15:35, not quite. In any room with brown-gray doors that start flashing once you beat all of the enemies, the brown-gray doors will remain unlocked (blue) for the rest of the game as long as you hit them with your beam at least once after killing all the enemies. So in this particular room, as soon as you kill all the enemies, you can hit every door with your bean before you proceed to go through one of them and when you enter the room again all the doors will still be unlocked (blue) without having to beat all the enemies again. Most people do not know this as in most instances, brown-gray doors do not come in more than one door per room.
I love how all metroid games and even Zero mission makes Brinstar look like a swampy cave, while Super metroid brinstar is an extraterrestrial cherry blossom.
8:30 It still amazes me that, to this very day, almost all Metroidvania games use this EXACT style of map, down to the color of explored rooms being blue and unexplored ones grey. Yes, the maps in most post-1995 titles have added features (like where Doors are, and being able to Pin areas so you know where to backtrack to later) but you can pull up pictures of Super Metroids' maps, Symphony of the Night's map, and Bloodstained's map and they're all nearly identical in terms of presentation. Hell, even Hollow Knight uses this map template, even if the rooms are drawn more to scale and the colors are a bit different. For them to get it so right on their very first attempt that it set the standard for a quarter century (and counting) is WILD. 19:45 Considering that Mother Brain herself is (mostly) a cut-scene-in-boss-clothing, you're not wrong to say Ridley is the real final boss, at least in terms of being a tough-as-hell test of your combat abilities. 21:20 *cough* zero mission *coughcoughcough* ZERO MISSION *cough* 21:50 The wall jump-teaching critters "sing" the "item get" jingle, I love that so much. 22:55 DON'T YOU DARE INVOKE the baby YOU HEATHEN 25:00 And now, this sequence is significant part of the culture of every "Game Done Quick" charity marathon. 27:10 See you next mission!
As a Metroid fan, I like to use the blocks in all 2d versions as a unit of measurement. And this is the first and possible the last game where Samus is three blocks tall while the rest of the 2d Metroids feature her only being two blocks tall. Making Samus in Super Metroid the tallest she's ever been in a 2d Metroid game.
This is one of those games that everyone should play through at least once before they die. Other games like this are OG RE4, Super Mario Bros 3, Breath of the Wild, Ninja Gaiden Black, Metal Gear Solid 3, Chrono Trigger, Metroid Prime, Devil May Cry 3, Street Fighter 2, A Link to the Past, and Mario Galaxy 2.
17:20 You missed one of supers biggest hints. The enemies crawl from below and pass on it to get you to shoot and open it. There are MANY secret items that are found that way. One of the biggest strengths of this game is the way that it tells you where to go without actually saying it. While an average kid most certainly wouldn't spot it, the older audience would.
Yeah I'm honestly not sure why I felt the need to point that spot out, it is very fair. I think that might have been an area I struggled with on my first playthrough? In my Metroid 1 video I even praised that game for doing basically the same thing at the entrance to Kraid's lair, so yeah I was just being a lazy ass here haha.
@@Zeldamaster0999There are chozo statues that help you or give you an item. They're just statues. The ones that come alive to attack you are called Torizo.
My biggest issues with super metroid is that you cannot go into your spin jump midair, and that you can't get the springball until late game. It kinda feels like a slap in the face that you can't get an item that is, at best, a convenience until after most of the spots it would have been useful have gone by.
That's a legit nitpick. Honestly could have just made it a feature of the high jump boots. Maybe the reason is they want to encourage people to do the bomb trick?
I honestly love the run button and I'd hate to see it changed. Not only does it give you more control over your movement speed, but it allows you to move without triggering speedbooster as well as opening up a bunch of unintended stuff like short charging
How the hell did I never notice that SM is the only game in the series with a run button, and I've played through SM, Fusion, and ZM many times. But yes, the item cycling system is definitely clunky. Fusion and ZM's method was much more intuitive. Other than that the game is amazing.
oh no, this game... I have no words. The year was 1996 and I was recovering from femur surgery. 13 years old, super nintendo my cousin rented the games and one day it came out with SM... I hated it for 3 minutes now it's been 27 years of pure love...
If I had played it as a kid I'd have that feeling But because I beat it 2 days ago, I played it like a psychopath, I have high adaptability and I binged all the 2d metroid games (in one way or another, so no metroid 1 and 2, but ZM and AM2R)
One thing I hated about this game was the path was often hidden in a way that would be near impossible to find without a guide. You used Draygon’s lair as an example but the Lower Norfair entrance and the path to the speed booster are two other examples. The first time I played this game I was 9 years old and there were no UA-cam guides, I had a book lol
I managed to find the Speed Booster without much issue. for me it was the Ice Beam. It's really easy to miss the path that leads to it and had me going in circles for hours until I finally gave up and went to UA-cam.
I think that was the point. It's supposed to to be difficult and hard to find. Which is why it's so great. You can beat the game with some toying around and then you can beat the game with some crazy shit
That's kind of a thing I loved about this game though. I still find things on subsequent playthroughs that I never knew about before. It rewards you for trying new things and going well off the beaten path.
good video. 15:37 each door in this room needs to be unlocked only once after killing all enemies. but yeah, in a casual play you wouldn't think to double back and reopen all three doors after killing everything. 22:31 the blue hoppers in tourian can be killed with five super missiles oh also, x-ray and reserve tanks become much more important when you learn of major glitches ;)
For that blue hopper I mainly just meant the scripted one that the Baby Metroid attacks, but yeah the other ones can be killed. I've never tried that many glitches in this game other than some of the really common ones that are used in speedruns and stuff, but I was always intrigued by the spacetime beam glitch in particular lol
I used to love sequence breaking as a kid, and I remember being able to run the game in an hour, give or take. World record is 40m so I could have been way ahead of the curve, as that was 1995. I forgot how big this game is, like completely forgot. I'm playing prime for the first time with the remaster, then I'm gonna give this a revisit. Great series, thanks for making.
