{"id":332,"date":"2017-09-19T23:20:10","date_gmt":"2017-09-20T03:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/?p=332"},"modified":"2017-09-19T23:20:10","modified_gmt":"2017-09-20T03:20:10","slug":"game-ramblings-52-metroid-samus-returns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/?p=332","title":{"rendered":"Game Ramblings #52 &#8211; Metroid: Samus Returns"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/metroidsamusreturns.nintendo.com\/\">More Info from Nintendo<\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Genre<\/strong>: Action\/Adventure, Metroidvania<\/li>\n<li><strong>Platform<\/strong>: 3DS<\/li>\n<li><strong>Originally Released on<\/strong>: Game Boy<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>TL;DR<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Fantastic re-imagining of Game Boy&#8217;s <em>Metroid II: Return of Samus<\/em><\/li>\n<li>Additions to game break some of the expectations of the genre, but allow for a much higher challenge level of the base game<\/li>\n<li>Core loop of 40 effective mini boss fights keeps action high, but doesn&#8217;t get stale due to increasing power level of the Metroids<\/li>\n<li>Random note since it gave it to me, but my clear time was 8:38:13, which seems <a href=\"https:\/\/howlongtobeat.com\/game.php?id=46440\">a bit on the low side of average<\/a> to my surprise.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Nintendo is having one hell of a year. \u00a0<em>Breath of the Wild\u00a0<\/em>and the Switch in general have been a runaway success. \u00a0<em>Mario + Rabbids\u00a0<\/em>showed they could give control of their games to someone else and still maintain the high quality Nintendo feel. \u00a0Now with\u00a0<em>Metroid: Samus Returns<\/em>, they&#8217;ve shown there is both life remaining in the 3DS, as well as some new ground that can be explored in one of their storied IPs. \u00a0This re-imagining of <em>Metroid\u00a0II<\/em> is another fine example of what can happen when this series is given to outside developers, much like Retro and the\u00a0<em>Prime <\/em>series, and also shows that 2D Metroid games don&#8217;t have to stick to their conventions and still be fantastic on their own.<\/p>\n<p>Since some fans of the <em>Metroid\u00a0<\/em>series are going to find these controversial, let&#8217;s start with some of the little changes and additions that this remake brings. \u00a0Fights against Metroids start and end with checkpoints, allowing you to not have to trek all over the place to guarantee save locations. \u00a0Along with some more generally helpful abilities, you have a rechargeable map scanner that also acts as a way to show blocks that can be broken. \u00a0In addition to the usual save points and ammo\/energy recharge stations, there are also now teleport stations as a means of fast travel. \u00a0All of these things in general break some of the mold of exploring every little bit of land in\u00a0<em>Metroid<\/em> games, and also break some of the re-traversal expectations of the series. \u00a0However, the actual end result is that the developers have been able to drastically increase the difficulty across the board, much to the game&#8217;s advantage.<\/p>\n<p>Traversal in most Metroid experiences has usually brought relatively little danger outside of boss fights. \u00a0Enemies would do damage if you got hit, but more often than not the health drops they left behind would more than suffice to heal you back up. \u00a0This one definitely doesn&#8217;t follow that pattern. \u00a0It&#8217;s not unusual for a melee hit from a normal enemy to do half an energy tank or more of damage, and that&#8217;s just on normal difficulty. \u00a0Once you get to the Metroids and eventually bosses, multiple energy tank loss from one hit is expected. \u00a0The short version here is that even by end game, I could expect to maybe take 4-5 hits in a boss fight before I was dead, so being able to respawn in a checkpoint next to the boss room was particularly appreciated while I was learning fights.<\/p>\n<p>This is particularly important, because the combat system in place definitely had some things that have to be learned for <em>Metroid<\/em> veterans. \u00a0On the smaller side of things, Samus can now root herself in place and aim 360 degrees with the analog stick. \u00a0While this does offer up significantly better precision for attacks, it also leaves her extremely vulnerable to quick attacks. \u00a0This is balanced by the new melee counter attacks. \u00a0If an enemy flashes, Samus can activate a melee swing to counter an enemy, leaving them open for high impact damage. \u00a0For boss fights in particular, this activates a little mini-cutscene where you can unload missiles without repercussions, which ends up being the biggest damage dealer against Metroids.<\/p>\n<p>In general, these changes were a much larger positive than I was expecting. \u00a0The 360 aim opened up a lot of possibilities for much more dynamic boss fights, where they would hover around the room in spots where I had to play a balance of moving to avoid projectiles vs. stopping in place to get off a few precision shots for damage. \u00a0Once the enemy then came in range, the timing skill behind watching for opportunities for melee counters gave the game a feel more typical of heavy melee action games, which\u00a0<em>Metroid\u00a0<\/em>typically has not been. \u00a0Given that the developer MercurySteam\u00a0was also behind the\u00a0<em>Castlevania: Lords of Shadow<\/em> games, this perhaps isn&#8217;t that surprising, but it was very welcoming.<\/p>\n<p>I think the best way to wrap this up is that I&#8217;m pleasantly surprised. \u00a0The studio behind this has released some great games, but it&#8217;s been a while since a 2D Metroid came out (seriously, Zero Mission was in 2004) and I was surprised they were being given so much of a chance to take liberties with the core gameplay. \u00a0By and large they&#8217;ve also worked really well. \u00a0The studio has been on record saying that they had originally pitched a remake demo of <em>Metroid Fusion<\/em> and been turned down, which led to this project. \u00a0It&#8217;s clear they had a lot of passion for the franchise anyway and it&#8217;s evident in the quality of the game they&#8217;ve released. \u00a0It&#8217;s also worth noting that a post-credits scene shows the rise of the X parasite from\u00a0<em>Fusion<\/em>, which makes sense given it also takes place on the planet SR388 of this game. \u00a0Whether or not that&#8217;s just there as a tongue in cheek reference to their original hopes or the sign of something else, I can only hope that this and the upcoming\u00a0<em>Metroid Prime 4<\/em> are the beginning of more for this franchise. \u00a0It&#8217;s been on the side lines for way too long.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>More Info from Nintendo Genre: Action\/Adventure, Metroidvania Platform: 3DS Originally Released on: Game Boy TL;DR Fantastic re-imagining of Game Boy&#8217;s Metroid II: Return of Samus Additions to game break some of the expectations of the genre, but allow for a much higher challenge level of the base game Core loop of 40 effective mini boss &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/?p=332\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Game Ramblings #52 &#8211; Metroid: Samus Returns&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":335,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,13,37],"tags":[15,18,35,120,53],"class_list":["post-332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-3ds","category-action","category-adventure","tag-3ds","tag-action","tag-adventure","tag-metroid","tag-metroidvania"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=332"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":333,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332\/revisions\/333"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/335"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blog.dwgames.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}