* CatharsisFactor: One of the appeal points of this series is that you can [[AttackReflector reflect]] enemy BulletHell back at them for massive damage, and dramatically increase your score and multiplier in the process.
* FanNickname - "Giga Wang".
* SugarWiki/HeartwarmingMoments: From the first game:
** Many of the {{Golden Ending}}s (clear the first six stages on one credit, then defeat the TrueFinalBoss in Stage 7), all of which [[spoiler:have the heroes come home alive]]:
*** Ruby: [[spoiler:She's surrounded by the children at her orphanage, cheerful as she tells them about how she saved the world.]]
*** Shinnosuke: [[spoiler:Finally having achieved peace for the planet, he allows himself to sleep under a tree with a smile on his face.]]
*** Stuck: [[spoiler:He parks his plane, thankful that he'll never have to use it again, and heads home, knowing that his wife is -- not may be, ''is'' -- waiting for him at home.]]
** Not ''all'' of the standard endings (use at least one continue before completing Stage 6) are bad, at least in 2-player mode:
*** Shinnosuke and Isha: [[spoiler:Shinnosuke falls unconscious after having performed what seemed to be a HeroicSacrifice to destroy the Medallion. Fortunately for Isha, who's been [[PleaseWakeUp begging him to wake up]], he soon comes to his senses.]]
*** Ruby and Isha: [[spoiler:Ruby chews out Isha for trying to perform a SenselessSacrifice. Isha explains that she has no family or friends to come home to...until Ruby points out that [[YouAreNotAlone she can be her friend and offers to introduce her to the children at her orphanage]].]]
*** The ending for Stuck and Isha can hardly be called a bad one: [[spoiler:With both of them alive with their mission complete, Stuck declares that he's going to go home and relax, while Isha offers to aid those whose lives were affected by the Medallion's war.]]
** The good ending of the second game, [[spoiler: which Limi is revealed to be alive and reunites with her sister Romi.]]
* LowTierLetdown: Sinnosuke has the widest {{spread|Shot}} of the original ''Giga Wing'' characters. But that doesn't make him good for scoring: he tends to destroy everything on the screen at once, which makes it harder to collect all of the medals. This is not helped by his slow speed, a common trait amongst spread-type characters in {{Shoot Em Up}}s.
* MinimalistRun: It is entirely possible to play ''Giga Wing 2'' in a non-PacifistRun without getting any points. This is because unlike in the first game, which starts your ScoreMultiplier off at 1, ''2'' starts it off at ''zero''. As long as you never pick up a single medal, you can destroy everything and no-continue clear the game with 0 points.
* SugarWiki/MostWonderfulSound:
** The robotic "OK" sound that signals that your Reflect ability is ready to use again.
** In the Japanese version of ''2'', the characters CallingYourAttacks.
* OlderThanTheyThink: ''VideoGame/{{Refle|X}}ction'' (1998) and ''VideoGame/StarSoldier: Vanishing Earth'' (1998) were using bullet-reflecting as means of offense and bonus points two years before ''Giga Wing'' did it, although those two games aren't as bombastic about it as ''Giga Wing'' is and in the case of ''Reflection'', its status as a Japanese doujin game made it virtually unknown to the West at the time.
* PortingDisaster: ''Giga Wing Generations'' uses a vertically-oriented monitor. The porting team neglected to offer a vertical option in the [=PS2=] port. Also, it runs at only 30 frames per second--not a desirable framerate for games demanding precision and reflexes.
* SelfImposedChallenge: Some players try to go for the lowest score possible, or go as far as possible without scoring ''at all''.
* TearJerker: All of the single-player bad endings in the first game [[spoiler:have the player character commit HeroicSacrifice in order to pump enough firepower into the Medallion to destroy it]]; some of the two-player bad endings [[spoiler:also have one character sacrifice themselves much to the grief of the other]].
** Shinnosuke: [[spoiler:He's ''[[TheGreatestStoryNeverTold completely forgotten from history]].'']]
** Stuck: [[spoiler:His last words are to his petrified wife Elise, who he regrets he will never see return to life. Then Elise turns back to flesh, almost as if his sacrifice is what cured her.]]