Topic: The Super-Massive Metroid Thread

[Quemaqua]

For those of you who've been following me lately, you know I'm completely obsessed with Metroid at the moment.  I've always loved it, but for some reason when I was fiddling with my new MP3 player and ripping music for it, I started listening to the all the Metroid soundtracks again and just got obsessed.  So I played through Fusion, started going through Zero Mission again on hard, picked up and started playing Hunters, and bought a Wii so I could both replay Prime 2 (and actually finish the second half this time), and play Prime 3.  I did finish 2 and am already underway with 3.

Anyway, there's been something special about this series for years, but it seems I'm only now realizing just how deep it goes and how much has happened behind the scenes.  Too, I couldn't have expected how much I'd come to love the series after playing that first game all those years ago on my NES, and it's yet another reminder of what games have done for my life, consistently inspiring me mechanically, artistically, musically, and with their endless and varied fictions.  Metroid is right up there with the Mana (or Seiken Densetsu) games, Doom & Quake, and The Elder Scrolls games as examples of things that I played when I was younger and still love today.  My affection for these franchises did not merely hold steady, it increased as time has gone by, which is why I went out on a limb and picked up this polystone figure of Samus in her Varia Suit by First4Figures.  A bit on the pricey side, but when I saw the afternoon sunlight reflect off of her suit for the first time, I knew exactly why it was worth it to me.  I also finally had the spare money to get this piece of fanart which I've been wanting to hang on my wall for some time now.  Yes, I know I've been buying a lot of stuff, but this is entirely thanks to my grandmother, who left me some money very unexpectedly when she passed from us a short while ago.  Thanks, grandma!  Your generosity hasn't been *entirely* wasted on the bank, only mostly!

Anyway, I've been celebrating my love of all things Metroid for almost a month now, and have come across some cool stuff in my obsessive travels.  I've thrown some of it around here or there, but I thought I'd go one better and just make a thread with some concentrated goodness.  This place has been a little lifeless lately anyway, so we can always use something else to read, right?

Sites you should really visit -

To begin with, this is the best fansite ever.  It's got a ton of everything (including a nice review of the aforementioned Samus statue), but most importantly, you can find what has to be nearly every piece of Metroid-related music ever composed, be it from an OST or a compilation or from another Nintendo game which featured something of Samus or her little friends.  Wish I'd found that out *before* I'd gotten nearly all of sets which didn't get a CD the hard way.

Another kickass site I'll mention is Metroidhat.com, which is both insanely awesome and kind of creepy.  It was made by some little Asian girl who decided one day to... well, make a Metroid hat.  She even expanded it to a plushie.  I find this immensely amusing, whereas her creepy little lesbian fan-comic (I pray it's just a joke), not so much.  She makes up for it, however, by hosting chapters 3 - 7 of the Metroid manga, which many of us Westerners have never even seen.  And yes, it's translated.  You can also see from that link that the first 2 chapters were done as e-manga, which you can still view (I have... they're pretty fun), and there's a guy who took stills from that and translated them (that link is also provided there).  Apparently this is considered actual canon, and the first chapter shows Samus as a child when her folks got blown to kingdom come by Ridley and gang.  And while it isn't Metroid, the Storytime of Epicness is kind of amusing.

Lastly, I somehow forgot to include MetroidGuide.com, which I'd seen a while ago and promptly failed to visit again for years.  Looks like they're still doing their thing, and they've got a lot of general information on the fiction and stuff (a lot of it pulled from the Prime encyclopedias and such, looks like).  Really nice interface, too.

Along the same lines is Wikitroid, which has tons of stuff in a nice, standard Wikia layout.  Go there and learn things like: why yes, the Galactic Federation does have a home planet, and: this solar system is totally schizophrenic.

Three fangames you're all but guaranteed to want -

It was from the first of the aforementioned sites that I found SR388, a traditional 2D Metroid fangame that was originally made with Super Metroid assets like the Samus sprite, which now has a plethora of new and extended animations.  The trailer there is a little old, as vonrichter now claims that Samus is the only thing taken from Super Metroid, with everything else being completely original work from the team.  And as you can see from the trailer, there's some real potential there.  You should also definitely check out this fan remake of Metroid II, which is also linked in that Destructoid article.  See if you can check out the trailer... I can only see bits of it because YouTube hates me again.

