Video Game / Super Robot Wars Judgment

Super Robot Wars Judgment is the final installment of the Super Robot Wars series for the Nintendo Game Boy Advance, featuring vastly improved visuals, game mechanics and an all-new storyline dealing with the invasion of the lunar Fury. The player, as usual, can choose between a male or a female Player Character, each with his or her own unique storyline that ties in with the new imposing menace.

Judgment generated considerable controversy in the Super Robot Wars fandom. The game was announced mere weeks after the release of Super Robot Wars Alpha 3 with Judgment launching less than a month post-announcement^note No two Super Robot Wars installments have had such a narrow release window between them. Secondly, Judgment broke tradition by excluding Universal Century Gundam and Getter Robo, which disappointed some of the franchise veterans (to date, only Mazinger has appeared in every licensed-Super Robot Wars game). Finally, the inclusion of Tekkaman Blade was seen as a violation by some, as the series uses Powered Armor rather than Humongous Mecha (fans, however, note this demonstrates Banpresto's willingness to expand upon the definition of "robot" for the franchise).

A Fan Translation has been released by the Romhacking Aerie.

Series featured in Judgment (Bold indicates debuting entries):

• Mobile Fighter G Gundam
• Mobile Suit Gundam SEED
• Mazinkaiser
  • Mazinkaiser vs. The Great General of Darkness
• Combattler V
• Voltes V
• Dancougar
• Blue Comet SPT Layzner
• Hades Project Zeorymer
• Tekkaman Blade
• Martian Successor Nadesico
• Brain Powerd
• Full Metal Panic!
  • Full Metal Panic? Fumoffu

Judgment features examples of:

• A.I. Is a Crapshoot: The Nadesico's main computer system Omoikane suffers a malfunction at the start of Chapter 15 (in the route split where you stay with the Nadesico instead of transferring to the Archangel), which resulted in the Aestivalis units (which rely on it for targeting information and other data) and Nadesico treating Dancougar, Shining Gundam, and UEFA as enemy units. The Dancougar crew were naturally not amused by this.
  • That said, it did not simply "run amok"; it was integrated with a sophisticated learning program which Omoikane uses to decide the best moves to make autonomously. The problem however lies with the learning program, as the Nadesico had to fight the UEFA to get to Mars near the start of the game. However, the reason it did not give trouble at Heliopolis, fought alongside the Archangel without problems, and doesn't recognize the patrol units surrounding the Nadesico after the mess was handled, not to mention attacking Dancougar despite it not even being part of the army, Inez explains that it's a result of Omoikane essentially undergoing stress with all the surfeit of information it's had to take. As such, it has a reset system, which explains its non-aggression against the Archangel, though it only side-stepped the problem. Because its first memories are of fighting the UEFA, it still has a lingering resentment against them, and that is why it snapped during that joint operation, and in order to protect the Nadesico and its crew, it reverted its decision-making basis to its pre-Mars state. The reason the player's mecha was spared was because it had fought alongside the Nadesico and was thus marked as an ally.
  • And on the main mission itself, the Aestivalis and Nadesico herself turn into "yellow units" on Turn 3 (and will eject any units loaded inside the Nadesico), attacking all other units indiscriminately except for the player mecha and Combattler V (who also participated in the escape to Mars). On Turn 4, Capt. Teletha Testarossa from Mithril makes contact and offers to hack into Omoikane from her ship, with Ruri's help in regards to what she's supposed to correct. They eventually fix things (albeit temporarily) after you take out the attacking Boazanian forces and Baron Ashura's Mechabeasts after that.
• A.I. Breaker: This game inverts the usual flavor of Artificial Stupidity that SRW games of the time had regarding Fragile Speedster units, as the AI in this game is coded to flat-out ignore units that it has no hope of hitting. This leads to amusing sights, such as enemies bypassing Layzner in droves to get mowed down by the likes of Mazinkaiser.
• Adaptational Early Appearance: The Strike Rouge is given to the Archangel a lot earlier where Cagalli receives it during a time Kira is still piloting the Strike compared to obtaining it in the very last battle of the anime.
• Adaptation Expansion: The Strike Rouge can use the Launcher and Sword packs where it can use the packs in theory but never shown to use them. Like Alpha 3, the Strike Rouge is compatible with the IWSP pack.
• Adaptational Late Appearance: Kira gains the ability to use SEED mode after landing to Earth whereas in the original anime, he does so much earlier on.
