I have to take issue with you guys on your discussion of Other M.  Let's see...

1.  The fellow in charge of the game was Sakamoto, not Itagaki (who wasn't even a member of Team Ninja when this game was being made).

2.  You lay the blame for how Other M came out at the feet of Team Ninja.  Team Ninja did their job, and they did it well.  The game plays fine.  All the faults of the game are at the design and writing levels, which both lead directly to Sakamoto.  He's the one who demanded it play like an NES game, demanding it take no advantage whatsoever of either the Nunchuk or Classic Controller.  He's the one who decided to take a strong West-favored female character and turn her into a whiny, insecure, useless wimp who has to be bailed out by a man every 5 minutes and who is too STUPID to turn on life-saving abilities when facing certain death.  Frankly, considering how hands-on he was with the project, I wouldn't be surprised if he was the one responsible for the literal translation NoA did of the game as well.

I agree with brood 100%.

One other minor correction: you cite Samus as having killed Ridley twice before the events of Other M.  She actually killed him 4 times (6 if you count her killing him twice in Zero Mission and Prime 3: Corruption) before then:

Metroid/Zero Mission (note that she kills him twice in Zero Mission)
Metroid Prime
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (note that she kills him twice in this game)
Super Metroid

You only get "twice" if you are like Sakamoto and choose to pretend that the Prime games never existed, and you are discarding Zero Mission (which also references the Prime games).  ;)

Broodwars makes an excellent point. Even more reason for Samus NOT to have a mental breakdown at that moment.

Was Ridley actually killed on all of those occasions? Yeah, in Zero Mission, you mess him up badly, but the whole Meta Ridley idea is that he was repaired and implanted with cybernetics. In Prime, after the battle, he falls off a cliff, and no death is witnessed. Same with the first fight in Prime 3, where he falls down the shaft, but does not appear to die. The Omega Ridley fight... well, there is an explosion, but unlike all other bosses, which you see explode, the camera intentionally pans away, and Samus is blinded by the light. Finally, in Super Metroid, I think that is meant to be the game in which he really was killed. He blows up into many, many pieces.


As for Other M, I remember having a good time when I played it back in September of last year. The main issue was the totally overblown scriptwriting, which I did my best to ignore. With that said, I'm definitely not going to go so far, as some others have, as to say that Yoshio Sakamoto should never be involved in Metroid again. He made some blunders in his latest product, sure. However, he factors into the reasons that you are interested in the series in the first place.

Considering Metroid Prime was the game that brought me into the series (a game that Sakamoto had significantly less involvement in than in most Metroid games) and it is IMO the best entry in the series, I'm going to say I wouldn't miss him if he were kicked to the curb.

Same here. I owned the original Metroid, but never liked it much. I got Metroid Prime from a Blockbuster Video for like $5, and was hooked. It's still one of my favorite games of all time. I like MP2 (never beat it though), and really enjoyed MP3. I would not feel sorry if Sakamoto was not involved in future Metroid games (or is limited to the role he had with the Prime games).

I am curious to know if I am the only one who actually enjoyed the story in Metroid: Other M? I've been following Metroid ever since its Super iteration (I actually received the Game Boy version as a birthday gift, but Super Metroid was the first entry which I anticipated and purchased upon its release), but I never felt that I had any specific attachment to the Samus character, and believed her lack of speech to simply be due to the tradition originally  created from hardware limitations.

Anywho, to me, games are there for the sole purpose of entertainment. Therefore, when I sat down with Other M, I followed the story and found it interesting and surprisingly compelling. I always wanted to play just a little further to see the next part of the story unfold. I enjoyed the twists that were thrown in there, too. I specifically remember NOT listening to an NWR podcast that would spoil some of the surprises at the end just so that I could discover them for myself.

I am curious as to why everyone seems to place this series on a pedestal? Sure, almost evey game in the series has been great, but in that regard you could draw a comparison with other series which people are not as adamant about preserving certain aspects. As far as Samus's behaviour in Other M, I just likened it to any number of movie or TV shows which further explain why a character is a certain way--what they believe, how they act, etc. I'm not saying Other M is perfect, but I have always had a hard time understanding why people rag on it so much.

