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Metroid Dread Reviews

kunonabi

Member
Should nintendo let mercury make a Yoshi or DK game? Yet to play dread but looks pretty good.
Hard to say, their attempts at what they call "platforming" have all been shit so Dread would really have to be a turnaround for DK to make any sense for them. Yoshi seems like a better fit but their puzzles aren't that great either. But then again it is Yoshi so maybe that doesn't matter that much.
 

MacReady13

Member
Got my pre order of the limited edition here in Oz so I'm looking forward to picking it up tomorrow (or hopefully they release them today as I've noticed online people already receiving the game early).
 

ssringo

Member
Washington Post barfs out:

Metroid Dread is a good Metroid-style game, but does little more.

This...what...I don...

qbSVHQq.gif
 

Marty-McFly

Banned
This game is underrated, even at the high score of 88. It's really about 93 plus. I would personally go higher,

A couple of hack review soccer moms killed the average.

GamesRader+ - 70
"Frustrating boss battles and cumbersome controls distract from an otherwise fun and isolating adventure."

Digitally Downloaded - 70
"I left Metroid Dread feeling quite conflicted about it. On the one hand, I do think it is fundamentally well designed, and the main gameplay element - the robot stalkers - are woven into the Metroid formula beautifully. On the other hand, that Metroid formula is getting long in the tooth and Dread doesn't do nearly enough to revitalise it. Dread is fine. It's not just nearly memorable enough for a game that fans have been waiting so many years for now."

Questioning the boss battles and controls of all things? :messenger_grinning_smiling: They're some of the best in the franchise/gaming.


.
 
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Astral Dog

Member
I'm perfectly fine with the game being 9 hours or less, but my normal first playthrough of Samus Returns took 13 I think. Seems strange this game would be significantly less than that. GameSpot always bringing the weird shit.
I have not finished the game , but i have a good idea why Dread takes less to complete for many people.

In terms of content and map, the game might easily the biggest 2D Metroid ever made, but Dread's design is very linear in big parts, players expecting Super 2.0 or traditional metroidvania may be dissapointed, the game guides you and holds your hand, closing off doors you aren't supposed to go yet, if i wanted to progress i knew exactly were to go, its 'convenient' how many tricks they use but it was not until i beat Kraid i got lost because i wanted to explore past areas with my new abilities.

This is gonna cut back on play time if you only care to beat the story, similar to RE3 remake despite having similar content to 7 and 2 everyone still said it was shorter

Of course if you want to go for 100% its going to last much longer.

Edit: a big part so far has felt even more linear than Fusion and Samus Returns imo, while Fusion told you exactly were to go you still needed to figure out a big portion of the map, Samus Returns metroids were tricky to find
 
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I have not finished the game , but i have a good idea why Dread takes less to complete for many people.

In terms of content and map, the game might easily the biggest 2D Metroid ever made, but Dread's design is very linear in big parts, players expecting Super 2.0 or traditional metroidvania may be dissapointed, the game guides you and holds your hand, closing off doors you aren't supposed to go yet, if i wanted to progress i knew exactly were to go, its 'convenient' how many tricks they use but it was not until i beat Kraid i got lost because i wanted to explore past areas with my new abilities.

This is gonna cut back on play time if you only care to beat the story, similar to RE3 remake despite having similar content to 7 and 2 everyone still felt it was shorter

Of course if you want to go for 100% its going to last much longer
Personally I love that about this game. Less time wandering around aimlessly. Just enough map complexity to keep it interesting without sacrificing pacing. Then heavily improve the quality of the combat.

I don't enjoy wandering around completely clueless and wasting hours on nothing, generally.
 

Astral Dog

Member
Personally I love that about this game. Less time wandering around aimlessly. Just enough map complexity to keep it interesting without sacrificing pacing. Then heavily improve the quality of the combat.

I don't enjoy wandering around completely clueless and wasting hours on nothing, generally.
Yeah its not wrong or right, just the way they designed the game, trying to please both camps, personally i prefer Super and Fusion so far, but i haven't finished Dread yet, only got it yesterday 😁

i forgot to mention, Samus is so agile in this game she runs through those maps fast
 
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fallingdove

Member
Am I crazy in thinking that this looks like an indie game?

