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This review contains spoilers
I went into this game with tempered expectations as I was cautious of how the game would hold up. Despite how much I respect its ambition and how ahead of its time it was, I found Metroid 1 to range from mildly enjoyable to moderately frustrating, so I was pretty skeptical on how a successor on the Gameboy would stack up…after playing it, I am glad to have had my concerns proved wrong. Very wrong in fact, as this is a fantastic game, a huge step up from its predecessor and the game that made me a real fan of Metroid.
The first substantial improvement over the first game is the controls. Samus is now able to shoot below herself when in midair and can take a stationary crouched position to shoot knee-high targets, making it so combat is more like fighting enemies and less like fighting the limited controls.
There are ten save stations around the map, though two are very close to each other so functionally there are nine. I think it can be a little bit too hard to come by one, but overall, it works fine, and I much prefer it over Metroid 1’s password system. There are also refueling stations placed about, they come in handy but are too few and far between to be able to lean on.
Metroid wouldn’t be Metroid without upgrades and Metroid II not only keeps the old ones but brings in some new blood with the spider-ball and the space-jump. The spider ball lets Samus cling to surfaces while in morph-ball mode and traverse walls and ceilings which adds some nice verticality to exploration. The space-jump serves as its more mobile late game equivalent, letting Samus be able to jump repeatedly while in midair, infinitely if your timing is good. I don’t think a single other powerup in Metroid’s history feels as satisfying to get as the space-jump, though the screw-attack comes second due to how well it synergizes with the space-jump.
What I believe to be the most important quality of a Metroid game is its exploration and world design…and the Metroid community’s most common complaint about Metroid II is regarding its exploration and world design…specifically, its different approach to entries in the series both preceding and succeeding it. The player has to enter and complete each zone in a specific order with backtracking being largely absent, once you are done with an area you typically never have to set foot in it again and what few revisits there are, are very brief. Though, each zone lets you explore in a non-linear manner within its confines. I think this direction is perfect for the game when accounting for the often-forgotten fact that this was made for the Gameboy, a handheld console most owners would typically use in car rides, on breaks or during recess. Having a giant intertwined world with backtracking large distances like Metroid 1 is a little bit demanding for a system people would typically play for shorter time frames. add the fact that the first Metroid was already difficult to navigate while having the advantage of being on a home console where most people would typically have longer more dedicated play-sessions than a handheld, a more bite-sized approach to the world that still embraces non-linearity works best for the Gameboy, while still keeping what makes Metroid…well, Metroid!
The second most common complaint about Metroid II is how zoomed in the camera is. I view it in a similar vein to Resident Evil’s fixed camera angles, where the game is designed specifically to obscure the players vision. Vision is one of your strongest and most reliable abilities in a game, so to have that limited makes you more vulnerable. The game takes something away from you. This would normally be annoying in something like an action game or a shooter, but with horror it adds to the experience. Metroid II, whether you find it scary or not, is a horror game. It turns what was a limitation of the hardware into a way to build dread. When you find the shed remains of a recently hatched mutant Metroid, you know its near, but not exactly where it is or when it will attack, having to keep begrudgingly inching forward, not knowing when it’s going to pop into view.
Both the story and objective of the game revolve around hunting Metroids. the Metroids, while being a plot point in Metroid 1 and the series namesake, I’d argue this is their first real game in the spotlight. When you first land on SR-388 you enter a cave and explore for a bit, then eventually find a Metroid, but unlike previous encounters with one, this one starts to mutate. It jettisons its old form for one resistant to the ice beam at the cost of a very weak underbelly. As you dive further into the planets depths finding upgrades and progressing, you find more and more Metroids, some being even further along their mutation process, getting more agile and deadly. while fighting the Metroids can be range from an intense, erratic scuffle to a complete mess depending on the arena design, I ultimately enjoy their presence throughout the game and even the worst of the fights are better than any of the bosses in Metroid 1.
