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

[crispy4000]

1 hour ago, legend said:

 

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.

 

Because you made a point to say that the brain bosses call for more of your attention than the EMMIs.  I just don't think that's accurate.  The projectiles aren't a threat.  The environment isn't a factor.  You're not searching for an exit, or a long enough stretch to take them out.  It's not just the difficulty or failstate comparison, everything about the EMMIs encounters are more involved than that mini-boss.  Like Ghost_MH said, the brain might as well be dead when you walk in the room.

 

If I can summarize your position: What makes these sections tedious to you is that you don't like their change of focus from the rest of the game.  They also don't live up to the title for you, or feel fun in your opinion.  So any minute spent doing them feels too long, even when the challenge and time spent in EMMI zones isn't actually that much.

 

Strictly from a design perspective, I don't think the EMMI should be singled out for not being engaging enough.  Not when other parts of the game have greater redundancy faults and respect your time less.  I say this as someone who still loves this game.

 

 

1 hour ago, legend said:

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.

Interesting that it's your first Metroid.  The EMMI bits are certainly layered on top of the core structure.  So I could see a long time fan appreciating the variety where a first time player wouldn't.

 

A few of the previous Metroids try similar things, but they're not as well integrated into the map design.  Think linear hallways being chased, or an entire portion of the map dedicated to stealth.

[legend]

41 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

 

Because you made a point to say that the brain bosses call for more of your attention than the EMMIs.  I just don't think that's accurate.  The projectiles aren't a threat.  The environment isn't a factor.  You're not searching for an exit, or a long enough stretch to take them out.  It's not just the difficulty or failstate comparison, everything about the EMMIs encounters are more involved than a phoned in mini-boss.

 

If you are healthy and just take the hits while standing still and shooting the brain, then yeah that would be pretty fucking boring! I usually make an effort to not get hit at all which requires constant dodging and shooting, but I can totally see how it can become even more mindless depending on how you play it.

 

But it's probably not worth arguing over how boring different weak parts of the game are though, I already agreed the brain boss battles aren't great either  

 

41 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

If I can summarize your position: What makes these sections tedious to you is that you don't like their change of focus from the rest of the game.  They also don't live up to the title for you, or provide the type of fun you're looking for.  So any minute spent doing them feels too long, even when the challenge and time spent in EMMI zones isn't actually that much.

 

TBC, it's not just that it's a change of focus in the game, it's that it puts the focus on something I actively find boring. But this description is fine enough.

 

41 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

 

Strictly from a design perspective, I don't think the EMMI should be singled out for not being engaging enough.  Not when other parts of the game have greater redundancy faults and respect your time less.  I say this as someone who still loves this game.

 

I think when the EMMIs are designed to be a focal point of the game, it singles itself out!

 

I'm certainly open to criticisms of the rest of the game though too. If you want to argue that other parts are even worse I'm open to that; I'm not really interested in ranking what is specifically the worst part of the game  My point was my experience is usually an eye roll whenever I have to go through EMMI parts and I would enjoy the game much more if those parts were just removed and replaced with conventional boss fights or something of the like.

 

41 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

 

Interesting that it's your first Metroid.  The EMMI bits are certainly layered on top of the core structure.  So I could see a long time fan appreciating the variety where a first time player wouldn't.

 

A few of the previous Metroids try similar things, but they're not as well integrated into the map design.  Think linear hallways being chased, or an entire portion of the map dedicated to stealth.

 

For some reason, I only got into Metroidvania games relatively late relative to the length of my long gaming career (which started as far back as I can remember), and the last Nintendo console I had prior to Switch was an N64. So I think that's why I've largely missed them.

[crispy4000]

Fair enough.  I think after playing the game it's clear that the boss battles are the real standouts, not the EMMI encounters.  But that's a harder pitch.

The EMMI sections do the most work to make it distinct from other games.  It's a question of how much they really needed to lean into that.  I think it's a better game for not going in too hard.  I like the balance as is, personally.

 

The real thing to dread in this game are the hardest missile expansions.

[legend]

3 hours ago, crispy4000 said:

Fair enough.  I think after playing the game it's clear that the boss battles are the real standouts, not the EMMI encounters.  But that's a harder pitch.

The EMMI sections do the most work to make it distinct from other games.  It's a question of how much they really needed to lean into that.  I think it's a better game for not going in too hard.  I like the balance as is, personally.

 

The real thing to dread in this game are the hardest missile expansions.

 

Yeah I can see how it's aiming for something new and I think it's a reasonable goal to make the player interact with an enemy that is a big threat but you later get the reward of killing it. It's kind of like in RPGs going back an annihilating things that gave you trouble before. But the way they executed it fell pretty flat for me.