I do love how this game really doesn't require you to use a guide (as long as you're generally familiar with how to play Metroid in general in terms of progression and finding hidden areas to move on to the next place), though the one part I did get stumped on and had to use a guide was the glass tunnel you break with the power bomb, wish there was a bit more of an indicator there. Very creative by the devs and makes a lot of sense though. Also, I know you said you struggle with doing Shinesparking Diagonally, and I did too in Super, but SomeCallMeJohnny said in his Super review there's actually a trick to doing diagonal upward Shinespark very easily. All you gotta do is store the shinespark, hold whatever button you have mapped to aim diagonally, then hold B to shinespark and Samus will shinespark diagonally up, hope this helps you! Another interesting trick Johnny brought up in his video is that during the Phantoon fight, for some reason if you turn off the Ice Beam, Phantoon stays on screen longer to shoot. I'm guessing it's some glitch the game's code, but that's also very helpful for Super replays. I never knew about the Power Bomb sequence break that you found with the Wave Beam, that's pretty cool. The way I sequence broke to get the power bombs early on my first playthrough was after I killed Crocomire; to the left of the room where you fight him in there's a large chasm that at the very far left of leads to a room that has a Power Bomb, and you normally need the Grapple Beam to get it. It took many attempts of me trying very hard to master Shinesparking, but eventually I managed to properly time shooting open the door and then shinespark through it all the way across that chasm to get my first Power Bomb, which let me get the Grapple Bomb super early too and shaved off a lot of time and backtracking on my playthrough, I still remember it and plan to abuse it in my future playthroughs of Super. I'm glad someone else agrees that the Grapple Beam feels very clunky, I'm sure it was great for its time but I think the way SR and Dread refined it and made it a lot better was very much needed. I also adore Ridley's lair, filled with the hardest enemies of the game and feeling so oppressive with challenge and it's design, it feels like you're traversing through the pit of Hell itself, which fits Ridley very well. As for the Ridley fight itself, I hear there's a way to kill Ridley without him grabbing you, but it involves some kind of glitch I haven't ever looked up that speedrunners found and abuse. You could probably look it up if you want to kill him without him grabbing you in future playthroughs though. Super's final boss being an emotional rollercoaster cutscene really stands out to me, especially for the time it was made, that was just unheard of in 1994. The only other final boss in gaming that I can think of that's like this in a similar way is Mother 3's final boss, but it's an RPG so the presentation is handled differently (but is just as genious in my opinion). Super in general feels a lot like a reimagining of Metroid NES with it being set on the same planet, having returning bosses along with new ones and a few returning areas but mostly improved, and much more overhauled and polished gameplay, and I love it for that. Overall another great review from you and I agree with most of your points, very excited to check out your other reviews in the near future man!
Ehh, I wish I had used a guide from the start, honestly. I got about up to Crocomire and then everything fell apart. Did a lot of backtracking and lost patience with the area's design.
I’ve replayed the game so many times and only once did I ever have Ridley do the grab death sequence. Every other time he just falls after enough damage is dealt.
actually, thanks to the button mapping system theres a button layout where you dont have to rely on too much thumb movement or claw formation. if you map shoot to X, run to Y and jump to B, you can place the tip of your thumb between Y and X and press down B with the base of your thumb. thats how i always play the game.
great retrospective! every time i replay super metroid, i am constantly impressed with how the devs nailed so, so many aspects of the game. like, how do you go from the first two games to this one? really enjoyed the way you presented your thoughts about it. definitely checking out the rest of your channel!
I did not know wall jumping was a thing for a good 10 years after this game came out. When I ended up in the shaft with the green dudes, I bomb jumped my way out. And then when fell thru the speedbooster floor where you learn to shinespark, I tried to bomb jump out only to hit the blocks and not be able to leave, so I shut the game off and didn't play it for a good 3 or 4 years 😂😂😂
Another flaw I think that's in Super is that it locks you in with the monkeys to force you to learn wall jumping. The timing isn't the most generous and your save is down there so you're just stuck there, at the bottom of the hole, with those monkeys, until you figure it out.
That's reasonable. I like that there's a sort of tutorial within the game itself on how to wall jump, but it can be tough to understand what the monkeys are trying to show you since wall jumping in this game is so much different to how it is in most other games. The save station is pretty cruel too haha.
@@basedsamtv I just wish you could leave and come back to try to solve the mystery of what's going on here, without halting your momentum suddenly like that. Walljumping is so awesome once you get it down though, completely changes replays.
To solve the "maybe we need claw to play this with run" conundrum: map run to A (bottom button, I'm using xbox as a base), map fire to X (left button) and map jump to B (right button). You'll always run, and jumping and firing are just a thumb roll away.
To me, I’d make 3 changes to this game, then it would be perfect: 1. Skip cutscenes you’ve already seen (beginning, credits, etc) 2. Faster collecting items. The screen with the item name lasts forever. Much prefer it with a loading time like Fusion for example 3. MAKE THE DOORS LOAD FASTER
A small nitpick, but super missiles actually do 5x the damage of normal missiles, evidenced by the fact that you need 5 normal missiles to open purple doors, but they can also be opened with a single super missile. Though I could be wrong and this only applies to doors and not enemies
It's actually what you said, this is only for doors, in damage power, regular missiles does 100 of damage while super missiles do 300 of damage, but yeah, it would make sense if they did 500, weird design decision I guess....
5:35 I'll let you know that I started playing this thing months ago and I got stuck in this STUPID ROOM cuz I didn't know the run button was a thing so THANK YOU for getting me past that! I'm back in the game yaaaay!
I would highly recommend playing Super Metroid Redux, a ROM hack that gives Samus her GBA controls. Its hard mode is super difficult, similar to Zero Mission's. There's also an option to increase Samus' weight, so she controls even more like the GBA games. And the map adds doors.
