Are you ready for some rambles? (Reason at the bottom)

Metroid itself is a lot to many different people, something impossible to really balance altogether. It's the nonlinearity like Super but not Fusion. It's the sequence breaking like the original Metroid but not Zero Mission. It's the environmental storytelling like Prime but not the original Metroid. It's the anti-power fantasy like Metroid 2 but not Super. It's the action-oriented bounty hunting like Samus Returns but not Federation Force. (I don't actually believe some of these, just throwing out things I've heard)

I said to others while playing this that it felt like Dread was actually thinking about the DNA of the series in terms of what to focus on more than the prior games. And the last hour DEFINITELY did, what a goddamn rug pull. Samus has always toed the line between being used by a literal police imperial force to basically blow up planets and commit genocide, while also still doing so for the sake of the galaxy and saving people (although only a few games ever show a more human side to her that felt like she had her own agency around the mission itself, like saving animals). Metroid 2 was a literal genocide simulator. But Dread turns everything that came before completely on its head. She's originally here for the mission, but it immediately becomes the quest to get out, literally putting you at the bottom of the map, the furthest from her ship in any game so far. Without spoiling, the ending turns the entire concept of its formulaic approach on its head, actually using its gameplay to a strong narrative point around Samus' identity.

Spoilers

I LOVE how a lot of the strongest tools that you got in earlier games actually take longer to get. I initially thought it wasn't enough but I realized at that point you'd have to remove them wholesale. I like how the Morph Ball actually takes its time to get there to force you to find ways of navigating along with the Speed Boost.
The game rarely tells you where to go like its original idea. It's a lot closer to the DNA of the original than it has been in years, albeit an amalgamation of design quirks, focused around the concept of a hostile world that you are alien to, structured in a weird balance between structured factories made out of sprawling alien worlds. It's almost like the game is balancing on a scale, trying to connect its environmental storytelling while also being, by far, the most action-oriented title so far. It also has pretty good environmental storytelling through the regions and vibes, while trying to push the player towards being conscious of the world, and then continually doing its best to make you second-guess what you knew.

The EMMIs are the new idea to the series of adding a real stealth component that's less cinematically scripted and more dynamic. They're good on paper, especially the second and third one that genuinely challenge your pathing and stealth, but I kinda wish they weren't boxed in to the EMMI areas and they could actually surprise you outside of it. They give the greatest challenge of suddenly pushing a stealth option but around the 4th or 5th EMMI the patterns of the EMMI rooms tend to coalesce and you're more knowledgeable of the movement by then that they become a joke and more of just running away execution. The areas also look too similar so it somewhat approaches novelty if not for the ending.

I really like the emphasis this game has on its environments in terms of a factory-controlled world, where it feels more in tandem between experiments and the enemies adapting to what the Chozos have done, although I think it goes... too much on the factory. Some of the areas start to blur together in terms of color design, which is fine (it still does a good job signposting without maps, with the environmental storytelling literally helping as landmarks), but it also made the areas a bit less distinct. The starting zone in particular is bland as hell regardless of it being a "tutorial" zone or not.
Some of the item collection was a bit frustrating but I liked how much of it actually challenged my damn movement, with some really cool speed puzzles with tight as hell situations.

I'm on the fence on whether the world changes a bit too quickly is a good thing or bad thing. It's great narratively and mechanically for keeping you on your toes and feel alien, but it slightly messes with the general idea it ends on.

I think the overall vibes are good-ish. I like the factory SFX along with a few of the songs, but its imitation of previous games weren't as good this time around, and honestly I think the game should've been even quieter. There was an area where it was in darkness with very few noises but it was for such a short time! The other rooms have too much sound (even the break rooms), especially by the last hour. Some of the songs fell flat but I'm going to listen again at some point, could be audio mixing.

Didn't find the parry remotely broken and that could be because I'm just bad (>_<) but I also found the game literally challenging how you approach parrying anyway as it progressed. You could just shoot from a distance until they come at you for parrying, but then they get faster than you can even go, they get armor, and then you have to approach them. There was more attention to enemy placement in the last two zones as well.

Some of the bosses were ACTUALLY GOOD THIS TIME, albeit almost all of the good ones were in the last hour. If you include EMMIs, the speed boost one freaked me the hell out when I thought I could just figure it out while running.
I think the biggest highlights were the implementation of the Chozo Warriors (I'm always gonna dig enemies that have your movesets, even if they're still pretty weak they make you fucking learn your moveset). That and the final boss were amazing strengths of challenging combat as opposed to keyhole or puzzle bosses from prior games. You really have to be good with your mobility, the execution of space jump, flash shift, etc. The final boss really kicked my teeth in.

The bosses that suck usually are the ones that don't challenge your movement at all and just have very little error for mistakes. While I died to Kraid a few times, it had way more to do with ridiculous damage output.

People keep saying I should play Rain World because I had a lot more fun in this game when I was trying to get away and figuring out how to navigate rather than shooting and parrying. The final boss was amazing, sure, but I was drawn to Metroid moreso for vibes, its environments, and figuring out how to move forward. Something for me to think about.

Gonna come back to this game a lot for some of its environments though. That one region with all the flowers and plants that react off-screen to Samus' presence. By far the most gorgeous region.

(Note explanation: I'm doing rambley reviews instead of structured ones as soon as I finish games as an experiment to actually put something out. I have huge issues of wanting to be detail-oriented and understanding every corner of something, and unfortunately that brain worm is never going away. So a lot of these will get follow-ups at some point, but I wanted to, y'know, put something out there on why I loved a game for the time being :D.)