[best3444]

So after reading some negative opinions on certain aspects of this game, is it worth a playthrough if I'm a complete noob to Metroidvania games? They certainly aren't my favorite genre but this is a new Metroid so it has my attention. 

[legend]

8 minutes ago, best3444 said:

So after reading some negative opinions on certain aspects of this game, is it worth a playthrough if I'm a complete noob to Metroidvania games? They certainly aren't my favorite genre but this is a new Metroid so it has my attention. 

 

Hmm. If Metroidvania isn't your favorite, I'm not sure this will do anything to change your mind. But it is a solid Metroidvania.

[Ghost_MH]

19 minutes ago, best3444 said:

So after reading some negative opinions on certain aspects of this game, is it worth a playthrough if I'm a complete noob to Metroidvania games? They certainly aren't my favorite genre but this is a new Metroid so it has my attention. 

 

The one thing this game does that other Metroidvanias don't do as well, even other Metroid games, is keep you moving forward. I find that the biggest challenge newcomers to the genre face is that feeling of being lost and not really sure where to go next. It's there for Super Metroid and even for newer, really great Metroidvanias like Hollow Knight. Metroid Dread does a really good job of guiding you forward while also not feeling like it's leading you along.

 

This is the game's biggest weakness for those that really like to explore and get lost in a Metroidvania. If that's a part of the genre that never really clicked for you, then you're in luck. There's still a lot of exploration to do, but the game world doesn't really fully open up until later into the game.

[best3444]

1 minute ago, Ghost_MH said:

 

The one thing this game does that other Metroidvanias don't do as well, even other Metroid games, is keep you moving forward. I find that the biggest challenge newcomers to the genre face is that feeling of being lost and not really sure where to go next. It's there for Super Metroid and even for newer, really great Metroidvanias like Hollow Knight. Metroid Dread does a really good job of guiding you forward while also not feeling like it's leading you along.

 

This is the game's biggest weakness for those that really like to explore and get lost in a Metroidvania. If that's a part of the genre that never really clicked for you, then you're in luck. There's still a lot of exploration to do, but the game world doesn't really fully open up until later into the game.

 

Good to hear as this suits my gaming preference. I'll give it a shot and there is a demo, too. Thanks

[Raggit]

So there's no way to customize controls in the full game? That's extremely disappointing. Hopefully they patch in that feature at some point, or even have multiple control schemes to choose from. I played the demo for a bit, but there were a few controls I really want to swap around.

[TwinIon]

After 10 hours I'm down to collecting things I've missed before facing the final boss. I truly curse whoever came up with the whole Shinespark mechanic. I've given up on a few collectibles now, and they've all included some insane speed-boost timing. Part of it is that it's just hard, and I can accept that. Part of it is the controls for chaining these actions together are horrible. Somehow I'd feel better if I could just see that my timing was off and I just couldn't make jump or whatever, but most of the time I can't even do the thing I meant to do. At this point I'll happily skip some extra missiles or whatever when I see those stupid speed blocks in some hard to reach place.

 

Also, to hell with those blocks you fall through. I was really hoping with each upgrade that you'd gain the ability to cheese them by freezing them or get some ability to blow them up.

[Nokt]

37 minutes ago, TwinIon said:

After 10 hours I'm down to collecting things I've missed before facing the final boss. I truly curse whoever came up with the whole Shinespark mechanic. I've given up on a few collectibles now, and they've all included some insane speed-boost timing. Part of it is that it's just hard, and I can accept that. Part of it is the controls for chaining these actions together are horrible. Somehow I'd feel better if I could just see that my timing was off and I just couldn't make jump or whatever, but most of the time I can't even do the thing I meant to do. At this point I'll happily skip some extra missiles or whatever when I see those stupid speed blocks in some hard to reach place.

 

Also, to hell with those blocks you fall through. I was really hoping with each upgrade that you'd gain the ability to cheese them by freezing them or get some ability to blow them up.

I had to watch videos for those because I had no idea what I was suppose to do in order to shinespark at that location. You can usually nail it in a few tries after you watch some strategies for it.

[Ghost_MH]

5 hours ago, TwinIon said:

After 10 hours I'm down to collecting things I've missed before facing the final boss. I truly curse whoever came up with the whole Shinespark mechanic. I've given up on a few collectibles now, and they've all included some insane speed-boost timing. Part of it is that it's just hard, and I can accept that. Part of it is the controls for chaining these actions together are horrible. Somehow I'd feel better if I could just see that my timing was off and I just couldn't make jump or whatever, but most of the time I can't even do the thing I meant to do. At this point I'll happily skip some extra missiles or whatever when I see those stupid speed blocks in some hard to reach place.

