Metroid Dread Review

Where to start when talking about Metroid? 

I’ll give a brief rundown of my history with the Metroid series so as to help put my thoughts on Dread in context.

I didn’t have a NES or a SNES growing up. I didn’t even have an N64 even though that wouldn’t have given me too much exposure to the Metroid-verse. So my first exposure to the series came in the form of Metroid Prime on the GameCube, the controversial expansion of the series into the First-Person Adventure format rather than the traditional 2D side-scrolling affairs of Metroid, Metroid II and Super Metroid. But following fast in the wake of Samus’ groundbreaking escapades on Tallon IV was the diminutive offering on the Gameboy Advance, the more classic 2D setup of Metroid Fusion. 

Metroid Fusion was extraordinary - to have a handheld game be so full of atmosphere and terror was an incredible achievement. So much of this came down to the modern design of the game building on the back of the foundations of the series setup by the original Metroid, but more-so, Super Metroid. I know it’s sacrilege to ever express that something is better than an older thing that people love, but there’s no doubt about the fact that Metroid Fusion whips the dick off any other 2D Metroid affair, and also 99% of other ‘Metroidvania’ games - it’s incredible. And even though it was great to get a refresh of Samus’ original adventure in the Gameboy Advance title Metroid Zero Mission, it was kind of obvious why Nintendo didn’t then revisit the 2D Metroid formula for over a decade - Metroid Fusion was the apex of the format, and until someone could come along and show them how it could be built upon or bettered, there was no point in churning another Metroid game out, especially as the hunger for one wasn’t necessarily reflected in the pounds and pence of the series’ sales. 

But… enter MercurySteam with their superlative ‘remake’ of the original Gameboy’s Metroid II - the 3DS title, Metroid: Samus Returns. The reason for the inclusion and subsequent inversion of commas there is because the game bears little to no resemblance to the original Gameboy game - which isn’t a bad thing, because it provided a seismic shift in modernisation of the original 2D Metroid format. All of a sudden Samus’ movements and techniques were as fluid and seamless as you’d come to expect after the brilliant Metroid Prime Trilogy and the continual exploration and evolution of the Metroidvania sub-genre from other developers. The fact that you could now freely aim on the 2D plain shouldn’t have been as revolutionary as it was, but to be honest, you can’t go back once you’ve played Metroid like this! All of the classic suit upgrades and abilities were there from the Space Jump and Spin Attack to the Grapple Beam and Spider Morph Ball - it’s quite remarkable that no one really played the game as it proved to be something of a swan song for the stereoscopic handheld. But, fortunately, Nintendo didn’t sever ties with MercurySteam. In fact, quite the opposite!

And so we come to Metroid Dread! You’d be forgiven for thinking that this was commissioned, announced and released in the downtime between Metroid Prime 4’s development restart and it’s still-yet-to-happen release to try and satiate the ravenous Metroid fans - and it’s possible that that was the case, but my goodness am I glad that Nintendo felt that MercurySteam had more to offer this franchise than Samus Returns. The blueprints of Dread are exactly what they drew out in Samus Returns; it feels as brilliantly fluid to play, and for what you lack in the lovely subtle depth granted by the 3DS voodoo screen, it’s made up for in the crisp HD graphics and silky smooth frame rate. The way that you can link your abilities together is insanely satisfying, almost feeling like a Tony Hawk game where you’ll run, charge, shoot, boost, slide, Morph Ball, jump, grapple beam, melee attack in a single unbroken chain - and the fact that there are sections of the game where you HAVE to complete these combos in order to reach every last Missile or Health Upgrade is a true testament to the quality of the design of some of these environments. It creates a puzzle game out of an action game, and you’ll be using your head continually through the game to figure out the right way to go, and the way to combine your abilities to attain the lofty 100% completion mark against your save file. Fortunately the map system, which I initially found a bit overwhelming as it’s swimming with details and information, is brilliantly made to give you all the information you need to figure out where to go next or which areas may need more thorough examination.

In terms of the content of the game itself, it almost feels like a ‘Best Of’ - it’s a familiar setup, you crash land on an alien planet, lose your abilities and then have to find them again whilst exploring different environments and biomes, and defeating larger and harder bosses. There aren’t any dramatically new abilities that I hadn’t seen in one Metroid game or another in the past, which was a little disappointing, but also, the satisfaction, glee and novelty you get from finding an upgrade or a new ability, however familiar, is something that hasn’t dulled with time! And the new physical controls that are migrated over from Samus Returns are still as welcome as ever, being able to have better control of your aiming, being able to slide, being able to execute a perfectly-timed melee counterattack - it really does make you wonder how you tolerated the older games without those little things! And it’s great to see the return of the X Parasite from Metroid Fusion - it was such a large story point in the previous game in addition to being a fundamental mechanic of how the game was built, that it would’ve been strange if it didn’t return - and the double-edged sword nature of it providing you with health and ammo recovery whilst also distorting and continually generating enemies for you to defeat, is as compelling as it was in Fusion.