Definitely not crazy. The game feels like an indie game. Anyone who says otherwise has some thick nostalgia glasses on. The game just lacks some of the polish you would expect from a AAA title. Here are just a handful of things that feel indie:

- Static story screens at the beginning of the game are something I would expect from $20 indie game and not a full-priced title from a studio with Nintendo's backing (especially strange given the quality of some of the cutscenes later on)
- Area transition screens are uninspired, overly simplistic, and immersion breaking
- EMMI one-hit (barely avoidable) kills --> 20 second load screen --> 30 second+ backtracking cycles are incredibly grating and feel like the sort of QoL oversights I would expect from an indie studio
- L + Left Stick aiming is far too imprecise, especially in the EMMI sequences; something that I would expect from an indie studio and not from Mercury Steam given their history
- The music is good but not great IMO. Again, something I would expect from an indie studio.
- The sound design overall. Having played through Super Metroid and AM2R recently, Dread sound effects just don't have the same impact
- Menu options are extremely limited (i.e. no button mapping, stick sensitivity options, etc.)

I like the game overall, and welcome more of these AA games to tired AAA formulas but I get the sense that with Metroid Prime 4 delays, Nintendo wanted a quick-turn around stop gap. I don't know what the full development cycle looked like for this title, and I think it is a solid effort from Mercury Steam, but there are quite a few elements that "feel" indie that have nothing to do with the 2 1/2D presentation.
 

MacReady13

Member
This is basically my "perfect" game. I love it so much. I'm yet to finish it but I'm having a hell of a good time playing through it. Just enough challenge to not get frustrating yet hard enough to not be a cake walk. Map is pretty damn huge. Game plays gloriously. It will be very hard for any game to topple this as my game of the year. I love it!
 

carlosrox

Banned
This game is underrated, even at the high score of 88. It's really about 93 plus. I would personally go higher,

A couple of hack review soccer moms killed the average.



Questioning the boss battles and controls of all things? :messenger_grinning_smiling: They're some of the best in the franchise/gaming.


.

Yeah the game is no less than a 9. Review average should be 90+.

And this is why review scores ultimately don't mean shit to me.
 

fallingdove

Member
Mainline Metroid games have always done this. It's part of their identity.







You are talking about games that were made for retro consoles or portable devices. Static story screens were about all you could expect from these consoles at the time. The story screens in Dread are about what I would expect from a game made in the late 90s/early 2000s or from a modern indie studio, not from something being represented by some as a AAA 2d game from Nintendo.
 

MagiusNecros

Gilgamesh Fan Annoyance
You are talking about games that were made for retro consoles or portable devices. Static story screens were about all you could expect from these consoles at the time. The story screens in Dread are about what I would expect from a game made in the late 90s/early 2000s or from a modern indie studio, not from something being represented by some as a AAA 2d game from Nintendo.
Metroid Other M is always an option for you. One of the outlier's that gives you the big boom you are looking for.
 
You are talking about games that were made for retro consoles or portable devices. Static story screens were about all you could expect from these consoles at the time. The story screens in Dread are about what I would expect from a game made in the late 90s/early 2000s or from a modern indie studio, not from something being represented by some as a AAA 2d game from Nintendo.
It's clearly a stylistic choice. The game has in-game cutscenes right after that, and throughout the game. I don't think it has anything to do with budget.
 

Bodomism

Banned
Definitely not crazy. The game feels like an indie game. Anyone who says otherwise has some thick nostalgia glasses on. The game just lacks some of the polish you would expect from a AAA title. Here are just a handful of things that feel indie:

- Static story screens at the beginning of the game are something I would expect from $20 indie game and not a full-priced title from a studio with Nintendo's backing (especially strange given the quality of some of the cutscenes later on)
- Area transition screens are uninspired, overly simplistic, and immersion breaking
- EMMI one-hit (barely avoidable) kills --> 20 second load screen --> 30 second+ backtracking cycles are incredibly grating and feel like the sort of QoL oversights I would expect from an indie studio
- L + Left Stick aiming is far too imprecise, especially in the EMMI sequences; something that I would expect from an indie studio and not from Mercury Steam given their history
- The music is good but not great IMO. Again, something I would expect from an indie studio.
- The sound design overall. Having played through Super Metroid and AM2R recently, Dread sound effects just don't have the same impact
- Menu options are extremely limited (i.e. no button mapping, stick sensitivity options, etc.)

