It seems to me a few people round here are replaying Metroids lately. I know I’ve certainly got it on the brain. If there’s anything left to say, let’s get to talking about it.
What’s your favorite Metroid? Why?
What’s your favorite metroid? Why?
What is the point of making a Prime 4?
Did anyone here get the secret message in Fusion?
@captain My favorite Metroid is the one that my babysitter’s son had on his Gameboy (I wanna say color) when I was about 7 or 8. This is my experience with a number of significant games (including Super Mario World and Ocarina of Time (maybe Majora’s Mask, hard to remember)). However, I’ve booted up Metroid 1 on switch nes for a bit and I love it.
That said, my favorite Metroid game is the Metroid section of the Subspace Emissary in SSBB. Jk, it’s Alien Soldier (jk that’s not even close to being close to Metroid I realize)
That said, I’m REALLY excited for Metroid Dread! I realized recently that the majority of games I play are 2d and that Metroid is my ideal type of game (with platforms, shooting kids, exploring, and spinning). I haven’t has a good opportunity to jump into the hype stream of these until now. I did preorder a switch vita, and I think I will download that game first
I love metroids 1, 2, and 4 in near-equal measure, but my garland has to go with @dylanfills's around metroid 2’s poofy shoulders. It’s the only metroid I can replay in an afternoon (I could do metroid 1 if I hadn’t lost the maps I drew… therefore looking forward to snagging the hand-drawn metroid guide). The universal-surface spider ball is a piece of metroidvania design genius that I’m shocked and outraged has not(?) been iterated on: it’s a game about killing where you repeatedly render yourself slow, vulnerable, and fetal in order to ferret out more creatures to kill.
I love the idea that, after fusion, samus herself is the last metroid left in the galaxy. I really hope metroid dread leans into that angle instead of reviving the metroids yet again. Samus being hunted by paranoid machines designed to exterminate an already extinct species is such a perfect follow up on the narrative and mechanics of the first four games that I’ll be a little bummed if they do something else. so I guess I’m saying that samus is my favorite metroid: is this the first series named after NOT the main character to end up being named after YES the main character ?
@baftaboo my first thought is The Legend of Zelda followed up by Zelda 2: Link’s Adventure
Also, there’s this isometric Souls like called Immortal Planet that has essentially that exact plot of exploring and finding all this alien technology and life. I love the art style too. Definitely a far cry from Metroid as far as gameplay, but a very similar vibe
I have played all the 2D Metroids (official, I have been meaning to check out AM2R). Perhaps it’s cliche but I think Super Metroid is the pinnacle so far. The pacing, world design, freedom, sequence breaking, high skill ceiling on the controls… Everything is so good. I don’t think Nintendo of today is prepared to make a game with the kind of obtuse elements that I really love about SM. That time where you have to just walk through a solid wall is just stupid though.
My favorite Metroid is Metroid Fusion followed by Metroid II on Gameboy.
Here’s my favorite game review of all time, A Maze of Murderscapes: Metroid II, which I posted here on IC a while back.
Definitely Metroid Prime and Super Metroid for me.
Super Metroid baffled me as an 8 year old when I rented it, but with a little guidance I would probably have latched on then. Wasn’t until Prime that I truly grasped the concept.
Metroid Prime was the last game I remember reading the manual for in the car on the drive home as I was extremely hyped up to play it, thanks to Nintendo Power and being a Turok fan, on my thirsty GCN. It was my first true Metroid experience and I was obsessed with everything - scanning, secrets, power-ups, music, the cool visor effects. It all was just so cohesive and polished.
That intro still gives me chills:
I went on to play Fusion and Zero Mission afterwards, but my return to Super Metroid was incredible. Everything from Prime was here and it still felt fresh as a daisy, perfectly paced and engaging. I felt so foolish for passing on it years earlier. I think I still prefer it to the newer 2D games simply for the more melancholy and dangerous atmosphere, and the little graphic flourishes. The intro demos are a great example of the work they put into Samus (plus the demonstration of the secret moves must have been a great teaser on the school yard) but I can understand if people think it plays a little sticky.
and anytime I hear Brinstar Overgrown I want to drop everything and play it:
To answer the other questions:
Fav metroid: Baby Metroid for a good, legit feeling of empathy from the protagonist and tragic moment that affects gameplay
Prime 4: It’s been a long time and would to see some fresh ideas
Fusion Secret Message: Yes
Also, Other M is good and not sure how hard AM2R is to find these days - but I preferred it to the 3DS game…
@treefroggy I linked the same essay, which is also my favorite piece of writing about videogames !
Big Metroid fan here. I want to point out that I refer to the Metroid games by their numbers rather than their subtitles and I encourage you all to do the same. I recognize this may be a borderline obnoxious personal affectation but it is supported by the text. E.g. the words “METROID 3” appear before the words “Super Metroid” do on the title screen. “METROID 5” are the first words we see in the announcement trailer for the new game. I think this is cool.
What’s your favorite Metroid game? Why?
Metroid 3 for sure. Great atmosphere throughout the game. I don‘t think that the “non-verbal storytelling” is as effective as it is made out to be in games discourse, but I like that other than the prologue, there’s very little text. Samus has a job to do and she goes and executes it solo. There‘s no need to talk to yourself about it. I also like that it’s compact. I can play through it over a week or casual gaming or so and it doesn't feel like it is too short or too long. The character ability progression is superb.
What’s your favorite Metroid? Why?
Metroid larvae. I don‘t recognize the ones in Metroid 2 are cannon, I kinda think they are silly. And… I can’t remember what Metroids are even in Prime1/2. It‘s been 20 years and those games didn’t stick in my brain in quite the same way. Or at least the Metroids themselves didn't.
What is the point of making a Prime 4?