 

Also, to hell with those blocks you fall through. I was really hoping with each upgrade that you'd gain the ability to cheese them by freezing them or get some ability to blow them up.

 

Some of those shinespark puzzles look like goofiness straight out of the speedrunning community. I saw a few of them and then just said I'm good on upgrades. I don't really need to 100% this game.

[crispy4000]

What’s cool is that there’s often multiple different ways to tackle some of the more difficult power ups.  Some of the speedrunner stuff actually looks easier than the ‘obvious’ way.

[5timechamp]

… i had hoped smash bros would toss us a bone and update the samus character skin options to the initial Dread suit..

 

 

also: random thing

Spoiler

For such a meticulously designed game as this is i find it interesting that Samus’ neck is exposed when talking to Quiet Robe.. such a minute detail to add

 

[Brick]

2 hours ago, 5timechamp said:

… i had hoped smash bros would toss us a bone and update the samus character skin options to the initial Dread suit..

 

 

also: random thing

  Reveal hidden contents

For such a meticulously designed game as this is i find it interesting that Samus’ neck is exposed when talking to Quiet Robe.. such a minute detail to add

 

 

Her suit has always been like that... I don't get what you mean. 

[Brick]

I just remembered, but in the Switch menu you can remap your controls, so those of you who wanted to do that for this game can in fact remap your controls. You'd just need to reset them when you're done playing since they'd be remapped for everything. 

[Chris-]

I bought this the other day and just got the Phantom Cloak, having a blast so far. It is a really good game.

[Chris-]

Ok I just beat Kraid and that was absolutely wild, what a fun boss fight (healthy challenge too). This game rules. Granted I didn’t play many new games in 2021 but this should have cleaned up the GOTY awards. True old school gaming. 

[gabi lenon]

22 minutes ago, Chris- said:

Ok I just beat Kraid and that was absolutely wild, what a fun boss fight (healthy challenge too). This game rules.  192.168.100.1 192.168.1.1 Granted I didn’t play many new games in 2021 but this should have cleaned up the GOTY awards. True old school gaming. 

I love old school games a lot , I grew up playing mario 24/7 . I would never stop until the gaming hand breaks 

[TheLeon]

I was curious how this game would fit into the modern gaming landscape, for all the reasons that we definitely don’t need to rehash. I didn’t buy it at launch because I’ve been trying (and often failing) to save some money. So I was delighted to win a game from @Commissar SFLUFAN and get the chance to play it. 
 

I’ve been churning through it the last few days. I just took out my 5th (?) EMMI to get the ice missiles. I’m really enjoying it so far. I had one frustrating session where I spent a good 45 minutes making zero progress, just running in a loop, completely missing where to go next. I have a hard time reading this map and connecting it to places I’ve been, but that might be a me problem and not the game’s problem. Overall though, it has been pretty smooth sailing. 

 

[Anathema-]

I'd like to reiterate that playing on hard is a different experience. More fun if you ask me. It doesn't feel like they upped the enemy damage to make it harder, it feels like they lowered it to make 'normal' easier. 

[Paperclyp]

I beat this a month of so ago. Solidly made game, but not in the league of super Metroid. 
 

I did not enjoy the emmi sections. Did not like how you were forced out of certain areas and like elbowed in the right direction. Didn’t find exploring for the sake of it particularly fun. 
 

Loved the boss fights but felt the variety was kind of lacking, especially with those repeated enemy encounters that just kind of kept adding the same enemy or changing locations. 
 

Fun game tho! Just was surprised when some gaming journos were like THIS IS THE BEST METROID GAME EVER.

[Xbob42]

14 hours ago, Paperclyp said:

I beat this a month of so ago. Solidly made game, but not in the league of super Metroid. 
 

I did not enjoy the emmi sections. Did not like how you were forced out of certain areas and like elbowed in the right direction. Didn’t find exploring for the sake of it particularly fun. 
 

Loved the boss fights but felt the variety was kind of lacking, especially with those repeated enemy encounters that just kind of kept adding the same enemy or changing locations. 
 

Fun game tho! Just was surprised when some gaming journos were like THIS IS THE BEST METROID GAME EVER.

See, as someone who holds exactly 0 reverence for Super Metroid, I think we get different things out of these games. Just moving around and shooting in Dread is fun for me, while movement and combat, to me at least, always felt like total dog shit in previous Metroid games. It was like they made the combat terrible on purpose or something. And while you'd eventually unlock some fun movement options, the basic movement always just felt so rigid and bad to me.

 

Dread fixed all those problems and thus made me want even more of the game, whereas something like Super Metroid always just made me bored halfway through and sick of exploration because it wasn't actually fun to do anything.

