This Game Can’t Be Replicated 

I think Metroid Dread came pretty close for me. Samus moves so quickly and the toolkit you unlock only makes maneuvering her better. Plus the parry/counter thing is kind of like the sword slice-you can quickly 1 hit enemies with good timing, and on the enemy side the timing for their parryable attacks is tuned well for you to blaze through a level.

I find that Katana Zero does an excellent job with speed, precision, and capturing that flow that when you get it, you feel like a God Gamer.

Actually here's another contender: The Messenger. Speed, precision, flow. I think one of the important parts of making flow is that enemies are obstacles, but the game actually manages to make you want to go and kill them. in Zero most enemies are 1 shot with the sword and often just in your path, so you slash right through them and run/dash/jump along. In Gravity Circuit they do much of the same thing but they take a few more hits, however now they become projectiles so you can chain kills into each other giving you the same feeling of pace as Zero does. In The Messenger your grapple pulls you to enemies, *turning them into your dash* for the game. Also your sword 1 shots most things here too. Though admittedly The Messenger leans a bit more on its precision than speed, comparing it to Zero. I still feel like it does the flow though

Copen in Gunvolt 2 is exactly what one could be looking for Flying through the stage, slicing through enemies with your gun or ex weapons (ice blade in particular) It's very much the flow contrasting with gunvolts more deliberate gameplay

Gravity Circuit is a masterpiece, no doubt about it. It really blew me away. Not only is the movement satisfying, the whole game is brimming with a certain charm and personality that is hard to recreate.

I highly recommend giving Cyber Shadow a look if you haven't already. The difficulty is quite high (but fair) and the dash isn't unlocked until part way through the game, but chaining dash strikes through enemies is one of the most satisfying feelings.

I did 3 playthroughs of Gravity Circuit in the 3 days after it came out. It's a blast start to finish and definitely captures that feeling, even going beyond it and making it more fun in my opinion. 🐾

I instantly recognized that green slashing shape in the thumbnail. The Zero series' flow is so exceptionally snappy and precise that the X games feel downright clunky if you pick one up right after playing a Zero title. I'd say that Copen's gameplay style from Gunvolt 2 and Luminous Avenger iX 1 is the closest Inti came to recapturing the flow of the Zero series in my eyes.

Gunvolt 3's main character IS a sword user, btw. I feel like a lot of people skipped Gunvolt 3 despite it being one of the best 2D character actions games ever in terms of feel.

Heck yeah! I had a blast playing this game! The mega man/zero formula of gameplay will always be one of my favorites, and I’m glad to see more games channel that.

Movement that flows well combined with speed that makes you feel like an absolute gamer, is ART. when listening to the video i also had certain racing games in mind, or wintersports games - when you get to board downhill with speed, through a nice snowscape with all sorts of obstacles, shortcuts and secret passages to discover, it's such a nice feeling.

Donkey Kong Country Returns and Tropical Freeze have a really good sense of flow, but they do it because of the momentum you can build up rather than instant turning and stuff as you have a more weighty feel.

Gravity Circuit was the first game I've played where it felt like the game was teaching me how to speedrun in real time. The level designs just scream "Hit this guy, so you can throw him at that guy, so you can make that jump clean, so you can slide under this stage hazard, etc etc" its an astoundingly good game.

You should try Luminous avenger ix its an spin off of azure striker with a better focus on the "flow": you have a limited number of dashes but every time you bounce to a wall, roof or florr with it reloads, it include enemies and when you bounce to an enemy makes a target lok on so every shot goes to him and that makes the gameplay so fast and smooth Ps : sorry for bad English

Gunvolt 3 has a sword user as the main protagonist and as far as the demo showed me, it works extremely well.

tried gravity circuit because of this video, enjoying it very much so far. I have one circuit left and coming back to this video just makes me wanna keep playing. thank you

Was not expecting to get brain blasted on a random work night when you mentioned Gunvolt man. I played a free demo of it on my 2ds years ago when I was still in school and that brought back some sweet memories! Great vid as always tho dude

Like everyone else recommended, I'd love for you to review the Gunvolt Chronicles: Luminous Avenger iX spinoff, or try Copen's campaign in Gunvolt 2 (the lead character of the spinoff). The speed and precision in both of those games are actually much higher than any Mega Man Zero game, as the gimmick of that is dashing into enemies to lock onto them before shooting homing shots. This means you need to be precise to airdash either forward or even diagonally into enemies which you can easily zip past if you time it wrong. They also have different level gimmicks that accommodate his abilities.