A new addition to the list, I also came across Super Metroid Redesign, and you can find a short writeup about it here.  There's also a gigantic map to show you what's included.  Hardcore!  Apparently it's extremely difficult, but looks to be fairly well developed and well thought out beyond that.  If you're looking to test yourself, it could be worth a look.  Myself, I may throw it on the PSP at some point and give it a whirl on the go, but we'll see.

Super awesome music of doom -

Yes!  Metroid music on Piano by Daniel Brown!  Metroid Metal!  Don't forget Relics of the Chozo!  And when you've run out of other random crap, get even the most obscure Metroid music from games like Super Smash Bros. / Melee / Brawl, Tetris, and even Warioware at the Metroid Database!  Also, check out Virt's arrangements!  You know he's good because they got him to do the soundtrack to Contra 4, which is pretty fucking good for a freelance musician dude.

But I'm not done, oh no.  Next, you are required to check out game cover band Armcannon, and I'm totally fucking serious.  Watch the YouTube link for awesome Kraid music medley, and then check their MySpace page and listen to the Zelda track at the top (and don't get impatient, give it at least a couple minutes... around 2:30 I grinned a lot).  These guys are actually quite talented musicians.  There's other Metroid music that they do, but I haven't spent the time in trying to find it (you can find live versions on YouTube, but the one I watched didn't have the best sound quality).

Metroid Prime articles and interviews -

First, we have an awesome article from IGN featuring an assload of commentary from the Retro artists who worked on (mostly) the first Prime game.  It's about 8 pages, but there's tons of cool stuff in there.  Well worth a look.

Next, there's a much shorter, but really interesting article/transcript of a talk Michael Kelbaugh and Mark Pacini gave at the 2007 Montreal Games Summit, also very worth reading as it's got some stuff about what they first pitched to Nintendo and how remarkable it is they were given the franchise in the first place (which the first article also gives some insight into).

I hate to link to anything MTV is involved in, but there's a decent little article around which is mostly noteworthy for a couple great quotes, like: "You can ask any artist here what the first 'Prime' was about and they'll say cracks. All we did was put thousands of cracks everywhere. For some reason at the time I was real big into cracks and everything had to be beveled."  Gold.  But this confirms that yes, every crack in Prime was custom.  There were no copies.  Sy and I were talking about that just the other night.  The rest of the article is mostly about the Wiimote and its use in Prime 3.

There's a little more remote talk at this Next-Gen.biz interview, which I include here mostly for the interesting comments relating to the way Retro works with Nintendo (and which known Japanese Metroid design personalities have their say about things, such as Kensuke Tanabe).

Kenji Yamamoto is the guy responsible for the music, also obviously on the Japanese end, and there's a nice little interview with him here where he talks about the music for Prime 3.

<idol>pics?</idol> -

Tons and tons of wallpapers, including some from other Nintendo games.  Unfortunately, they're all limited to 1024x768.  But still, there's an assload of them, so that has to count for something.

A few good ones here as well.

As of July 11th, the Metroid Database also officially has full-resolution gallery art from Prime and Echoes up.  This is quite nice and something I've been looking for for quite some time now.  So... awesome!  Check out the Prime 1 and Prime 2 galleries for some pretty awesome artwork, concept and otherwise.



Also, metroid jello.





EDIT - I've added a bunch of stuff here and there, but I should really be tracking it.  Latest edit is another fangame, Super Metroid Redesign.  It's a romhack, but apparently quite a good one.

[Quemaqua]

Updated with links to Armcannon in the music section, and a few other cool websites.  Seriously, you guys need to check out Armcannon.  DO IT.

