I am a bad person and I don't think Super Metroid holds up that well

[Bebpo]

Played a fuckton of this on the SNES emulator on the switch last night, both on a 8bitdo controller for a while and then in portable mode on the joycons for the rest of the night to try to reduce input lag for stuff like wall jumping with its really tight frames. Got space jump/plasma beam/spring roll, now just need to clear up a bit and go fight Ridley, so close to the end.

I'll always place Super Metroid as one of my favorite SNES games. Played the crap out of it and all the various GBA sequels and I've played the majority of modern Super Metroid/Metroidvania inspired games because I love the addictive concept of exploring and gaining new abilities opening up more exploration.

But man, either 1) I'm old now, or 2) The emulator version has some issues/lag, because I was raging a lot last night at all the stupid ass shit in Super Metroid.


-Wall jump controls are stupid and suck ass
-Grappling hook controls are stupid and suck ass
-Weird ass jump physics with slowdown at random times to fuck your jump up
-Even space jump which I remember pulling off perfectly all the time in the original from my memories isn't super consistent here and I fall out every few jumps (maybe switch controls?? or just old man now idk)
-Way too much troll design of hahaha fuck you player now go spend 5-10 mins getting back here again because you fell through an invisible block!
-The entire Miramidian map or whatever it's called I did last night was so much shittier than the first 3 maps which are all good. The SAND SHIT THAT RANDOMLY IS FUCKING UP YOUR JUMPING combined with the map being confusing as hell with all the sand connectors and making it a pain in the ass to get around. I was so glad to be done with this section as it's not fun to traverse at all.
-The boss fights kind of suck and are easy/boring but not fun at best, Plant face is ok but not fun, Crocodile is easy and boring, pushing guy back off bridge is boring, snake is ok until he stops staying still in his last parts of life and then flies around at 100 miles an hour and you just kinda have to spam trying to hit his face while he's moving
-Lots of backtracking, no fast travel (modern convenience)
-Map isn't very good. Doesn't show whether there are dead ends or doors connecting between segments. Wasted a lot of time backtracking to dead ends because of this. Hard to look at the map and figure out how to get where you want to go.
-Map doesn't remove the stupid "-"" which indicates a secret when you get it, so no way of telling which secrets you've gotten and which you haven't (again, modern convenience)
-If you don't remember/know the grappling beam trick, Draygon is fucking bullshit ridiculous. Gee, let's have an insane amount of HP and spam all these webs which with slowdown your shots can barely break in time all while avoiding his grab and all while trying to find the right spot to get some missiles in, oh and be dodging 4 green shots from all corners at the same time too. This shit took me almost an hour to beat "normally" after I ran out of ammo early on and had to rely on a few regular missile pick ups from shooting spiderwebs, dodge rolling Draygon and picking them up and then trying to get a few shots in. I swear he must have taken like 50-100 missile shots. When I saw the grapple beam trick after I was like oh, that sure would have been nice to know.

Anyhow, some of this is probably just old man criticizing and some of it is just modern evolution of 30 years building upon the formula, but my biggest gripe outside the sand map being shit is the controls are just not very smooth and fun and I realized how much I am used to very nice and smooth controlling metroidvanias these days like Hollow Knight or Guacamelee and this janky fight the controls stuff really brings the game down a lot in modern enjoyment to me.

[demi]

Yea this is a hot take based on playing the shit on a Switch, sorry DUDE

[Chooky]

first yoshis island now this? get it together man

[team filler]

 

[paprikastaude]

Doesn't need fast travel, because the map is compact and there's new shit on most back tracking sessions. I found the water boss 'trick' myself, seems pretty obvious. Space jump is intransparent, but the rest of the moveset is completely fair.

The sand is pretty bad though.