Its the atmosphere of the game what makes it probably the best Metroid game in the series. And i say this as fan of Zero Mission too. But Super Metroid sound and sprite-works mesh together wonderfully to make this dark and super-immersive atmosphere no other Metroid game has.
This is the first time that Ive ever heard of the grab death with Ridley. He definitely will die if enough damage is done, and i guess that I always did enough.. 🤷🏼♂️
Super Metroid Rating without the wall jump: 100% Super Metroid Rating with the wall jump: 99.9% on good days, 50.1% on days you throw the controller across the room.
22:30 you can kill that enemy but you need something like 8 super missiles to do so. The Amarillo/lobster round bug, the snail and the strongest guys that shoot at you on the walls are unkillable, but mostly everything you can kill
I love this game. It was my introduction to the series. It is also probably my least replayed game in the 2D series. The reason being exactly what you said about the controls, and also I think the wall jump, bomb jump, and shinespark being just a bit easier to pull off in Zero Mission makes it less frustrating, and allows them to get more creative with the shinespark puzzles. At least horizontal sparking isn't needed if you're not speed running and going to wrecked ship early, and diagonal sparking can be done by initiating it while aiming diagonally, but I love how later games expanded on the speed booster and shinespark. I love how with the proper techniques you can do 100% without having to do the endgame victory lap like later games. I don't go for 100% often in the later games.
Also putting a save point right before Mother Brain when you're locked into Tourian with no return was kind of a dick move. I know they wanted players to start from the beginning and see how much better they were after taunting them by telling them how many items they missed, but when I realized that I couldn't go back and search for them without starting over it kind of put me in a sour mood. Of course I did start a new game later, because it's Super freakin' Metroid
Super Metroid is good IF you use a guide, shame the controls didn't age that well tbh It really needs a remaster with updated controlls and less cryptic progression
When playing this game, I had no idea a grappling beam existed, so I got the X-Ray scope using only the ice shots and damage boosts (granted, I'm playing on the switch, wich can go back in time, so it wasn't as painful)
Going through these retrospectives and enjoying them so far, but had to make one comment about the run button. I agree it would have been better to not have it at all and just always be running, but my workaround is to map run to the R button. You do lose one direction for aiming, but you almost never need to aim down diagonally while not moving so that's the one I sacrifice.
There is actually a way to skip the opening cutscene after you've seen it once. Just reset the console after your first viewing, and you will see a 0% completion save file with Samus in Ceres. Just copy that save file to the other two slots, and now whenever you want to start a new game, you can play from one of those files with no opening cutscene. That's how speedrunners do it. I also don't know why you think the mockball is "obviously a glitch." The smooth morph is definitely not a glitch. This is when you morph while falling at just the right time so that you land without bouncing. And the "mockball" is just smooth morphing while moving at high speed. Since it's the bounce that slows you down in the first place, this allows you to morph without slowing down. It might not have exactly been intended (there's no way to know), but I don't think it's a glitch.
You do not need to kill every enemy every time in the room at the top of the wrecked ship. Common misconception. When you kill all the enemies, it activates the doors. If you open both doors before leaving, they remain permanently open.
hey i liked that video. SM is my personal favorite game of all time, but lots of your small criticisms are valid. on the dash button though: there is this mechanic called "short charging". It enables you to store a shine spark using a very small area, it uses the fact that the game only checks for the dash button being pressed on certain frames. Now you might say, that's an unintended mechanic, same as the mochball. However, they made it so shine sparks can damage Draygon, but the room is just a bit too small to store a spark the normal way. Coinkidink? I think not. Would be impossible without a dedicated dash button. Oh and dont you dare disrespecting springball again 🤣 cheers mate!
while i agree the controlling of super metroid can feel a bit hmm clunky for lack of a better word , i however still praise it's genius with my favorite way of describing it which is , you have to learn to make love to your controller , and that's when samus rewards you with the smoothest and most complex gameplay experience the 2d platforming genera has to offer , as evident by speedruns
Super Metroid to this day still is in my top 3 games. I've played and replayed Super Metroid so many times I've lost count. It's so easy to just get get hooked and lost in the game.
The man eating plant & Crocmeyer are mini bosses sir!!!! Everything is a mini boss in this game other than the 4 statue bosses : Kriad , Ghost Brain , Draygon & Ridley that are on the golden/silver statue in the shrine room of the first chapter area of the planet u enter!!!!! Theres four major locations in the game each with a mini boss before u face the main boss for each area that u fight at the very end before u can go to the next area of the planet!!!!
