Hey everyone, retro dude here. Thanks for joining me again . From time to time I like to take a look at everything retro and cool. When I heard about this game I got super excited! I love the metroidvania genre . and when you hear one of the pioneers is releasing a game. You stand up in attention!
Solid Roots to Pull From
A direct sequel to Metroid fusion from the Game boy advance.
Let’s take a quick look back at that game . You were attacked by enemies known as X. They’re a type of parasitic organism that can mimic the hosts powers. In Samus’s case. It made the SA-x . Which is a clone of Samus. It took all her Super Metroid powers! She was ultimately cured by fusing her with Metroid dna. Which was the only known predator of the x parasites. As a result she gained the ability to absorb the X parasites. She also suffers from their weakness to cold now. A thing of note. My son was really scared of the sense of dread that came when being hunted by the Sa-x parasite. And he wasn’t the only one. Because that was the inspiration for, Metroid Dread!
Cut to Metroid Dread
The federation receives video footage of an x out in the wild. Samus is sent to destroy it. Now up to this point Samus has destroyed Every planet she’s been in . So You don’t want her in your neighborhood. If you catch my drift. As soon as she arrives she’s attacked and defeated by a Chozo warrior. The same kind that made her suit.
Keeping the tone from fusion. The sense of dread is great when you’re being chased by the emmi. A new type of enemy that samus is powerless against , for the most part. They can only be killed by an omega blast that you get from killing some mother brain type enemies. For the most part all you can do is run from these guys . And if they catch you. It’s almost certain death. You have a small window in which to avoid it’s one shot kill.
The Classic Gameplay’s Back!
It wouldn’t be Metroid without those beautiful power ups. We get the morph ball. Lol, like 2 hours in! Power up shot, missiles, the speed boost, a new camouflage feature, to help avoid the Emmis. A melee attack, that’s extremely satisfying to use. If timed correctly it stuns most enemies, and if killed in that state. They’ll drop extra resources. As a result, the game never really felt hard. If you were low on health all you had to do was melee an enemy or two and you’re good to go. We also get a flash step that’s extremely useful. Both the boss fights and regular gameplay have a lot of uses for it. I imagine speed runners will be spamming this like crazy.
Speaking of the bosses. They all have a discernible pattern to them. Once you get it down, beating them is a breeze. Though you can just tank through most of them. If you decide to go this route. Acquiring the various optional power ups scattered throughout the game is a must. The game has these optional speed boost puzzles that are a blast to figure out, and add quite a bit of fun to the gameplay. I can say that the game felt extremely polished. The controls were intuitive. You don’t need to navigate through half a dozen menus to select a different power up. This made gameplay fluid and fun.
Where’s my Smash Bros Remixes?
The music was atmospheric. However, for my taste . I would have preferred some classic Metroid tracks. Or at least some new music . Metroid music is iconic. I can’t believe they opted not to include it. I mean, they have those awesome tracks they could have pulled from Smash Bros right?! You do get little things here and there , mostly sound bytes . Like when you get the items. But the lack of epic music was a bit of a let down in my opinion.
Some Style Goes a Long Way
Even though it’s in 2-d . It pushes the switch to skip a few frames. Mainly on some boss fights. It doesn’t hurt gameplay, and it’s barely discernable. And it rarely happens. But it’s worth noting that Nintendo needs to up their game with their consoles. It is a beautiful looking game. Samus’s armor looks great when acquiring power ups . the bosses are epic! We get the huge boss Kraid. The cutscene’s awesome, with Samus shooting him in the mouth. It has some nice cinematic cutscenes, which can be skipped. This is important, because when you die. You don’t wanna go through the cutscene again. Even regular enemies had a certain flair to them. Lastly, the environments were varied and stylized. As they’ve always been in Metroid games. Even the backgrounds are lively. Sometimes it felt like enemies were gonna jump at you.
The game is great fun to play. First run will clock in at about 10 hours. But with a bit of effort you can complete it in about half that. Check out my full playthrough . It’s about 4 hours long.
The game’s only available for Nintendo switch.
So, Is Metroid Dread better than Super Metroid? I don’t think it supplants the legendary game. But don’t let that deter you from this game. It’s a ton of fun and definitely worth the price of admission . I would rate it at around 8.5 out of 10.
Thanks for joining me . If you like what we’re doing don’t forget to keep checking back with me for more cool stuff. See you next time. And as always. Stay retro.