Still think Dread could use more exploration, but that's only because I want to play it more. That said, I think a 2D game is inherently going to have rather poor exploration potential and nothing has changed my mind on that since to me the Metroid Prime games eat all the 2D ones for breakfast in terms of joy of exploration.

[crispy4000]

1 hour ago, Xbob42 said:

See, as someone who holds exactly 0 reverence for Super Metroid, I think we get different things out of these games. Just moving around and shooting in Dread is fun for me, while movement and combat, to me at least, always felt like total dog shit in previous Metroid games. It was like they made the combat terrible on purpose or something. And while you'd eventually unlock some fun movement options, the basic movement always just felt so rigid and bad to me.

 

Dread fixed all those problems and thus made me want even more of the game, whereas something like Super Metroid always just made me bored halfway through and sick of exploration because it wasn't actually fun to do anything.

Still think Dread could use more exploration, but that's only because I want to play it more. That said, I think a 2D game is inherently going to have rather poor exploration potential and nothing has changed my mind on that since to me the Metroid Prime games eat all the 2D ones for breakfast in terms of joy of exploration.

 

Hollow Knight is a good counter-argument for exploration not needing to be "poor" in 2D.  That's the modern Metroidvania I'd recommend that's less funneled than Dread.

I also agree that 3D will always have more exploration potential.  There's very few 3D Metroidvanias that make the grade though.

[Xbob42]

18 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

 

Hollow Knight is a good counter-argument for exploration not needing to be "poor" in 2D.  That's the modern Metroidvania I'd recommend that's less funneled than Dread.

I also agree that 3D will always have more exploration potential.  There's very few 3D Metroidvanias that make the grade though.

I really like Hollow Knight but I actually get lost quite a bit in that game in such a way that I still haven't completed it because I'll somehow get lost for half an hour but also refuse to look up where I'm getting turned around. It's definitely large, but I also never feel super satisfied exploring, just annoyed at my failure to get around, which I still don't understand as I usually don't get lost in games. Maybe it's because it occasionally feels directionless so I just wander blindly?

[Chris-]

I agree with @Xbob42 () that the action is what makes Dread compelling as opposed to the exploration. Some of those Chozo mini-bosses are fun as hell, and really nailed the feeling of being on a hostile planet where everything wants to murder you. 

[Paperclyp]

8 hours ago, Xbob42 said:

See, as someone who holds exactly 0 reverence for Super Metroid, I think we get different things out of these games. Just moving around and shooting in Dread is fun for me, while movement and combat, to me at least, always felt like total dog shit in previous Metroid games. It was like they made the combat terrible on purpose or something. And while you'd eventually unlock some fun movement options, the basic movement always just felt so rigid and bad to me.

 

Dread fixed all those problems and thus made me want even more of the game, whereas something like Super Metroid always just made me bored halfway through and sick of exploration because it wasn't actually fun to do anything.

Still think Dread could use more exploration, but that's only because I want to play it more. That said, I think a 2D game is inherently going to have rather poor exploration potential and nothing has changed my mind on that since to me the Metroid Prime games eat all the 2D ones for breakfast in terms of joy of exploration.

I liked Dread for those reasons as well, I just felt boxed in for the vast majority of the game. It felt like I was driving a Ferrari on residential streets. 

[Joe]

Dread is fun as hell. I had an amazing time with the game.

[crispy4000]

9 hours ago, Xbob42 said:

I really like Hollow Knight but I actually get lost quite a bit in that game in such a way that I still haven't completed it because I'll somehow get lost for half an hour but also refuse to look up where I'm getting turned around. It's definitely large, but I also never feel super satisfied exploring, just annoyed at my failure to get around, which I still don't understand as I usually don't get lost in games. Maybe it's because it occasionally feels directionless so I just wander blindly?

 

I never felt all that lost in Hollow Knight, aside from the few places where it intentionally tries to be confusing/bewildering/blinding.  Most areas are easy enough to manage on their own. 

The game's big exploration problem is the warp points aren't intuitively laid out.  Some of them feel further away from where you're headed than you think.

[Paperclyp]

2 hours ago, crispy4000 said:

 

I never felt all that lost in Hollow Knight, aside from the few places where it intentionally tries to be confusing/bewildering/blinding.  Most areas are easy enough to manage on their own. 

The game's big exploration problem is the warp points aren't intuitively laid out.  Some of them feel further away from where you're headed than you think.

I always think hollow knight is like a few quality of life tweaks away from a top 10 all time game for me. But the flaws it does have really hampered it for me (though I still loved loved it).

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

I loved dread. EMMI zones I though were very cool. I’m dreading (heh) finally facing the final boss and I haven’t had a chance to play it yet. 

[Keyser_Soze]

Hard mode and easy mode added