a BaD day for GooD game analysis.

On 02/08/2014 at 04:21 PM by Machocruz

Linked to Article Series: Blog a Day (BaD) 2014

Not my own, because I don't have the time or the will right now, but I have Super Metroid on the mind and want to do some warm up blogging.

A (eventually) 20 part series from 1up vet Jeremy Parish, one of the few actual critics (as opposed to product reviewers and publisher shills you'll find at the mainstream sites) in the medium:

http://2-dimensions.com/anatomy-of-a-game/ - scroll down

Hugo Bille over at the presitgious Gamasutra magazine:

http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/HugoBille/20120114/9236/

I'll assume most everyone at a video game site has played and loved Super Metroid at some point. For those who haven't, you're akin to the student of literature who has never read The Odyssey -your scholarship and pertinent media knowledge are lacking. Get on it. No game you can buy in stores currently is more worth your time.

I say Super Metroid about as perfectly executed a video game as has ever been, certainly one of the most consistent and cohesive in all its elements. I also consider it a tour de force in video game specific storytelling. It's not my personal favorite game, but along with various Castlenvania games, it is among the most inspiring pieces of media that I've ever encountered. Only a game so well designed and so rich in what it offers the player is subject to such detailed analysis, or worthy of such for that matter.

Casey Curran Staff Writer

02/08/2014 at 07:39 PM

Super Metroid is the kind of game I respect a lot, but don't quite enjoy as much as everyone else. I think my issue was that I played Prime and Zero Mission first and just prefer the way they handled the formula so SM seemed kind of basic. I still like the game, just not one of my favorite games of that era.

Machocruz

02/08/2014 at 10:16 PM

I think Super is more complex and ambitious than Zero Mission, so I don't know about it being basic in comparison. Maybe 'redundant' is a more accurate term? I think the level design is more nuanced in SM, but it's the dark aesthetic (how Samus is drawn and animated, music, color palette, environments) that makes it my 2D Metroid of choice. It demonstrates how a game can be cinematic without aping cinema's camera set-ups

Prime IS my favorite Metroid to play though. And Echoes is underrated. (I'd rank the top 3 as Prime>SM>Echoes)

I don't know if any other game in the series lends itself to the level of analysis that SM does, though.

02/08/2014 at 11:13 PM

Yeah redundant was probably the better word. I like ZM's faster pace and the way its bosses were presented so much more its basically the perfect sidescroller in my mind.

BrokenH

02/08/2014 at 08:32 PM

I used to consider Super Metroid my favorite Metroid game but "Zero mission" was pretty amazing too. I know it's just a flashier remake of its' original nes counterpart but it's really well done! Also, without Metroid there never would have been SOTN and THAT would be a tragedy!

02/08/2014 at 10:23 PM

I can't really compare ZM and SM, not without some thorough testing of both, side by side, which I don't have time for. The presentation has so much to do with why Super Metroid has such pull that I'd have to see ZM's gameplay wrapped in the same dark wrapper to even begin to see how it stacks up. I will say that SM has far more subtle level design, while Samus in ZM is faster, which is what I like in my action games.

PixlBit