So I've been putting a good chunk of time into Prime 3, and I've gotta' say, this is a really, really good game.  It's a little different from the previous two, but not drastically.  They really just tried to "fix" a few things, streamline some stuff, and make it a bit faster paced because of the new more fluid control system.  Takes some getting used to, but it works like a charm, and the graphics are just gorgeous.  This is a very, very pretty game, not only because it's technically proficient, but because it's got jaw-droppingly awesome art.  It isn't as good looking as the usual game for 360 or PS3 just in terms of technical prowess, but that doesn't stop it from being one of the most visually memorable games I've seen in some time.

Anyway, yeah, amazing stuff.  I don't know if it'll end up being my personal favorite or not, but it's shaping up to be something really special.

[sirean_syan]

All of Que's talk lately got me going through the games again too. Last week I played through Prime 1 for the first time again in a few years. The game holds up extremely well. It is probably the most true sequel to the original Metroid games in that it's the loneliest and feels the most like a hunt. This time I managed to go through it on hard while finding 100% of the items, which was surprising since I really wasn't even trying to get everything until the end when I realized that I had only a few more missile packs to find.

There were things that were missing from Prime 3 that I really missed from the first two games. Mostly, I missed the weapon switching mechanics. I understand that those were there to make the combat more interesting when you could lock on to most things, but I enjoyed cycling through weapons in the Metroids simply because of how the whole thing looked.

Oh yeah, I saw this today. Looks pretty awesome.

[Quemaqua]

Nice.  It's really kind of a shame all the suits seem to have the same pose.  Would have been nice if they'd gotten a few different ones out there.  Also, IGN is wrong.  They said that the original and Varia suits are out, which is inaccurate.  The Varia suit and Gravity suit are out.  Phazon is the newest announced, though I believe they've confirmed that they'll have the Dark suit at some point.  And Zero suit is poised to come out soon, though that's sorta' different.

[sirean_syan]

Huh. I'd be interested in how a Dark Suit comes out since it's really the first non-traditional Samus suit out there. What would be really cool is a Dark Samus figure or a Ridley one.

[gpw11]

For those of you who've been following me lately,

Awesome.

[Quemaqua]

Added full-resolution gallery art for the first two Prime games to the main post.  Thanks Mdb!

So I've got two things to say here, both relating directly to Prime.  Point 1: Hunters, while not a great Metroid game, isn't nearly as bad as everyone makes it out to be.  Point 2: It really, really sucks that more people haven't gotten to play Prime 3.

For the first point, I'll just say that I've been playing Hunters for a good number of hours now, and it really isn't a bad game at all.  There are some odd points to it, and there are some elements that are lame or just not well thought out, but there are also good points, and to say that this isn't a Metroid game is kind of stupid, I think.  A lot of people said this is just Quake with another name and logo slapped on it, but I don't think that's accurate.  Granted, the platforming, puzzle solving, and morph ball elements aren't as compelling as the other games, but that doesn't mean there isn't any of that stuff.  The game still has a lot of exploratory elements to it, and for a portable version of a franchise which doesn't seem like it would translate well to a portable system, I'd say it's fairly impressive.  Some of the level designs are quite nice, too, which make up for the areas here and there which aren't as nice.  The art design is also very solid being overseen by Retro, and the music is quite good for the most part.  I have no complaints there at all.  And the control is great, even if it takes a little getting used to the weird positioning of your hands.  But it really functions similarly to Prime 3, and I appreciate it all the more for that now.

The worst parts, I think, aren't the bot battles with other hunters, which are a little different from fights in the other games, but feel somewhat fresh because of that.  They're still fun, and not *completely* shootery (though more so than anything in the past, yes).  However, regular enemies still feel like good stock Prime stuff to me for the most part, though a little more variety would have been nice.  Scanning is also still there, as is a story told through scanning the remnants of a lost civilization, and while it isn't terribly compelling and shouldn't have been quite so limited, it's in the spirit of the other games.  So to get back to my other point, the worst parts are the boss fights, mostly because they repeat.  There are only 3 bosses in the game, essentially, and two of them you'll fight a number of times before reaching the final one.  These fights aren't identical, as the two boss types do have wrinkles added to them every time you fight them, but you're still fighting the same bosses several times, which is a letdown.  I'd argue that they're fairly well-designed fights at least, but more care should have been taken there however you look at it, though.