I really dug Other M, and I'd say its imperfections come more with the presentation than anything else. The random pixel hunts and borderline nonsensical story hurt it for me. I didn't mind the characterization of Samus; I just wish it was told better. Other than that, I consider Other M to be a great modern Metroid game. It's not as exploration heavy as other games in the series (then again, neither is Prime 3 and people lost their shit over it because omfgretrostudios), but it is still a fun game and in my eyes, it nails what I loved about Super Metroid: that growing sense of empowerment.

I've been considering replaying it, and all this recent Metroid talk might push me over the edge. The good thing is that what I disliked about the game can be skipped for the most part. My second playthrough might feature even more affection.

My introduction to Metroid was the original back as a kid.  I never owned it but had played it at friends houses and thought it was a pretty cool if not impossible and impenetrable.  I thought it was like an arcade game where you just played until you die.  Metroid II i didn't own either (i didn't even have a gb) but played it and liked it enough to think it was another cool but totally impenetrable game.

The SNES passed me by until I picked one up in 1997 or 98 when I already had an N64.  I never really amassed any collection of games for it--a few NHL titles, Zombies Ate My Neighbors and Zelda.  I'd like to get around to it one of these years.

I bought a GCN used that came with Mario Sunshine and Metroid Prime.  I liked prime a lot and don't remember why I never finished it--probably too busy with work and other bits of life.  I picked up Prime3 and is so far, the only Metroid game I've ever beaten.  The combat is pretty terrible and the whole game feels a bit messy and disjointed, but I was never really frustrated by the controls or level design enough to really make me put the game down.  I know the game gets a lot of hate but the worst thing I can say about it is that it's just sort of a run of the mill adventure game.

I doubt I'll play other M or any of the handheld titles.

Regarding a Mario football game and Nintendo/football games in general, Nintendo did publish a Wii football game in Japan called Eyeshield 21: Field Saikyou no Senshi Tachi (based on a Japanese anime). They didn't develop it themselves though, 8ing developed it. So it's not like Nintendo hasn't been involved with a football game before.

From Samus' point of view, is there really any difference between blowing Ridley off a cliff to a presumed death and blowing him into tiny pieces?  It's still 6 times in the past where she's squared-off with him, and the encounter's ended with him being totally incapacitated.

Except that Samus' actions and attitude in Other M don't line up with how she is depicted in any other Metroid game, and that includes Metroid Fusion (the Metroid game Sakamoto outright copies with Other M).  Consider for example how Samus reacts to Ridley's appearance in Prime 3 and how she reacts to it in Other M:

Prime 3 - Samus raises her arm canon and blasts at Ridley until she's plunged down a core shaft, where she continues to battle Ridley in midair until she finishes him off and is saved by a fellow bounty hunter.

Other M - Samus screams, curls up into a metaphorical ball, and continues doing nothing while her Federation teammates scramble to take Ridley down in her place.

Even taking into account the B.S. "psychological damage" Sakamoto incessantly harps upon throughout Other M, these responses do not make sense within the same universe (especially when Samus has killed Ridley several more times since that first Prime 3 battle by the point of Other M).

There were several things that annoyed me about the Ridley scene. I don't have a problem with the idea of someone showing fear when they see a big monster like Ridley, because after all, being brave is facing your fears, not having no fears. In addition to the fact that Samus had met and defeated Ridley a number of times as was mentioned by others, it was also just so poorly done, making it melodramatic and cheesy. That kind of applies to the whole game. Samus reacted as if this were the first time all of this kind of stuff happened, but at this point in the storyline she had already experienced a whole lot. When a person goes through that much, they do become at least a little desensitized, hardened, whether they're a man or woman. If this were the first game in the storyline then it would have been at least more believable, but even in that case it would have the issue of being poorly presented.

