Nintendo Metroid Dread - A Game 15 Years in the Making [10/08/21], update: Patch Ver. 1.0.1 released

[crispy4000]

Just bought and started this today.  Think I needed a break after finishing Samus Returns.  I've somehow avoided most spoilers till now...

Anyways, it controls great.  60fps is so refreshing.  EMMI zones aren't all that annoying too, which I appreciate.  I actually countered the normal one the very first time.

 

[Brick]

This is a really good analysis of the level design of Dread (spoilers btw for items and enemies) 

 

 

[crispy4000]

Played through a bit of the first four big areas, I could easily see this being a better Metroid game than Zero Mission if not Super.  All the complaints I had about Samus Returns are null here, the map design is superb.

 

It’s a tad linear, but it does it a way that feels clever more than restricting.  And like the Emmi zones themselves, everything eventually opens up.  I don’t know how they balanced it so well, but they did, and it’s awesome.  It’s definitely it’s own thing compared to Super, Fusion, etc.

 

I hate having to push the left stick in though.  That’s pretty much my only complaint so far.  I even like the music a lot for what type of Metroid this is. 

[TwinIon]

Not yet done with it, but I'm definitely more than half way through. I think Dread is a fine Metroid game, but it's such a throwback that it doesn't feel like it advances the series in any meaningful way. I appreciate that I'm not getting lost, but I also rarely feel like the constant upgrades matter all that much beyond being able to open the next door. I'm not really exploring in any real way, and while I appreciate the limited backtracking, I do wish it felt like upgrades enabled more.

 

It's been a long time since I've played a straightforward Metroid style game, and while I'll happily finish Dread, it doesn't make me want to seek out similar titles. It also hasn't yet left me with any anticipation for more of this, especially if it's just going to be a complete throwback.

 

It did get me to pick up my Switch for the first time in a long while, so at least there's that. Unfortunately that just made me remember how much I wish the Switch was more powerful. Dread looks fine in portable mode, but it's unimpressive on a big screen.

[crispy4000]

I'm at a similar spot, but disagree on a lot of that.  A good bit of the movement options feel unique for the series (sliding, shift move, grapple beam chaining on magnetic walls, etc).  Dread also streamlines the Aeon powers in Samus Returns into something much less cumbersome.  The EMMI stuff feels kind of like what Zero Mission's finale and Fusion tried but better integrated into the map design on the whole.

 

Dread's pacing of upgrades feels most similar to Zero Mission to me, as did its guided hand loosening and tightening.  There's times when you're forced down a path, but unlike Fusion, you're almost always free to backtrack and explore earlier sections with new things to find.  It's also got a bit of Zero Mission in the booster puzzles, but it's a little less absurd about it (so far, at least).

Someone who thinks Zero Mission didn't let you breathe it in enough, like Super or Samus Returns, would probably feel the same about Dread.

It looks good on a 4K set to me.  I'm not playing this and wishing it was on more powerful hardware for more than the resolution.  Though I'd readily admit it could look better.  It's still a nice change up from Samus Returns, which did rub me as too visually constrained by the hardware.

[best3444]

1 hour ago, TwinIon said:

Dread looks fine in portable mode, but it's unimpressive on a big screen.

 

35 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

 

It looks good on a 4K set to me. 

 

Which is it!?  

 

I'll eventually be playing this on a 65in OLED. I hope it doesn't look like shit.

[Biggie]

1 minute ago, best3444 said:

 

 

Which is it!?  

 

I'll eventually be playing this on a 65in OLED. I hope it doesn't look like shit.

Looks great and I think we have the exact same TV

[best3444]

9 minutes ago, Biggie said:

Looks great and I think we have the exact same TV

 

Ok. I never read any complaints about it's visuals while docked. Thank you.

[crispy4000]

There's a relative lack of AA, which is pretty standard for Nintendo 60fps releases.  Just expect that, and it'll be fine.  Everything's suitably detailed for the visual design they've gone with, and the bosses are epic.

[TwinIon]

I dislike the controls. I don't know if it's just being an aging gamer or what, but I have no doubt that I'll finish the game before they become comfortable or natural. My biggest problem is with firing missiles. The combination of L to free aim, R to use missiles, Left stick to aim, and X to fire is too much. It's one of the most common actions in the game and it hasn't felt right to me from the start. I think a standard lock on would have been very helpful in alleviating this, but maybe that's just me being a papered modern gamer. Still, there is a larger issue that it presents, which is that you can't move while you're aiming, which seems like a terrible choice for a game that is so often about movement.