• Adaptational Villainy: While General Colbert has always been a colossal jerk, in his original series his worst issue was being a possessive and power-hungry military commander, but he still wanted to get rid of the Radam menace as much as the heroes did. Here? He outright forms a Big Bad Duumvirate with Muruta Azrael, seduced by the ideology of Blue Cosmos and its attendant genocidal hatred for the Coordinators, and forms alliances with plenty of other villains whenever convenient.
• Adaptational Wimp: The Great General of Darkness appears in only two scenarios late in Judgment and only if players pick the correct route (it's possible to miss him entirely). In the first of these, he attacks while players are fighting someone else, something the Gradosians and Boazanians have already tried. In the second encounter, the Reclaimers defeat most of his generals before the heroes even arrive on the scene. Sure, he puts up a fight, but his late, brief appearance, un-original style, and the total failure of his plan just don't convey what he was capable of back in his home series.
• Adapted Out:
  • The entire "Devil Colony" arc, as its plot comes to a halt upon Master Asia's death.
  • Prime Minister Wong Yun-Fat (who was involved in the TV series' final arc that the final battle is based on) and Urube Ishikawa (whose role of manipulating Domon is partially done by Azrael) are given this.
  • The Muge Zorbados Empire does not exist in Judgment; instead, Shapiro defects to the Gradosians.
  • Arnold Neumann is not present as an Archangel crew member in the entire game.
• A God Am I: Big Bad Gu-Landon Goetz and Shapiro Keats, at least until Sara shoots him
• All Your Powers Combined: Great Zeorymer possesess the strongest attacks of all seven enemy Hakkeshu of the Hau Dragon. In the case of Breist of Fire and Gallowin of Water, this is their Combination Attack "Twin Lords" which Great Zeorymer performs by cloning itself.
• Ambidextrous Sprite: Averted; it doesn't matter for most units, as they don't change sides and most of cast are symmetrical, but it still manages to avoid it with several Gundam units (Gundam Rose and Bolt Gundam and Buster and Duel AS) having asymmetrical designs. When they appear as enemies, their sprites are edited to not be ambidexterous.
  • But played straight in most cases, as seen in mission where there are yellow enemy units that can also attack the red ones.
• Animation Evolution: The first three license-based GBA Super Robot Wars games used the Limited Animation that the series was known for in the 1990s. This game recreates, and in some cases even improves upon, animations from the PlayStation 2 entries.
• Arc Welding: Like most SRWs, Judgment ties together the disparate stories of the various series involved. For instance, the Human Aliens from Layzner and Voltes V are descendants of the ancient Martian civilization from Nadesico (who are presumably descended from space explorers of the advanced Mycenae civilization or contemporaries of them) and the truly extraterrestrial enemies such as Orphan and the Radam are presumably members of the alien alliance the Fury fled to Earth from in order to escape. Some of the advanced technologies created by humans such as IFS Nanomachines and the seven Hakkeshu are said to have been created using designs gleaned from the Mental Time Travel of the Whispered, who are in turn tapping into Fury designs.
• Ascended Extra: Of the Shuffle Alliance's support characters (excluding Rain Mikamura), only George de Sand's butler Raymond makes it in as a new attack for the Gundam Rose, no less. To top it off, Raymond's Butler Gundam gets a map sprite.
  • The original Shuffle Alliance make their only cameo appearance in the entire SRW franchise to date in Judgment. Sadly, this trope is subverted as they are not playable nor do their units have any animations or sprites outside of a map sprite.
  • Even though Tetsuya Tsurugi has a relatively small role in Mazinkaiser, he is the only supporting character in the game who has dialogue with bosses outside his parent series. On the other hand, given his previous ascension in the Alpha series, it's understandable that certain villains want to have a word with him.
  • Gai Daigoji, if you get him back.
  • Miguel actually managed to survive his battle with the Strike Gundam and continues to pursue the Archangel as part of the Creuset team, though he still dies later.
• Ascended Fanboy: In addition to Gai and Akito Tenkawa, Kouji Kabuto is also a Gekiganger 3 fan. If you take the Nadesico/Layzner Route after Scenario 43, the special Gekiganger film created by the Jovians turns almost everyone else into a fan. Even Domon Kasshu is overcome with emotion.
  • On the very same scenario, we find out that Daijoro is an aspiring manga artist.
• Awesome, but Impractical: The Shuffle Alliance Combination Attack is one of the strongest attacks in Judgment, but requires energy from all five Gundams of the Alliance and must be adjacent to one another. The dual Combination Attacks from each other are more efficient and easier to set up.