6:01 well, first of all, you're using the default control scheme, which sucks. Put "shoot" on the left button, "jump" on the bottom button, "dash" on the right button, and "item cancel" on the top button. Bam! Instantly more comfortable control scheme, a la Mega Man X
I'm gonna come in the polar opposite of you and say that I'm having less fun with this Metroid game than previous ones and I certainly wouldn't call it one of the best games ever made. It just keeps doing things that irritate me. At first, I was kind of relieved it wasn't like AM2R with massive sprawling caverns to navigate and more tight-knit designs instead, along with how fast you get a lot of upgrades, but then somewhere around halfway through the game it started to feel like I was never sure where I was supposed to go and was wasting my time in other areas getting lost. I never had that feeling with Zero Mission. Occasionally I would look up something in a guide, but it was usually for optional stuff or maybe one section that I found a bit bewildering. I think it all came to a head around the time I hit Crocomire. The game doesn't do anything to explain the boss fight, so how was I supposed to know he doesn't even have health? You're meant to time things right and knock him back, but it doesn't broadcast this to you *at all* and missiles were so worthless for pushing him back, he'd only go back one step and pretty much always took one forward if you weren't lightning-fast at getting another hit in with his maw wide open. Eventually I got the timing right with a full set of super missiles and killed him off easily, but it took way too long to get through and definitely soured me on the game... and that's not including the many long hallways with tons of enemies and platforming that the game loves throwing your way. None more irritating than the one with a hundred floor/ceiling maws that trap you in place, the spikes that always knock you backwards repeatedly, and the enemies on platforms that will also help knock you back and off the platforms. That single hallway alone made me want to toss my system out the window and find a new hobby. It's bad design disguised as a challenge. Not even save states could make that section bearable and believe me, _I tried._ At one point I got so confused about where I was supposed to go before Crocomire that I just left and went all the way to the other side of the map. I knew it was unlikely that was the way forward and I was probably just going to get a bunch of upgrades, but I think I needed a break from the irritations of the level design. Where Zero Mission and AM2R refined the original games' level design with new mechanics and so forth, Super Metroid is very much a product of its time and it desperately needs a remake that dulls the sharp edges and cleans it up a bit. In its current state it is rather painful at worst and somewhat tedious at best. I'm pushing through, but... just... _wow_ it annoys me. The point in the game where it expects you to know to blow up the capsule... yes, you showed me one broken capsule, but it's a *broken* capsule. i.e. - missing all of its glass. I barely recognized it. I had to look up a guide to figure out you could power bomb the glass capsule hallway, but the developers expect you to just *know* that this is what you're supposed to do because it uses the same model of the capsule *after* it's blown up. Going through it the first time I'm not going to notice that. If this game ever got a remake, which it would seriously need, I'd like them to focus on being a bit more player-friendly with its hints. Zero Mission had its Chozo statues to tell you where you needed to go and those were a really good option (and almost entirely optional as you mentioned in your Zero Mission video). Perhaps something like that would help. For the capsule hallway, it could showcase it by maybe trapping you in one somewhere else until you're forced to experiment. Maybe show any bombs you use shaking the capsule itself and causing Samus to pause? Anything that indicates what you're intended to do without the potential of the player going right past it and never realizing this wasn't other narrow hallways to come in the series that you literally can't break into or out of.
More than anything, though, I *hate* the grappling hook. I don't care for how it plays and I don't like that I have to toggle to it with my missile/weapon toggle button. It's a pain in the ass to use. If it were a shortcut tool, like something you could use to get into rooms you can't jump straight into or something, similar to the hookshot of Ocarina of Time/Majora's Mask, it would be nice. Pulls you to a spot and is quick and simple. But no, it's worse than that, because it requires you to bob back and forth and drop from it to grab another spot mid-air. Not really the right game for that.
Yeah for me Super Metroid is, next to Zero Mission THE best two Metroids. But I loved the first one one NES as well, the only thing with the NES one is it doesn't have allot stuff because of size limitation. I don't like any other Sidescroller Metroid game past those two, and I saikd "Sidescroller" for a reason.
For those that say that fusion is my favorite prime is my favorite zero mission is my favorite yeah that’s fine but that doesn’t mean they are better than super.
Being super honest, I think an accurate review of this games just can come from a player that played them chronologically as they came and also played when they released.
a good review should consider the context of SM with any relevant games made then and now. many (most?) people don't have this background, even if they've played SM, but you'd want the reviewer to have that background if they're going to make such tall claims as "almost perfect." what does "almost perfect" mean if you've only ever played 3 games?
15:35, not quite. In any room with brown-gray doors that start flashing once you beat all of the enemies, the brown-gray doors will remain unlocked (blue) for the rest of the game as long as you hit them with your beam at least once after killing all the enemies. So in this particular room, as soon as you kill all the enemies, you can hit every door with your bean before you proceed to go through one of them and when you enter the room again all the doors will still be unlocked (blue) without having to beat all the enemies again. Most people do not know this as in most instances, brown-gray doors do not come in more than one door per room.
This also works for those Super Pirate rooms on Lower Norfair.
I love how all metroid games and even Zero mission makes Brinstar look like a swampy cave, while Super metroid brinstar is an extraterrestrial cherry blossom.
That explosion on metroid/ZM gave brinstar a glowup
I mean, the original NES design of Brinstar is in this game, too
8:30 It still amazes me that, to this very day, almost all Metroidvania games use this EXACT style of map, down to the color of explored rooms being blue and unexplored ones grey. Yes, the maps in most post-1995 titles have added features (like where Doors are, and being able to Pin areas so you know where to backtrack to later) but you can pull up pictures of Super Metroids' maps, Symphony of the Night's map, and Bloodstained's map and they're all nearly identical in terms of presentation. Hell, even Hollow Knight uses this map template, even if the rooms are drawn more to scale and the colors are a bit different.
For them to get it so right on their very first attempt that it set the standard for a quarter century (and counting) is WILD.
19:45 Considering that Mother Brain herself is (mostly) a cut-scene-in-boss-clothing, you're not wrong to say Ridley is the real final boss, at least in terms of being a tough-as-hell test of your combat abilities.
21:20 *cough* zero mission *coughcoughcough* ZERO MISSION *cough*
21:50 The wall jump-teaching critters "sing" the "item get" jingle, I love that so much.
22:55 DON'T YOU DARE INVOKE the baby YOU HEATHEN
25:00 And now, this sequence is significant part of the culture of every "Game Done Quick" charity marathon.
27:10 See you next mission!
As a Metroid fan, I like to use the blocks in all 2d versions as a unit of measurement. And this is the first and possible the last game where Samus is three blocks tall while the rest of the 2d Metroids feature her only being two blocks tall. Making Samus in Super Metroid the tallest she's ever been in a 2d Metroid game.
You mean in this game they used the smallest bricks to build the areas.
Y=Shoot
B=Jump
A=Run
X=Item Select
Select=Item Cancel
these are the only acceptable controls in my opinion
Agree
Indeed. And don't turn off moon walk unless you have no taste
@@Dime_time333nah
@@axl256gamesx7 ya
I’d say that works, but move the face buttons one rotation counter clockwise. 🤙🏻
This is one of those games that everyone should play through at least once before they die. Other games like this are OG RE4, Super Mario Bros 3, Breath of the Wild, Ninja Gaiden Black, Metal Gear Solid 3, Chrono Trigger, Metroid Prime, Devil May Cry 3, Street Fighter 2, A Link to the Past, and Mario Galaxy 2.