 

Speaking of movement, I've got a couple gripes there as well. These are related towards later gameplay, so I guess mild gameplay spoilers. I actually felt like the game moved better early on than it does later when the game design seems to slow you down and your movement options get more complicated. It's most often seen in the EMMI zones. Early in the game, it's mostly about out running your hunters, which I found rather fun. Later the game pushes you to rely on your stealth. So before I was running and jumping and platforming my way through, now I feel like I'm sitting still for twice as long as I'm moving.

 

As for complicated movement, the grapple hook falls into the same problems as the missiles. It's too many buttons, and free aiming it a lot to ask while in motion. I kind of understand it as a gameplay choice not to have lock on for enemies, but the grapple hook really should be easier. It's hardly ever used though, so it's a nitpick, but it still bothered me when it came up.

 

Far more frequent is my issue with the double jump. It's been a while since I played a Metroid game, so this might just be a legacy decision, but only allowing a double jump when you're pushing far enough to one side sucks. I've screwed up so many times because I wasn't going quite far enough to be in a ball jump. I don't understand this decision at all. It's annoying and serves no useful purpose as far as I can tell.

[Ghost_MH]

12 hours ago, TwinIon said:

I dislike the controls. I don't know if it's just being an aging gamer or what, but I have no doubt that I'll finish the game before they become comfortable or natural. My biggest problem is with firing missiles. The combination of L to free aim, R to use missiles, Left stick to aim, and X to fire is too much. It's one of the most common actions in the game and it hasn't felt right to me from the start. I think a standard lock on would have been very helpful in alleviating this, but maybe that's just me being a papered modern gamer. Still, there is a larger issue that it presents, which is that you can't move while you're aiming, which seems like a terrible choice for a game that is so often about movement.

 

Speaking of movement, I've got a couple gripes there as well. These are related towards later gameplay, so I guess mild gameplay spoilers. I actually felt like the game moved better early on than it does later when the game design seems to slow you down and your movement options get more complicated. It's most often seen in the EMMI zones. Early in the game, it's mostly about out running your hunters, which I found rather fun. Later the game pushes you to rely on your stealth. So before I was running and jumping and platforming my way through, now I feel like I'm sitting still for twice as long as I'm moving.

 

As for complicated movement, the grapple hook falls into the same problems as the missiles. It's too many buttons, and free aiming it a lot to ask while in motion. I kind of understand it as a gameplay choice not to have lock on for enemies, but the grapple hook really should be easier. It's hardly ever used though, so it's a nitpick, but it still bothered me when it came up.

 

Far more frequent is my issue with the double jump. It's been a while since I played a Metroid game, so this might just be a legacy decision, but only allowing a double jump when you're pushing far enough to one side sucks. I've screwed up so many times because I wasn't going quite far enough to be in a ball jump. I don't understand this decision at all. It's annoying and serves no useful purpose as far as I can tell.

 

I think I said this like 10 minutes into the game, earlier in this thread, but I would MUCH rather have had this game cycle your weapons Super Metroid style. Really, there are only three weapons, so just assign them to different directions on the dpad. From there, map shoot to the right trigger and use the right stick to free aim whenever you like. That would have made sitting controls so much easier. The control scheme here didn't stop me from getting used to them about l enough to be able to make my way through some bosses, hitless, but you have it right. I got used to them, they just never felt truly comfortable.

 

I've got no problem with the jump. I totally get that most people do. They probably should change it to match more modern games, but I'm sure Sakamoto like keeping it the same it's always been since '91.

 

Metroid Dread's creator on life among the Metroidvanias

WWW.CNET.COM

---

Yoshio Sakamoto discusses Samus, Dread and the big Switch question: TV or handheld?

 

I'd love a Metroid movie, even though I'm not sure how you do it. It would be hard to keep the same desolate atmosphere in a film with an actual plot that needs to move forward. I feel like a movie would be more Other M, but I would be cool with a origin story. How much childhood background have we had in Samus outside of the old manga?

[Nokt]

13 hours ago, TwinIon said:

I dislike the controls. I don't know if it's just being an aging gamer or what, but I have no doubt that I'll finish the game before they become comfortable or natural. My biggest problem is with firing missiles. The combination of L to free aim, R to use missiles, Left stick to aim, and X to fire is too much. It's one of the most common actions in the game and it hasn't felt right to me from the start. I think a standard lock on would have been very helpful in alleviating this, but maybe that's just me being a papered modern gamer. Still, there is a larger issue that it presents, which is that you can't move while you're aiming, which seems like a terrible choice for a game that is so often about movement.