  • The "Love" Spirit Command may grant almost every possible buff in the game, but is still the most expensive Spirit Command in the game at the cost of 90 Spirit Points (for point of comparison, by the end of Judgment, an average pilot will have amassed around 160-200 Spirit Points), and it's rare a pilot will need all possible Spirit Commands at once. Even if it's used solely against bosses, the Accel movement boost is usually wasted.
  • Great Zeorymer is possibly the strongest single unit in the game. Howewer, to obtain it you need to choose routes leading to missing most of the other secrets, and you must abstain from using normal Zeorymer - which is a very useful robot in its own right - in all missions except for those where its deployment is mandatory.
• Ax-Crazy: Jua-Mu Dalby, after getting shot down for the first time and receiving his promotion to full Knight, and Gosterro
• The Battle Didn't Count: If you manage to defeat Ru-Kain in Scenario 30 (difficult, but doable), it turns out you haven't even managed to dent his Zakarl - its regenerates HP and the Prince laughs in your face.
  • The same goes for Moon/Nadesico route Scenario 23.
• Beach Episode: Which kind of loses its point as it's rendered all in text...
• Big Damn Heroes: Alan Igor and Schwarz Bruder do this, but when the party is running from the failed peace negotiations, Gai is the one who pulls this and starts talking about things that actually make sense (even while speaking in Gekiganger), that is, if you meet the requirements for getting him back.
  • Another one pulled by the protagonist during a Full Metal Panic event: Sôsuke Sagara, Chidori Kaname, Kouji Kabuto and Sayaka Yumi are stranded behind enemy lines and are about to be discovered by the enemy when Melissa Mao and Kurz Weber appear, then followed by a whole team of robots. Chidori being amazed at the number of mecha is an icing on the cake.
• Boss in Mook Clothing: The 'Behemoth' Arm Slave. In the anime, it was a unique, one-of-a-kind Awesome, but Impractical unit that required a special (and insane) pilot. But after the relevant incident has popped up in the game, numerous Behemoths - driven by ordinary Mooks - show up in a bunch of stages as mercenaries. They possess thick armor, a ton of HP, and a 'Lambda Drive' shield to boot... their attacks, though powerful, aren't very accurate, or very long ranged, so they mostly just wind up serving as metallic Meat Shields. On the other hand, if they DO manage to hit you... you're gonna NOTICE.
• Boring, but Practical:
  • Aside from pilot stats, Spirit Commands, and Nanga's air support, eight out of ten Brain Powerd units carry the same abilities: good mobility, a barrier, a variant on "Mirror Image" ^note At 130 Will, gain an Ability-modified chance of evading any attack, A-ranking for performance underwater, decent melee weapon, relationship boosts with one another, and reliable long-ranged Combination Attacks. Their practicality is only limited by low health and energy reserves, both of which regenerate quickly. Emphasis on "boring", all units use the exact same sprites, animations, and loadouts. No player can be blamed for turning battle animations off when fielding more than a few of them, due to how repetitive it can get watching the same thing over and over under a different Palette Swap.
  • To a lesser extent the Aestivalis Units. Decent mobility, a nice barrier, as long as they are in range of the Nadesico they refill their energy each turn. Later they get a Barrier ignoring melee attack. Ryoko, Hikaru and Izumi also have some nice team attacks you can easily spam after upgrading their energy a bit, and they all have relationship bonuses with one another and the battleship.
    • While they have the same repetitiveness from the Brain Powerds above, there are a few small differences in their animation to better reflect the pilots' personalities, like Akito hamming up a simple Distortion Punch, Ryoko smashing a knife inside the enemy unit with a roundhouse kick, or Gai uppercutting a battleship!
  • One of the most powerful Modules in the game just grants a pilot the Hit and Run ability, which can grant a huge amount of extra mobility to many units that aren't supposed to have it.
• Breaking Old Trends: This game is the first to exclude every series featured in the original Super Robot Wars. The classic Mazinger units are playable in this game, but only because the Mazinkaiser OVA is utilized. Super Robot Wars UX would later one-up Judgement in this regard by using a Mazinger series that doesn't feature Mazinger Z or Koji Kabuto.
• Broken Bird: Calvina Coulange; she gets better.
• Bullying a Dragon: General Colbert tries to nuke Orphan, which, with help from the heroes, sends the missiles through the Vital Net directly to his position.
• But for Me, It Was Tuesday: If you attack Prince Ru-Kain with Akito in one scenario, he'll pull this on the deaths of Akito's martian parents. Akito doesn't appreciate this.