So yeah, I don't think it's half bad.  Not an incredible game for the series, and could potentially be the worst of all the games Prime or otherwise, but it still holds up as being something fun to play that's still in the spirit of Metroid.  A few missteps to be sure, but not the colossal clusterfuck that people made it out to be.  It's easily good enough to be played and enjoyed despite its problems as long as the problems don't push any particular buttons for you.

Also, I've really got to give more credit to Prime 3 after logging some long hours in yesterday.  The game is officially up there with Prime 2, Guild Wars, Okami, and Disciples II as something that just screams "living concept art".  It's like an artbook that decided to walk off the page and into a physical space.  It's absolutely stunning, and I can't stress enough how well it works that way, especially on a nice HD set.  Getting to fly Samus's ship into a bigger Federation ship, then just walk around gawking at stuff in the opening is a great moment that I'll remember with nearly as much awe as when I loaded up Doom 3's opening area for the first time, or played through the opening of the first Half-life.  Then later, when I reached SkyTown for the first time, I literally was moved almost to tears by the sheer strength of the art, and how it simultaneously called forth memories of past things and provided something unique and beautiful that I'd never seen before.  I was stunned, and spent probably a good half hour over the course of exploring the area just standing around soaking in the atmosphere and staring at what I was seeing, no longer even really playing the game.

I sincerely hope that more good, hardcore Wii games come out in the future so that more people who've avoided buying the system will get to play this.  I was skeptical about whether or not it would bother me to talk to other people in the game, to hear voice acting, to not feel as lonely... but I'm converted now because of the way it was handled.  Samus still doesn't talk, which I don't find jarring in the slightest since there isn't a *ton* of other dialogue, and while it was very strange to go back to Norion and run across NPCs there while the thing was still an explorable level with secrets to be uncovered, the way they were pressed upon their own business and generally ignored me, leaving me to explore the explosion-riddled halls still left me with a very desolate and distinctly Metroid feeling.  I know some weren't as impressed with things as I've been (though the buzz around the game is still pretty much universally positive), but I feel like my skepticism has been washed away with this game as much as my skepticism of moving the series into 3D first-person was washed away in the first Prime.  I never thought a more cinematic style, some voice, further presence of previously backstory-only elements, and the feeling of a greater society would actually work here in a way that I'd find compelling and *proper*, but I was wrong.  Retro has once again smashed my expectations and come out with something I couldn't have imagined.

Needless to say, I'm having a great time, and I feel like it's still a really great day to be a Metroid fan.

[K-man]

My problem with Hunters is the fact that the control scheme is just terrible.  No matter how much time I spent trying to get used to the controls, the effort was in vain.

[Quemaqua]

It's definitely an acquired taste, mostly because the positioning of the hands is awkward, but if you get past that it's actually fluid, functional, and only a few steps from elegant.  It's just hard to adjust to.  Initially my hand was cramping up quite a bit, but then I figured out another way to hold it and I'm quite comfy now.  I hold the DS normally with my left hand, then with my right I sort of grip it with my ring and pinky fingers (and sort of palm it), then use my other ones to operate the stylus.  Awkward at first, but after a couple hours it became second nature.  It's just a shame they couldn't find a way to make it a little more appealing and intuitive.

[Quemaqua]

Just a snippet from a conversation Sy and I had earlier on IRC that I found interesting.  I think some interesting observations were made, and there was some stuff I'd thought about but never tried to form into words.

