Super Metroid

[Mortificator]

Ok. A while ago I played Metroid Zero Mission until the end of Chozodia, right before the boss fight that gives you back all your stuff. But then I lost my savegame. Does anyone have a savegame at that exact point or a little bit before that? I would highly appreciate it. Otherwise I'm going to abandon this game for now and replay it from the beginning when I am motivated to play those first five hours again.

Here you go.

And unless you're playing on an original cart, remember to back that shit up.

[BazookaBen]

i found all of the near constant pulling and turning of doors, handles and various computer terminals pretty unbearable in prime 3. I never finished the game because of it.

I was ultimately disappointed in Prime 3 as well. Too much filler, too compartmentalized. I had to force myself to finish it. I guess it was worth it, certain parts were pretty fun, but there were long strethces where I was saying "Crap, they're going to make me go all the way over there again?".

It's been a long time since I played Echoes, it had some of the same problems, but was more engaging overall. Honestly though, Prime 1 is the only one (of the Retro produced titles) I'd recommend to everybody. Hopefully Nintendo finds a new studio to breathe new life into the series.

[Squire Grooktook]

Prime 2 is far, far worse in terms of back tracking and unclear objectives than Prime 3, which is relatively streamlined in comparison.

[KindGrind]

There were recent breakthroughs in Prime 2 speedrunning, namely you can skip the initial items loss now, which makes for a very interesting playthrough, to say the least.

I picked up a JP copy of Super Metroid last week and oldschool spedrun it up until the Gravity Suit. I've always struggled with the Ghost Ship shinespark and I still did, but most of the rest of the run was clean. If I were to try to run it for real, I'd have to go get Grappling, it's far more reliable for me than that terrible shinespark. There are new routes being discovered, and runs deemed unbeatable in the past (Hotarubi's single segment in 32 mn) have been beaten, which I find very exciting.

[Pretas]

Prime 3 felt like a Halo game to me. The default difficulty level was so disappointingly low that I avoided most energy tanks, and still breezed through.

It's especially sigh-worthy to hear Iwata's hidden audio message calling it the best game in the series.

[CDexWard]

Ok. A while ago I played Metroid Zero Mission until the end of Chozodia, right before the boss fight that gives you back all your stuff. But then I lost my savegame. Does anyone have a savegame at that exact point or a little bit before that? I would highly appreciate it. Otherwise I'm going to abandon this game for now and replay it from the beginning when I am motivated to play those first five hours again.

Here you go.

And unless you're playing on an original cart, remember to back that shit up.

Thank you very much!

[BIL]

You could even bomb-jump up the cliff face if you were ambitious.

Replaying SM at the moment, and the first thing I wanted to do was make it up the cliff sans Space Jump as you'd mentioned. I totally misremembered your post saying to walljump so that's what I did.

So goddamn good, this game's movement. An entire game unto itself.

[Squire Grooktook]

Have you tried skipping Kraid, and using the wall jump to stock up on enough energy tanks early to tank through Norfair? Actually quite fun.

[BIL]

Nope - I'm an absolute beginner at anything sequence breaking. I killed Ridley before Kraid in ZM on my last play and that was enough excitement for me.

Regarding the benefit of having four triggers/shoulder buttons in Super Metroid, these allow you to change weapons with your index finger(s) as your thumbs do the rest. Technically an exploit, but who cares? To quote dr. Fitzgerald, "nobody ever loses their memory".

Have to say, I do miss Fusion/ZM's streamlined controls upon returning to Super. I like having missiles/powerbombs a shoulder button press away at all times.

[CDexWard]

Whoa, I can't even single wall jump in ZM and that's supposedly easier than in SM.

[BIL]

From my limited experiences, ZM has simpler timing with less of a wait between hitting away, then jump; it's closer to hitting both simultaneously. But it seems stingier about whether you're making sufficient initial contact with a wall/ledge. The tiniest pixel collision will work in Super, as seen above (in the first three jumps, you need to just barely brush the cliff, or you'll hit the outcroppings and fall). ZM walljumps seem harder if not impossible to do with such minimal contact.

