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As someone who only recently played Super Metroid for the first time, and thoroughly fell for it, I love reading people tackling it anew. It is a wonderful game. I had the same experience of 'Getting it", despite having tried it in short stints before, and once that game hooks you, it really hooks you

ZeroAX wrote:There are barely any memorable tracks in metroid.

I will cut you. I'm not going to argue whether or not Castlevania tracks are more epic than Super Metroid tracks, but to say there are barely any memorable tracks is heresy of the highest order.

I love Castlevania. Symphony resides in my top 3 games of all time (above Super Metroid!). But no memorable tracks? Super Metroid is full of amazing and memorable tracks!

That being said, many of the tracks are slower and more atmospheric, and might take a few listens for them to imprint on your brain. I still regularly listen to this soundtrack (and derivations of it), even if I haven't played through the game in its entirety in years.

One of the best OST's of all time. It is incredibly unique, there is nothing quite like it.

I love Classicvania and the Iga Metroidvania games, but let me be honest... the architecture and level design is boring compared to Super Metroid. Every CV game is extremely blocky in level design, secret walls are painfully visible, etc. I have some sci-fi bias for Metroid, but the organic level design is on a completely different level that has never been matched yet. No single room in Super Metroid is the same. Even new attempts like the amazing Axiom Verge, still tend to come off as "blocky" and linear in ways (though in fairness I think Axiom goes for more of an NES Metroid feel).

Glad you're loving it ZeroAX. One of the guys over on the Retronauts podcast is playing it newly and having the same kind of reaction once it clicked with him. It's a tall claim but I think the facts are in especially 20 some years later, Super Metroid is just a straight up masterpiece in every conceivable way.

MrPopo wrote:

ZeroAX wrote:There are barely any memorable tracks in metroid.

I will cut you. I'm not going to argue whether or not Castlevania tracks are more epic than Super Metroid tracks, but to say there are barely any memorable tracks is heresy of the highest order.

Most of Super Metroid's tracks focus on ambience versus melody, understandably. But I've always loved this track: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLcyg4T ... E4&index=6

MrPopo wrote:I will cut you. I'm not going to argue whether or not Castlevania tracks are more epic than Super Metroid tracks, but to say there are barely any memorable tracks is heresy of the highest order.

Don't shoot me please . I think the issue is that as others said it's very ambient music, while most games of the era had really memorable melodies. I'll try playing more of it during the day, which would allow me to have the volume louder and see if that changes my mind.

Xeogred wrote:One of the best OST's of all time. It is incredibly unique, there is nothing quite like it.

I love Classicvania and the Iga Metroidvania games, but let me be honest... the architecture and level design is boring compared to Super Metroid. Every CV game is extremely blocky in level design, secret walls are painfully visible, etc. I have some sci-fi bias for Metroid, but the organic level design is on a completely different level that has never been matched yet. No single room in Super Metroid is the same. Even new attempts like the amazing Axiom Verge, still tend to come off as "blocky" and linear in ways (though in fairness I think Axiom goes for more of an NES Metroid feel).

Good point. It's weird to say, but for me Super Metroid feels like I'm exploring a real alien world. Castlevania never felt like I'm exploring an actual castle. I'm just wondering though, didn't anyone else find the enemy placement in castlevania sometimes cheap and dull? I'm thinking of those enemies who don't really take thinking to clear and once you level up they are super easy to get past.

While in Super Metroid, either it's the 1 shot to kill enemies that cling on small platforms making them dangerous, or the freaking enemies that jump between the ceiling and floor which are a pain to shoot, it just felt that the enemies all had an attack pattern related to the environments around them, which imo is great level design.

I can't wait to get to the ship (at least I saw there's something like that on the map), it sounds like a cool environment . Now I'm starting to wonder if I should try out Metroid Prime again.

We've had some discussions lately in regards to a few things there, when Samus Returns came out. The majority of the enemies in Super Metroid are mostly stationary and not even aggressively hostile, it's almost like... Samus herself is kind of the bad guy here killing a bunch of aliens just going about their business. There's a lot of somber melancholic atmosphere to Super Metroid all around and to this day just one of the most atmospheric adventures in all of gaming to me.

But a lot of the other games in the series are kind of different and put a heavier focus on the combat. In Fusion and Zero Mission, the levels don't feel as big and are more claustrophobic. Maybe because of the GBA's capabilities and screen space, but it feels like there's almost constant shooting in both games from one room to another. Samus Returns takes it to another level and is like Contra action from start to finish. Some of us here have our preferences on which style we like more. I love my sidescrolling shooters, but I do like how Super Metroid is slower and different. Zebes feels truly alive.

[quote=Xeogred] The majority of the enemies in Super Metroid are mostly stationary and not even aggressively hostile, it's almost like... Samus herself is kind of the bad guy here killing a bunch of aliens just going about their business[/quote]
haha yeah, that's a cool way to describe it.

Actually Samus Returns got me thinking of trying out a 2D Metroid game, but then I saw the gameplay videos and didn't like all the quick time 1 hit kills.

How long did it take you guys to beat this game the first time you played it?

My first run (earlier this year) took me about 6 hrs 30 minutes, with around 90% completion. I spent a good amount of time trying to find things, which added at least an hour or two, but didn't force a complete play and was happy to move along once I felt I had explored well enough.

Yeah, the combat was never the main draw in Super Metroid. It's there, and necessary, but it always felt like a means to an end. The point was the exploration and the remarkable atmosphere. There are very few SNES games, or heck, games in general that manage to evoke the feelings that Super Metroid does. There's a reason it's an all-time classic.