Now, do not take the title of this article at first glance, or at least do not read it that I have a negative view of Metroid games. I bought Metroid on the NES I have no memory of when, and I may have even gotten it for a Christmas present sometime between 1987 and 1990. I never bought Metroid II: Return of Samus on the Game Boy because either Dr. Potts or one of my neighbors had it and I played it a little bit but never got too far. I played Super Metroid on the SNES a lot although I did not buy it until some time in 1999 or 2000. I then bought/played Metroid Prime, somewhat excited by a Metroid FPS, but I stopped maybe 1/3 of the way through after becoming lost and annoyed with the control scheme. That was where my adventures with Metroid ended until these last 30 or so days.
When Metroid Fusion came out in 2002, I had read reviews, some of which I already discussed in my Game EXP article. But the gist of it was that I heard negative things about the game railroading you and I did not like Ridley's design from the picture I saw in Nintendo Power. When Metroid: Zero Mission came out in 2004, I thought, "Well, I already have Metroid on the NES, why do I need a revamped version of this game?" When Metroid: Samus Returns was remade in 2017, I had recently purchased the Virtual Console port of the original Game Boy game on my 3DS and had a similar, "I'll just play this and not pay $40 for a revamped version of this game" thought; although I was very excited when the game was first announced at E3 2016. Regarding the rest of the games in the Metroid Prime series (Echoes, Corruption, Federation Force, Hunters), because I did not like the first Metroid Prime, I saw no reason in continuing with that storyline either. Also the focus on multiplayer for Metroid Prime: Federation Force and the generic-looking character design was a huge turn-off.
So jump ahead now to 2021 and Metroid Dread, developed by Mercury Steam (Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, Metroid II: Samus Returns) announced that they were releasing a new 2D Metroid game on the Nintendo Switch, I felt like it was now time to get back into this franchise. So I pre-ordered the game after only watching the announcement trailer and staying away from all subsequent trailers to keep the story as fresh as possible. But then I got the hankering to play Metroid Fusion. . .although that desire had been around for a few years, occasionally looking at auctions on eBay, but never jumping on getting the game for the Game Boy Advance. Then a month ago I began to hear rumblings that the Wii U and 3DS eShops were going to be no longer accepting payments in early 2022, that both Metroid: Zero Mission and Fusion were available on the Wii U Virtual Console and seemingly never coming to the 3DS and with time running out when Nintendo might announce a Game Boy Advance Nintendo Switch Online app akin to the NES, SNES, and now N64 versions, I decided to spring and buy a Wii U.
So my first purchases were for Metroid Fusion and Metroid: Zero Mission, knowing that I wanted to play through Fusion before I started Metroid Dread. 15ish hours later, I finished Metroid Fusion, wrote my Game EXP article then jumped into Metroid Dread, only slightly afraid that I might be Metroided out, but that was not the case. I have only gotten a few hours into Dread as Conklederp has been reinvigorated by Animal Crossing's update and DLC, but I did not mind because I then started Zero Mission on the Wii U. Having now beaten that game, I feel like my previous held expectations about Fusion and Zero Mission are leading me to try and jump back into Metroid Prime and buying the Metroid Prime Trilogy on the Wii U rather than trying to find Metroid Prime: Echoes and Metroid Prime: Corruption on either the GameCube or Wii. Maybe even do a chronology run through the entire series? I have read that in Metroid Prime: Federation Force that the game is primarily multiplayer with very little to enjoy about the single-player campaign (or playing a multiplayer game as a single-player, although the Left 4 Dead series comes to mind as an enjoyable single-player co-op game), but with the game still averaging its $39.99 price tag, I would rather give that money to play Metroid: Samus Returns.
One last thing that I wanted to touch on about the Metroid series is its passive emphasis on completion time and item completion rates. I knew that the faster you beat the original Metroid, the more of Samus you see at the end (when it is first revealed that this character is a woman), and even in Super Metroid, I never sought to beat the game faster than I needed to; exploration was always more fun than speed for me. So with both Fusion and Zero Mission getting between 57-65% Item Completion in six to eight hours, I struggle to find any kind of desire to beat the game in fewer than 2 hours with 100% Item Completion. That just seems bonkers to me and I am sure that I could find a video on YouTube [https://youtu.be/EfLwuWe_Qdk?t=24], but I do not really want to watch someone else play a Metroid game just to see an end screen I can easily look up myself. I guess I will just need to work on my wall jump.
~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
I'm Looking At Myself, Reflections of My Mind
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