[Bebpo]

https://www.reddit.com/r/Metroid/comments/5kgvwb/why_do_people_love_super_metroid_when_the/

https://www.ign.com/boards/threads/i-had-forgotten-how-bad-super-metroids-controls-were.455084889/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Metroid/comments/7njw4q/my_issues_with_super_metroids_controls/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Metroid/comments/73pgxz/are_super_metroids_controls_that_bad/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Metroid/comments/8tn4j6/not_to_be_that_guy_but_super_metroid_has_some/

Maridia can go fuck itself. I know I'm not the only one to make that complaint. Other than that, some of the... "atmospheric" music is just grating to my ears. Brinstar and Crateria are fine, even enjoyable at times, but I genuinely can't stand some of the other musical tracks. I don't know if it's the SNES sound hardware (which I believe is better than GBA hardware but none of the GBA games have the same obnoxious sounding music) and even if it is, Megaman X has one of the most legendary soundtracks in videogame history and did it with SNES sound hardware, which makes me think in an effort to create atmospheric pieces, the team accidentally just would up with bitcrunched noise. There's also this beeping that does not stop on the pause menu and it's one of the most obnoxious examples of sound design I've ever heard in a videogame. Some sound effects are just flat out poorly chosen. That "ugh" Samus does when she takes a hit is especially misplaced. I don't know the best route through Norfair so I will say that I wasn't super optimal in getting all the items, but even so, you spend way too much time in Norfair. It ties more into pacing but at some point it becomes padding and this ain't no JRPG, so yeah, I won't lie and say Norfair wasn't an egregious example of just poor routing. Individual paths within Norfair were fine but I feel like paths could have looped back on themselves a little better to reduce the back and forth.

Getting to Draygon and Botwoon is a chore and a pain. Actually, everything between the Kraid and Ridley fights is a goddamn chore. It's probably the worst in terms of pacing.

From that last one.



Look, a week ago I would've rolled eyes at anyone saying this because in my memory Super Metroid is perfect. But replaying it now, it's still good but I mean:

1) The controls are clunky
2) The boss fights are pretty weak (either simple/boring, or annoying)
3) The map design/routing for certain parts are not great (other parts ARE great)

the game is still genre inspiring and good, but in retrospect I think it's definitely far from perfect and some of the modern metroidvanias are a lot better games. I'd take Hollow Knight over this in a heartbeat.

[paprikastaude]

SM level design shits all over Hollow Knight. The latter is too bloated and convoluted for no reason, way more tedious to traverse than Metroid.

[nudemacusers]

It’s no Metroid prime.

[Bebpo]

I also never played either of the Metroid 2 remakes and this is getting me in the mood to play one next. From browsing around it seems like both AM2R and Samus Returns have much smoother/easier controls so I'd probably enjoy them more on that aspect. Not sure which I'd play. AM2R looks more authentic but Samus Returns has good reviews too.

It’s no Metroid prime.

I'd be curious to replay this one and see how it holds up. I really loved Prime 1 & 2.

lol SM level design shits all over Hollow Knight.

The only thing I'd give SM over Hollow Knight in map design is SM has way more hidden secrets with all the missile packs and stuff and some are pretty clever. The main non-secret map design and flow is excellent in HK imo, but definitely has fewer secrets.

[demi]

I'm still rolling eyes at you, you really tryna be one of those people like "man if you really think about it, super mario world wasn't that good"

I'll jump on your precious hallow knight and tear that shit up too if you want. Want me to? Come get these hands

[Himu]

Agreed. Super Metroid has Maridia which is awful. Wall jump controls are nasty but while they can be mastered don't feel good.

Great, but highly flawed game.

Zero Mission is the best Metroid.

[paprikastaude]

There's that one invisible trap in SM in front of an energy tank, but even then it involves other challenges going back. HK is full of annoying vertical rooms, in which you fall into hazards because you don't see what's coming. HK has warping, but you spent multiple times the amount of redundant walking compared to Metroid. Too little new secrets during backtracking compared to SM and bloated level design. Instead of a single shop area, like in Castlevania, there's like ten shop things in HK and almost none have a warping point near it. Don't see how the bosses are more inspired than most other Metroidvanias either. It's also missing the Metroid element of feeling much stronger at the end compared to enemies/bosses than in the beginning. Instead, until the end flying enemies annoy you in those lame vertical rooms.

[BisMarckie]

Getting your sword upgraded in HK was a hassle and I didn’t even bother with the shops or the bank because getting there was such a hassle. I liked HK, but it was a good 10 hour game stretched to 20.

[Svejk]

 SNES games simply don't age as well as Genesis games do. 

[BisMarckie]

Good games don’t become bad because of time passing in general.

[Tuckers Law]

 

The only real design criticism I have for SM is in Lower Norfair escapes fireflea room, specifically the wall gap textured over in the foreground so that you don’t see you can go through (it still appears solid when using X-ray scope).  To my knowledge, that’s the only “required” location that features that mechanic and the environment doesn’t give any particular hints that it’s there.