Seeing Gravity Circuit really makes me want to give making a Mega Man Zero-inspired game idea that I've had rattling around in my brain for a while a try

6:31 the wavedash asmr

Inti Creates have done such a good job with the entire Megaman Zero series. I wish they had been able to make more (copium for a futile official ZX 3). Seeing the combo tech refined throughout the Zero series feels great and is very rewarding to learn and master. . Even after playing other action platformers, the MMZ-ZX series is what i always get back to, especially Zero 3 and ZX. . Gunvolt was great and i think they tried to get back "melee" from Zero by introducing Kirin in GV3, and i think it works well if you unlock XX mode.

This is such a fun topic! It's less anything scientific and more about the vibe of games. I'm sure we all have those games that have one or two aspects that we just adore and wish to see more of in other games. We can find some of them in some place, but it's rare to find something that REALLY captures the same feeling. And when you do, it's almost sort of magical. Two different games from different times, somehow providing such similar feelings. It's almost like a tether between the past and present, and it can make the child in all of us smile.

One game that taught me speed, precision and flow has got to be Dead Cells. The game not only punishes you for not being precise and decisive with every of your actions. It rewards you when you actually do. Clear a floor fast enough, you can access a treasury room that gives you better weapons and tools. You're also rewarded when you tear through a certain amount of enemies without taking a single hit. To add to that, you are given a speed buff if you kill 8 enemies in a row. There are multiple mechanics that gives you that feeling of the "flow" such as dodge rolling, dive cancelling (which requires moderate timing and precision), shield dashing (exclusive to the Assault Shield). You want to go defensive and tactical? Fine by me. The game provides you all the tools for that stuff. But it *encourages* you to become a speed demon, tearing through every obstacles in your way just like the hot headed war-mongering soul you are (lore inteded joke)

You reminded me just how much I freaking love Megaman X. How many "Top 10" gaming lists have I mentioned without saying this series? It's tragic!

The secondary character they added to the gunvolt series Copen feels a lot like a continuation/evolution of the Zero gameplay

I loved the games and always pretended to be Zero as a kid!

love to see the respect for Zero. definitely one of the tightest games of all time

may i also mention the luminous avenger games in the gunvolt franchise it may be closer to what you’re looking for

I would definitely recommend trying Pizza Tower if you haven't already. It's not quite the same as the MMZ series, but I would say it has all three of those pillars you're talking about. It even has a grab/throw mechanic and the ability to just plow through enemies, if you know what you're doing

Love the appreciation for the mmz series. Also love that gravity circuit seems to have used the z-knuckle, chain rod and recoil rod as part of its game play. Definitely gotta give it a try now

Pizza Tower & Neon White both have an immaculate "flow" feeling.

it is my solemn duty to upvote every YT video praising Gravity Circuit ; this game is amazing

The Megaman Zero/ ZX Advent games are so frikken good, thank you for the video!

house of dead ninjas nailed the speed and maneuverability while effortlessly cutting through enemies thing a long time ago.

Interesting how I was able to guess Flow being the third aspect.

Reminds me how sometimes in rocket league you can feel like you're some telepathic and time-foretelling god because you ended up at the right place at the right itme.

On the topic of Flow this video essay is a great example of that. You nailed the pacing excellently.

Haven’t seen anyone mention it yet, but personally 30XX was a really good game for me to get my Megaman kicks off to. Platforming roguelike with a ton of callbacks to classic Megaman, all the way down to the loading slide before you enter a boss room (just because they could) anyway great video man, love seeing roguelike enjoyers discuss the niches that made us all fall in love.

If my pfp is no indication I love MM, and Zero and ZX are some of my favorite for the very flow that you mention in this vid, i'll have to check out this game after your vids on it, just seeing the trailers alone I thought it looked cool, but this analysis has me sold

Funny enough I was gonna say "Have you played Gunvolt" and then I saw gunvolt lol. It is made by the same people so that's why it's so close. Inticreate is a great studio.

Gravity Circuit character looks hell-of-a-lot like Shredder from the Ninja Turtles xD

4:42 You know what else Inti Creates made aside for the ZX games and Gunvolt? They also made Mega Man Zero games

Mmz is just sooo smooth. Its the gold standard for contoll in my opinion

What got MMZ series for me was not only the flow, but the game had a good story to back-it up too.the side characters had personality, and you could approach the game with different playstyles..

all that gameplay praise and on top of it all the game looks so good

When you've mastered the dashes, sprints, bullet jumps, and aim glides in Warframe, the flow is there too

Thank you so glad to see people talking about this game

Just got my physical copy of this for switch the other day. Excited to play it when I find the time, because there's just too many games these days.

I think there's a better word intead "flow" : "Rhythm" I say this because, the games you showed have this 3 things, but te "Rhythm" is diferent. Some are more slow, others have more pauses, the combination betwen all ingredients seems more like a rhythm

Great video, I love Megaman Zero

Ori did it perfectly for me and I have a very good feeling I'm also going to achieve flow in Silksong

Watching this video the whole time I was thinking "has this guy played the Mega Man X games yet I have a feeling not, he would probably love X4" then he said the zero games were 20 years old and I have been playing mega man x style games for 30 years and realized I am fucking old.

