But the overall flow of the adventure is radically changed here, with repetitive caverns taking on a denser, more puzzle-oriented feel with an emphasis on acquiring weapons and gear in order to delve deeper into the planet. Samus Returns reworks Metroid II into a post- Metroid Fusion adventure, maintaining the original game’s plotline, the general layout of SR-388, and the need to face off against rapidly evolving metroids on their turf. Metroid: Samus Returns (Nintendo 3DS, 2017)The second remake in the Metroid line, this one for a game that genuinely needed revisiting to bring it more into line with the series’ standards and vision. Planet SR-388 also isn’t nearly as thoughtfully structured as other settings that have appeared throughout the Metroid franchise, and the monochrome graphics make the corridors both confusing and repetitive. Samus looks great, but she’s huge on the tiny Game Boy screen, and the chunky proportions of the graphics crowd the action and hamper exploration.
That said, Return of Samus does suffer from a few notable issues.
METROID PRIME PINBALL SERIES
Still, no one knew the Game Boy’s strengths and weaknesses like Nintendo’s R&D1 division - the creators of both the Metroid series and the Game Boy hardware - so the pairing turned out to be a forward step for Samus Aran regardless.Metroid II did a great deal to flesh out the series’ universe, exploring the origins and evolution of the eponymous space monsters, and its minimalist narrative set the stage for the magnificent Super Metroid. Metroid II: Return of Samus (Game Boy, 1992)Metroid’s first sequel immediately took the series in an unexpected direction: Onto a handheld platform with less horsepower than the system that hosted the original. Taxing, tiring, and tedious throughout most of its running length, Echoes is one of those sequels that demonstrates the “difficult second album” phenomenon in action. It doesn’t help that Echoes is probably the single most challenging Metroid game ever made even without the reality-shifting elements, with some of the trickiest bosses in the entire franchise to conquer. Things do become less punishing toward the end of the game, as Samus finds tools to help mitigate the effects of shifting universes, but the journey to reaching that point is so exhausting most players never get there. Venturing into the dark world drains Samus’ energy, and certain creatures within each realm can only be destroyed with specific expendable ammunition. Here, players have to navigate a world divided into dark and light zones, a concept that defines every last inch of the game. The original Prime suffered from what were ultimately fairly forgivable issues, but Echoes exacerbated all of those issues and threw in problems of its own making on top.Echoes revolves around a duality-based gimmick that might work on paper but falls flat in practice. Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (GameCube, 2004)Samus’ second outing in 3D abandons much of the cohesion and sense of purpose that drove its predecessor.
Players take control of Samus in a single-player campaign or play as one of several different bounty hunters in a head-to-head competitive mode, running around claustrophobic alien environments and attempting to gun down as many other rivals as possible.It’s fine for what it is. Hunters, on the other hand, was precisely the kind of game that everyone expected the Prime titles to be before they played them. Metroid Prime Hunters (Nintendo DS, 2006)Nintendo made a big deal about Metroid Prime not being a “first-person shooter.” This was partially to assuage the fears of fans who assumed the series was going to transforms into a mindless run-and-gun game, and partially because, well, Prime actually didn’t focus much on shooting. It’s decent enough, but there’s almost no substance to it. It’s a tutorial-teaser for Hunters rather than an actual game in its own right. A pared-down version of Metroid Prime Hunters, First Hunt consists of three tiny, bite-sized scenarios set in environments drawn from the final game.