Still, probably the best single videogame ever designed outside of Tetris.

[Himu]

Maridia is dog shit.

[Fifstar]

The controls aren't the best and Maridia does suck indeed. This was always the case though.

Hard hard disagree on the map. Imo still one if not the best map in a Metroid like game ever. HK has a shit map through and through.

Combat could be better but never was the point of Super Metroid.  Since Dark Souls it seems to be en vogue to criticize every game for not having an intricate combat system. Which is fucking dumb because not every game has to break up it's general gameplay for hard boss fights or general combat focus.

[Himu]

I will disagree in saying Super Metroid "doesn't hold up that well". It absolutely does. But it also has a lot of flaws too.

[Bebpo]

Getting your sword upgraded in HK was a hassle and I didn’t even bother with the shops or the bank because getting there was such a hassle. I liked HK, but it was a good 10 hour game stretched to 20.

There's that one invisible trap in SM in front of an energy tank, but even then it involves other challenges going back. HK is full of annoying vertical rooms, in which you fall into hazards because you don't see what's coming. HK has warping, but you spent multiple times the amount of redundant walking compared to Metroid. Too little new secrets during backtracking compared to SM and bloated level design. Instead of a single shop area, like in Castlevania, there's like ten shop things in HK and almost none have a warping point near it. Don't see how the bosses are more inspired than most other Metroidvanias either. It's also missing the Metroid element of feeling much stronger at the end compared to enemies/bosses than in the beginning. Instead, until the end flying enemies annoy you in those lame vertical rooms.

Did you guys not max out your sword? You definitely feel invincibly powerful in endgame HK and kill everything in one slash. Also there are quick travel points within like 20-30 seconds of every merchant, but most merchants you don't need to be revisiting unless your fragile strength/heart/money breaks. As long as you keep upgrading, the progression in HK is excellent and you're always feeling more powerful but can still be challenged by some stuff. The game is very non-linear so you're gated by tougher areas until you get stronger and can take them on for the most part.

I'm gonna disagree super hard on the boss fights. Hollow Knight has an entire boss rush DLC dedicated to just fighting the 50+ bosses because they are fun. The fights are some of the best 2d boss fights ever. There are a few bad ones, but the better ones are basically the Vergil fights in DMC3 but in 2d. Amazing 2d combat that is a mix of Megaman x Contra x Swordplay bosses.

Also other than the first time through a vertical room, you shouldn't be going up vertical rooms. If you're backtracking you warp to above and drop down. Also the controls with the dash, crystal flying and stuff make movement incredibly fast and quick throughout the world. I don't feel there's more walking than Super Metroid or any other metroidvania in HK.

I will disagree in saying Super Metroid "doesn't hold up that well". It absolutely does. But it also has a lot of flaws too.

I'm mixed on this. I mean it holds up well enough to get me glued to it playing for hours straight. It's still an exciting progression fun game. But the flaws definitely date it and make the backhalf less fun than it should be.

[Himu]

Play Link to the Past. Ten times the game Super Metroid is.

[D3RANG3D]

I guess, I am a bad person because LTTP is a snooze fest.

[tiesto]

Wall jumping jankiness fucking sucks, and parts of Maridia are a bit of a drag, but everything else about SM is excellent. Still my overall favorite game in the genre.

[Bebpo]

Wall jumping jankiness fucking sucks, and parts of Maridia are a bit of a drag, but everything else about SM is excellent. Still my overall favorite game in the genre.

To be fair, I haven't replayed any of the others, so it's probably my favorite game in the series from memory, yeah. I mean I remember liking the GBA ones and Prime ones but I don't remember much about them other than they were very good and fun.

Play Link to the Past. Ten times the game Super Metroid is.

Funny thing is my brother just replayed Super Metroid & LTTP on switch and he said Super Metroid was easy and didn't have any problems but LTTP was hard and had some backtracking zzz because you don't get fast travel until late game. He still thought both held up great though. I don't remember LTTP being hard but haven't played in 20 years and as I've seen with Super Metroid my memory doesn't mean much that far back.

[Himu]

LTTP has backtracking but it’s negligible because you have the sword charge that dashes you literallly across the screen and the map is so small you can get from one end to the other in maybe two minutes.

