For a description of what these stats mean, see the
Stat Explanation page.
- Open Menu: No
- Charge Up: Yes*
- Lose Charge: No**
- Horizontal Recoil: Variable
- Vertical Recoil: N/A
- Shots On Screen: Yes
- Fall Off Ladder: N/A
- Paused Refills: No
* You can start charging while the boss’s meter is refilling, but not during the rest of the boss’s intro. If you release the button before the game gives you control, you lose your shot (and it’s difficult to tell when you have control, sometimes...).
** If you try to shoot and get hit at the same time, you lose your shot.
X’s Weapons
Uses: 4 units (6 charged)
Crystal Wall
X forms a wall of crystal on the ground which stands there taking hits. It will also damage enemies that run into it. You can shoot through it. If you bump into it yourself, it falls over and breaks. Unlike the
Ice Wall, you can’t stand on your own walls. (You can stand on Trilobyte’s.) When charged, the walls that X forms have life or weapon energy capsules embedded in them. This can be a good way to quickly refill your health if you are in danger. Just form a wall, then knock it over and claim your prize. This is also this game’s form of the
Rush Search: depending on where you put the wall, you might pull up other objects (like rare metals) instead of the random energy. Note that you can only have one wall formed at a time; pressing the special weapon button when there is already a wall on the screen has no effect. Also you have to be on the ground to use this.
Characteristics: Multidirectional
Drift Diamond
Fires a V-shaped spread shot. Anything hit by the shot is frozen. When charged, X surrounds himself with some shards of ice which circle him in spirals, and if any enemies come into bodily contact with the shards circling X, they are frozen.
Uses: 6 units (4 charged)
Green Spinner
Shoots large green missiles forward that explode into sphere-shaped fiery bursts when they hit something. When charged, X shoots a missile off the top of the screen; moments later, several missiles come raining back down.
Uses: 3 units (4 charged)
Melt Creeper
Sends bursts of flames across the ground. This will go for a decent distance before it wears out on its own. When charged, the flames go in both directions from X, instead of just forward. You have to be on the ground to use this, and you can only have one fire burst on the screen at a time.
Shadow Runner
A black-purple shot circles around, homing in on an enemy and circling it tightly before dissipating. When charged, several larger bursts come out all at once, and chase after enemies for a good few seconds before disappearing.
Characteristics: Multidirectional
Shining Ray
This shoots a colorful sphere upward which bursts into rays that shine in eight different directions. Can’t be fired while in the air, which somewhat limits its positioning. When charged, this forms what are essentially fireworks: multiple bursts of the eight-pointed rays.
Uses: 2 units (4 charged)
Squeeze Bomb
Creates a black hole which will draw in and absorb certain enemy shots. The ball moves slowly forward. When charged, this creates a large black hole in X’s location which fills the screen briefly, then goes away.
Characteristics: Auto-Aim
Thunder Dancer
Shoots a short-ranged laser of lightning toward the nearest enemy. When it hits an enemy, sparks of lightning seem to stick on the enemy for a few seconds, possibly doing multiple hits of damage and stunning it. Bounces from enemy to enemy. When charged, it’s basically the same thing, only the lightning bolt is slightly bigger and forked.
X’s Special Moves
These are granted based on the armor X is wearing.
Also Known As: Giga Crush
Obtained From: Icarus Armor
Giga Crash
This is basically the Giga Crush from other games. Press the special weapon button while not equipped with a weapon to activate this. Although it doesn’t always look like it, this hits all enemies on the screen. One use requires your entire weapon energy bar, but the Giga Crash slowly recharges its energy over time. You can actually use this to weaker effect even when the weapon meter is not full, so you don’t have to wait for the meter to completely fill to use it.
Obtained From: Hermes Armor
X-Drive
Press the special weapon button while not equipped with a weapon to activate this. While active, all of X’s abilities are increased, and the weapon meter slowly decreases. The effect wears off when the weapon meter runs out of energy. The X-Drive slowly recharges over time.
Obtained From: Ultimate Armor
Motion: Special weapon (while in air)
Nova Strike
This is a large air-dash that can damage enemies. Press the special weapon button while not equipped with a weapon. You have to be in the air. A single Nova Strike uses the entire weapon meter of energy, but the meter refills relatively quickly.