I really adore the environmental story telling throughout the game, especially near the end just before the Metroid nest where there are no enemies besides the Metroids to convey how invasive they are to SR-388’s ecosystem. It really sells the sense of urgency in hunting the Metroids before they mutate to a stage too strong for you to stop and eventually take over the planet in its entirety.
Metroid II is extremely ambitious for a horror game on the Gameboy and it’s even more impressive that it manages to achieve what it does. It has an intensely strong sense of identity and stands as both a huge improvement from Metroid 1 on almost every front and as a great game in its own right.
Maybe the most underrated game of its era.
The first substantial improvement over the first game is the controls. Samus is now able to shoot below herself when in midair and can take a stationary crouched position to shoot knee-high targets, making it so combat is more like fighting enemies and less like fighting the limited controls.
There are ten save stations around the map, though two are very close to each other so functionally there are nine. I think it can be a little bit too hard to come by one, but overall, it works fine, and I much prefer it over Metroid 1’s password system. There are also refueling stations placed about, they come in handy but are too few and far between to be able to lean on.
Metroid wouldn’t be Metroid without upgrades and Metroid II not only keeps the old ones but brings in some new blood with the spider-ball and the space-jump. The spider ball lets Samus cling to surfaces while in morph-ball mode and traverse walls and ceilings which adds some nice verticality to exploration. The space-jump serves as its more mobile late game equivalent, letting Samus be able to jump repeatedly while in midair, infinitely if your timing is good. I don’t think a single other powerup in Metroid’s history feels as satisfying to get as the space-jump, though the screw-attack comes second due to how well it synergizes with the space-jump.
What I believe to be the most important quality of a Metroid game is its exploration and world design…and the Metroid community’s most common complaint about Metroid II is regarding its exploration and world design…specifically, its different approach to entries in the series both preceding and succeeding it. The player has to enter and complete each zone in a specific order with backtracking being largely absent, once you are done with an area you typically never have to set foot in it again and what few revisits there are, are very brief. Though, each zone lets you explore in a non-linear manner within its confines. I think this direction is perfect for the game when accounting for the often-forgotten fact that this was made for the Gameboy, a handheld console most owners would typically use in car rides, on breaks or during recess. Having a giant intertwined world with backtracking large distances like Metroid 1 is a little bit demanding for a system people would typically play for shorter time frames. add the fact that the first Metroid was already difficult to navigate while having the advantage of being on a home console where most people would typically have longer more dedicated play-sessions than a handheld, a more bite-sized approach to the world that still embraces non-linearity works best for the Gameboy, while still keeping what makes Metroid…well, Metroid!
The second most common complaint about Metroid II is how zoomed in the camera is. I view it in a similar vein to Resident Evil’s fixed camera angles, where the game is designed specifically to obscure the players vision. Vision is one of your strongest and most reliable abilities in a game, so to have that limited makes you more vulnerable. The game takes something away from you. This would normally be annoying in something like an action game or a shooter, but with horror it adds to the experience. Metroid II, whether you find it scary or not, is a horror game. It turns what was a limitation of the hardware into a way to build dread. When you find the shed remains of a recently hatched mutant Metroid, you know its near, but not exactly where it is or when it will attack, having to keep begrudgingly inching forward, not knowing when it’s going to pop into view.
Both the story and objective of the game revolve around hunting Metroids. the Metroids, while being a plot point in Metroid 1 and the series namesake, I’d argue this is their first real game in the spotlight. When you first land on SR-388 you enter a cave and explore for a bit, then eventually find a Metroid, but unlike previous encounters with one, this one starts to mutate. It jettisons its old form for one resistant to the ice beam at the cost of a very weak underbelly. As you dive further into the planets depths finding upgrades and progressing, you find more and more Metroids, some being even further along their mutation process, getting more agile and deadly. while fighting the Metroids can be range from an intense, erratic scuffle to a complete mess depending on the arena design, I ultimately enjoy their presence throughout the game and even the worst of the fights are better than any of the bosses in Metroid 1.