Haven’t tried Gravity Circuit yet, but I’ve heard a lot of good about it. I’ll add it to my wishlist if it’s not on there yet. When talking about speed, flow, and precision though, the first game that always comes to my mind is Bleed 2 (totally not biased). I rarely find anyone who knows about it, and I think more people should. The speedrun potential is huge.

That flow term that you described as made-up... Well, there is an academic paper by P. Cairns and E. Brown that describe the terms "immersion" "flow" and "presence" and what feeling it leaves to the player... So, I can safely say that what you described as flow is pretty close to what they said 😁 If you want you can check it out, it's called "A grounded investigation on game immersion" and it's pretty short, so you can have a look if you want

Strider 2's speed is so much fun! Double tap forward, mash that slash button, and dash towards the game's ending within a half hour. It's just a satisfying snack!

Sanabi is a very recent game that I instantly thought of when you put up those three qualities. I've heard it described as Katana Zero with a grappling hook, but I haven't played KZ yet so I can't vouch for it. Sanabi has insanely fun and smooth gameplay that takes a while to click, but once you get why/how to swing in the right direction and speed at a given moment, you fly through enemies with that "pro gamer" feel. The main attack is somewhat of a slash where you grapple onto an enemy and ride it for a second before dashing away from it, so it might capture that feel that Gunvolt lacked. And that's not even talking about the story. Like, wow, the story is insane. For fear of spoiling any of it, I won't say a word about it except that it's exceptionally crafted and completely explained in a normal playthrough (as opposed to games like Hollow Knight, which make you dig through lore and/or watch video essays to understand it). Overall an amazing game that is relatively unknown (I mean it came out mid-November so I'm not surprised).

How this game plays gives me a mischief makers vibe

Megaman Zero was my favorite series when I was a kid, and you described it perfectly. That feeling is why I got into Smash bros Melee and Rivals of Aether too, they’re the only fighting games to capture that flow

sweet, so its like a love child between megaman, mischief makers and teeworlds

my god I knew I forgot about something from 2023!! My GOTY games are HI-FI RUSH and Bomb Rush Cyberfunk, Knuckle Sandwich coming in November will be too, but this game, that movement oh my, this is a definietly one of the best games this year too, I need to buy it as fast as I can! Thanks man for this awesome video, I strongly reccomend you playing these three games that I mentioned if you didn't, keep going with this awesome content!

Gravity Circuit is phenomenal.

Great video! Thanks for making it.

i noticed something about Gravity Circuit in your video... a lot of the things in it are visually similar to the older Megaman games as well. One of the gunships resembles the ones you fight in the opening level of X, the grapple resemble the Chain Rod from Zero 2, the main character's appearance looks like it could be one of the Robot Masters from the original Megaman games.... honestly i could go on. Its clear they drew a lot of inspiration from the Megaman series in terms of design and layout.

I saw this game advertised in like... January, and immediately I wish listed it. When it dropped, I bought it that same day. One of the best gaming decisions I've made this year.

Gravity Circuit's weapon mechanics seem like a more polished version of the ones throughout the Zero series. The Chain Rod was clunky in execution compared to GC's hook, and the grab attack is like a reworked Z Chip from Zero 4.

No one mentions Dead Cells? Actually one of the fastest game Ive played, the randomness of the environment also means u will always have to adapt. Its a superior mmz for me

I am glad that I am not the only one who sees Hollow Knight being inspired by Megaman Zero. Btw, try Moonrider.

I assume someone already pointed it out but, luminous avenger is also up there, it's the spin off from gunvolt that has that melee aspect you wanted

I think you really hit the whole speed thing. Basically as soon as I got used to the controls I will practically play through the stage with the sprint button practically glued down as I bounce from enemy to enemy smashing everything in a wild flow state. It’s become a great game to relax to and I can put something on to keep my higher functioning brain parts thinking and enjoying a podcast while my lizard brain and body just blast through the stage trying to get everything and be faster than before. My only complaint is that at the end of the game I gotta either start a new game or new game plus to experience the intro stage and the Ark again and I hope that there’s an update to fix that. Once I beat the whole game I want to be able to play everything again and just grind away at all of the stages to get faster times and to re fight Nega and the Circuit Boss Rush. Both are thrilling boss battles and it’s a real shame that I gotta go through all of this work to fight them again.

There is a game that does come close to MMZ, and that game is Starbuster, its just a demo but I recommend it

The content is great! I need more monster hunter too though all of your videos on the series are 10/10

1:44 "Hollow Knight too" - My Brain "hollow night 2, silksong GIMMI GIMMI!"