• The Cameo: Judgment has a few of units appearing as map-only sprite cameos. These include the original Shuffle Alliance Gundams, Gundam Spiegel and Combattler V's head unit the Battle Jet
• Character Development: For many characters, especially for the chosen protagonist, and for Gai, if you acquire him.
• Charles Atlas Superpower: Master Asia can take out several anti-aircraft batteries on the Archangel with his bare hands like it was nothing, then leaps through the air over to the Nadesico and do the exact same thing. Of course, this IS "The Undefeated of the East" we're talking about here.
• Cloud Cuckoolander: Izumi is this HARD. She regularly smashes the fourth wall to tiny bits, makes references to anything she can and has dialogue that would fit right into a Dragon Quest game.
• Combo Rifle: The Belzelute's Orgone Rifle: Mode A, combines its pistols with its rifle to form a bow-like Wave-Motion Tuning Fork.
• Curse Cut Short: Although specific to the translation patch, at one point Mao calls Kurz a "motherf-" only for him to cut her off. Later, Domon cuts Allenby Beardsley off when she starts to call Murata Azrael a "blonde, racist, son of a—"
• Death by Origin Story: Touya's parents (El-Serda Shiun and his unnamed wife) and Franz Zeppelin (who developed the three starting mechs, and also friends with El-Serda).
• Demoted to Extra:
  • Mazinkaiser vs. the Great General of Darkness's entire plot got merged with the Brain Powerd finale, so the Mycenae Empire, instead of being the apocalyptic threat it was in the show, are treated as secondary enemies for the grand total of two scenarios they appear in (both of which are optional). On top of that, only three of the Seven Generals actually appear as enemies, the other four get killed off-screen by Jonathan.
  • Dancougar in general doesn't have many plotlines; aside from the main cast interacting with other shows the only major enemy is Shapiro, who turns his coat for the Gradosians in the absence of any other alien invaders, and the only side character who shows up on-screen is Alan.
• Didn't Think This Through: Gai's Heroic Sacrifice. He launches in the Aestivalis Ground Frame and intends on attacking a Gradosian ship to disable it, then swap out to an Aerial Frame so he can get back to the Nadesico. When he tells Urubitake to launch the Aerial Frame to do the second part, he's told the Aestivalises aren't built for that sort of swap up and Gai is stranded and presumed dead.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: The seven Hakkeshu of the Hau Dragon and Great Zeorymer, The Devil Gundam, Tekkaman Omega, Baron Maximillian's Hyper Baronz and Gu-Landon's Zui Gaiden fused with the Fury mothership
• Dwindling Party: Natarle Badgiruel, Tolle Koenig, and Kuzzey Buskirk all depart the Archangel over the course of the story; it's why it's generally less powerful than the Nadesico.
• Fake Longevity: While an issue in many Super Robot Wars games, Judgement in particular is noted for the number of times that it spawns large numbers of enemy reinforcements. The game is especially fond of doing this on large maps, where it will take several turns for said reinforcements to even reach the player's units.
• Fiery Redhead: Hime Utsumiya, Sara Yuuki and Festenia Muse
• Fix Fic: Gai, Miyuki "Tekkaman Rapier" Aiba and Balzack Azimov, Ahmos Gale and Alberto Null Julia Asuka can survive. Asagi, Juri and Mayura of Orb also survive (but other named SEED characters aren't so lucky...), Rolly and Roll and Alan don't die. However, Ru-Kain does bite it, while Haruki Kusakabe FINALLY dies and the tragic events of Prince Of Darkness are averted.
• Flat "What": The general reactions the non-Nadesico characters have to viewing the "How and Why of the Nadesico" bits in-game.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: The Devil Gundam's "Death Army attack" has the Death Master and Death Dragon (common Death Army units that are outfitted with parts of the Master Gundam and Dragon Gundam's armor and weapons respectively) appear among the common Death Army units.
• Glass Cannon: The Shuffle Alliance units hit hard thanks to their pilots' stats and get stronger the more of a beating they take, but their evasion rate and armor rating try to split the difference between Super and Real strategies and end up being great at neither. The exceptions are the God Gundam (a Mid-Season Upgrade), which gets God Shadow as defensive ability that works with Domon's high Ability, Dragon Gundam, since it has a its own Mirror Image variant and an attack that decreases the target's attack, and Bolt Gundam, which is more of a Mighty Glacier than the others. Rising Gundam and Nobel Gundam lean more into dodging and are stronger for it.
• Guest-Star Party Member: The Tuatha de Danann provides some fire support from the water during the assault on Hell Castle. Tekkaman Rapier, Balzak, and Gai Daigoji also count, provided you don't save them.