17:20 You missed one of supers biggest hints. The enemies crawl from below and pass on it to get you to shoot and open it. There are MANY secret items that are found that way. One of the biggest strengths of this game is the way that it tells you where to go without actually saying it. While an average kid most certainly wouldn't spot it, the older audience would.
Yeah I'm honestly not sure why I felt the need to point that spot out, it is very fair. I think that might have been an area I struggled with on my first playthrough?
In my Metroid 1 video I even praised that game for doing basically the same thing at the entrance to Kraid's lair, so yeah I was just being a lazy ass here haha.
Ah yes, the Chorizo statues. Made of tasty sausage.
"torizo"
Chorizo is still a better name for it lol❤
I thought it was “Chozo” 😅
Bocata chorizo
@@Zeldamaster0999There are chozo statues that help you or give you an item. They're just statues. The ones that come alive to attack you are called Torizo.
My biggest issues with super metroid is that you cannot go into your spin jump midair, and that you can't get the springball until late game. It kinda feels like a slap in the face that you can't get an item that is, at best, a convenience until after most of the spots it would have been useful have gone by.
Yeah I agree the spring ball is found too late in the game. The only flaw I agree with.
@jamesk1868 the fact that there are so few complaints about Super Metroid is a testament to just how amazing this game is.
That's a legit nitpick. Honestly could have just made it a feature of the high jump boots. Maybe the reason is they want to encourage people to do the bomb trick?
I honestly love the run button and I'd hate to see it changed. Not only does it give you more control over your movement speed, but it allows you to move without triggering speedbooster as well as opening up a bunch of unintended stuff like short charging
Now I just want to walk, the SA-X walk in fusion, and samus can only moonwalk (same animation)
How the hell did I never notice that SM is the only game in the series with a run button, and I've played through SM, Fusion, and ZM many times. But yes, the item cycling system is definitely clunky. Fusion and ZM's method was much more intuitive. Other than that the game is amazing.
oh no, this game... I have no words.
The year was 1996 and I was recovering from femur surgery. 13 years old, super nintendo my cousin rented the games and one day it came out with SM... I hated it for 3 minutes now it's been 27 years of pure love...
If I had played it as a kid I'd have that feeling
But because I beat it 2 days ago, I played it like a psychopath, I have high adaptability and I binged all the 2d metroid games (in one way or another, so no metroid 1 and 2, but ZM and AM2R)
One thing I hated about this game was the path was often hidden in a way that would be near impossible to find without a guide. You used Draygon’s lair as an example but the Lower Norfair entrance and the path to the speed booster are two other examples. The first time I played this game I was 9 years old and there were no UA-cam guides, I had a book lol
I managed to find the Speed Booster without much issue. for me it was the Ice Beam. It's really easy to miss the path that leads to it and had me going in circles for hours until I finally gave up and went to UA-cam.
@@RockyVegaTV dunno why but i had lots of trouble finding power bombs lol
I think that was the point. It's supposed to to be difficult and hard to find. Which is why it's so great. You can beat the game with some toying around and then you can beat the game with some crazy shit
@@babaG819 yeah it really is super fun im replaying it rn on nintendo switch
That's kind of a thing I loved about this game though. I still find things on subsequent playthroughs that I never knew about before. It rewards you for trying new things and going well off the beaten path.
good video.
15:37 each door in this room needs to be unlocked only once after killing all enemies. but yeah, in a casual play you wouldn't think to double back and reopen all three doors after killing everything.
22:31 the blue hoppers in tourian can be killed with five super missiles
oh also, x-ray and reserve tanks become much more important when you learn of major glitches ;)
For that blue hopper I mainly just meant the scripted one that the Baby Metroid attacks, but yeah the other ones can be killed.
I've never tried that many glitches in this game other than some of the really common ones that are used in speedruns and stuff, but I was always intrigued by the spacetime beam glitch in particular lol
I used to love sequence breaking as a kid, and I remember being able to run the game in an hour, give or take. World record is 40m so I could have been way ahead of the curve, as that was 1995. I forgot how big this game is, like completely forgot. I'm playing prime for the first time with the remaster, then I'm gonna give this a revisit. Great series, thanks for making.
I do love how this game really doesn't require you to use a guide (as long as you're generally familiar with how to play Metroid in general in terms of progression and finding hidden areas to move on to the next place), though the one part I did get stumped on and had to use a guide was the glass tunnel you break with the power bomb, wish there was a bit more of an indicator there. Very creative by the devs and makes a lot of sense though.
Also, I know you said you struggle with doing Shinesparking Diagonally, and I did too in Super, but SomeCallMeJohnny said in his Super review there's actually a trick to doing diagonal upward Shinespark very easily. All you gotta do is store the shinespark, hold whatever button you have mapped to aim diagonally, then hold B to shinespark and Samus will shinespark diagonally up, hope this helps you! Another interesting trick Johnny brought up in his video is that during the Phantoon fight, for some reason if you turn off the Ice Beam, Phantoon stays on screen longer to shoot. I'm guessing it's some glitch the game's code, but that's also very helpful for Super replays.
I never knew about the Power Bomb sequence break that you found with the Wave Beam, that's pretty cool. The way I sequence broke to get the power bombs early on my first playthrough was after I killed Crocomire; to the left of the room where you fight him in there's a large chasm that at the very far left of leads to a room that has a Power Bomb, and you normally need the Grapple Beam to get it. It took many attempts of me trying very hard to master Shinesparking, but eventually I managed to properly time shooting open the door and then shinespark through it all the way across that chasm to get my first Power Bomb, which let me get the Grapple Bomb super early too and shaved off a lot of time and backtracking on my playthrough, I still remember it and plan to abuse it in my future playthroughs of Super.