I really adore the environmental story telling throughout the game, especially near the end just before the Metroid nest where there are no enemies besides the Metroids to convey how invasive they are to SR-388’s ecosystem. It really sells the sense of urgency in hunting the Metroids before they mutate to a stage too strong for you to stop and eventually take over the planet in its entirety.
Metroid II is extremely ambitious for a horror game on the Gameboy and it’s even more impressive that it manages to achieve what it does. It has an intensely strong sense of identity and stands as both a huge improvement from Metroid 1 on almost every front and as a great game in its own right.
Maybe the most underrated game of its era.
(Played Via the 2021 “Enriched Edition” Remaster.)
(Before getting to the actual game, I’d like to appreciate how easy and user friendly the devs have made this to play. Usually, mods can range from a tad complicated to a complete bitch to set up, but it’s as easy as downloading, unzipping, and opening the desired episode. You don’t need to download GZDooM since it comes with a copy built in. and, hell; It doesn’t even require you own DooM II!)
Something I really respect about this game is what a strong sense of self it has despite being a DooM mod. From its ruined environments to the dialog, everything reinforces the identity of the world the developers have built.
Ashes inherits DooM’s lightning-fast movement and adds jumping and crouching which make it feel closer to a build engine game than DooM. You get a specific key for a boot knife that you can use at any time. It’s nice that you don’t have to switch to your crowbar every time you want to break a box or vent cover. You also get a lantern that recharges via exposure to sunlight which strikes a balance of not burning energy too fast, but fast enough that you want to conserve its battery. There are radiation hotspots you can encounter, and you get a Geiger counter that will tell you when you are in proximity to such hazards. (Pretty clearly lifted from Fallout, but hey it works well here.) You also get an auto map and a journal to keep track of main and side objectives.
The game includes 7 normal levels, 2 trading hubs and 1 secret mission. All of which are very well designed. They do well in pretty much every kind of way you’d want, with good combat arenas, fantastic looking environments that are impressive both technically and presentation-wise and are choked full of secret loot stashes to uncover. Something I quite like about the secrets are that they are much more based on exploration then DooM’s typical unfun wall humping antics. Trading hubs have plenty of NPCs scattered about with dialog that adds more depth to the world and a few side quests that can land you some scrap to trade to shopkeepers with or even whole new weapons. Speaking of which…
Any good shooter needs good weapons and Ashes is by no means an exception. You get a crowbar, revolver, a 9mm pistol, a pump action shotgun, an SMG, a napalm launcher, pipe bombs and a sniper rifle. Everything feels like it has a place in your arsenal and since ammo is somewhat limited it encourages you to use the right tool for the job. This is even more true in later difficulties that change how much ammo you can get. Every weapon has top notch animations and sounds. They’re just all around are a blast to use. You know that if just the act of firing into a wall feels fun that you have gotten the shooting right.
As for enemies, I think we encounter my first real problem with episode 1: Lack of variety. Mutant cannibals, mutant dogs, Napalm Mutants, Raiders, Shot-gunners, Evil Balloons (???), and the huge mutant for the end of episode 1’s boss are the ones I can think of off the top of my head. It’s a tiny bit underwhelming that there are so few, and it gets a little stale by the end. It’s not a huge problem though since the gunplay is great and the enemies though few are well designed. They are all fun to fight and have very readable designs so it’s easy to tell what you are going up against immediately and the sound queues are great at telling you if an enemy is nearby out of view, if it has spotted you, if its attacking and if its dead.
Something that’s super cool to me is that you get a motorcycle! A vehicle!! In the DooM engine!!! Yes, I know its GZDooM but that’s still impressive. And what’s more impressive is that it controls pretty well too, I know some have had problems with how it handles but I don’t really share those problems. I consider that an achievement. to have not only have a vehicle in an engine very much not designed for vehicles, but one that doesn’t completely suck.