  • Welcome Back, Traitor: Akatsuki Nagare
• Guide Dang It!: Par for the course for the series, when getting secret characters who have a lot of conditions. Some are obvious, some are not.
  • Wanna get the Infinity +1 Sword down there? You have to NOT use Zeorymer, an incredibly good unit on its own, whenever it isn't mandatory, defeat all of the bosses from its series with it, and take a route which will leave you missing nearly every other secret character. In exchange though, you'll get one godly Game-Breaker of a unit, its Mid-Season Upgrade, Great Zeorymer.
  • Some of the later Puzzle Robos are positively fiendish, requiring extreme lateral thinking and perfect mastery of the game mechanics, to say nothing of perfectly arranging lots of attacks, movements, spirit commands...
• Handsome Lech: Kurz hits on the female bosses when attacking them.
• Henshin Hero: We're not sure why the Tekkamen are in a game about giant robots, but no one's complaining.
• Hot-Blooded: One of the pilots mentions pretty much all the characters are.
• Human Aliens: Seems to be the theme of this game. With Jovians, Gradosians and later on the Fury, indistinguishably human aliens form a good part of the plot.
• Hypocritical Humor: Occasionally, Argo Gulskii will espouse that only newcomers give speeches in battle. Given where he comes from... Though, to be fair, he never joins in.
• Infinity +1 Sword: Great Zeorymer is, pound for pound, the most powerful robot in the game... and the hardest to unlock.
• Interface Spoiler: Characters who are lovers in canon start with the "love" relationship correction (represented by a red heart on the map), even before they become lovers in the story. So you can tell who ends up with who at a glance.
• Jiggle Physics: All the original generation female characters during the final attacks of the units; in the case of the male protagonist, its a result of Anime Hair.
• Joke Character: Bonta-kun: shares the same stat growths as the ARX-7 Arbalest. The only reason why it's not as useful is a lower HP pool and weaker weapons, not to the mention it lacks the Arbalest's "Lambda Drive" abiliity. To balance that, it does have a high evasion rate, can be upgraded to have fairly decent, if not outstanding parameters (carrying four possible parts slots in contrast to the Arbalest's two), with the benefit of inspiring some absurdly funny comments from the villains who fight it. The Grenade Launcher is also a mid-to-long ranged weapon at a maximum range of six, whereas the Arbalest caps at the range of four.
• Karma Houdini Warranty: Much like in Impact, Haruki Kusakabe won't escape justice and will be swiftly killed. However, you're not the one doing it this time, Rau Le Crueset does the job for you, and no one is complaining.
• Killed Off for Real: Every Gundam SEED character who dies in canon stays dead, with absolutely no way to save any of them. The sole exceptions are the M1 Astray pilots, who are Demoted to Extra. Unlike other titles, particularly Super Robot Wars Advance, Master Asia stays dead with no way to obtain him. This is one of the few games where he is not playable in any capacity, even as a guest character.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Azrael tells Akatsuki that having IFS Nanomachines makes him no better than Coordinators. Both traits have the same effect on pilot performance.
• Lethal Joke Character: Believe it or not, Boss Borot - four parts slots and three pilots with a great set of Spirit Commands each, it's an absolute monster when upgraded. Just make sure to slap a part that enables flight. Plus, like most SRWs that have the Boss Borot as a playable unit, if it gets destroyed in battle, it costs a mere 10 credits to repair, even if it used its self-destruct attack.
  • What really adds to this unit's lethality is it's a Combat Medic in Judgment: not only can it perform its usual resupplying ammo and energy job, but the Boss Borot is capable of repairing allied units, and its weaponry is exceptionally cheap to upgrade. Essentially, it's Swiss Army Glass Cannon in a game with lots of options for upgrading durability.
  • Unlike its previous counterparts, the Boss Borot has attacks that can strike aerial opponents. Granted, Super Robot Wars Advance, Super Robot Wars Reversal and Super Robot Wars Destiny gave the unit the "Borot Pressure Punch", but Advance rendered it a secret upgrade, became a Mid-Season Upgrade in Reversal and was available in Destiny from the start, but that game had much better units.
• Let's Split Up, Gang!: A staple in Super Robot Wars games. The route splits do a good job in mixing the series up but the last two route splits are asking which series you do not want to have in your party as aside from two series, everyone else will follow the route chosen. Notably, Mobile Suit Gundam SEED and Nadesico are always mutually exclusive on all routes, justifiably because those series each contain the main battleships the group uses.
  • Stage 44 to 45 is either have Mobile Suit Gundam SEED and Tekkaman Blade units or Layzner and Nadesico units.