I like the game overall, and welcome more of these AA games to tired AAA formulas but I get the sense that with Metroid Prime 4 delays, Nintendo wanted a quick-turn around stop gap. I don't know what the full development cycle looked like for this title, and I think it is a solid effort from Mercury Steam, but there are quite a few elements that "feel" indie that have nothing to do with the 2 1/2D presentation.
sVjj3Rr.png
 

fallingdove

Member
Definitely not crazy. The game feels like an indie game. Anyone who says otherwise has some thick nostalgia glasses on. The game just lacks some of the polish you would expect from a AAA title. Here are just a handful of things that feel indie:

- Static story screens at the beginning of the game are something I would expect from $20 indie game and not a full-priced title from a studio with Nintendo's backing (especially strange given the quality of some of the cutscenes later on)
- Area transition screens are uninspired, overly simplistic, and immersion breaking
- EMMI one-hit (barely avoidable) kills --> 20 second load screen --> 30 second+ backtracking cycles are incredibly grating and feel like the sort of QoL oversights I would expect from an indie studio
- L + Left Stick aiming is far too imprecise, especially in the EMMI sequences; something that I would expect from an indie studio and not from Mercury Steam given their history
- The music is good but not great IMO. Again, something I would expect from an indie studio.
- The sound design overall. Having played through Super Metroid and AM2R recently, Dread sound effects just don't have the same impact
- Menu options are extremely limited (i.e. no button mapping, stick sensitivity options, etc.)

I like the game overall, and welcome more of these AA games to tired AAA formulas but I get the sense that with Metroid Prime 4 delays, Nintendo wanted a quick-turn around stop gap. I don't know what the full development cycle looked like for this title, and I think it is a solid effort from Mercury Steam, but there are quite a few elements that "feel" indie that have nothing to do with the 2 1/2D presentation.
Metroid Other M is always an option for you. One of the outlier's that gives you the big boom you are looking for.

Not looking for an alternative. (I have played through all of the Metroid games with the exception of Prime Hunters and I am enjoying Dread quite a bit) My point is that there are a number of design decisions that make this feel more like an indie than a full-fledge AAA title.
 

daveonezero

Banned
I would agree that it probably doesn't have anything to do with budget. Some of these 'stylistic' choices feel a little cheap though. Static story screens among them.
I’m not far in but thesound design, animation detail, and polish are not like any “indie” game. Also this is a bad criteria because “indie” games in and of themselves have a huge discrepancy in quality.

I don’t see much this game does worse than any other top tier 2.5d adventure games. It is right up there in all aspects with Steam world 2, Bloodstaind, Ori, and Hollow Knight. Regardless of indie or not. It is up there with the best examples of the same type of game.

And exceeds them in some areas. In my opinion.

At least the first three. The 4th I and never could get into. Just can’t get over the style of HK to even give it a shot. I just don’t like the look of the game. Doesn’t mean it is bad.

Do we know the budget of each game to make a dollar to dollar comparison?
 
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- EMMI one-hit (barely avoidable) kills --> 20 second load screen --> 30 second+ backtracking cycles are incredibly grating and feel like the sort of QoL oversights I would expect from an indie studio
Uh???

20 second load screen??? 30 sec backtracking??

The only way you're getting that is if you're quitting the game after dying each time.


On none of the boss fights or EMMIs thus far there was anything like that. It's die repeat, you're back there really quick and it's one of the things I like about the game is that they don't waste your time with such crap.

Makes learning the patterns and retrying much much better and enjoyable.
 

Bragr

Banned
This game has some incredible level and boss design. The bosses are not hard, but you usually need to figure them out, and it's relatively easy to do so and you don't need to spend long times grinding the bosses. They hit this awesome balance where you don't spend too long with bosses, but it's not a complete cakewalk either. The bosses are also designed so that when you learn their phases, you can get through the individual phases extremely fast, so you don't have to grind through 2 stages over and over to get to the third stage. I also love how they use Samus's mobility in some of these fights to great effect. After playing through the annoying grind bosses of Kena, it's so damn great and refreshing to see bosses done right.

Every room is also so well done, with different challenges and different ways to engage the player constantly, there are so many smart subtle ways the game guides the player, you can run through 80% of the game by intuition. But they also have a few sections where you have to shoot some walls and think about where to go, to change things up, but those sections are also perfectly tuned to not become long and boring, you always find the next area before it turns into frustration.

The game has an absolutely absurdly well-done progression and flow to it, it leads you onward from place to place and room to room in an elegant addicting way, this is really where the triple-A 60 dollar nature comes in, it beats out Hollow Knight and Ori in just how well it progresses from hour to hour and what it offers the player in each hour. Even though I'm not gonna say it's better than those games overall, it's in the same league.