<@sirean|boomed> You know what I realized while playing through Prime 2, how much the Ing were made to look like the original Metroid Prime (last boss thing).
<@Que|zomgmovie> Yeah.  They were cool.
<@sirean|boomed> It makes things a lot more cohesive.
<@sirean|boomed> I never caught it the first time.
<@Que|zomgmovie> I was listening to the soundtrack again today... I really, really like it.  I think it's my favorite next to Super.
<@sirean|boomed> The pieces were good individually, but I think they went a little too atmospheric or quiet with the Dark World parts. While playing, too much of the game is almost silent.
<@sirean|boomed> I actually think Corruption ended up being my favorite in terms of soundtrack if memory is serving me correctly.
<@sirean|boomed> Probably with Prime 1 in second. Pendrana Drifts was just great.
<@Que|zomgmovie> I sort of like that, though.  I mean, it works for the game and makes it feel really stark.  And that doesn't make up the majority of the soundtrack, either.  The subguardian ing music, emperor ing's first music, the temple grounds, the main energy chamber, the menu and credits, plus the bog and the brinstar remix from the water area... I love those so much.
<@sirean|boomed> Stark is fine, but it also felt like an easy way out. Much of the dark world just used slower and softer mixes of the light world areas. That also makes sense, I guess. While Metroids are about being lonely, the soundtracks have usually been pretty prominent. Like you said though, it does make up for it.
<@Que|zomgmovie> I haven't listened to a lot of Prime 3, though.  I mean I've heard the music as I'm playing, but I haven't really sat down to listen to it.  When I have it hasn't been so great, but it's a ripped soundtrack and a lot of the tracks in the beginning are more ambient or generic battle stuff, so I think most of the main themes are later.
<@sirean|boomed> There's one really great remix in there, again from Super Metroid. It's in that area I told you about which was completely awesome.
<@sirean|boomed> You need to get there.
<@Que|zomgmovie> I'll say that I've never been more emotionally moved by Metroid games than the energy temple area of 2 and SkyTown from 3.  When I hear those songs I just completely remove from myself and have to stop whatever I'm doing to remember being in those places.
<@Que|zomgmovie> It's actually surprised me how moved I was going back through 2, and seeing what I have of 3 so far.  For games where story isn't paramount, nor even storytelling so much, it's amazing how they can use raw context to actually create emotional friction.
<@sirean|boomed> I've never been able to phrase that idea as well as that.
<@Que|zomgmovie> I think that's the reason I enjoy the games more every time I go through them.
<@sirean|boomed> That's what the games did really well... sadly, it was the one thing a lot of the anti-fanboys couldn't understand.
<@sirean|boomed> Man, I remember all the crap the game got when it came out from people who wanted only the shoot things in a FPS.

[Cobra951]

I thought the story of how I came to look up this thread was worth its resurrection.  It should have gotten more love anyway.

I've been heavily into Castle Crashers for the past 3-4 days.  CC was made by The Behemoth, as was Alien Hominid.  I played the AH demo on XBLA when it came out last year, but found it way too hard to get any interest from me.  Now that I have a lot more respect for these guys, I wanted to find anything on AH I could, like a PC demo.  What I found was a GBA version which was only released in Europe.  I guess publishers here were only interested in DS games by that point.  The GBA game is a very worthy port, and a blast to play.  While I was examining my GBA directories, I remembered that I lost a bunch of stuff when one of my external drives crashed.  I had moved the main games directory to it in order to reclaim space on C:.  The save files, still on C:, told the tale of what I was missing.  In the process of recouping the games I cared most about, I happened across Metroid Zero, which I actually own (on a cart).  I found that, and started to play it.

Amazing.  I had totally forgotten that this is a remake of the original game with Fusion-era GBA technology.  (When Que mentioned playing it, it didn't register.)  The familiar music playing in the background, together with the also familiar, yet much prettier environments drew me back in.  It's a favorite old place, long neglected.  What a roundabout way of rediscovering it.

And I still haven't cracked open the shrinkwrap on Prime 2.

[Quemaqua]

Zero Mission is a great game.  It's a very cool little package on the whole.  Prime 2 is well worth your time as well, though it's definitely a little more love-it-or-hate-it than most other Metroid games.  It's one of my favorites.