[CStarFlare]

I'm glad this got bumped. I just finished Metroid Super Zero Mission - incredible hack. Not too crazy on the whole, though the walljumping to get to Spore Spawn was something I didn't consider possible unto I looked it up.

Moniker's right though. It's better than every official Metroid except the game it's built on. The only real flaw I can think of is that the final boss was... anticlimactic. But something tells me there's something I missed - the game flat out asked me if I've beaten all the bosses.

[Immryr]

Did that metroid 2 remake ever get finished?

[CStarFlare]

Still in development, but I remember getting the pressipn from comments that you could play quite a lot of the game in the demo.

http://metroid2remake.blogspot.com/?m=1

[Astraea FGA Mk. I]

My favourite game. I used to skip school and play this. I got away with it so often because my mom always wanted to watch me play.

[BIL]

I've been brushing up my clear time+item% in Fusion's JP-only Hard mode*... and if not for the "gr8 narrative" to skip through every single time, I'd call it addictive. It's still quite compelling. Superb pace and variety, marverous control, gratifyingly beefy hitz and some cool bosses in a 1-2hr runtime depending on what item% you're going for. The enforced linearity isn't nice in series context, but as a tight set course I really like this. When it's not battering me with reams of text. It's not even that much to skip through, but in a fast-moving action context it's as welcome as a thumbtack amongst Braille. Was this The Revenge of Sakamoto The Frustrated Screenwriter Upon The Ingrate Consumer Masses, or something?

...speaking of, I read the Zero Mission tie-in manga out of curiosity and was surprised to see Other M's Most Reviled Bit in there, only Done Properly. Rookie hothead harbouring horrific unresolved trauma is ambushed by the revived source of said trauma, chokes and is brutally defeated. Ok! Primal scream of release upon her much later triumph over the monster? Good shit. But ok! That's enough! Good job, Samus Origin Story! It's a good thing nobody will shoehorn in a rehash of this arc several adventures and Ridley destructions later.

*Hard mode is just a parameter tweak AFAIK, same as Zero Mission's. Less assets given, more damage taken. Normally I find these uninteresting, but with the aggressive enemies and challenge to minimise supply hunting for faster times, it's been fun.

[Ed Oscuro]

Prime 2 is far, far worse in terms of back tracking and unclear objectives

It's a good thing they still nailed the atmosphere pretty well, but yeah...good to know I'm not going crazy (at least on this point). I got most of the way to the end of the game, realized I'd missed a scan, and then lost my enthusiasm. But that happened for me on that final ramp to the boss in the original - which I picked up and beat a year or two ago, many years after my initial playthrough. Not bad, but these games have some tedious moments. I guess my major gripe is lock-on and that it simplifies the major part of FPS a bit more than I'd prefer - it makes many fights feel like little more than a waiting game. I especially felt that way during the original Prime fight, which wasn't difficult but just slow.

You could even bomb-jump up the cliff face if you were ambitious.

Replaying SM at the moment, and the first thing I wanted to do was make it up the cliff sans Space Jump as you'd mentioned. I totally misremembered your post saying to walljump so that's what I did.

So goddamn good, this game's movement. An entire game unto itself.

Very nice. What's this, just a regular move? Bomb jumping is not hard - just requires patience to get it started unless you have the timing down at the start. It makes me feel warm and fuzzy to know there's a better and more stylish way

[BIL]

Yeah, no equipment required - you can jump up there immediately on arrival, though you need the morph ball and bombs to clear the passageway (I'd already nuked it before recording that gif). Both items are acquired a few minutes into the game, ofc.

For walljumps, you need to be in a spinning jump (jump while moving forward), make contact with a wall or ledge, hit and hold "away" and a moment later hit jump. The delay between those two inputs takes getting used to, but the window is pretty forgiving (wait for Samus's turning frame, seen in that gif). With practice it's easily possible to walljump straight up sheer walls, making SM goddamn catnip for me and my affinity of sidescrollers with the mechanic. ^__^ I'm not even bothered about Fusion and to a much lesser extent ZM's linearity. Between the engine and geography SM's already got a lifetime's worth of stuff to try out.