[Human Snorenado]

MODS HELP

[Chooky]

backtracking barely even counts when you're talking about 80s and early 90 games because we're talking about like two minutes of going over areas you'd already been in.

and complaining about maridia while comparing the game to hollow knight? maridia has what, like three rooms that are actually shit. three rooms in the whole fucking game. meanwhile hollow knight has bloat every where you turn, barely any passages and warp points to make getting around easier, dead ends, frequent lack of a clear direction on where to go, hours of backtracking, it uses the same god damn boss template more times than i could keep track of, and the item collection is so fucked that you barely find anything in the first 10 hours or so of the game. it has incredible controls, combat, and player feedback, but everything else in that game is a god damn mess. sm meanwhile you gotta use a microscope while comparing it against modern day games to find the flaws.

[Nintex]

Super Metroid is great.

In that game Samus felt like a walking tank, which is how it should be because she is.
Metroid Prime did the same thing. Clunky, walking tank Samus.

One of the many things Other M got wrong was turning Samus into a mechanical Ninja and she had been slowly moving in that direction since Metroid Fusion.

As for the music


 

[Trent Dole]

lol shut up bitch

[Nintex]

Playing Link's Awakening and Super Metroid reminds one of how tightly designed these classic games are 

Every frame, byte, tile and layer used to the fullest. Not a single redundant sequence or element that takes you out of the experience
because the developers didn't have the time, technology and resources to spend on bullshit.

[CatsCatsCats]

Lol yeah I never played it as a kid and all emulator attempts were 

[Fifstar]

I will disagree in saying Super Metroid "doesn't hold up that well". It absolutely does. But it also has a lot of flaws too.

It most definitely had some big ass glaring flaws. It's also incredibly ahead of it's time.

[Tuckers Law]

As for the music


 

There’s some tasty synth versions floating around for SM music.

[paprikastaude]

I didn't even play SM until after the GBA games. Didn't know what the buzz was about, but then I played it and yeah, SM was the GOAT. Zero Mission is weird going back, because it feels like a short version of SM that cut the best parts.

[Svejk]

I think M4 doesn't get enough praise.  Although not too keen on the simplistic "X" suit design, the game was a solid sequel, imo. 

[Himu]

M...4?

Fusion? Didn’t that come out around the same time as Prime? So how is it 4?

Either way I always felt fusion was a poor sequel to super. Let’s take a game series without handholding that relies on atmosphere and going solo and give you a talking voice as a partner that always tells you where to go

[Svejk]

M...4?

Fusion? Didn’t that come out around the same time as Prime? So how is it 4?

Either way I always felt fusion was a poor sequel to super. Let’s take a game series without handholding that relies on atmosphere and going solo and give you a talking voice as a partner that always tells you where to go

Yes, Fusion (aka Metroid 4).  The voice talking to you; "guiding" you, was a big twist of M4 actually.  Other than that, visually, it was the same as M3 in terms of "you need to go here.. the blip off the beaten path of the map". A bit more linear than M3, but still great.
 

[Chooky]

m4 would be a lot better if you could skip the fucking cutscenes with a button press. still a pretty good game. lots of great boss fights there.

[Himu]

Too linear for Metroid in my opinion but different strokes

[Shuri]

Can we at least agree that the first metroid game was dreadful?

[Trent Dole]

Original Metroid was maybe too ambitious for the hardware it was on. SM takes what they were going for and does it about as perfectly as was possible at the time.

[demi]

Can we at least agree that the first metroid game was dreadful?

I think it wouldn't be bad if it had a map and saving like SM

There's a hack that adds these sort of things

Metroid 2 isn't that good either, Samus Returns kinda helps as a remake but that has its own issues

[benjipwns]

You left out the worst part about the controls, Metroid can't even crawl, so you can't get past the first part without some crazy wallhacking speedrun type bullshit.

[Trent Dole]

Can we at least agree that the first metroid game was dreadful?

I think it wouldn't be bad if it had a map and saving like SM

There's a hack that adds these sort of things

Metroid 2 isn't that good either, Samus Returns kinda helps as a remake but that has its own issues

Ugh, that fucking stupid melee bullshit that they constantly force on you.

[Bebpo]

Can we at least agree that the first metroid game was dreadful?