[Cobra951]

I much prefer my GBA Metroids this way.  That's a 4x magnification (16x the area) with the Super Eagle (2x) interpolating filter taking half the workload and D3D's bilinear filter taking the other half.  The last time I played Zero Mission, it was on the GBA attachment for the Gamecube, back when it first came out.  That was a great experience as well.  I had forgotten how good this game is.  I'd say it's easily my favorite 2D Metroid.  It's not a simple remake of the original, but a whole new game telling a much more elaborate and involving version of the story.  It features the most refined version of 2D Metroid mechanics, and the more modern automapping and audiovisuals.  It's a complete joy to play.  Fusion is excellent as well, but more linear than a Metroid game should ever be.  I've been going back and forth between these two, with ZM taking most of my game time today.

Edit:
For those who prefer a small image to bilinear filtering (which softens up the image), same screen at 2X using only the Super Eagle filter.



None of the 4X interpolating filters do a good job, my guess is because the possibilities for mistakes in the derived data go up literally exponentially.  Plus my CPU can barely handle some of the 2X filters to begin with.  I actually prefer xq2xS with the Metroid games, but the overall CPU consumption is too close to 100%.  I don't like the rest of the system getting unresponsive.

I don't understand the aversion to scaling with bilinear filtering.  As something gets bigger without enough native or procedurally added pixels, it will get either blockier or softer.  Blocky is always ugly to me.  Whatever.  There is no accounting for taste. 

[Quemaqua]

You know, I don't find Fusion *that* linear.  More so than the others, but I never really felt like it was that terrible.  Maybe I was just having too much fun to notice?  I agree with ZM, though.  It's definitely one of my faves.

[Cobra951]

Oh no.  Not terrible by a long stretch.  It's awesome in its own right.  But Metroids are known for allowing fairly random exploration.  ZM excels at this, even allowing you to break intended sequences with bomb jumps.  Fusion leads you by the hand some of the time, and restricts your options.  That doesn't mean I don't like it.  I played through once already (this time around), and I'm on my way through again now.

[Quemaqua]

You know, thinking about it, I think I don't see it as much because I've played all the games a bunch of times now, and I tend to go through them the same general way.  So they don't really seem as open to me now as they once did.  I'm conscious of options, but I know what I like to do and go do it... so once you have a bit of a system, linearity isn't really something you pay attention to one way or the other.

[Cobra951]

The long power outage made me realize* that I own every Metroid game except 2 (GB).  I own the original (1) both as a NES cart and as an extra in Zero Mission.  I own Super Metroid (3), both GBA games (4, 0) and all the primes--Hunters on the DS, 1 & 2 on the GC and 3 on the Wii.  After playing some of it on an emulator, I can't say that I want 2, but damn, so close to a complete collection.  I may have to track it down.

----------
* (I went rummaging through drawers looking for battery-powered entertainment.)

[Quemaqua]

I still need the original and Super.  Otherwise I have all of them, including the cart for 2.  Which isn't a bad game... just a little odd.  And very hard to play now because it's sort of an evolution over the original, but still very dated, so it just comes across as kind of awkward.  But if you stick with it it isn't so bad.

It wasn't long ago I actually had an assload of items on ebay I was watching for Super... it just never happened.

[K-man]

I don't own hunters (had it and couldn't get used to the controls), but I do own the Metroid pinball game which I must say I find much more fun.

I've made a push in the past week to finally finish Metroid Prime 2: Echoes.  I'm at the save station right before the final boss.  Got my ass handed to me last night, but I'm going to give it another go this evening.  I've got all energy tanks, power bomb upgrades, beam ammo upgrades, and something like 210 missiles.  Hopefully I'll be able to finish it without too much trouble.  I beat the original prime once and have never been able to do it again.

[Quemaqua]

Did you ever try out 3, or have you been holding off waiting to finish 2?  I got about halfway through and stopped, but I'm still really anticipating having some free time to go back (hopefully October when I have some time off).  I wanted to do it sooner, but personal problems interfered rather heavily, and now my at-home schedule has just gotten weird.

[K-man]

Did you ever try out 3, or have you been holding off waiting to finish 2?  I got about halfway through and stopped, but I'm still really anticipating having some free time to go back (hopefully October when I have some time off).  I wanted to do it sooner, but personal problems interfered rather heavily, and now my at-home schedule has just gotten weird.