Ashes goes for a very bleak world that’s story centers on a lone scavenger set in the east coast of what used to be the USA, inhabited by mutated monsters, thieving raiders, psychotic cannibals and what little remains of a civilized society.
The story is pretty simple. One day while scavenging you encounter an old radio that still works and somehow is getting a message in a world where only a few remaining radio towers are thought to still even function, let alone be broadcasting. So, you start moving your way toward the city center to find what’s at the source of the signal. I think it’s a simplistic yet interesting premise and quite enjoyed it.
The sound design is topnotch too. The ticking of your Gieger counter, the bolting of a fresh round in your rifle, the roaring engine of your bike, everything just sounds so perfect.
And on top of everything else it does well, the music is A-grade bangers all the way though. It knows when to play more triumphant music for gunning down dozens of bandits and play more reserved uneasy music for the quieter, more uncertain moments, or when to go dead silent. And that leitmotif from the games main them ‘2063’ that presides through so much of the OST is just awesome.
So, all in all: a damn good DooM mod that is absolutely worth your time. Especially since once you are done with it you can play Afterglow.
(Before getting to the actual game, I’d like to appreciate how easy and user friendly the devs have made this to play. Usually, mods can range from a tad complicated to a complete bitch to set up, but it’s as easy as downloading, unzipping, and opening the desired episode. You don’t need to download GZDooM since it comes with a copy built in. and, hell; It doesn’t even require you own DooM II!)
Something I really respect about this game is what a strong sense of self it has despite being a DooM mod. From its ruined environments to the dialog, everything reinforces the identity of the world the developers have built.
Ashes inherits DooM’s lightning-fast movement and adds jumping and crouching which make it feel closer to a build engine game than DooM. You get a specific key for a boot knife that you can use at any time. It’s nice that you don’t have to switch to your crowbar every time you want to break a box or vent cover. You also get a lantern that recharges via exposure to sunlight which strikes a balance of not burning energy too fast, but fast enough that you want to conserve its battery. There are radiation hotspots you can encounter, and you get a Geiger counter that will tell you when you are in proximity to such hazards. (Pretty clearly lifted from Fallout, but hey it works well here.) You also get an auto map and a journal to keep track of main and side objectives.
The game includes 7 normal levels, 2 trading hubs and 1 secret mission. All of which are very well designed. They do well in pretty much every kind of way you’d want, with good combat arenas, fantastic looking environments that are impressive both technically and presentation-wise and are choked full of secret loot stashes to uncover. Something I quite like about the secrets are that they are much more based on exploration then DooM’s typical unfun wall humping antics. Trading hubs have plenty of NPCs scattered about with dialog that adds more depth to the world and a few side quests that can land you some scrap to trade to shopkeepers with or even whole new weapons. Speaking of which…
Any good shooter needs good weapons and Ashes is by no means an exception. You get a crowbar, revolver, a 9mm pistol, a pump action shotgun, an SMG, a napalm launcher, pipe bombs and a sniper rifle. Everything feels like it has a place in your arsenal and since ammo is somewhat limited it encourages you to use the right tool for the job. This is even more true in later difficulties that change how much ammo you can get. Every weapon has top notch animations and sounds. They’re just all around are a blast to use. You know that if just the act of firing into a wall feels fun that you have gotten the shooting right.
As for enemies, I think we encounter my first real problem with episode 1: Lack of variety. Mutant cannibals, mutant dogs, Napalm Mutants, Raiders, Shot-gunners, Evil Balloons (???), and the huge mutant for the end of episode 1’s boss are the ones I can think of off the top of my head. It’s a tiny bit underwhelming that there are so few, and it gets a little stale by the end. It’s not a huge problem though since the gunplay is great and the enemies though few are well designed. They are all fun to fight and have very readable designs so it’s easy to tell what you are going up against immediately and the sound queues are great at telling you if an enemy is nearby out of view, if it has spotted you, if its attacking and if its dead.