As someone who plays an absolutely inordinate amount of platform fighters, and especially coming off the messy Nick All-Star game, this definitely has its head on its shoulders way moreso than the other. I'm glad platform fighters are taking cues from Rivals of Aether and Brawlhalla that to be a platform fighter in the space that actually gives a damn means actually having something that makes you unique instead of just riffing off of Melee (cough Icons and Slap City cough), even if I don't like Brawlhalla at all.

The success of this game already out the gate definitely says a lot about being free to play and having a crap-ton of IPs (along with actual production values like voice acting for those IPs), but there's also some kind of glue adhering the game that is unique to MultiVersus, that being the 2v2 component that every character is centered around. Brawlhalla focused around items and recovery, Rivals of Aether focused on movement system centered around gimmicks, and MultiVersus characters fundamentally change when they're paired together, or should I say, are completely lesser by playing 1v1. While I do not enjoy this game (which I'll get to in a moment), I do think playing 1v1 this time around isn't meeting MultiVersus on its best terms.

It's a STRONG component. Characters like Steven focus entirely around supporting the other player, with shields and buffs, and the perks system works in tandem with the other player. Twin Taz, which was a menace up until the nerf on release day, wasn't nearly as good in 1v1 because of the buffs the tornado gets when you pass your own ally, which ups the duration of it. Synergy is a must, which is a given if you've played any other Smash 2v2, but here pre-game synergy is important. While not a fully strategic element that won't mean you'll instantly win the game, not caring too much about perks or how your characters work together will pitfall you at top level play (unless you're Bugs and you work with literally everyone, see the recent Justice League tourney). There's also a few other things unique to this, like how much status effects are prevalent, albeit its combination with perks makes projectiles way better than they have any right to be.

The onboarding here is certainly better than Nick and other platform fighters on average. Still woefully not as far as it could go, living in the shadow of RoA's tutorial by doing the bare minimum in teaching DI (Directional Influence) as well as a few other more than beginner mechanics, but also confusing the waters with terms that already existed in the space which makes onboarding a tad more difficult than it needs to be (Knockback Influence?). The free rotation is welcome, at least.

I think this game is going to go farther than FOMO based on the above. I think the fact that they have the money and manpower to constantly push out new characters is insane, and god having LeBron is insane.

However, I think this game is just straight up not for me, and I had trouble articulating it for a bit but I think I'm up to it now. It's mostly "death by a thousand cuts", but if there's one issue I can pin the hardest...

The game feel is garbage.

One of the issues I had with Brawlhalla is its floatiness and just blatant lack of weight. You were basically flying across the screen, so a lot of the appeal was hoping to find the playstyle that worked for you, and focusing entirely on that. This game isn't nearly as floaty as Brawlhalla is, but it has the exact same issue. The air movement really feels like hitboxes are free game with how you fly around. Ground movement is sticky which is fine, but air time just feels like a whole different ball game. It's not a game that you can just immediately pick up a character and enjoy the movement. That in itself is a big pushaway for me. I think the game is aware of its floatiness, even pushing it with how enemies spaghetti from high knockback attacks which admittedly makes it funnier when there's 0 teching in this game. That being said, what is with the hurtboxes. The hurtboxes when putting out aerial moves in particular right now are an absolute joke. People point to Bugs' hurtbox specifically when he's doing up-air, but like look at Jake! Look at Finn! I hope mods showcase the hurtboxes when doing aerials soon so more people can see what I'm talking about.

The freemium components also just SUCK, but they're not remotely egregious as much as just being very very annoying. I didn't like unlocking characters in Smash, but I excused it mostly in Ultimate because the roster was HUGE, and I think MultiVersus with all the leaks is fighting for a roster that big. However, as it stands with roster size now, it reminds me of Brawlout with how you grind for character unlocks. You could just pay for them admittedly, and $40 for basically all of them isn't remotely a bad deal, but right now Rivals of Aether has a roster nearly this big for less money.
It also, like other freemium games, pushes for you to play every day as opposed to playing a ton of hours per day. With how the pass and level ups work, playing 5 hours in one day won't get you nearly the same amount of benefits as playing 1 hour every day for 5 days. That's absurdly normal for a freemium game to have, but it's annoying for me personally to have it strapped to a platform fighter. It would also help if you could get gold from shooting the shit with friends, but alas, you only get it from matchmaking.
The microtransactions in the room of $775 for everything in terms of skins isn't also that far out there, but it also seeps into the game in terms of the main menu in an annoying way.

I do want to give a massive disclaimer. The game is only just out if you haven't been playing early access. Tournament play is still new for the game and even though there were tournaments running with early access, it wasn't a TON.
That being said, the game is not DNF Duel in terms of balance, but it certainly feels kusoge after 40 hours. They thankfully nerfed the massive elephant of double Taz which outright advocated bans for twins in tournies, but Bugs, Tom, and Finn are just absolutely insane right now. There are also a few characters that remind me of Melee that are just flat out BAD and are not seeing any top level play at the moment (ex: Wonder Woman). WB's seeming focus on pumping out characters en masse as opposed to balancing them gives me worry that this will be the next Slap City in terms of balance. I do not like heavily unbalanced games, gomen.

I'm happy for the people who are just in love with the IPs on display, and the leaks so far show they are going to have an insane amount of fun with what's being put next. Seeing the lean-in meme of Ultra Shaggy beat the shit out of Finn the adventurer is extremely funny, and I think past the amount of corporate IP bloat that reminds me of Space Jam, this actually does have SOUL under the surface in terms of good time spent on animations and the voice lines aren't remotely cringey, but the game feel and other aspects of the game just will take a lot of convincing for me to ever be on board for a long time.

In other words, I'll see you all in Rivals.