I bought 3 the day it came out (if you remember I sold bioshock to Pyro to finance it).  I had every intention of pushing to finish 2 before 3 came out, but got sidetracked there toward the end.  Good news is that last night I finished Prime 2, which has been something of a thorn in my side for years.  I got it for Christmas the year it came out and quickly got sidetracked to other games.  It was number 1 on my back log list.  All in all a great game, but the whole power sap thing in the dark world got pretty old (although the power refill was convenient in places).

[Quemaqua]

3 is currently the big game on my backlog list, along with The Witcher (which I'm playing again now), Okami which I sunk tons of time into and still haven't beaten (Julia just beat it today and nearly clocked me over the head for neglecting it), the original Baldur's Gate because I've played 80% of it like 5 times and just never finished because I'm an idiot (and to this day haven't played BG2, which by all accounts makes me an even bigger idiot), and then Final Fantasy XII, one of my favorite games ever, and one I can never bring myself to finish because I don't want it to be over.  Oh, and Odin Sphere, which I played for approximately a half hour and never went back to because I was trying to beat its untranslated predecessor Princess Crown on PSP using a giant stack of paper that had the English text.

[Cobra951]

Just finished Super (3), again after quite a few years.  I don't think I ever played the whole game on an emulator before.  (ZSNES 1.51 behaves perfectly, as far as I can tell.)  There are some mechanics that have been polished up a bit since, but this still stands as one of the best.  14 years ago it was a masterpiece, and the real origin of the modern 2D Metroids.  It is intensely more difficult that Zero Mission (GBA).  Ridley made me break out into a real sweat.  Mother Brain was easy by comparison.

[Quemaqua]

Such a classic.  I beat it not too long ago on my PSP.  I dreamed for years about having that one on the go, and the Mana games.  When I realized I could have all that on my PSP and then some... I died a little inside.  From over-happiness.

[scottws]

(ZSNES 1.51 behaves perfectly, as far as I can tell.)

Obviously OT, but have you tried SNES9x?  Do you think it compares favorably to ZSNES?  I just can't stand ZSNES' DOS-era interface.

[Quemaqua]

Heh, that's funny.  I absolutely prefer the ZSNES interface.  I prefer the emulator as a whole, actually.  There isn't really anything wrong with 9x, but every time I tried ZSNES in comparison it was the superior emu.  It's been so long I couldn't tell you why, though, and the PSP emulator I use is a 9x-derived program, for what it's worth.  It's a more port-able thing, I gather.

[scottws]

I've never had issues with either emulator.  I just always preferred SNES9x's more modern way of handling the GUI.

[Cobra951]

I do too.  Unfortunately, Snes9X is nowhere near as accurate as ZSNES.  So while I have my ROMs associated with Snes9X, so I can double-click them from anywhere, including archives, I always go through the extra bit of trouble when I'm going to do more than a quickie check.  Snes9X has several issues with Super Metroid which are apparent right off the bat, even in the demo sequence. 

[Quemaqua]

That's funny, because I don't recall any issues with it on PSP.

[Cobra951]

That's in the demo sequence (attract mode).  There seem to be constant issues with layer priorities or missing layers altogether.  [That's because transparency inexplicably was turned off in the configuration.  The Snes9X screenshot on the left should look just like the ZSNES shot on the right.]  Even when playability isn't affected (as it obviously is here) things will look much less sexy without some effects like an expanding transparent ball of light.  [That all derives from the same configuration problem, not emulator inaccuracy.]  What you can't tell from images is the poppy, scratchy audio.  ZSNES's audio reproduction is pristine.  I hate to spew too many generalities, so I'll just say that other games also exhibit problems under Snes9X that are absent under ZSNES.  I could go do some specific research, but nah.  Take my word for it.  I'm using the latest Snes9X, which coincidentally is also 1.51.  What you have on the PSP is a derivative, and it doesn't necessarily have the same problems as this version.

[Quemaqua]

True, I just didn't think they did much to it.  But yeah, my experiences with ZSNES were always superior to 9x.  I can't recall the specifics, I just know I decidedly favored one over the other and stopped using 9x altogether, even to check updates.

