''other'' hand, given the secret fight takes place in Cyberspace, where you have unrestricted access to ''all'' of your Cyber Elves' powers, even this upgraded fighting style [[CantCatchUp can be overcomed much more easily]].

* SurprisinglyImprovedSequel: While ''Zero 1'' overall is considered a decent game, it also has its issues both gameplay and story-wise and many consider it the weakest in its respective series and not the kind of game that would reach the all-time greats in the series as a whole. Luckily, ''Zero 2'' streamlines the grinding issues ''Zero 1'' has in both Cyber-Elf and weapon skill department, introduces EX skills you could acquire by beating a boss with Rank A or S (thus giving actual incentive to go for such ranks and suffer the wrath of an entirely new attack outside of being a hardcore player), replaces the divisive Triple Rod with a more convenient Chain Rod and includes two additional Sub-tanks meaning you don't ''have'' to risk any Cyber-elves for having two health back-ups and thus lower the rank. It also puts a much larger emphasis on the story and characterization compared to the rather barebones plot in Zero 1, something the later games would follow up on and which the series as a whole would be known for.
* ThatOneAchievement: Getting the 2 minigames in the third game requires you to beat the game with perfect 100 points in your average score. This means completing ''every'' mission perfectly - complete every subobjective, beat levels quickly, kill a minimum amount of enemies and take no more than a small amount of damage. Oh, and not using your elves (at least not the Fusion ones) or entering Cyberspace.

* EnsembleDarkHorse: Despite only serving as a recurring antagonist for the first three games, Harpuia is beloved for being one of the most well developed characters in the franchise, as well as for being a NobleDemon that becomes increasingly more sympathetic as the series progresses.

* HarsherInHindsight: During the ''Alouette's Good Day'' audio drama, Rouge and Joan starting going at each other over the names they've chosen for the two baby elves. It's mostly meant to be funny, but during the discussion Joan points out that Rouge's simulation for Operation Righteous Strike would fall apart under even minimal scrutiny. Joan is proven tragically correct halfway into ''2'' where the entire operation gets every participant besides Elpizo killed, and reduces Elpizo to [[LaughingMad something much worse.]]

* MemeticMutation: "WARE WA MESSIAH NARI!! HAHAHAHA!!"[[note]]I will be the Messiah!! Hahahaha![[/note]] [[spoiler: Said by Omega when confronting Zero after the latter learns his body is a copy of the original possessed by Omega.]] [[EvilIsHammy The delivery of the line]] with the dramatic music is what sells it.

* The Eight Gentle Judges are said to have been built by Weil himself, which explains how they immediately started supporting him as soon as he and Omega returned to Neo Arcadia, and how Omega was simply got sentenced to exile instead of being executed (while Weil might have been exempt from it due to [[ThreeLawsOfRobotics human privilege]], Omega is a Reploid and would have legally been deemed a Maverick). However, given the drastic personality changes between their times as the Judges and Weil's return, were they [[BitchInSheepsClothing pretending to be benevolent and impartial until Weil returned]], or were they [[ManchurianAgent unaware that Weil created them and their personalities changed on a trigger]]?

* SoOkayItsAverage: ''Zero 1'' falls under this category and is considered the weakest in the saga even though it's still slightly better than just plain average. Common criticism includes a relatively lackluster plot and heavy reliance on grinding to obtain more weapon skills and when farming E-crystals for Cyber-elves. And speaking of Cyber-elves, the fact that using them lowers the hunter rank and are the only collectibles in the game is considered a ScrappyMechanic. Overall, the game is hard to recommend stand-alone but is otherwise required due to ContinuityLockout of the subsequent games. Luckily, all of the mentioned issues were improved in the sequels.

* SoOkayItsAverage: ''Zero 1'' falls under this category and is considered the weakest in the saga even though it's still slightly better than just plain average. Common criticism includes a relatively lackluster plot and heavy reliance on grinding to obtain more weapon skills and when farming E-crystals for Cyber-elves. And speaking of Cyber-elves, the fact that using them lowers the hunter rank and are the only collectibles in the game is considered a ScrappyMechanic. Luckily, all of these aspects were improved in subsequent games.