Axl’s Weapons
Black Arrow
Axl’s gun looks like a crossbow and shoots black-purple shots. If you fire when there are no enemies around, the shots simply arc toward the floor. Otherwise, they home in on the enemies. The arrows from this weapon actually stick briefly to walls and floors and other objects they strike, which is amusing.
Blast Launcher
This one’s fun. Axl shoots grenades that bounce to the ground in an arc, then explode. He can have up to three on the screen at once (ones that are busy exploding don’t count). This may be a guard break. Remember that Axl can aim grenades in any direction, just like all of his other weapons. Shooting a grenade upward, for example, might help you to get it to land in just the right spot.
Bound Blaster
This shoots colorful ring shots that bounce off walls and the floor and such. Quite entertaining. However Axl can only have so many shots on the screen at once, of course, so the rapid-fire aspect of this is a bit limited by that (since the shots take a while to bounce around before they disappear).
Flame Burner
This is a flamethrower. Lots of fun, but short range. It can set some enemies on fire.
Ice Gatling
Shoots rapid bursts of ice shards which freeze enemies when they hit.
Plasma Gun
Shoots a wedge-shaped burst of forked lightning. Extremely short ranged. This is a guard break.
Ray Gun
Fires small blue laser beams.
Spiral Magnum
Shoots small bullets that leave spiral trails behind them. The bullets can go through walls and other obstacles.
Zero’s Techniques
Motion: Special weapon (while standing)
Dairettsui
You get this when equipped with the T Breaker. Zero swings the hammer downward and slams it on the ground, producing a small shockwave.
Also Known As: Enjoukyaku
Motion: Down + special weapon (while in air)
Enkoujin
This is a flaming down-stab. Zero seems to get one in every game. On the other hand, they tend to be universally useful. The K Knuckle’s variation (Enjoukyaku) goes diagonally down instead of straight.
Also Known As: Shouryuuken
Motion: Up + special weapon (while standing)
Hyouryuushou
Zero spirals upward, and anything he hits that is vulnerable gets frozen. (Amusingly, when Yeti uses this himself, he says the same name of the attack.) When you are using the K Knuckle, this is the same attack but it gets a new (somewhat more familiar) name.
Also Known As: Ganzanha
Motion: Special weapon (while standing)
Juuhazan
This is a very slow but large overhand slash which breaks through guards. With the K Knuckle equipped the attack is called “Ganzanha” and is a lot smaller and faster.
Also Known As: Raijinken
Motion: Special weapon (while dashing)
Raikousen
Zero vanishes for a split second, and reappears a short distance ahead of where he had been, and produces a horizontal slash of lightning. He can do this in the air too, via an air-dash. The easiest way to pull this off is to roll your thumb over dash and the special weapon buttons, hitting dash slightly before the special weapon button. Can stun enemies. When you have the K Knuckle equipped, Zero dashes forward while trailing sparks, then finishes with a vertical lightning bolt.
Also Known As: Senpuukyaku
Motion: Special weapon (while in air)
Rasetsusen
Hold down the special weapon button while in the air, and Zero will hang in midair spinning. After a few seconds he drops to the ground, or you can speed this up by pressing down, down-right, or down-left while spinning to cause him to move in that direction while still spinning. When you have the K Knuckle equipped, Zero spins horizontally surrounded with purplish energy.
Also Known As: Zekkyoudan
Rekkyoudan
Allows Zero’s saber to deflect enemy shots. This gets applied to his weapon automatically. The B Fan’s version seems to come with it.
Motion: Down + special weapon (while standing)
Tenshouha
Zero forms what is similar to the
Volt Tornado where he is standing. It doesn’t move, and Zero himself can’t move for several seconds of recovery time after he does it. The tornado-like laser beam lasts a set time. Requires weapon energy.
Also Known As: Renyoudan
Motion: Left or right + special weapon (while standing)
Youdantotsu
Zero stabs forward with the saber. This is a guard break attack. When using the D Glaive weapon’s version (Renyoudan), the attack changes slightly, and Zero jabs rapidly multiple times.
Zero’s Blades
Zero can change weapons, replacing his traditional saber with other kinds of energy blades. You build these weapons in the Chip Dev lab. To change to a new weapon, switch to the “Item” page of the subscreen and select the new weapon. Zero can use all of his techniques with these blades (although some of them change slightly depending on his current weapon).
Σ Blade
This is Sigma’s sword. Yes, it is. This has good reach and seems to do more damage than Zero’s regular saber. Also, every swing is a guard-break.