  • Stage 47 to 48 is either Mobile Suit Gundam SEED, Tekkaman Blade and Layzner units or Brain Powerd and Nadesico units.
• Magikarp Power: The Shuffle Alliance units may be Glass Cannons, but they have enough to benefit from upgrades to armor rating and mobility. This hybrid defense works well with the pilots' high level of the "Prevail" pilot skill ^note The lower the HP, the greater the increase to accuracy/evasion/critical/armor stats and allows their strong offense to work to its fullest. Each unit also receives a Mid-Season Upgrade later, with the God Gundam for Domon and the rest of the Shuffle Alliance getting their Super Modes and Combination Attacks.
  • The hidden Vorlent unit may seem like an underwhelming original unit with only three attacks, especially considering its requirement (beating the game three times each with a different original mecha). However, not only does it start out with Orgone Cloud when the other three each require a Midseason Upgrade to unlock it, its enhanced form is the Raftclans, arguably the strongest of the original playable mecha.
  • Layzner, too: a Fragile Speedster at the start, but once it unlocks "V-MAX", it becomes a Lightning Bruiser.
  • Units with poor base stats make up for it with more parts slots and more cost effective weapon upgrades.
• Manly Tears: Kouji, Hyoma Aoi and Touya Shun's reaction to the aftermath of Master Asia's death.
• Marathon Level: The attack on Hell Island pits you against several waves of high HP bosses and Elite Mooks, including Gauron, who is invulnerable to all but the strongest and most expensive attacks.
• Mercy Lead: If you choose to save Gale in Chapter 4, at the end he'll say that his forces will give them 10 minutes before they launch their attack.
• Mistaken for Pedophile: At one point, Kurz tries to cheer up Ruri Hoshino. She tells him he's acting inappropriately and the other pilots proceed to tease the hell out of him.
• Ms. Exposition: Inez Fressange really likes explaining things and usually shows up out of nowhere whenever someone asks a technical question just to explain it and disappear again. She joins the crew after chapter 3, within one or two battles other characters in the game start to comment on her love of explanations, by chapter 7 people start to openly ignore her.
• Mutually Exclusive Party Members: Ahmos Gale or Julia Asuka are both secrets but only one of them can be obtained while the other is lost. The player can fulfill conditions for both of them but Gale will take priority over Julia. Mazinger Z and Great Mazinger are mutually exclusive where Z leaves in the stage where Great joins immediately after. What makes this example stand out is that Z and Great have two combination attacks together but cannot be used due to their conflicting availability.
• Nuke 'em: The Earth Alliance's solution to every problem. It eventually comes back to bite them in the ass HARD.
  • This is Burrstone of the Mountain's specialty.
• Obviously Evil: Gu-Landon, as immediately noted by the Dancougar team. "If he looks like a bad guy, talks like a bad guy, and acts like a bad guy..."
• Out-of-Character Moment: Ru-Kain leads the Gradosian Empire in striking an alliance with the Jovian Federation. This is completely antithetical to his in-series beliefs, where he views all humans as inferior. It's partially justified by it playing to his Might Makes Right philosophy, however, and dovetails with both his Character Development throughout the series and the OVA, where he comes to trust and respect some humans who have demonstrated their strength and cunning, to the point of leaving on in charge of Earth's occupation while he goes out to fight Layzner. Several characters do point out the Grandosians would never see the Jovians as equals, and are simply using this alliance to make their invasion of Earth easier before turning on them, to the point of aggravating the war so that the Earthlings and Jovians will wipe each other out.
• Post-Script Season: For Combattler V, as the Campbellians have either been defeated before Judgment starts or they simply don't exist in this setting. For the most part, Combattler is treated as a part of the Voltes V plotline (though they have separate slots in the "Favorites System").
• Redemption Demotion: Averted with Gale and Julia; they have the same stats they had as bosses if they join you. And when Al Van zips in for the final battle, he gets all his boss upgrades including a staggering 50,000 HP.
  • Played straight with Jonathan and Quincy, whose Baronz are more powerful than all but the Nelly Brain, but are nowhere near the 60,000 HP they exhibited as bosses.
• Reconstruction: Remember the moment where Akito calls himself a fool for believing in Gekiganger? If you saved Gai, he shouts that just because the Jovians are abusing the ideal doesn't mean the ideal itself is wrong. After all, Tsukumo Shiratori believes in that ideal, too. Eventually, that same ideal inspires the Jovian aces to rebel against Kusukabe, in a sequence of events that culminates in the mad admiral's death.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Yurika's father, Admiral Koichiro, holds back Blue Cosmos and their mad plans from within the UEFA for as long as he can.
