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2021-08-06
The past twelve weeks have seen my personal life plummet into depths I was not capable of imagining. It's a context that adds to the complete and utter shock that greeted me in early June week when my brother apped me with the unforgettable words
"METROID DREAD 2D METROID GAME is coming guys ;)"
Yes. Yes it's real. No jokes. No teasing. No speculation. No Hoax. It's REAL. And what's more it even has a release date, October 8th 2021. Un-f*cking-believable... This is really happening, the in-universe chronology is FINALLY progressing after years and years of remakes and entries that took place way before Fusion... Oh my God.... Oh my dear, sweet, generous God... THANK YOU *cries in release of 17 years of longing*
It seems an almost common thing for the summers of the last 5 years to grant me something special, oftentimes something I never expected to happen...
Summer 2016 gave me Portugal as European Champions.
Summer 2017 gave me the reveal of Samus Returns for the 3DS.
Summer 2018 gave me the joyous discovery of working out.
Summer 2019 gave me my first real relationship and Gaia's Moons Of Jupiter album.
Summer 2020 gave me the thrill of constructing my own album in tandem with a bestie supervising.
And now summer 2021 has given me the reveal of Metroid Dread for Switch.
What a time to be alive... What's that? Why is this a big deal you ask? Bruh! Let me give you a little bit of context to this non-music related entry on the blog.
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A Long Time Ago In A Childhood Far, Far Away
My venture into the Metroid franchise began in early 2003. My brother provided us with Metroid Prime for the Gamecube and a couple of months later I used my savings to get us Metroid Fusion for the Gameboy Advance. I consider both these games as my Year Zero in the Metroidverse. No, not "the holy grail" Super Metroid on SNES, not the underappreciated Metroid II on the original Gameboy, or the highly frustrating NES Metroid. No, my first taste of Metroid Bounty hunting took place in two of the games that some of the old-timers at the time nagged against ("Metroid should be 2D", "sAmUs tAlKs (toO mUcH)!"). But even so, these two games were special for other reasons than the platform/radically different plot: they lauded an unprecedented Golden Age for Metroid fans. Between 2002 and 2007 we were treated to the three delightful entries in the Metroid Prime universe (3D: GC / Wii), Metroid Fusion (2D: GBA), an excellent re-imagining of the first Metroid called Zero Mission (2D: GBA), a pretty fun and addicting multiplayer experience in the guise of Metroid Prime Hunters (3D: DS) and the seemingly random but entertaining Metroid Prime Pinball (DS). Almost a new entry each year. Seven games in total across a span of five years. Never before or since has this franchise received that type of love from Nintendo. Fusion from 2002 however, would remain the last chronological entry for the story until the official announcement of Dread during this summer's E3.
But Dread HAD been in contention to be released on the DS waaaay back in 2005. It's just that the project was kept such a secret you'd think the government had a hand in it. And as Sakamoto-san revealed, the intention had been to follow-up Fusion much sooner. Sadly the story they had envisioned for it could not be replicated visually or in terms of gameplay on the DS or the 3DS for that matter so the project was abandoned for a long time. In an interview a couple of years back, Sakamoto-san explained that Dread had been scrapped and if they were ever to return to it, they would start over from the beginning. But it turns out that this Dread we are about to play is actually how they had wanted to create the game in 2006!
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Enter Mercury Steam
The honour to develop Dread was given to Mercury Steam who had already shown how much they feel the Metroidverse: their Samus Returns for the 3DS in 2017 deserved so much more plaudits and players then it ended up having. Metroid II is a vital entry to the series as a whole and the way they brought back that grainy, moody Gameboy classic from 1991 to the modern era impressed me deeply. The thing with Samus Returns was, it hit it out of the park on several levels for me: ever since playing New Super Mario Bros for the DS in 2009 I had dreamed of a "2.5D" Metroid. And ever since completing Zero Mission I had hoped for a (at the time) similar remake for Metroid II (which ended up being done by Milton Guasti and his team in the shape of the beloved AM2R: Another Metroid 2 Remake).
Mercury Steam merged both desires into one and created a game that pushed the 3DS to its visual limits. And yes, playing it with the 3D effect on is amazing and almost mandatory! Moreover, the ambient soundtrack they managed to craft out of Metroid II's dull bleep blops and at times aggressive attempt at music impressed me from a producer's standpoint. The Chozo Laboratory soundtrack will always be so damn nostalgic to me because it served as the background theme to the Samus Returns reveal trailer in 2017! But it wasn't just the music: I loved the edgy badass design of Samus' suits in the game (though I wasn't too keen on the Fusion Suit with shoulder orbs... Or the Varia coloration of said suit...); I loved the storytelling through actions rather than sentimental monotonous wailing; I absolutely adored the redesigns of the various Metroid stages; I loved the added boss fights; I loved the environments; and I loved how unforgiving the game was, killing me over and over in my very first playthroughs on Normal, Hard and Fusion mode alike. Ever since buying the game in September 2017, I've replayed in 2019 and this year and in total I've spent nearly 100 hours on it. Given how short 2D Metroid games actually are, this is insane! Now I don't exactly speedrun or anything but even if I ignore the fact I tend to take my sweet time during new playthroughs to soak up the environment and ambiance, it's still impressive.