B Fan
Kind of a silly weapon; Zero looks ridiculous using it. This can reflect enemy shots by just standing still and letting them bounce off the shield, but since Zero gains a technique from a Maverick that gives him the same ability, I don’t use the fans much.
D Glaive
A ridiculously long lance with a blade on the end. This has great reach, but sometimes it misses enemies that it by all rights should have hit. It also appears to do less damage than Zero’s regular saber.
K Knuckle
Zero has no range with this; you have to get him right up to the enemy and punch them. However, most of his special moves change when he’s using this, and his attacks seem to be more powerful than normal.
T Breaker
This is a huge and ridiculous-looking hammer. But it breaks right through guards as if they aren’t there. Zero seems a little sluggish with this, but no surprise there—he’s lugging around a hammer that’s almost bigger than he is.
Axl’s Transformations
- Guardroid: “Can perform a special salute.” (Can also throw bombs and dash while on the ground, and can wall-jump.)
- Rolleroid: “Can walk on spikes with this.” (This shoots a 3-way rebounding shot, and can wall-jump. Cannot dash.)
- Skyroid: “Can fly in this configuration.” (Only shoots one shot at a time; walks slowly, cannot dash, cannot wall-jump.)
- Sphereoid: “Can walk while crouching.” (Rolls around in ball form. Can dash and jump as a ball. Press
to come out of ball form and be able to attack with punches. Cannot attack while in ball form, and cannot move while not in ball form.)
These are some of the things that you can build in the Chip Dev room.
Chain Combo
The effect that this one seems to have is that the game gives you more time between hits to still be considered a combo. Basically this means you can afford to hunt down enemies over greater distances or spans of time and still add hits to your combo. Note that this has nothing to do with Zero’s saber. Adding slashes to your saber is done using
Saber Skill items.
Chip Discount
Lowers the cost of building other items in the Chip Dev room. Obviously you’ll want to build this as soon as possible.
D.Barrier
The character who builds this has an extended invincibility period after he takes a hit. This can really reduce the overall damage you take in some situations.
Escape Boost
According to the game, this allows you to escape from holds easier. I’ve never really put it to the test because I always tag-team out of them.
Hyper AT
This increases the speed at which your AT gauge fills.
Life Bottle
These recover life energy, but disappear upon use. The half and full versions restore different amounts of energy. (They aren’t exactly “half” and “full” depending on how big your life bar is.)
Life Up
The various Life Up items increase that character’s maximum health. You have to build the first one before you can build the +1, and so forth.
Prickle Barrier
If you have this item and you touch spikes, instead of dying, you are reduced to 1 health and start flashing as if you’d just taken a hit. Get off the spikes fast because if your invincibility wears out you will simply die. Afterward, switch out that character and let him recover some of his health back. Each Prickle Barrier can only be used once, and you can only carry one at a time.
Saber Skill
These items add moves to Zero’s slash combos. What this means is you can keep tapping the button rapidly and Zero will perform additional moves after the standard three. This also helps keep him vulnerable less. Only works with Zero’s default saber.
Shield Armor
Increases the character’s defense, similar to X’s body armors (which, incidentally, is why he can’t build this item).
Shock Absorber
This eliminates your character’s horizontal recoil (as seen
above). The character will just take the hit and keep on going. Sometimes you don’t even notice you took damage.
Spare Energy
If you have this item and one of your characters runs out of health, this will restore some of his health back. Each Spare Energy item can only be used once, and you can only carry one at a time.
Speedy Recovery
I’m not sure exactly what this does, but it may cause your character to recover health faster when he’s on the bench.
Spike Walker
Despite its name, this has nothing to do with walking on spikes. This slows the speed that you slide down walls.
Super Recover
As seen in other games, this increases the amount of energy restored by life and weapon capsules.
Weapon Bottle
Like the Life Bottles, except these restore a weapon’s energy instead.
Weapon Converter
Ignore what the game says about this one. What it really does is restore some energy to your weapon meter whenever you take a hit. When coupled with the power-up items that cause your character’s lost health to turn all red (such as X’s red armor), you can use this to easily restore weapon energy. Just let an enemy hit you intentionally, over and over, until your weapon is full, then switch out and let the character regenerate the health back.
Weapon Up
Same thing as the Life Up, only this increases your character’s maximum weapon energy. Good for X, because he relies heavily on weapon energy, and for Axl to prolong his transformations.