 

Speaking of movement, I've got a couple gripes there as well. These are related towards later gameplay, so I guess mild gameplay spoilers. I actually felt like the game moved better early on than it does later when the game design seems to slow you down and your movement options get more complicated. It's most often seen in the EMMI zones. Early in the game, it's mostly about out running your hunters, which I found rather fun. Later the game pushes you to rely on your stealth. So before I was running and jumping and platforming my way through, now I feel like I'm sitting still for twice as long as I'm moving.

 

As for complicated movement, the grapple hook falls into the same problems as the missiles. It's too many buttons, and free aiming it a lot to ask while in motion. I kind of understand it as a gameplay choice not to have lock on for enemies, but the grapple hook really should be easier. It's hardly ever used though, so it's a nitpick, but it still bothered me when it came up.

 

Far more frequent is my issue with the double jump. It's been a while since I played a Metroid game, so this might just be a legacy decision, but only allowing a double jump when you're pushing far enough to one side sucks. I've screwed up so many times because I wasn't going quite far enough to be in a ball jump. I don't understand this decision at all. It's annoying and serves no useful purpose as far as I can tell.

Having to hold the thumbstick to enable speed boost is annoying as well. The grapple outside of the breakable blocks is extremely useless and most of the time doesn’t even need to be used. 
 

What I’ve seen from speed runners they just spam the regular shot incredibly fast or stop and use missiles. I personally used the charged missile (I forgot what it’s called). You can hold the charge and still move around. Stop for a split second, lock on, and unleash. Then rinse and repeat. 

[crispy4000]

I always simply outran the EMMI.  I think there was one time near the end when I truly needed to use the cloak, but overall, mad dashing works fine.  Using the grapple at times also works, before you get better movement options.

 

Missles feel fine to me, but I got used to it in Samus Returns.  The grapple is a bit more confusing admittedly, but you seldom need to use it on the fly.  The double jump works as spin jump does in any other Metroid.  It’s antiquated, but I’ve gotten used to it over the years.  It does factor into some of the boost puzzles for missile expansions.

 

My biggest gripe with the controls by far is making you have to push in the stick to activate a sprint.  But there’s nothing in this game that feels unreasonably difficult to control like Wall Jumping was in Super.  Or even the hardest missle expansions in Zero Mission.

 

Oh, and phase shift is awesome.  Bosses are perfectly tuned to your abilities.  I bet hard mode is a real test of skill, it’d be fun if I ever go back.

Beat it last night.  What a game, definitely a worthy follow up after all these years.  Absolutely worth the $60.

[Brick]

6 hours ago, Nokt said:

Having to hold the thumbstick to enable speed boost is annoying as well

 

You don't need to hold it. You just need to press it while you're running. Still an annoying change though. Should be automatic. 

 

I got 100% last night finally. 

[Kal-El814]

I think the designers must have realized that the controls were a drag to some extent; the grapple beam is used extremely sparingly because aiming with it after swinging absolutely sucks. 

[Brick]

I didn't really have any problems with the controls, but remapping should probably have been an option, and I can think to myself some changes that might have made things better. 

[best3444]

Some of the negative opinions in here have me discouraged in trying this out. I'm not a big Metroid fan in general nor do I enjoy 2d side scrollers much. I'm conflicted if I should buy this or not. 

[crispy4000]

51 minutes ago, best3444 said:

Some of the negative opinions in here have me discouraged in trying this out. I'm not a big Metroid fan in general nor do I enjoy 2d side scrollers much. I'm conflicted if I should buy this or not. 

This is full stop one of the best 2D games I’ve played.  It feels bigger budget than you might expect, and has immaculate pacing, if you don’t mind a little linearity at times.  The design team knew what they were doing at every beat.

The control nitpicking in here is mostly remedied by the fact that everything is introduced to you gradually, so that it doesn’t overwhelm at the start.  Either way Samus feels good to control in this game.  General movement is the best it’s been in the series, and that’s after the GBA games upped the ante.

I wouldn’t say its definitively the best 2D Metroid: that depends on how highly you regard Super.  But there’s no part of the game I got bored or exhausted by.  Or felt like it retread earlier games (or other Metroidvanias) too much, or without earning it on its own accord.  Its just awesome through and through.  An instant classic IMO.

[crispy4000]

@best3444  Forgot to mention there’s a demo now.  Go try that.

[best3444]

1 hour ago, crispy4000 said:

@best3444  Forgot to mention there’s a demo now.  Go try that.

 

Wow. Thanks for the heads up!

[legend]

I'm reasonably far into to game and overall it's a lot of fun, but I hate everything to do with EMMIs. It was mostly ignorable in the early stages, but has become increasingly tedious. If they were going to insist on this mechanic, I think they should have done a more consistent a reliable setting where you just have to outrun it through a linear platforming set rather then impeding your exploration of the environment. The fights to kill them are similarly tedious in finding a long enough stretch and making sure you are accurate enough the whole time.