Considering I didn‘t play Prime 3, it may be to get me to play a 3D Metroid game again. I mean, the real answer is “continuing a successful franchise” but I suspect that you’re coming at it from more of an artistic perspective rather than a market-driven one. I think the Metroids that talk the least are the best. I hope that they continue this. And the Boston Dynamics enemies are scary as hell.
Did anyone here get the secret message in FusionMetroid 4?
Not at all. I think I only learned about that recently.
I completely lost my mind when I heard this song start to play in 2004.
Yeah. The pink snowflake area is my favorite in the game partially because of the music. But the bass and echoed chimes of the title screen gets me every time.
I love that you brought these up. These attract modes are so amazingly effective. Note how the auto-map is blanked for the beginning of all of them? Honestly, depending on the software architecture of the game, that may have been “easier” than having saved map data for the game’s progress up to that point.
(Metroid Prime spoilers)
Metroid Prime.
Metroid Prime.
Metroid Prime.
Another question I would have/should have added up top is what exactly distinguishes Metroids (not metroids) from Metroid-likes, something I don’t think I saw discussed much in the Castletroid thread (nice breakdowns there Gaagaagiins). Which I wonder about for two reasons:
Thinking about it I suppose I haven’t actually played too many Metroid-likes, but I don’t know, I feel like just simple advances like instant load times and showing more of the screen at once could make for interesting designs. If Nintendo/Mercurysteam insists on new ones being rendered in 3D, maybe experiment with something like Bloodstained’s spiral staircase rooms—not the most elegant design maybe but it did make me stop and go “oh yeah, you can do that in this space.” (Figure out a way to make them more interesting than Bloodstained managed to do.)
No matter how many more of these games come out there’s still the itch to play Metroid. It can’t be replaced.
†I neglect to mention Metroid and Metroid II because they really are a different kind of game whose design philosophies have not been carried forward within the series.
Yeah, I just don’t know how much more there is to explore within the specific framework established in Prime 1. If you play Prime 3 you may agree that —this isn’t a spoiler or anything, I just don’t want to ruin your fun— you may agree that it seems the studio wasn’t sure how to advance the series without turning it into a different game, which they didn’t want to commit to all the way because it has to be a Metroid game, or maybe more accurately a Metroid Prime game. In my opinion Prime 3 feels like half-measures of different games which are in conflict with each other. And it talks too much.
I do this with Fire Emblems 1-10 (further abbreviating to e.g. FE7, 8), I will not be one to judge you buddy boy
I think probably Metroid Prime. Awesome music, amazing visuals (for the time), an FPS that was enjoyable on a console because of the lock on system. I’d say Super Metroid is a better game and probably more playable now. But for my memories and nostalgia I think Prime wins.
As some have already mentioned, Samus is my favourite Metroid haha.
Hmmm well it would be nice to see what they could pull off with more advanced hardware. Extend on the multi planetary system mechanics and spaceship usage of Prime 3. Would also love to see a zero gravity environ with the grapple.
My favorite metroid is the baby, but when it’s actually a baby at the end of II. So cute! However…
Fusion Samus is a good answer. I hadn’t thought of that!
Ah god no! NOOOO!
Oh god YYEESSSSSSS!!!
How did anybody ever figure these out? They’re not in the manual, right? Did the/a published guide mention them? Did people call the Nintendo Hotline asking about the weird images in the attract mode?
@captain I would push back a little against your footnote: I think fusion and prime 2 especially learn a lot from 2. Both games break the world into discrete chunks where you can explore freely within each chunk. Prime 2 in particular I think often drops the idea of a “critical path” (mark brown voice) within each discrete section, which 2 also does… Whereas in 3 there is discernible critical path snaking its way through the whole world. (I think the scavenger hunts in all three prime games are also cool attempts to go beyond the critical path.) On the subject of critical paths, in 2, enemies respawn as soon as you leave the screen, meaning it’s no easier to go backward than forward, so you’re always “in the middle of things”, and 4 textualizes this with the respawning x parasites.
Also, 4 and prime 2 both learn from the ways 2 makes Samus feel vulnerable. The SA-X encounters where you see it from behind a wall remind me a lot of the moments in 2 where you see a (hatched or unhatched) metroid egg while exploring tunnels in morph ball form. The dark world in prime 2 is I think inspired by exploring lava rooms before you’re “supposed to,” which 2 introduced to the series. 4 plays into the claustrophobic screen in some of the same ways 2 did, for example with jump scares where you suddenly are face to face with an enemy you didn’t see coming.
Actually, while the experience of 3 and zero mission I think is roughly triangulable by later metroidvanias (hollow knight + axiom verge + the messenger), I would say it’s the enduring dna of 2 that makes Metroid games feel like metroid to me. 2 funnels into the series a lot of that alien/the thing-style horror of penetrating and being penetrated by the environment that I dig (the whole idea of picking up ancient artifacts of an alien race and incorporating them into your cybernetic self is a mood). I’m staking out a much stronger claim for 2 than I meant to before I started writing this post, but that’s the way the cookie crumbles I guess.
I do like axiom verge a lot for textualizing the subtextual glitch artiness that I find in nestroid and Metroid 2. Axiom verge is the Metroidest metroidvania in my book even though hollow knight is the best one.
What are the numbers of the metroid games? I’m a bit confused reading some of this thread.
I understand the first two, so does Super Metroid = 3, Fusion = 4. Is Other M considered 5 and Dread will be 6?
Is the number order just release date or is there some sort of chronolgical timeline going on?
@beets Super Metroid, Metroid Fusion, and Metroid Dread declare themselves to be Metroid 3,4,5 in their title screens (resp. announcement trailer), and each is a direct sequel to its predecessor. I think of these as the “mainline” Metroid games and the others as spinoffs (prime being the persona to metroid’s SMT)