As Roo said earlier in the thread, technically you're meant to learn walljumping after falling into a vertical shaft with friendly walljumping animals (or letting the demos run long enough to play the scene), but the crucial delay between "away" and jump isn't quite obvious. It'll feel godawfully inconsistent if you're hitting the commands simultaneously. It's also critical to not hit any directions besides "left" or "right" ; AFAIK, anything else will break the spin. Not sure if that can be counteracted - I like how Fusion and ZM let you start a new spin at any point by hitting Jump in midair.

I find bombjumping a bit squirrely in the original and Super (it was chopped right out of Fusion), but I've not put the time in. ZM's massive blast radius is EZ modo, at least for vertical ones. Horizontals still perplex me a bit. Just barely got the early Varia suit then called it a day pending further practice.

edit: CRUMBZ I WAS (and indeed still am) TIRED AND DRUNK, apologies if you already know about walljumping Ed! 3: I seem to recall springing a possibly unsolicited tutorial on someone else recently, it's the booze talking I swearz ;3 ;3 ;3

the booze and the walljumps D:

<- muh brain

[Obiwanshinobi]

It's a good thing they still nailed the atmosphere pretty well, but yeah...good to know I'm not going crazy (at least on this point). I got most of the way to the end of the game, realized I'd missed a scan, and then lost my enthusiasm. But that happened for me on that final ramp to the boss in the original - which I picked up and beat a year or two ago, many years after my initial playthrough. Not bad, but these games have some tedious moments. I guess my major gripe is lock-on and that it simplifies the major part of FPS a bit more than I'd prefer - it makes many fights feel like little more than a waiting game. I especially felt that way during the original Prime fight, which wasn't difficult but just slow.

"Slow" being the keyword here. I think Metroid doesn't really suit the Deus Ex-like FPP engine and stage design. I'm fine mostly walking, rarely running in Thief or Deus Ex where I don't expect to perform any super-human acrobatics. For the same reason Tomb Raider reskinned as Metroid wouldn't make the trick either.
For Metroid Prime to work for me it should be nigh on entirely playable as the ball. The engine could stay as is; it would just take different stage design.

If the exploration was way faster, you wouldn't mind backtracking all that much.

[Mortificator]

you're meant to learn walljumping after falling into a vertical shaft with friendly walljumping animals (or letting the demos run long enough to play the scene), but the crucial delay between "away" and jump isn't quite obvious.

I didn't even realize wall-jumping was possible when I first played through the game, and thought they were giving you a preview of the space jump.

It also took me way too long to figure out how to get to Kraid (breakable walls in an elevator room!?) and that the underwater tube could be destroyed.

[BIL]

Always thought both the walljump and Shinespark traps were pretty ballsy moves from the devs - the former moreso, since the technique is quite subtle. Although, I was reminded on my last play that you don't have to make it all the way up the pit - I guess they didn't quite want a trial by fire there.

The Etecoons singing the item fanfare theme melts my heart, as does the one dude being a bit slower than his two pals. Gawwwd I love this game. ;-;

[Obiwanshinobi]

Watertube I did learn about from FAQ.

Has anybody here discovered everything in Other M? I still have yet to.

[evil_ash_xero]

Such a great game. Definitely one of the best of all time.

The cover should be more epic though. It doesn't scream "this is one of the best games you'll ever play".

The JP cover is a lot nicer (as usual). Does the JP version have English options, like the U.S. version has JP options?

[soprano1]

They are the same version, only the cover is different.

[drauch]

I like the cover just fine. To add anything would sorta diminish the experience. I'd personally enjoy a cover that's much like the intro screen. That perfect, subtle buildup with the haunting sound of empty laboratories and the atmospheric buildup to the title screen is absolutely perfect, and completely foreshadows the isolation you're about to endure. Fuckin' aces.

[KindGrind]

Does the JP version have English options, like the U.S. version has JP options?

The JP cart has the English dialogue option. As a matter of fact, the roms seem to be identical.

One of the advantages of the JP cart is that it costs 1/3 the price of a US cart...

[evil_ash_xero]

I like the sound of that.

I've owned my copy since it came out. I don't think I'd want to part with it. But the JP cover is a lot better.

It's weird, cause the U.S. cover is almost the same, but like a lesser version. I don't understand the choices of these companies. Especially in the old days.