But in terms of NEW things in the game, the poster-bot for this game has very much been the EMMI - highly functional, elite killing machines that have turned on you and are relentlessly pursuing you. Whilst the sections where you’re trying to avoid and outrun these murderbots can be incredibly tense and exciting, I found they didn’t quite carry the same fear factor as eluding the SAX from Metroid Fusion. It’s possibly because there are 6 of the EMMI to destroy, so once you defeat the first one in a semi-tutorial section early on, you’re aware then that they aren’t invincible, which the SAX often felt like it was. It could be that with a wealth of new movement abilities to employ, I always felt like I could squeeze myself out of a tight situation rather than run out of options and get killed. But still, it was always exciting to encounter the next EMMI and see what new ability it was using to hunt you, that you would then gain when you managed to attain your Omega power and blast the twat off it’s face!

Speaking of the EMMIs and the Omega energy - it does feel a bit strange to have the repetition of some bosses in the game. This starts as the systematic return of the security brain/boss/thing to allow you to harness this Omega energy to defeat the EMMI - it’s a shame not to see more variation in these as they are fairly contained and simple - they just add more projectiles to avoid each time. But then later on in the game you come up against fairly intense Chozo warriors that are infected with the X Parasite, and the first time you come up against one of these guys, it takes a while to learn it’s attack patterns and get the timing of your counter-attacking right, but once you’ve figured them out, the next time they appear, you can dispatch them without too much trouble. But to be honest, given the battering that you take through the game, especially in the form of its bosses, it’s almost a sort of relief to find one you know already how to beat! And the bosses are superb - it’s easy to make a comparison to Dark Souls in terms of how you identify the bosses’ attack patterns and movements in order to avoid them and beat them, but that’s simply been the feature of boss fights since the beginning of video games! But there is an incredible sense of achievement to be found when you correctly identify all of the boss attacks and movements to the point where you get through the whole fight unscathed - the game reminds you from time to time that no attack is unavoidable, and it makes you feel all the more mighty when you prove that to be right! And they can be brilliantly cinematic as well if you look for the opportunity to counterattack them, it will catapult you into a sort of QT event allowing you to get a ton of bonus shots in whilst you’re being hurtled around the area by a leviathan! 

I’ve always felt that the most important aspect to get right in a Metroid game is the sense of isolation - it was something that I felt was lost a bit in the Metroid Prime sequels as more characters were introduced and the world was expanded, but when you feel totally alone, with nothing to do but explore a hostile alien territory - that sense of intrigue and adventure is palpable when it’s done right. And I’m so glad that MercurySteam have nailed it in Dread - it would have been easy for them to fall into that hole after Samus Returns, and making some things bigger doesn’t necessarily make it better - the environments and expanse are bigger, and so is the awareness of your mortality and isolation. It proves that you don’t need to be running an unfathomably large open world game on the biggest gaming PC to achieve that sense of wonder and awe - all it takes is smart and efficient game design. 

There’s been a lot of discourse over the price point of the game, given that it’s essentially a 2D game - should it cost as much as a big 3D open-world game like the AAA titles on the PS5 or Xbox Series X, or even the bigger First Party titles on the Nintendo Switch? For anyone that thinks that graphics, expanse and fidelity are the true gauge of the worth of a game, go home. I’ve said it before and I’ll continue beating this drum until I die: gameplay is king! If you’re not striving to attain the best gameplay with your video game - why are you making a video game?!

I blasted through my first playthrough of Metroid Dread in about 11 hours and it was some of the most fun hours of gaming I’ve had all year. It’s so rare in this day and age when piles of games tower over me making me quiver in FOMO that I will NOT just complete a game, trade it in and continue to machete my way through my gaming library. So it says something that as soon as I’d finished my first playthrough, I immediately talced up, jacked the difficulty and dove straight back into a fresh save file! I tried to return to a few other games I was playing, but the fact remained that I would be having more fun if I was playing Metroid Dread again, even though I’d just finished it 100%. 

So even though I’ve cited some small quibbles with the game, and there’s a very exciting sliver of room for improvement for what MercurySteam produce next, I can’t bring myself not to give this game the full quota of points - because it’s as fun a game as I’ve played in years, and it’s up there with the very very best games to play on the Nintendo Switch!

10/10

ReviewsJonathan DunnComment