I also love how it ties into the other Metroid games later on. But I'm not gonna spoil anything.
 

Marty-McFly

Banned
The score went up to 89.

90 here we come.


This doesn't happen often with games usually they go down over time.

.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
I’m not far in but thesound design, animation detail, and polish are not like any “indie” game. Also this is a bad criteria because “indie” games in and of themselves have a huge discrepancy in quality.

I don’t see much this game does worse than any other top tier 2.5d adventure games. It is right up there in all aspects with Steam world 2, Bloodstaind, Ori, and Hollow Knight. Regardless of indie or not. It is up there with the best examples of the same type of game.

And exceeds them in some areas. In my opinion.

At least the first three. The 4th I and never could get into. Just can’t get over the style of HK to even give it a shot. I just don’t like the look of the game. Doesn’t mean it is bad.

Do we know the budget of each game to make a dollar to dollar comparison?
Animations and general levels of polish wise this is leagues beyond Bloodstained.
 
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BlackTron

Member
Definitely not crazy. The game feels like an indie game. Anyone who says otherwise has some thick nostalgia glasses on. The game just lacks some of the polish you would expect from a AAA title. Here are just a handful of things that feel indie:

- Static story screens at the beginning of the game are something I would expect from $20 indie game and not a full-priced title from a studio with Nintendo's backing (especially strange given the quality of some of the cutscenes later on)
- Area transition screens are uninspired, overly simplistic, and immersion breaking
- EMMI one-hit (barely avoidable) kills --> 20 second load screen --> 30 second+ backtracking cycles are incredibly grating and feel like the sort of QoL oversights I would expect from an indie studio
- L + Left Stick aiming is far too imprecise, especially in the EMMI sequences; something that I would expect from an indie studio and not from Mercury Steam given their history
- The music is good but not great IMO. Again, something I would expect from an indie studio.
- The sound design overall. Having played through Super Metroid and AM2R recently, Dread sound effects just don't have the same impact
- Menu options are extremely limited (i.e. no button mapping, stick sensitivity options, etc.)

I like the game overall, and welcome more of these AA games to tired AAA formulas but I get the sense that with Metroid Prime 4 delays, Nintendo wanted a quick-turn around stop gap. I don't know what the full development cycle looked like for this title, and I think it is a solid effort from Mercury Steam, but there are quite a few elements that "feel" indie that have nothing to do with the 2 1/2D presentation.

1) Will have to disagree about the static story screens. The story screens only accounted for the recap of past events leading up to this point. It reminded me of when Starcraft II did the same thing with its install screen that explained "the story till now". It led into the current situation of sending the EMMI's, which shifted to polygons. Sorry, I just find this a silly complaint for a quick "last time, on METROID..." recap.

2) I know a lot of people are complaining about the EMMIs. Maybe you would like to go back to Fusion and brush up with the SA-X. Personally I thought they are really cool even though I tripped up and died a few times while coming to grips with how to deal with them. And when I did, I was almost IMMEDIATELY back in the gameplay. I could see it being really frustrating if the game punished you with a long wait, but what strikes my attention is that I sampled this game on PC before going out to buy it, and while emulating this thing, I noticed loading took a really long time. Are you sure you're playing on a Nintendo Switch?

3) I love the free aiming. It's 1:1, like free-aiming arrows in Towerfall. I don't know what you mean by "imprecise" being no-BS 1:1 aiming. They aren't running your input through any kind of screen like an FPS game with an aiming curve. This is part of what I love about the pure 2D simplicity of this game. I had no issue with it at all and a breath of fresh air after games like Fusion that lock you in at 45 degree angles. Now I can make the most precise shots as long as I have line-of-sight. In a game where you are aiming in a 2D space, stick sensitivity makes no sense. She simply aims in the direction you point the stick lol. And the Switch allows controller profiles so change any button you want.

4) The point at which I decided to try-before-I-buy was hearing all the complaints on the music. I can say now that I understand the gripes, but the sound design fits the game exceptionally well. As a bit of a game music snob, who thinks music can even make or break a game, I personally really like the sound design. I won't be listening to it when I'm not playing, but it's very appropriate in the game. For example I never wanted to listen to OOT's dungeon music for its own sake, but in-game, the music fit the tone and feel of the dungeons very well. I feel the same way about this game.

I feel you are just out to get this game and many of your complaints just don't even make any sense even if we respect the subjectivity of opinions.
 
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