Something that’s super cool to me is that you get a motorcycle! A vehicle!! In the DooM engine!!! Yes, I know its GZDooM but that’s still impressive. And what’s more impressive is that it controls pretty well too, I know some have had problems with how it handles but I don’t really share those problems. I consider that an achievement. to have not only have a vehicle in an engine very much not designed for vehicles, but one that doesn’t completely suck.
Ashes goes for a very bleak world that’s story centers on a lone scavenger set in the east coast of what used to be the USA, inhabited by mutated monsters, thieving raiders, psychotic cannibals and what little remains of a civilized society.
The story is pretty simple. One day while scavenging you encounter an old radio that still works and somehow is getting a message in a world where only a few remaining radio towers are thought to still even function, let alone be broadcasting. So, you start moving your way toward the city center to find what’s at the source of the signal. I think it’s a simplistic yet interesting premise and quite enjoyed it.
The sound design is topnotch too. The ticking of your Gieger counter, the bolting of a fresh round in your rifle, the roaring engine of your bike, everything just sounds so perfect.
And on top of everything else it does well, the music is A-grade bangers all the way though. It knows when to play more triumphant music for gunning down dozens of bandits and play more reserved uneasy music for the quieter, more uncertain moments, or when to go dead silent. And that leitmotif from the games main them ‘2063’ that presides through so much of the OST is just awesome.
So, all in all: a damn good DooM mod that is absolutely worth your time. Especially since once you are done with it you can play Afterglow.
(Used a map, used save-states due to lack of a save system.)
I respect this game to a high degree for how revolutionary it was to the point of pioneering an entire genre. The sense of exploration, solving the very map itself, earning every upgrade you get your hands on, etc. the specific flavor a metroidvania has is just something you can’t really get anywhere else. However, unfortunately that does not mean I would recommend this game to everybody.
Metroid has no built-in map. I personally don’t really consider this too huge of an issue since in the modern age, since if you have the means to play Metroid you probably also have the means to find a fan made map online. But I imagine it was a pain back in the day. What is more of a navigational dilemma is that Metroid tends to reuse room layouts. This makes its frustratingly easy to get lost since you don’t have a good sense of where you even are on the map.
Combat can be iffy since you can’t crouch to hit lower targets or shoot down while jumping. in fairness this was an overlying problem with most games of the period, but that doesn’t make it less frustrating.
Arguably the defining feature of any Metroid game is the upgrades, and this was a pretty good start. The ice beam probably being my favorite of the bunch since it lets you freeze enemies and use them as platforms which is a very creative idea and fun to do. The wave beam makes it possible to hit lower enemies since you can’t crouch which is an imperfect solution but better than nothing.
You encounter only 3 bosses on your adventure and all of them are bad. Ridley and Kraid are both bullet spongy slogs but by far the worst one is Mother Brain. Mother Brain is effectively immobile the whole fight and has the security systems do all the fight for her, so its pretty much just desperately praying you don’t get hit by one of the billion projectiles coming at you while also needing to focus on damaging Mother Brain. I consider this to be the lowest point of the game.
That’s pretty much all I have to say on the gameplay. But sadly, the problems don’t end here. Metroid has a large number of technical issues that vary in how they affect the player.
Samus sometime shows up on the other side of the screen when going through doors and at one point there was an inaccessible door behind some wall tiles that I am pretty sure was not supposed to be there as it was not on the map I used. These are ultimately harmless glitches but there are much more invasive ones. Enemies being able to get cheap hits on you when going through a door and enemy's getting cheap hits on you as soon as you enter a door is obnoxious. But the worst offender is the lag. Pretty much any time there are more than 4 enemies on screen at one the game starts lagging into a slideshow.