[Cobra951]

   Never mind.  Metroid 3 works fine on Snes9X.  I should have checked the configuration before saying anything.  The transparency box was off for some reason.  Anything else I may think about this emulator is meaningless until I examine all the games in light of this oversight.

[Quemaqua]

Big news!  Apparently Prime 1 and 2 are being rereleased for Wii with motion controls which, while annoying in the sense that it means die-hards like me have to waste money buying them all over again... that's totally fucking awesome because I love the way the motion controls on Prime 3 work, and it would be a great excuse to go back through both games.

What do you guys think?

[K-man]

I think it's typical Nintendo, repackaging and reselling.  They would have to add a lot more than Wii controls to get me to repurchase them.  I actually like the control scheme, and think MP3's is lacking in comparison.

Plus, as much as I loved them, I don't think I could play through either of the first two games again.  Both are just terribly exhausting, even though they were a blast.

[Cobra951]

With the controls set to "advanced", I think Prime 3 trumps the other 2.  It would have been nice to get the first 2 with a direct weapons pointer to begin with, but that didn't happen, and I doubt I'll buy them again.  Now if they let me trade in my unopened M'2 for the Wii upgrade, that would be something.

[Cobra951]

A new addition to the list, I also came across Super Metroid Redesign, and you can find a short writeup about it here.  There's also a gigantic map to show you what's included.  Hardcore!  Apparently it's extremely difficult, but looks to be fairly well developed and well thought out beyond that.  If you're looking to test yourself, it could be worth a look.  Myself, I may throw it on the PSP at some point and give it a whirl on the go, but we'll see.

I've been re-reading your original post, read through the translated manga (real shame it's incomplete) then came across this "Redesign".  I got it to work after some trial and error.  Super Metroid (JU) [!].smc seems to require the headerless version of the ips patch.  Lunar IPS does the trick nicely.  It works in ZSNES 1.51, but not in Snes9X 1.51.

This is a very nicely done hack.  The environments are properly tiled, with no mismatched ugliness across the landscape.  Everything works as intended so far.  However, the game has significantly altered gravity, and relies heavily on one of Super Metroid's most flawed mechanics, the wall jump, which was fixed in the later (GBA) games.  With the much-heavier gravity, each wall jump up the long shafts carries you a much-shorter vertical distance.  Many consecutive jumps will be required, and a single error in the technique will send you hurtling all the way to the bottom of the shaft again.  In my long experience with SM, I find that a chain of wall jumps longer than about 4 is simply too unreliable to base game advancement on.  The original devs knew this, and very little of the game requires it.  This hack's author has ignored the problems with the technique, completely killing all the fun as soon as the wall-jump boots are found.  I managed to chain better than a dozen jumps, and still ended up back where I started.  Frustration for its own sake is not the same as challenging good gameplay.  Sorry.  Pass.

[Quemaqua]

Well, you may have better luck with SR388, which now has an official website!  Woo!  Looking like it could be some pretty super wicked awesome stuff... looking forward to a release!

[Cobra951]

I finally opened my copy of Metroid Prime 2.  Like every GC game I've tried so far, it allows progressive-scan display on the Wii.  It looks very nice.  It's taken me a bit to get used to the GC Prime controls again.  I'm almost there.  I played a few hours last night, and quit when a big worm with a head at each end kicked my ass.  I was too tired to try again.  That will be the first thing I do when I play again in just a little while.

[Quemaqua]

It's a little more difficult than the other games (significantly more than 3), and some of the boss fights have given people a bit of trouble.  There was one I found mildly incomprehensible, and I still managed to beat it despite being unsure of what it was I was supposed to do.  The very-very-very last boss also killed me a number of times, forcing me through some long and irritating replays, because I hadn't even the slightest idea what I was supposed to be doing.  The big worm you're talking about is a favorite fight of mine in the series, though.  It isn't really revolutionary or amazing, it's just really fun!

[K-man]

Boost Ball guardian and Spider Ball Guardian.  Both can kiss my ass.