 

Th regular boss fights are decent though.

[crispy4000]

The EMMI sections get more and more linear as the game goes on though.  You just find the next possible exit in the later zones, there’s no other options.  Same goes for killing them.  By the last EMMI, it’s super obvious that you’re supposed to do it in a very specific spot they funnel you to / trap you in.

[legend]

7 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

The EMMI sections get more and more linear as the game goes on though.  You just find the next possible exit in the later zones, there’s no other options.  Same goes for killing them.  By the last EMMI, it’s super obvious that you’re supposed to do it in a very specific spot they funnel you to.

 

It's not that it's "hard" so much as I find them tedious. The stealth might as well not exist because the damn thing will run up to exactly where you are anyway because they're naturally cheating and looking at the player coordinates. The stealth also killing your jump mobility is annoying. It means you can't really look at your surroundings to figure out where you want to go and I frequently would just retreat through the door and do it again. It's boring and tedious; it slows down the game, keeping me from doing what I want to do, rather than providing an interesting challenge.

 

Funneling you to find the right spot to shoot it for an hour straight is similarly boring.

[crispy4000]

18 minutes ago, legend said:

 

It's not that it's "hard" so much as I find them tedious. The stealth might as well not exist because the damn thing will run up to exactly where you are anyway because they're naturally cheating and looking at the player coordinates. The stealth also killing your jump mobility is annoying. It means you can't really look at your surroundings to figure out where you want to go and I frequently would just retreat through the door and do it again. It's boring and tedious; it slows down the game, keeping me from doing what I want to do, rather than providing an interesting challenge.

 

Funneling you to find the right spot to shoot it for an hour straight is similarly boring.

An hour straight?  Maybe I just got lucky, but I never struggled with an EMMI section for more than a few minutes.  A death or two was it.

 

Stealth does suck.  You’re always quick enough to outrun it.  It only gets a little tricky when it’s between you’re point A and point B.  Even that gets helped or can be cheated by the RNG.

 

Exploration isn’t the point of these sections.  There’s few upgrades In them.  You get in and out so you can explore elsewhere. 

[legend]

39 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

An hour straight?  Maybe I just got lucky, but I never struggled with an EMMI section for more than a few minutes.  A death or two was it.

 

I wasn't talking about how long it took me to succeed, I was being hyperbolic about the length of time you have to continually shoot an EMMI in the face. The reality is probably 5 continual seconds of shooting it in the face, followed by another 2 seconds of charging your weapon. But it's a boring procedure rather than an exciting bit of combat  

 

39 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

Stealth does suck.  You’re always quick enough to outrun it.  It only gets a little tricky when it’s between you’re point A and point B.  Even that gets helped or can be cheated by the RNG.

 

Exploration isn’t the point of these sections.  There’s few upgrades In them.  You get in and out so you can explore elsewhere. 

 

You still have to decide where you're going. The point is it's a tedious procedure. "Oops I have to retreat because I went the wrong way and have to do it again." If the best thing you can say about a game mechanic is it's short lived it's not exactly strong praise!

[crispy4000]

I actually like how long it takes to melt an EMMI’s face, and the slowdown that accompanies it.  Without it, it’d feel more like a cheap shot if you got caught.  This way, you have more time to decide if you need to escape.

 

In deciding where to go in an EMMI zone, I stopped looking at my map to plan routes after I realized that it was going to funnel me in the proper directions anyways, and zig zag me in and out of the zones.  
 

Later on, you’re presented a certain obstacle that subtly signals you’re on the right path.  If it seems like a bad idea … go in, follow the flow.

[legend]

That's all well and good, but I don't think it helps my core concern with it being a boring activity  

 

But if you like it, I'm glad it's working for some people!

[crispy4000]

40 minutes ago, legend said:

That's all well and good, but I don't think it helps my core concern with it being a boring activity  

 

But if you like it, I'm glad it's working for some people!

 

If you think outrunning and gunning down EMMI is boring, why no mention of the brain mini-bosses in between?  They're more redundant, and are never a match for your current abilities.

To me, it's still splitting hairs for how little time you spend on it.  Looking at the game as whole, the most tedious design choice doesn't have anything to do with the EMMI.  It's the colored teleport system.  I could have shaved a few hours off backtracking for powerups if the warp network let you fast travel to any reached checkpoint, a la Samus Returns.  Dread is just short enough to where it doesn't become a real drag.