As for the presentation, it’s great. especially for the NES. Metroid goes for a pseudo horror setting that feels less so scary, more so eerie and lonely. Which serves a secondary purpose as it makes the sense of progression feels even more noticeable, the quiet isolated early game smoothly transitions into late game where you are practically flying around killing most enemies before they can even make themselves a threat. This sense of progression would be improved drastically in later entries, but it is none the less impressive here. The music is nothing to scoff at either. All around very good with the most memorable track for me being the title screen music. It sets the eerie, isolated tone from the very beginning.
So, all in all: I think to really enjoy Metroid, you need to have an appreciation for what it did at the time and how much it means to the industry, while also being able to enjoy games of its era and put up with how cryptic, unfair and buggy it can be. Otherwise, your experience will probably be middling at best.
Even if i am a much bigger fan of later entries to both the series and genre, i still respect the hell out of Metroid.
I respect this game to a high degree for how revolutionary it was to the point of pioneering an entire genre. The sense of exploration, solving the very map itself, earning every upgrade you get your hands on, etc. the specific flavor a metroidvania has is just something you can’t really get anywhere else. However, unfortunately that does not mean I would recommend this game to everybody.
Metroid has no built-in map. I personally don’t really consider this too huge of an issue since in the modern age, since if you have the means to play Metroid you probably also have the means to find a fan made map online. But I imagine it was a pain back in the day. What is more of a navigational dilemma is that Metroid tends to reuse room layouts. This makes its frustratingly easy to get lost since you don’t have a good sense of where you even are on the map.
Combat can be iffy since you can’t crouch to hit lower targets or shoot down while jumping. in fairness this was an overlying problem with most games of the period, but that doesn’t make it less frustrating.
Arguably the defining feature of any Metroid game is the upgrades, and this was a pretty good start. The ice beam probably being my favorite of the bunch since it lets you freeze enemies and use them as platforms which is a very creative idea and fun to do. The wave beam makes it possible to hit lower enemies since you can’t crouch which is an imperfect solution but better than nothing.
You encounter only 3 bosses on your adventure and all of them are bad. Ridley and Kraid are both bullet spongy slogs but by far the worst one is Mother Brain. Mother Brain is effectively immobile the whole fight and has the security systems do all the fight for her, so its pretty much just desperately praying you don’t get hit by one of the billion projectiles coming at you while also needing to focus on damaging Mother Brain. I consider this to be the lowest point of the game.
That’s pretty much all I have to say on the gameplay. But sadly, the problems don’t end here. Metroid has a large number of technical issues that vary in how they affect the player.
Samus sometime shows up on the other side of the screen when going through doors and at one point there was an inaccessible door behind some wall tiles that I am pretty sure was not supposed to be there as it was not on the map I used. These are ultimately harmless glitches but there are much more invasive ones. Enemies being able to get cheap hits on you when going through a door and enemy's getting cheap hits on you as soon as you enter a door is obnoxious. But the worst offender is the lag. Pretty much any time there are more than 4 enemies on screen at one the game starts lagging into a slideshow.
As for the presentation, it’s great. especially for the NES. Metroid goes for a pseudo horror setting that feels less so scary, more so eerie and lonely. Which serves a secondary purpose as it makes the sense of progression feels even more noticeable, the quiet isolated early game smoothly transitions into late game where you are practically flying around killing most enemies before they can even make themselves a threat. This sense of progression would be improved drastically in later entries, but it is none the less impressive here. The music is nothing to scoff at either. All around very good with the most memorable track for me being the title screen music. It sets the eerie, isolated tone from the very beginning.
So, all in all: I think to really enjoy Metroid, you need to have an appreciation for what it did at the time and how much it means to the industry, while also being able to enjoy games of its era and put up with how cryptic, unfair and buggy it can be. Otherwise, your experience will probably be middling at best.
Even if i am a much bigger fan of later entries to both the series and genre, i still respect the hell out of Metroid.