Mercury Steam, if you ever read this: I f*cking love you guys for Samus Returns. So for Sakamoto-san to have given you guys the reigns over Dread is well-deserved and a no-brainer really. It HAD to be Mercury Steam, someone else might have gotten it wrong. ;)
====================================Metroid is growing up, Metroid is life
My sister and I played Fusion and Zero Mission to death. We discovered all the items and secrets on our own, no guides, no internet, just the sheer perseverance of (power)bombing any conceivable surface really.... We shared our discoveries and both managed to get 100% endings. And God, how often we replayed those games... We also had an insane amount of fun with Prime Hunters. I also replayed Prime 1 several times over, beat it on Hard mode too (probably my proudest Metroid achievement). Echoes I replayed only twice though my itch to replay it has been awakened over the years, in no small part due to The Orpheon and The Geek Critique. I missed out on Other M, and I was a bit confused by Federation Force but around the time Samus Returns got revealed, I discovered Metroid II and Super Metroid were able on the 3DS eShop (I got my 3DS in March 2017 or something, VERY late to that party, don't shoot me :D) so summer 2017 turned into a true Metroid Mania period in which I replayed ZM, Fusion, Hunters, started playing Prime 3 and went through my first ever playthrough of Metroid II and Super. And just like that, half my life saw Metroid present throughout... Maybe not every year, and with quite the gaps overall but as my need for and joy out of gaming steadily decreased over the last decade, my love for Metroid never waned. And that's kind of funny given the barren periods this franchise has known... Just the other day it struck me how I tend to be an absolute maniac for things that aren't always easy to follow. Metroid can be unforgiving to follow. Rank 1 can be very unforgiving to follow as well when you love their music as much as I do. The Portuguese National XI has given me its fair share of near-heart attacks and gutting disappointments ever since they stole my heart in 2004. I guess I am a bit of a fandom-masochist. xD At the end of the day, these three things have one thing in common though: the disappointments hurt DEEPLY but my my my when they bring joy to my life, they truly lift my whole mood into another stratosphere like nothing else in this universe ever could. <3
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The possibilities!!
From the moment I got into the franchise through Fusion and Prime, I was amazed by this awesome universe with this iconic protagonist who has really gone through hell pretty much non-stop since her childhood! Samus is one of Nintendo's most tragic heroes (hence it sucks extra hard how they've treated the franchise at times) and each game plays like a chapter in her legendary Bounty Hunting career. The Metroid universe could very easily have its own streaming series if handed to proper writers... Because its lore is extensive and mysterious enough to write stories from that don't necessarily focus on Samus. But even when they do, you could tell so many more stories about this Galactic protector with a golden heart!
The last few weeks my Twitter and Instagram feeds have blown up with Metroid Database retweets of the incredible artworks by other Metroid heads, often with very cool interpretations or variations of the source material... Imagine what a group of these talented Metroid-adoring geeks could craft if led by a visionary group of writers! And this is just focusing on the people that do drawings/paintings. What to think of all those insanely creative folks over at Youtube that crossed Metroid with LEGO and/or Alien?? Two in particular have stood out for me:
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LEGO Metroid by 001rich100
LEGO Metroid vs. Alien by MrValgoku
I simply adore how these creators come up with their own storylines that are very Metroid-iesque, albeit with more dialogue / interaction then we see in the majority of the games. Despite that though, they still implement segments in which Samus is all by herself and the desolation and solitude that have defined the games still come to the fore. Those missions would actually have been really fun to play as games and the choice to use LEGO for presentation gives these stories an extra game-y feeling.
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From frustration to reconciliation
In a four year timespan Nintendo have managed to not only resurrect my favorite game series, they've managed to give me the two entries I have always wanted. And Nintendo has actually been PROMOTING the living fark out of this upcoming instalment too! It's almost as if they WANT it to succeed and sell well so they can release a shit-load of new stories for it!! I mean just visit https://metroid.nintendo.com/ real quick (unless you want to keep the game a huge surprise for yourself in which case, I said nothing!) and tell me that isn't some real love? Check out Nintendo Of America's twitter feed for the amount of Dread-related tweets. Can you remember the last time they gave Metroid this much love? Because I can't!
Man oh man... The fact that friggin Dread... Friggin Metroid 5 is only TWO MONTHS away from us is hard to wrap my mind around, even now... If there was ever a sign that the Universe wanted me to hang around, to not give up, to not give into the darkness within, This Is It really. What was once impossible, what was once but a dream, a wish or wishful thinking even, has solidified into reality. Yet another summer that something seemingly impossible to me has become real after all... I can only wonder... What will summer 2022 bring? And 2023? One can only dr- ... !!
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Oh God.. They j-just uploaded a new trailer!!!
FQOQFUBVOQAOABOJFNONAOFDNOAFNAOFOANBOF~@Y^#*^!#*!^T*#T!T V*T!*VT#!* T#*!!!!
====================================HAPPY 35TH BIRTHDAY METROID, SAMUS AND EVERYONE ELSE THAT LOVES THIS FRANCHISE!!!
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