I'm glad someone else agrees that the Grapple Beam feels very clunky, I'm sure it was great for its time but I think the way SR and Dread refined it and made it a lot better was very much needed. I also adore Ridley's lair, filled with the hardest enemies of the game and feeling so oppressive with challenge and it's design, it feels like you're traversing through the pit of Hell itself, which fits Ridley very well. As for the Ridley fight itself, I hear there's a way to kill Ridley without him grabbing you, but it involves some kind of glitch I haven't ever looked up that speedrunners found and abuse. You could probably look it up if you want to kill him without him grabbing you in future playthroughs though.
Super's final boss being an emotional rollercoaster cutscene really stands out to me, especially for the time it was made, that was just unheard of in 1994. The only other final boss in gaming that I can think of that's like this in a similar way is Mother 3's final boss, but it's an RPG so the presentation is handled differently (but is just as genious in my opinion). Super in general feels a lot like a reimagining of Metroid NES with it being set on the same planet, having returning bosses along with new ones and a few returning areas but mostly improved, and much more overhauled and polished gameplay, and I love it for that.
Overall another great review from you and I agree with most of your points, very excited to check out your other reviews in the near future man!
Ehh, I wish I had used a guide from the start, honestly. I got about up to Crocomire and then everything fell apart. Did a lot of backtracking and lost patience with the area's design.
just adding that ridley will in fact die if he doesnt grab you, but it needs to fail grabbing you 10 times before the game decides to let him die
I’ve replayed the game so many times and only once did I ever have Ridley do the grab death sequence. Every other time he just falls after enough damage is dealt.
actually, thanks to the button mapping system theres a button layout where you dont have to rely on too much thumb movement or claw formation. if you map shoot to X, run to Y and jump to B, you can place the tip of your thumb between Y and X and press down B with the base of your thumb. thats how i always play the game.
great retrospective! every time i replay super metroid, i am constantly impressed with how the devs nailed so, so many aspects of the game. like, how do you go from the first two games to this one? really enjoyed the way you presented your thoughts about it. definitely checking out the rest of your channel!
I did not know wall jumping was a thing for a good 10 years after this game came out. When I ended up in the shaft with the green dudes, I bomb jumped my way out. And then when fell thru the speedbooster floor where you learn to shinespark, I tried to bomb jump out only to hit the blocks and not be able to leave, so I shut the game off and didn't play it for a good 3 or 4 years 😂😂😂
Finally something I can catch you on to correct you! Ridley does eventually die, him grabbing you is just quicker. Great vid and series tho
One thing that they changed big ti'm from the tequila's was her original run that she has in this game she has the best run Mechanic in this game😊
Another flaw I think that's in Super is that it locks you in with the monkeys to force you to learn wall jumping. The timing isn't the most generous and your save is down there so you're just stuck there, at the bottom of the hole, with those monkeys, until you figure it out.
That's reasonable. I like that there's a sort of tutorial within the game itself on how to wall jump, but it can be tough to understand what the monkeys are trying to show you since wall jumping in this game is so much different to how it is in most other games. The save station is pretty cruel too haha.
@@basedsamtv I just wish you could leave and come back to try to solve the mystery of what's going on here, without halting your momentum suddenly like that. Walljumping is so awesome once you get it down though, completely changes replays.
When i was a kid getting stuck down there was a nightmare. For the life of me i could get out lol.
To solve the "maybe we need claw to play this with run" conundrum: map run to A (bottom button, I'm using xbox as a base), map fire to X (left button) and map jump to B (right button). You'll always run, and jumping and firing are just a thumb roll away.
To me, I’d make 3 changes to this game, then it would be perfect:
1. Skip cutscenes you’ve already seen (beginning, credits, etc)
2. Faster collecting items. The screen with the item name lasts forever. Much prefer it with a loading time like Fusion for example
3. MAKE THE DOORS LOAD FASTER
15:36 ...unless you have the foresight to unlock EVERY door after defeating every enemy before you leave the room.
A small nitpick, but super missiles actually do 5x the damage of normal missiles, evidenced by the fact that you need 5 normal missiles to open purple doors, but they can also be opened with a single super missile.
Though I could be wrong and this only applies to doors and not enemies
It's actually what you said, this is only for doors, in damage power, regular missiles does 100 of damage while super missiles do 300 of damage, but yeah, it would make sense if they did 500, weird design decision I guess....
5:35 I'll let you know that I started playing this thing months ago and I got stuck in this STUPID ROOM cuz I didn't know the run button was a thing so THANK YOU for getting me past that! I'm back in the game yaaaay!
there's a reason it's called the noob bridge ;)
have fun with the rest of the game!
I would highly recommend playing Super Metroid Redux, a ROM hack that gives Samus her GBA controls. Its hard mode is super difficult, similar to Zero Mission's. There's also an option to increase Samus' weight, so she controls even more like the GBA games.
And the map adds doors.
I went on an energy tank hunt before I went to beat phantoon, I also found spring ball useful
Its the atmosphere of the game what makes it probably the best Metroid game in the series. And i say this as fan of Zero Mission too. But Super Metroid sound and sprite-works mesh together wonderfully to make this dark and super-immersive atmosphere no other Metroid game has.
This is the first time that Ive ever heard of the grab death with Ridley. He definitely will die if enough damage is done, and i guess that I always did enough.. 🤷🏼♂️
Super Metroid Rating without the wall jump: 100%
Super Metroid Rating with the wall jump: 99.9% on good days, 50.1% on days you throw the controller across the room.
