The Day We’ve Been DREADing Has Finally Arrived: Metroid 5 Officially Announced

At E3 last week, Nintendo made several announcements during their latest Nintendo Direct. But while I’m interested in Mario Golf and a port of Cruis’n Blast got me excited, I don’t think anything captured my attention with as solid a grip as the announcement of Metroid Dread, aka Metroid 5.

The last two decades of the Metroid franchise were interesting, to say the least. The aughts formed something of a boom period for the franchise, with no less than nine releases over a 10 year period, spanning 2002 to 2010. For a franchise with only three games to its name since 1986, for a franchise as niche as this one, for a franchise that’s historically not known as one of Nintendo’s big sellers (particularly in its homeland of Japan), that is an absurd number of titles. While there was not a new release every year, if you spread out the years that had two releases, it effectively averages out to just that.

That last release, however… oh, that last release.

Metroid: Other M is controversial. That’s all I’m going to say about it, or else we’ll be here all week. Rather than making a huge splash with fans, it hit with a resounding thud, one loud enough for Nintendo to hear and say “well, that’s about enough of that for a while.” A sour note to go out on, to be sure.

Fans weren’t having it. “Bring back Metroid” were the cries from the fans of space not-bounty hunters, space dragons, and space jellyfish. So in 2016, their cries were answered…

In perhaps the worst way possible.

At E3 2015, Nintendo stealthily revealed Metroid Prime: Federation Force under the guise of its included mini-game, “Blast Ball,” a sort of futuristic chibi-style mech suit sporting event. When it was revealed to be a Metroid game, you couldn’t hear a pin drop, because the sound of keyboards clattering and YouTubers bemoaning that after an eternity of six years (never mind that the gap after Super Metroid was longer), this was all that Nintendo thought of them and their beloved franchise?

Depending on who you ask, the game rates anywhere from “pretty dang good, actually” to “a total slap in the face!” If we were to take the latter as simple venom spewed by a fanbase scorned, then we could simply say that Nintendo released the right game at the wrongest possible time. I mean, come on, we got Metroid Prime Pinball a decade earlier. The franchise doesn’t always have to be that serious.

Nevertheless, throwing that particular cut of meat to the starving lions came off as more than a little tone deaf. Fortunately, that wasn’t all they had planned.

In 2017, Nintendo would announce Metroid Prime 4 at their E3 Nintendo Direct. Didn’t show anything, as I don’t think they’d even started anything yet. But they didn’t have to; the announcement was all that was needed.

But not all that fans got. It would turn out that during the Nintendo Treehouse Live segment after the Nintendo Direct, they would reveal another Metroid game, this one much further along, and slated for release just three months later. Developed by MercurySteam of Castlevania: Lords of Shadow fame, this Nintendo 3DS title would be a 2.5D remake of Metroid II: Return of Samus titled Metroid: Samus Returns.

And aside from having to restart the Metroid Prime 4 project with the developers of the original trilogy in 2019, things have been largely peaceful in the galaxy.

But between the release of Metroid: Other M and these announcements, fans were left to speculate, to ponder, and to partake in a bit of what’s known in the wrestling corners of the internet as “fantasy booking,” i.e. “what I would do if I was in charge of making a new Metroid game.” And I participated in a fair bit of this myself.

Little did I realize how close I would nail what would come to be Metroid Dread, a game which had been announced and cancelled once or twice somewhere back in the 2000’s. The result is looking like a dream come true.

To that end, I’ve dug up some old forum posts from the Penny Arcade Forums, wherein I discuss what I want/what I would do if I were in charge of making a new Metroid game.

The first thing?

Metroid 5

Click to enlarge.

As noted above, Nintendo released a crapton of Metroid titles throughout the aughts, but only one actually advanced the main plot: Metroid Fusion, aka Metroid 4, all the way back in 2002.

Everything else that came out in that decade was either a spin-off (Metroid Prime), a remake (Metroid: Zero Mission retold the story of the original NES Metroid), a spin-off of a spin-off (Metroid Prime Hunters), an abstract remake of a spin-off (Metroid Prime Pinball), a collection of spin-offs (Metroid Prime Trilogy), or filler (Metroid: Other M, which tells an adventure which happened between Super Metroid and Metroid Fusion).

It’s a peculiar habit Nintendo sometimes displays with their franchises, in that — for a long span of time — they refuse to move the story forward. The Legend of Zelda is a great example of this with their one step forward, two steps back approach. There was the original, a sequel, then a sequel that took place before the original, the sequel to that, and — well, just read this. Eventually, they finally went to the very, very, very beginning, and then recently decided to throw everything to the future… of all three timelines, somehow.