I think it wouldn't be bad if it had a map and saving like SM

There's a hack that adds these sort of things

Metroid 2 isn't that good either, Samus Returns kinda helps as a remake but that has its own issues

So is Samus Returns or AM2R better? Because I'm gonna play that next.

[demi]

I'd imagine A2MR is better but I don't support illegal fangames

[D3RANG3D]

Imagine being a corporate shill.

[Chooky]

metroid 1 was great at the time. solid action, tons of secrets, and tons of atmosphere. outside of the lack of a map and the way your health starts low after deaths/resets the game is still solid.

[Himu]

I think Metroid is an okay nintendo series that has two, maybe three great games tops despite a 30 year history. It’s one of the cases where games influenced by it are often better. It’s one of the few franchises that has a large gap between games that I shrug at. Metroid isn’t good enough to care that much and other games do the formula as well or better.

Nintendo's most overrated franchise by a mile. Even Donkey Kong has a better track record.

Sorry Gunpei-San.

[Great Rumbler]

Samus Returns is pretty good.

[Bebpo]

Ok, finished Super Metroid. The Ridley area was tough but good design, screw attack is great as always, Ridley boss fight is ok and the endgame stuff is cool. Grinding the bugs for 10-15 mins to get back to full health and missiles before Ridley fight was the only annoying bit.

Overall it's still pretty good and the music is still awesome and nice sprite art. Just annoying in bits.

I feel like the map design is pretty confusing, even by the end I pretty much had to refer to the map to always know where I am. Part of this is that back in the day when you spent months with a game and not just like 6 hours over a couple nights you really got to know the areas and map layout. I feel like that with other metroidvanias where by the end of the game I can get around the map without having to pull up the map, but it never clicked like that here outside the starting crateria area. A lot of one way blocks and stuff that make traversal kinda a pain if you don't know the map really well. The first time in the Ridley area I went the way you're eventually supposed to leave after defeating Ridley before fighting Ridley which had one way blocks taking me back to one of the other maps and then had to go back down again.

I feel like if they remade it today it'd have smoother controls and the auto-map would have more details like one way doors and power ups you've collected vs haven't. I'd actually like them to remake it at some point, because otherwise probably not gonna go back through this for another 20 years.

I think Metroid is an okay nintendo series that has two, maybe three great games tops despite a 30 year history. It’s one of the cases where games influenced by it are often better. It’s one of the few franchises that has a large gap between games that I shrug at. Metroid isn’t good enough to care that much and other games do the formula as well or better.

Nintendo's most overrated franchise by a mile. Even Donkey Kong has a better track record.

Sorry Gunpei-San.

But I disagree on this. I've really enjoyed every Metroid game I've played. And there are definitely a lot of Nintendo series I cannot say that about. Not only did Metroid create its own genre and be incredibly inspiring for all videogames, it also kept making sequels that were good and enjoyable until Metroid Prime ended. Just because the series died and the original games have flaws doesn't detract from it being one of the better Nintendo franchises.

It is too bad Nintendo let Metroid die in terms of new content games. It's a good franchise and it'd be nice to have a quality modern one, either 2.5d or Prime-style.

Fwiw I never played Other M since it didn't seem like a real Metroid game and more like Metroid Pinball as some weird side thing you can ignore.

[Trent Dole]

Super, Zero Mission, and Fusion are all pretty great, you can argue for the first Prime too.

[Himu]

imo the only great Metroid's are Super, Prime, and Zero Mission. Haven't played Prime 3.

[Trent Dole]

Primes get progressively less good IMO so I don't think you're missing anything there.

[Tuckers Law]

Can we at least agree that the first metroid game was dreadful?

I think it wouldn't be bad if it had a map and saving like SM

There's a hack that adds these sort of things

Metroid 2 isn't that good either, Samus Returns kinda helps as a remake but that has its own issues

So is Samus Returns or AM2R better? Because I'm gonna play that next.

I feel as though Samus Returns and AM2R are two excellent “covers” that elevate the originally flawed and bare source material, with each remake going for a different kinds of feeling and experience from the player with how they expanded upon the original.  They’re very good and I think you should play them both if you like Metroid games.

My own personal experience was I had originally played Metroid 2 and thought it was okay for a game boy game but overall not a great experience.  When AM2R released I played that using my Wii U pro controller, and loved it start to finish.  Samus Returns released afterwards, I played that and also loved it, but differently than with AM2R.