[Ghost_MH]

1 hour ago, crispy4000 said:

 

If you think outrunning and gunning down EMMI is boring, why no mention of the brain mini-bosses in between?  They're more redundant, and are never a match for your current abilities.

To me, it's still splitting hairs for how little time you spend on it.  Looking at the game as whole, the most tedious design choice doesn't have anything to do with the EMMI.  It's the colored teleport system.  I could have shaved a few hours off backtracking for powerups if the warp network let you fast travel to any reached checkpoint, a la Samus Returns.  Dread is just short enough to where it doesn't become a real drag.

 

I REALLY wanted those core battles to get harder everytime. I mean, they did get harder, but not in any way that makes a difference. All the rings and missiles flew about as fast as they did in Metroid, only you had a huge room to jump around and are a thousand times faster than you ever were on the NES.

[Brick]

I get they're mini bosses, but the cores, robot soldiers, and soldiers not getting updates and changes for each fight was disappointing. Especially the last soldier since 

Spoiler

It takes the place of the last EMMI, so it should been like a Chozo Soldier Captain or something, and had different mechanics. 

 

[crispy4000]

Soldiers were varied with a shields variant.  I agree on the last one needing something more.  Would've been nice at least.

[Ghost_MH]

Even then, at least the soldiers were sort of a challenge. The cores weren't ever. They may as well all been already destroyed and sitting in a puddle of goo like the first one.

[legend]

10 hours ago, crispy4000 said:

 

If you think outrunning and gunning down EMMI is boring, why no mention of the brain mini-bosses in between?  They're more redundant, and are never a match for your current abilities.

To me, it's still splitting hairs for how little time you spend on it.  Looking at the game as whole, the most tedious design choice doesn't have anything to do with the EMMI.  It's the colored teleport system.  I could have shaved a few hours off backtracking for powerups if the warp network let you fast travel to any reached checkpoint, a la Samus Returns.  Dread is just short enough to where it doesn't become a real drag.

 

Those are fairly boring too, but at least I'm paying more attention to dodging the shots they fire at you instead of running back and forth between doors in the run phase of an EMMI and holding down the trigger shooting at the same angle in the kill phase.

 

The sins of the EMMI also stand out a bit more because it takes a much larger stage in the game. The game is called "Dread" because of the what they try to do with the EMMI's and it just feels tedious to me.

[crispy4000]

1 hour ago, legend said:

Those are fairly boring too, but at least I'm paying more attention to dodging the shots they fire at you instead of running back and forth between doors in the run phase of an EMMI and holding down the trigger shooting at the same angle in the kill phase.

 

EMMI sections are about thinking on your feet, paying attention to the environment, and taking occasional risks.

Brain mini-bosses boil down to missile spam and avoiding slow projectiles.

 

There's some room for subjectivity here, neither are hard, really.  But objectively speaking, you'll only fail at one if you don't pay attention.

 

1 hour ago, legend said:

The sins of the EMMI also stand out a bit more because it takes a much larger stage in the game.  The game is called "Dread" because of the what they try to do with the EMMI's and it just feels tedious to me.

I spent much more time killing Metroid after Metroid after Metroid in Samus Returns than dealing with EMMI in Dread.  For me, they didn't get in the way long enough to feel like a chore.

Maybe the sense of fear could be heightened if they didn't give you so many checkpoints along the way.  Unlike the bosses, dying to an EMMI feels trivial.  That seems intentional, in where they wanted to scale the difficulty.

[legend]

2 hours ago, crispy4000 said:

 

EMMI sections are about thinking on your feet, paying attention to the environment, and taking occasional risks.

Brain mini-bosses boil down to missile spam and avoiding slow projectiles.

 

There's some room for subjectivity here, neither are hard, really.  But objectively speaking, you'll only fail at one if you don't pay attention.

 

Why do you keep coming back to it being a question of hardness and failing? Failing at something isn't my issue and I already said the sections aren't "hard"; I find them tedious. I've died far more times to the conventional bosses in the game than I have to any of the EMMI evade sections or kill sections, but my issue remains with the EMMI sections.

 

2 hours ago, crispy4000 said:

I spent much more time killing Metroid after Metroid after Metroid in Samus Returns than dealing with EMMI in Dread.  For me, they didn't get in the way long enough to feel like a chore.

Maybe the sense of fear could be heightened if they didn't give you so many checkpoints along the way.  Unlike the bosses, dying to an EMMI feels trivial.  That seems intentional, in where they wanted to scale the difficulty.

 

I haven't played any of the other Metroids so I'm not making a relative ranking statement. My claim is that I think everything to do with the EMMIs tedious rather than fun, whereas I'm largely enjoying the rest of the game.