So while it might seem like a small thing on the surface, that number means quite a bit. That number represents progress.

Back to Basics

Click to enlarge.

Eh, sort of. Maybe. Okay, not really, per se.

With the ending of Metroid Fusion going the way it did (no spoilers here), I wanted a soft reboot of Metroid the further adventures of Samus — that is, everything that happened still happened, good or bad, but we’re moving on now — with new enemies to fight and new planets to destroy. And we’re getting that. Mostly.

According to the official website for the game, Metroid Dread takes place on the remote planet of ZDR, and Samus will have to fight off enemy robots called “E.M.M.I.” who hunt her. However, as per the “Metroid Dread Development History” video (per Press The Buttons):

Yeah. This is meant to be a conclusion to a story that honestly felt sort of like it ended long ago, but really hasn’t. I guess it could have gone either way, really. And the impetus for her visit to ZDR is the possibility of more existing X parasites, which were introduced in Metroid Fusion as a species the eponymous Metroids were created to keep under control. You know, before Samus killed them all.

For those worried, though, the game looks to recap previous events to such an extent that you don’t have to know every bit of Metroid lore to jump into this one.

New Power Suit

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One of the worst things about Metroid Fusion to me, was moving from Samus’s iconic walking tank of a Power Suit to the Fusion Suit, which looked like someone sneezed blue snot all over the Power Suit (and different colors as the game progresses).

Now, that isn’t to say I dislike change here. I loved the various suits introduced in the second and third Metroid Prime games. To me, those looked like Power Suits. More of that, but in a 2D (or 2.5D, as the case may be) game, please!

Well, looks like we got just that. More or less.

While there are still some signs of the Fusion Suit in the color and the almost sinewy strands running across it, it’s more teched out and has some different colors going on as well.

I dig it.

“Core” Gameplay

Just a neat little detail: In the screencap up above, I said one thing I’d like is to “shoot [Samus] into the center of some new Zebes-like planet that isn’t Zebes.”

And at 18:25 of this Treehouse Live video, we find out that’s effectively what they’ve done:

“One little interesting detail about this game is normally in Metroid games, you start at the surface of the planet, and you work your way deeper. But in this game, you actually start deep within the planet, and try and work your way to the surface.”

Neat!

Ineffective Old Weapons, Cool New Gear

Referring again to the screencap above, one thing I definitely wanted was a shake-up of Samus’s arsenal. “More new weapons, rather than her stock set,” I said, adding “maybe start with most of the old weapons and gear, but make them ineffective against the new enemy.”

What do we see in the Treehouse Live stream but…

New weapons!

While the benefits of this particular power-up are brief, it’s still rather uncanny how it matches up to my talking about a new enemy (though I was suggesting a new breed of Space Pirate) against which Samus’s old weapons would prove ineffective. And with the E.M.M.I. robots, we’re getting just that.

I also wanted to see some new gear, as it seems Samus tends to get the same stuff each time she goes collecting: Varia, Gravity Suit, Space Jump, and so on. Granted, some you’ve arguably just got to have, like the Morph Ball, but I think some of the other stuff could be tossed out in favor of something newer and fresher. And wouldn’t you know it?

New gear!

Now Samus can channel her inner-Spider-man and climb certain surfaces! Granted, she could do that before with the Spider Ball, but not having to shift into Morph Ball mode could change and freshen up the dynamic of that particular item. Hopefully we’ll see more twists and new ideas instead of the same old staples as we learn more about Dread.

Planet-Bound

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As noted above, between Metroid Fusion and Metroid: Other M, I felt like we’ve maybe had our fill of space stations for a bit. Not a problem in Metroid Dread! We get a whole new planet to explore, and by the looks of it, new creatures to fight as well. I am down with this.

And there’s some other stuff there that reiterates some things I’ve said before, too.

All of this is to basically show that I’ve had an ideal new Metroid rattling around in my brain for some time now, and it looks like Metroid Dread is ready to satisfy that itch.

I am a little nervous about the E.M.M.I. robots hunting you down, as dealing with SA-X was probably my least-favorite part of Metroid Fusion. But while these things may be instant death if they catch you, the Treehouse Live stream makes it sound like the setback for getting caught won’t be as significant here, so I’m hoping that will alleviate any concerns I have there.

Metroid Dread comes to the Nintendo Switch on October 8th, and if it wasn’t already clear, I can’t wait.

Thanks for reading!

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David Oxford is a freelance writer of many varied interests. If you’re interested in hiring him, please drop him a line at david.oxford (at) nyteworks.net.