While I agree that the run button is unneeded I can't agree on the hate for the two shoulder button aiming. I love it. 🤷♂️
22:30 you can kill that enemy but you need something like 8 super missiles to do so. The Amarillo/lobster round bug, the snail and the strongest guys that shoot at you on the walls are unkillable, but mostly everything you can kill
I love this game. It was my introduction to the series. It is also probably my least replayed game in the 2D series. The reason being exactly what you said about the controls, and also I think the wall jump, bomb jump, and shinespark being just a bit easier to pull off in Zero Mission makes it less frustrating, and allows them to get more creative with the shinespark puzzles. At least horizontal sparking isn't needed if you're not speed running and going to wrecked ship early, and diagonal sparking can be done by initiating it while aiming diagonally, but I love how later games expanded on the speed booster and shinespark.
I love how with the proper techniques you can do 100% without having to do the endgame victory lap like later games. I don't go for 100% often in the later games.
Also putting a save point right before Mother Brain when you're locked into Tourian with no return was kind of a dick move. I know they wanted players to start from the beginning and see how much better they were after taunting them by telling them how many items they missed, but when I realized that I couldn't go back and search for them without starting over it kind of put me in a sour mood. Of course I did start a new game later, because it's Super freakin' Metroid
My only problem is that I progressed so fast that I got to an area without the upgrade needed to traverse it and saved so I had to rest my save file
Super Metroid is good IF you use a guide, shame the controls didn't age that well tbh
It really needs a remaster with updated controlls and less cryptic progression
When playing this game, I had no idea a grappling beam existed, so I got the X-Ray scope using only the ice shots and damage boosts (granted, I'm playing on the switch, wich can go back in time, so it wasn't as painful)
BasedSam, Wow, this made my day brighter! Thank you!
Going through these retrospectives and enjoying them so far, but had to make one comment about the run button. I agree it would have been better to not have it at all and just always be running, but my workaround is to map run to the R button. You do lose one direction for aiming, but you almost never need to aim down diagonally while not moving so that's the one I sacrifice.
The music is perfect, I'll always be able to temember that music
There is actually a way to skip the opening cutscene after you've seen it once. Just reset the console after your first viewing, and you will see a 0% completion save file with Samus in Ceres. Just copy that save file to the other two slots, and now whenever you want to start a new game, you can play from one of those files with no opening cutscene. That's how speedrunners do it.
I also don't know why you think the mockball is "obviously a glitch." The smooth morph is definitely not a glitch. This is when you morph while falling at just the right time so that you land without bouncing. And the "mockball" is just smooth morphing while moving at high speed. Since it's the bounce that slows you down in the first place, this allows you to morph without slowing down. It might not have exactly been intended (there's no way to know), but I don't think it's a glitch.
Technically, the Prime games also take place before this one, so how did Ridley come back after Prime 3 is an even more appropriate question lol
You do not need to kill every enemy every time in the room at the top of the wrecked ship. Common misconception. When you kill all the enemies, it activates the doors. If you open both doors before leaving, they remain permanently open.
I got the Ice beam before the wave beam, then I got the wave beam like a renegade
I totally understand what you mean about the controls. I highly recommend the Super Metroid Redux mod. It'll make it more like the GBA games.
2:52 Super Metroid was my first. Trust me, it hooked me
I don’t agree with the control scheme point, but I can at least see your reasoning for preferring ZM et al. This is a pretty balanced take overall.
I love this game.
I love Zero Mission.
I love AM2R.
I love Planets and Rogue Dawn.
I love Dread.
I guess that makes me a Metroid fan! 😀
Great video once again ! Wonderful job... See you for the nex one about Fusion
Great video man crazy how little subscribers you have after your Metroid videos
hey i liked that video. SM is my personal favorite game of all time, but lots of your small criticisms are valid.
on the dash button though: there is this mechanic called "short charging". It enables you to store a shine spark using a very small area, it uses the fact that the game only checks for the dash button being pressed on certain frames. Now you might say, that's an unintended mechanic, same as the mochball. However, they made it so shine sparks can damage Draygon, but the room is just a bit too small to store a spark the normal way. Coinkidink? I think not. Would be impossible without a dedicated dash button.
Oh and dont you dare disrespecting springball again 🤣
cheers mate!
8:54 dat bomb chorizo doe))))
How does this only have 13k views
If you want a hyper beam without beating the game, have plasma beam selected and turn of wave beam, boom hyper beam,
Based on all the reviews from growing up I expected a longer Metroid but what we got still is good ❤️
11:05: it's actually most probably intended or was known during development, there's a single check ever that prevents you from running in morphball
If I was Nintendo I would make a Metroid movie with the story it could work
BasedSam, keep grinding
You got a few things wrong. But for someone who didn't play this first great job!
man, your videos are great... please do more
22:53 *the baby* (terminalmontage reference)
while i agree the controlling of super metroid can feel a bit hmm clunky for lack of a better word , i however still praise it's genius with my favorite way of describing it which is , you have to learn to make love to your controller , and that's when samus rewards you with the smoothest and most complex gameplay experience the 2d platforming genera has to offer , as evident by speedruns
Super Metroid to this day still is in my top 3 games. I've played and replayed Super Metroid so many times I've lost count. It's so easy to just get get hooked and lost in the game.
3:41
My guy I played the this week and I thought the exact same thing
For me, Super Metroid will always be perfect. Being my number one favorite Metroid game.
22:52 There it is.
The man eating plant & Crocmeyer are mini bosses sir!!!! Everything is a mini boss in this game other than the 4 statue bosses : Kriad , Ghost Brain , Draygon & Ridley that are on the golden/silver statue in the shrine room of the first chapter area of the planet u enter!!!!! Theres four major locations in the game each with a mini boss before u face the main boss for each area that u fight at the very end before u can go to the next area of the planet!!!!
6:01 well, first of all, you're using the default control scheme, which sucks. Put "shoot" on the left button, "jump" on the bottom button, "dash" on the right button, and "item cancel" on the top button. Bam! Instantly more comfortable control scheme, a la Mega Man X
I love fusion, even after knowing the story i still feeled threatend after seeing sa-x
Try spaming power bombs when ridley is near death they deal a lot of damage, so do the beam combos
4:43 they're pickles not French fries!