• Secret A.I. Moves:
  • The Great Zeorymer fought as a boss to unlock it as a player unit doesn't have the signature Hades Attack of the original, but does have Omzack's Proton Thunder as a substitute MAP attack.
  • The Raftclans has two different attack animations for each of its moves, with Fu-Lu getting a flashier Orgone Rifle than the normal one, Al-Van the Sword, and Jua-Mu the Claw. The player Raftclans gets all three of the flashier moves, but none of the basic ones. This trait is carried over in The Moon Dwellers for Al-Van and Fu-Lu, while the Orgone Claw specialty goes to Karo-Ran.
• Secret Character: There's quite a few. To name all of them: either Gale or Julia plus the Layzner mk-II, Tekkaman Rapier and Balzac, Gai Daigoji and the X-Aestivalis, Great Zeorymer, Strike IWSP Pack, Allenby Beardsley, and Bonta-kun. From the originals, you will get Vorlent and its Mid-Season Upgrade Raftclans after you finish the game thrice with different mechs..
• Set Piece Puzzle: The "Puzzle Robo" minigame is an unusual variant of this. You're given a very short scenario with a few units, and you have to move them in the correct way to complete the objective (move to the correct space(s), attack the correct enemy etc.)
• Shout-Out: The animation for the "Burning Punch" from the Gundam Maxter ends with a Shoryureppa. Bonta-kun's melee attack also incorporates the same punch.
  • Other Chibodee Crockett-related shouts include references to boxers Mike Tyson and Mohammad Ali. Hell, he even references Ali's catchphrase:
  Chibodee: You wanna see me sting like a bee? Sit tight. That's comin' next.
  • When using his chain attack, Boss will sometimes yell "Get over here!"
  • Masato Akitsu's evil-half Masaki Kihara uses one of Iori Yagami's Desperation Attack quotes.
  Masaki: Scream, cry, and then die!
  • The background music for Bonta-kun may sound a few notes familiar... and is indeed titled Tokkou Yarou.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: A lot of them, but especially frequent in Scenario 49. To wit:
  • Akito vs Ru-Kain:
  Akito: Why would a man such as yourself ally himself with Kusakabe?
  Ru-Kain: What Kusakabe affirms is right. Justice is power, and power is justice. This is the meaning of being conquered by your betters.
  Akito: There is no way this can be called justice, neither in Gekiganger nor anywhere else!
  • Gai vs Kusakabe
  Kusakabe: Justice isn't something that can be just spoken of. It must be made real by destroying evil ones such as yourself.
  Gai: Huhuhuu... Actually, Jovian general, you got it all wrong. At the end of the day, it doesn't matter if you win or lose. What does matter is what you believe inside of yourself. A justice like yours, founded of deceit and betrayal, isn't worth a damn!
  • Gai also gives a version this to Akatsuki when he starts talking about how there is no justice and bashes how idealistic the heroes are.
  • Kira Yamato vs Rau Le Crueset
  Crueset: You're a mistake, boy! You're something that should never have existed! It is time that you disappear forever!
  Kira: That's my line! If you hate the world so much that you want everyone to die, then the only way is for you to be destroyed!
• Shut Up, Kirk!: In one of the earlier scenarios, Karla Egiel summarily orders the heroes to be silent, as "monkeys" like them have no right to even question the "clearly superior" Gradosians. The heroes aren't impressed.
• Sliding Scale of Gameplay and Story Integration:
  • Integration: J is one of the few games where the Shuffle Alliance units can fly in a Super Robot Wars game as they all can in the series (Domon even using the God Gundam to fly out of the atmosphere no less!). However, they have a B ranking in the air compared which may be because the Gundams can fly but there are rarely any aerial fights in G Gundam. Like in the early episodes of the anime, attacking the Aegis Gundam with Kira will cause all attacks to be counted as "Cannot Counter" rather than attack back, defend or evade the attack, reflecting Athrun's hesitance to fighting Kira until Nicol's death. In gameplay, the Buster Gundam's beam rifle consumes the unit's EN rather than be counted as ammunition which is accurate to the anime as beam rifles in the Cosmic Era are commonly powered by the Mobile Suit's battery.
  • Segregation: The Aile Strike Gundam and Moebius Zero can both fly in the earth's atmosphere, despite neither being able to do so in canon. The Aile Strike does get upgraded to do so in the sequel Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny but it never does in the original series. This may be Justified to give the Aile Strike a niche that the other Strike forms do not have and to allow the Moebius Zero to be playable in space colony stages which use Air and Ground terrain rankings.
• Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: Played with; although the crew of the Archangel are extremely cynical, they do make sound tactical judgment and treat everything as War Is Hell. The likes of Eiji Asuka and D-Boy are justifiably downbeat, too. On the other hand, most of the others are ridiculously idealistic and despite making decisions that could get everyone killed, are always morally right. Makes perfect sense when you look at the cast.
• The Smart Guy: In addition to those from their respective series, Masato becomes this after inheriting Evil Genius Masaki's memories and knowledge.
• Spell My Name With The Heavens: The translation patch calls it "Zeorymer of the Skies", compared to the more-liked "of the Heavens". This will be fixed in a future release.
• Stock Footage: The game does reuse a few bits of animation where it can get away with it, most commonly seen with the explosions near the end of more powerful attacks. Justified given the game's animation is already pushing the GBA's limits.
• Story Branching: At multiple points, the player gets to choose between going with the Archangel or the Nadesico and various teams of units. They merge again after a few stages each time, but which paths the player takes determine unlocks for secrets.
• Secret Art: Mu La Flaga is the only one who can use the Wire-Guided Gunbarrel attack when piloting the Moebius Zero. All other Gundam Seed pilots can use the Moebius Zero but they will not have access to the attack.
• Suicidal Overconfidence: Other than the featured series, Judgment is notorious for the AI's preference for attacking units with low evasion rates. This tends to result in super robots and battleships hogging all the kills.
• Super Move Portrait Attack: A staple in Super Robot Wars games but certain units will receive exclusive cut-ins based on the pilot. Examples are Dearka in the Buster Gundam's Anti-Armor Shotgun and Yzak using the Beam Saber in the Duel Gundam. Using any other pilot will not have a replacement cut-in for those attacks.
• This Cannot Be!: Jonathan and Quincy, all the time, especially if they're taken down when piloting their Baronz. Also, Ru Kain and Shapiro murmur this as they die.
  • Jua-Mu, who dies in his insanity screaming that he can't be defeated over and over.
• Time Stands Still: The Fury's Larseilam device freezes non-Fury units over a fairly wide area. Only Calvina/Touya's mech is able to counter the effect, which means that having them shot down while fighting the Fury is an automatic loss since it'd leave the party helpless.
• Token Evil Teammate: Akatsuki is kind of a jerk, while Masaki is kind of a monster. Fortunately, only one of them sticks around.
• Took a Level in Badass: Touya, Akito, Kira, and Gai
• Villainous Breakdown: Gu-Landon falls apart in a spectacular fashion once he realizes that those he considered insignificant insects are beating him. He goes from the intent to take the Earth for the Fury to trying to render Earth into an uninhabitable ball of slag, negating the work of four billion years; then to an attempt to sacrifice his own race for a powerup to his mecha, rambling how he is going to destroy all life during the final battle. For no better apparent reason than being a sore loser.
• Villain Team-Up: The Jovian Union and the Gradosian Empire joined forces. In fact, the team spends a good chunk of the game thinking that Jovian Lizards are Gradosian unmanned weapons.
  • Gauron works for Dr. Hell and the Steel Dragon.
  • Azrael managed to convert General Colbert to the Blue Cosmos.
  • The trope gets subverted when Master Asia tricks Duke Bergan into facing the heroes underprepared.
• We Can Rule Together: Dr. Hell pulls this on the heroes once they've beaten all his forces. Our heroes reject the offer right away and tell him to shut up.
• What the Hell, Hero?: After the Archangel uses Lacus Clyne as a human shield, almost everyone who had joined the group (and Touya, if he's the protagonist) up to that point are royally pissed, to the point the Archangel crew was worried they would abandon them. Just about the only character who takes the other side is Akatsuki.
  • To a lesser extent, Touya's initial choice to desert the crew after his first skirmish regardless of the consequences causes Kouji and Tetsuya to have this reaction. Kouji, in particular, really lays it into Touya, going so far as using Touya's surname as opposed to his first.
• Willing Suspension of Disbelief: Ruri recommends this after Master Asia makes his first appearance.
• The Worf Effect: Kouji and his Mazinkaiser briefly suffer this when Gauron uses the Lambda Drive to block a Turbo Smasher Punch.
• The World Is Always Doomed: Doctor Hell is attacking in full force, Orphan is about to exit the atmosphere, Radam trees are growing all over the world, and GENESIS is ready to burn the Earth to a crisp. Yeah, nothing alarming about it.

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