As much as this is a love letter to the Zero X series, I also see something familiar in the melee mechanics... and that's Melee. Directional jump attacks, grabs and throws that scratch the itch Super Smash's adventure modes never did.

Damn I feel old 20years

Narita Boy is pretty awesome, the speed ain’t there for comparison.. but it’s definitely fun swinging a sword around, and riding a floppy disk surfboard, and other really fun stuff to see. The mechanics are fun too

There's a game that I know of that you might want to check out. I believe it's called 'Starbuster' - which replicates much of Megaman Zero's combat and mixes in Sonic Advance's speed and level design too.

Have you played 30xx? It also came out this year and gave me that feel.

I can't believe you didn't talk about the bosses. They're so good 😭 Because invincibility frames are really low, you will always do damage to the boss with your attacks. So the fight is almost always going at your pace. Chain dasher turns everything you said here up to 11. I haven't thought about it, but it's probably an all-time best video game ability for me. Being able to dash into enemies to begin your combos or even finishing them off with the dash is so satisfying. Then you can throw them and double jump.

I DO BELIEVE Hollow Knight reaches a certain point where the upgrades really make you feel the "flow" effect, with all those talismans at that state you almost feel like the real threat of the game ends being yourself (which is not a coincidence as this is embedded in the story and design)

I didn't know this game. Thank you!

if you haven't played it yet, I'd highly recommend giving "cogen sword of rewind" a try. it's a one hit and you'll you die kind of game, but like the title implies, you are able to rewind time to about 3 seconds into the past.

Hey there, massive zero and hollowknight fan here with an odd suggestion for you. The first attack on titan game checks all these boxes for me albeit a 3d game. Also Mario Wonder was a pleasant surprise this year and the special world offered some awesome 2d challenge goodness.

I just like when game is dynamic and gameplay is tight, and I've been playing the Demo of Gravity Circuit and felt that Zero vibe just like you've mentionned. Also honorable mention (imo) to Dead Cells and Oblivion Override where you can achieve the same feeling (depending on your build, since they're both Roguelites) Also I recommend you to keep an eye for "Berserk Boy" as this game has a chance to bring this type of gameplay again ^^ On a side note, Inti Creates also did the Megaman Zero. I don't think you've mentioned it, only for the sequels.

When you seaid the speed and precision combine to make the 3rd element, I instinctively said "Flow". Im glad to have gotten it right, as a while ago, I really got into Sonic Heroes. The game can be a bit glitchy here and there, but when i started getting the hang of the game's unique design, I felt that unique sense of flow, as the game isnt as focused on momentum as the classics or on pure speed like the boost games. There was satisfaction in overcoming each obstacle using the right character at the right time, and as I started playing Mega Man Zero more and more, I began to feel the same way despite it being a totally different game.

Titanfall 2 explores these concepts as well on different ways

Loved the video ans the editing, any chance we get to know what tool you used?

the final boss in this game has such a ridiculous difficulty spike, i thought i was missing something when i played it

Tip of the hat to the presentation. Rewinding to mark hyperbole to note call-back, and your subscribe segue, are s-tier. #masterclass

Doom eternal, while it’s a fps, it’s got that speed and precision and is absolutely top notch. It’s brutal yet fair with the best enemy design and resource management I’ve seen.

Shantae and the Pirate’s Curse feels like this once you unlock every ability. It’s the only Shantae I like for that reason

I like gravity circuit a lot, the only issue for me is how they break flow by giving bosses Invincibility for combo-ing

Being able to code it is the true challenge, no matter what.

Gravity Circuit has a lot of enimies in game that are from Mega Man Zero, and it even has people saving, like Mega Man X6's Reploid Saving

@mhswoocer What do you think about Dead Cells, Katana Zero and Oblivion Override when it comes to speed, precision and flow?

as an avid megaman fan thank you for recognizing the Zero games and what theyre good at. i feel like theyre so Underrated compared to the X series of old. one thing i gotta say though is that interestingly, you never brought up Zero 4's Z knuckle and 2's chain rod when talking about Gravity Circuits weaponry. they almost serve the same purpose and wouldve driven the point even closer to home with the comparison. but nonetheless, great work!

I think if Megaman Zero were zoomed out so that Zero's sprite was the size of hollow night, it wouldn't feel like it was fast, and hollow knight would seem faster. I think the tight PoV lends to a greater feeling of "speed" than games that actually have a wide view so you can plan moves over pure reaction speed.

I recently bought and finished a game called Virtual Unlimited Project. It really felt close to MMZ but felt really lacking in content, story and translation. It made me miss the MMZ series a lot.

I think that Katana Zero has what you are looking for 😉

although its a different genre, i would argue neon white is the ultimate example of all 3 facets

You sold me!