20:14 That's not true. You can kill Ridley without him having to grab you in order for him to die.
Yeah basically my only complaint is the run button forcing me to claw formation and cycling between items
6:50 What on Earth am I witnessing.
Best Metroid ever. They never recaptured the essence of super Metroid. One of the best games ever imo.
10:08 I gave up on super as a kid in the wall jumping tutorial. couldnt get out of it.
Bomb CHORIZO is delicious.
He said Torizo which is what I robotic chozo statues are called. Oof.
I'm gonna come in the polar opposite of you and say that I'm having less fun with this Metroid game than previous ones and I certainly wouldn't call it one of the best games ever made.
It just keeps doing things that irritate me. At first, I was kind of relieved it wasn't like AM2R with massive sprawling caverns to navigate and more tight-knit designs instead, along with how fast you get a lot of upgrades, but then somewhere around halfway through the game it started to feel like I was never sure where I was supposed to go and was wasting my time in other areas getting lost. I never had that feeling with Zero Mission. Occasionally I would look up something in a guide, but it was usually for optional stuff or maybe one section that I found a bit bewildering.
I think it all came to a head around the time I hit Crocomire. The game doesn't do anything to explain the boss fight, so how was I supposed to know he doesn't even have health? You're meant to time things right and knock him back, but it doesn't broadcast this to you *at all* and missiles were so worthless for pushing him back, he'd only go back one step and pretty much always took one forward if you weren't lightning-fast at getting another hit in with his maw wide open. Eventually I got the timing right with a full set of super missiles and killed him off easily, but it took way too long to get through and definitely soured me on the game... and that's not including the many long hallways with tons of enemies and platforming that the game loves throwing your way. None more irritating than the one with a hundred floor/ceiling maws that trap you in place, the spikes that always knock you backwards repeatedly, and the enemies on platforms that will also help knock you back and off the platforms. That single hallway alone made me want to toss my system out the window and find a new hobby. It's bad design disguised as a challenge. Not even save states could make that section bearable and believe me, _I tried._
At one point I got so confused about where I was supposed to go before Crocomire that I just left and went all the way to the other side of the map. I knew it was unlikely that was the way forward and I was probably just going to get a bunch of upgrades, but I think I needed a break from the irritations of the level design. Where Zero Mission and AM2R refined the original games' level design with new mechanics and so forth, Super Metroid is very much a product of its time and it desperately needs a remake that dulls the sharp edges and cleans it up a bit. In its current state it is rather painful at worst and somewhat tedious at best. I'm pushing through, but... just... _wow_ it annoys me.
The point in the game where it expects you to know to blow up the capsule... yes, you showed me one broken capsule, but it's a *broken* capsule. i.e. - missing all of its glass. I barely recognized it. I had to look up a guide to figure out you could power bomb the glass capsule hallway, but the developers expect you to just *know* that this is what you're supposed to do because it uses the same model of the capsule *after* it's blown up. Going through it the first time I'm not going to notice that.
If this game ever got a remake, which it would seriously need, I'd like them to focus on being a bit more player-friendly with its hints. Zero Mission had its Chozo statues to tell you where you needed to go and those were a really good option (and almost entirely optional as you mentioned in your Zero Mission video). Perhaps something like that would help. For the capsule hallway, it could showcase it by maybe trapping you in one somewhere else until you're forced to experiment. Maybe show any bombs you use shaking the capsule itself and causing Samus to pause? Anything that indicates what you're intended to do without the potential of the player going right past it and never realizing this wasn't other narrow hallways to come in the series that you literally can't break into or out of.
More than anything, though, I *hate* the grappling hook. I don't care for how it plays and I don't like that I have to toggle to it with my missile/weapon toggle button. It's a pain in the ass to use. If it were a shortcut tool, like something you could use to get into rooms you can't jump straight into or something, similar to the hookshot of Ocarina of Time/Majora's Mask, it would be nice. Pulls you to a spot and is quick and simple.
But no, it's worse than that, because it requires you to bob back and forth and drop from it to grab another spot mid-air. Not really the right game for that.
maaaannnn... this video hit me in the feels!
What do you mean by “almost”?
I like how he called the Chozo "chorizo" lol
No, he called it Torizo which is the name of the fake chozo statues that come to life. Get rekt scrub.
you can remap controls when making a new save! i always put run on L
In 1994 there was no games like Metroid 3
Yeah for me Super Metroid is, next to Zero Mission THE best two Metroids. But I loved the first one one NES as well, the only thing with the NES one is it doesn't have allot stuff because of size limitation. I don't like any other Sidescroller Metroid game past those two, and I saikd "Sidescroller" for a reason.
25:55 i don't know if I feel angry or ashamed, i just could not finish this game without a guide for some things
I never not sequence break Super Metroid. It's way too difficult not to
I never found "Force Bombs" either and I've been playing this game at least once a year since it came out!
Bomb 'Chorizo' Sausage!
Super Metroid lets you control the difficulty
Does... does he know dread exists?
probably not
@@basedsamtv Ah, go check it out it's just divine
For those that say that fusion is my favorite prime is my favorite zero mission is my favorite yeah that’s fine but that doesn’t mean they are better than super.
I did not care for the movement; much prefer zero mission, fusion, and am2r
You could have left out the word "almost"
ridley didn't die in Metroid 1
Being super honest, I think an accurate review of this games just can come from a player that played them chronologically as they came and also played when they released.
a good review should consider the context of SM with any relevant games made then and now. many (most?) people don't have this background, even if they've played SM, but you'd want the reviewer to have that background if they're going to make such tall claims as "almost perfect." what does "almost perfect" mean if you've only ever played 3 games?
6:58
What the...
I just beat this game but what in the heck is this
i like cars they're cute
14:06 ish. Yoshis Island came out after SM so I doubt that was inspiration
I think he was meaning yoshis island was inspired by crocomire
Yes, that is what I meant. Should've worded it better, my bad!