Metroid Dread a return to form for veteran series
That foreboding sense of … dread. The anticipation of walking into an unknown room and possibly finding a secret. It’s the stuff many old-school gamers and Metroid fans like me cut our teeth on growing up with Metroidvania games. The original Metroid set the tone, but Super Metroid is the house of cards that everything in the genre rests on. And Metroid Dread, while an admirable attempt to recreate that nostalgic feeling, is a few missiles short.
Don’t misunderstand me: I love Metroid Dread. It’s the return to form that we all expect of a Metroid game, and you can tell that within the first five minutes. The opening cinematic picks the story up after Fusion where Samus Aran, the baddest bounty hunter in the known universe, has simultaneously solved the X Parasite threat and ushered in galactic peace once again. Despite that, the Galactic Federation receives verified proof that the X are not extinct and sends EMMI (Extraplanetary Multiform Mobile Identifiers) to the planet ZDR to investigate the mystery of why the X Parasite has reappeared. Soon after the EMMI land, all contact is lost with them. Ms. Aran is sent in to investigate their disappearance, and shortly after landing, finds herself in combat with a mysterious figure that resembles a Chozo. Given that the Chozo other than herself are also extinct, it’s an even deeper mystery that Samus is determined to solve.
The story is interesting, and I was genuinely invested in learning about the EMMI and what they found on the planet. I was even more intrigued about the Chozo warrior because I’m well-versed in the lore of Metroid and anything that calls back to Super Metroid and Samus’ origin story is going to have my attention. It also references Metroid Fusion, obviously, and parts of Metroid II: Samus Returns — which is the excellent remake of Metroid II: The Return of Samus. Leaning on the older story is a smart move because you’re probably going to go back and play the older games and the remake, and you’re going to buy into the story of the current game a little bit easier.
What isn’t a little easier, even on the easy difficulty level, is the combat. Listen, I’m a Super Metroid expert and I can even claim beating the original Metroid, but the first hour of Dread is hard. I got stuck on the second EMMI chase sequence and had to go watch a detailed demonstration of what to do because I just wasn’t getting it. And, yes, I love this about Dread. Metroid, at its core, is about exploration, problem-solving and figuring out things by trial and error. I’m doing that in Dread, though my old-man reflexes and patience are getting in the way. But this is what I want out of my Metroid game to a point. The other side of this, however, is that I didn’t care for the mad dash away from an all-powerful enemy in Metroid Fusion in 2002, and I don’t particularly care for the mad dash away from an all-powerful enemy in Metroid Dread now. That frantic feeling of not knowing what to do in a sequence that means instant death constantly is not a good one, and I had hoped that it wouldn’t return 20 years later, but here we are. I’ll figure it out and learn to live with it, I guess, but it’s not one of my favorite parts of the game.
One of the other things I do love about Dread is the atmosphere. The music hits the sweet spot of nostalgia and new with leitmotifs of Super and the original game mixed in, and the graphics are gorgeous. I’ve long been a fan of the music of Metroid, and this is just another masterpiece in the long history of the series. Also, Samus has never looked better. She’s more fleshed out with modern graphics, but my favorite heroine is simply stunning even in the stripped Power Suit. And while ZDR is no Zebes, it’s a deliciously dark environment that invokes the best part of brooding moody dark planet that fits right in Metroid lore.
While I love a lot of Dread, there are some things that I don’t quite love. First, as a veteran Metroid lover, I can’t help but wonder why it took so long to get a side-scrolling version of Metroid again and why it followed Fusion after so many years. Dread is fantastic, but Fusion was not exactly Super, and Dread tries a little too hard to make Fusion work. I’d rather Dread had its own identity aside from the cleanup of Fusion’s mess.
And while we’re at it, Dread tries a little too hard to lean into Super’s legacy. It’s well-known that Super is our favorite game of all time. That is not a secret. However, unless you’re going to give me a full modern remake of Super, don’t tease me with something almost there.
Dread is a tease, a “what if we were to remake the greatest game of all time with modern controls” experiment. To quote the awful Ronin in Avengers: Endgame, don’t give me hope. Don’t give it to me halfway and then be like, naw, you know what? Let’s just call it Metroid 5 and we’ll revisit that Super remake later. This technically isn’t Dread’s fault, because it’s an excellent game and it’s giving me, the Metroid fan who didn’t want a first-person shooter Metroid, exactly what I’ve been asking for since Fusion. I’m not dinging Dread per se; I’m dinging Nintendo for being a tease and a terrible one at that.
Metroid Dread does almost everything right: The atmosphere is Metroid, the graphics are Metroid, the story is Metroid and the secrecy is Metroid. It’s a must-play if you’re into the series and even if you aren’t, you still need to experience it just to see how the grand dame of Metroidvania does her thing and creates perfection. It’s just that if you’re walking into this thinking you’re going to get Super Metroid levels of perfection, you’re going to be disappointed. It’s not Other M level of disappointment, but the layers of Super haunt the outcome. Then again, let’s face it: Nothing is going to touch Super’s level of nuance. And Dread is still fine for it. Dread nearly hits on every level, and it’s the side-scrolling Metroid adventure we non-first-person shooter fans have been waiting for. It’s just that you must be willing to look past the dreaded comparisons to Super Metroid to see its true finesse.
There are your standard attacks, a throw, a fireball sometimes, and an ultimate screen-clearing attack that requires energy. While the payoff is the same for all the Supermen, the attack animation is different. It’s kind of cool to see what each character is capable of but it’s by no means anything exciting. And, as is the problem with most beat-’em-ups like this one, you’re going to run into quarter-muncher syndrome. The hits are always unfair, especially with multiple enemies on the screen, and health isn’t exactly plentiful. The bosses particularly are bad about this, and it’s infuriating to no end that you can’t get clean hits against them without taking a brutal beating.
to move around the playfield. My only gripe is that it’s a little hard to remember which button controls special moves. Otherwise, it’s a standard action platformer for the 
polished a little more. Some of the translation is rough and there are frequent grammar errors in the text. For a game that relies on text to get the point across, that’s too jarring and takes me out of the experience. Another gripe is that, while most of the mechanics are improved, some of the new mechanics — such as the pole vault — need some work. It’s not hard to do — once you figure it out. The problem is that it takes much too long to figure out. If I have to watch a playthrough video to get the concept, it’s doing too much.
continue through the game. Also, realize now that in Arcade Mode, you’re going to fight everyone in the cast. There is no “let’s select six to eight opponents from this very full cast;” no, you’re fighting everyone before you even sniff Amakusa so you will get lots of practice with those hard movesets. However, it is broken up with progressively harder mini games, so this isn’t unfamiliar territory. The Countdown Mode, a sort of early survival mode, is a decent challenge that also gets progressively harder. There is replay value there, so that adds to the charm of an otherwise barebones game.
well, sometimes he moves almost too well. I had the same issue here as I did with the later Wii version: Mario slides around entirely too much. I have to keep in the back of my mind to undercompensate and overcorrect with running and jumping movements constantly, and it’s a bit much to keep up with while trying to play well. When I want Mario to stop running, it should be instantly. There shouldn’t be extra frames of stopping. Also, some of the jumps don’t feel as clean as they should if we’re basing it on the known Mario standard. It’s all a little too loosey-goosey for my liking and makes clean play a little bit more of a chore than I’d care to do. Later entries have cleaned this up, but it’s obvious here and I can cut it some slack because it has been fixed. Just know that it’s part of the “new” experience.
established in the original game: You pop clusters of like-colored bubbles in an effort to clear established puzzles. This basic premise was set up in the first game for the