I wouldn't mind a Mario football game as long as it is nothing like 10-Yard Fight on the NES.

all this talk about the terrible story and writing/voice acting in other M since it's release has made me not want to play this game. I even consider myself a huge Metroid fan. Now that it's dirt cheap i'm considering giving it a go but no way i would've payed $60 (Canadian) for it

but yeah, Metroid prime is probably my favourite metroid game in the series, followed really closely by super metroid :D

Lithium, I think that if you can find it for cheap, you should still give it a chance.  Annoying storytelling and character retcons aside, I think that a lot of the gameplay design is still entertaining for what it is.  I didn't like a lot of the choices, but I still had a lot of fun with the game. It's just not what a lot of people wanted from a Metroid sequel.

As for the animals in Super Metroid, saving them is optional.  In the finale of the game, they're trapped in a chamber and there is a wall that you can destroy to allow them to escape.  When Zebes explodes at the end of the game, you can see a very small dot (which is presumably a spacecraft) flying out in the distance as Samus' ship flies toward the screen.  If you didn't destroy that wall, the little dot won't be there.


I was able to play the original Metroid at the right time to enjoy it.  I first played Metroid when I was 10 at a friend's house;  I didn't have a Nintendo, and my experience with gaming had been limited to the Atari consoles and arcade gaming at that point.  My mind was blown that this was a game was so huge that you probably couldn't play it through in one sitting (which I know to be untrue now) and that you could find all sorts of weapon upgrades.  Also, the whole Tourian section and the Metroids themselves really scared me!  It was awesome!

A correction during the discussion with gripes on vague and/or open-ended aspects of video games: That frustration is not cognitive dissonance. Cognitive dissonance is the discomfort had when holding conflicting ideas simultaneously. Two examples of this would be buyer's remorse or the story "The Fox and the Grapes."

The frustration over the certainty of possible optimal play through tedious/obscure effort is a different phenomenon. I'm don't know of a technical, psychological term for it. I do see that it is heavily in play for players who are compelled to have a perfect or near-perfect first-time run of any given game. In big and open games such as Borderlands, Fallout 3, Grand Theft Auto, Mass Effect, and JRPGs, I would like to say that you should really just grit your teeth, play through them, and not worry about messing out on things. But I realize it's really hard to change your gaming habits and personality. Also, for JRPGs in particular, it's not uncommon for games to punish you for not knowing some things ahead of time. Though, games these days have been making the punishments less and less.

As for Star Trek, I've spent the last few weeks watching The Next Generation starting from season 3. Maybe this is truly nostalgia blinding me, but I'm enjoying the stories more than I ever had. The show can be stilted and naive but I just really love the honesty and positivity of its science fiction. On Voyager, the show has most of it's better/good episode after Seven of Nine joins the crew. That's probably because the writing team found their footing after the first rocky seasons (A case of Growing the Beard). There are some great ones like Year of Hell.


EDIT: Hmm, maybe I was wrong in typing that what you are experiencing isn't cognitive dissonance. I guess there's some sort of conflicting ideas? You want to play the game. The game is about being vague and obscure with player actions and consequences, but you don't like vagueness or obscurity in games. Yet, you still want to play the game. Hmm, I'm starting to see a conflict. I never thought that cognitive dissonance applies in such a manner.


Could you be experiencing a variation of self-handicapping? "Self-handicapping is the process by which people avoid effort in the hopes of keeping potential failure from hurting self-esteem." If the obscured consequences of certain games can be seen as potential failure, then you would avoid playing such games so your entertainment time isn't hurt.

I'm actually kind of disappointed that Deep Space Nine wasn't included on the Star Trek offerings; I remember it being my favorite of the series, but maybe it wouldn't hold up, either.

That's coming later to Netflix. I think it's due sometime in September. I guess there was some rights issues.

I think all the Star Trek television series are available for streaming on Amazon Prime.

I have something similar where I am always reluctant to use items in games (especially RPGs) unless I know for sure I can easily get more of the items. I rarely ever use rare items because of that.

As for Star Trek, I hate the first season of TNG ("Datalore" is one of the few I like) and don't like most of season 2. It picks up after that. DS9 is easily the best Trek show (although, like most Trek shows, the first season is meh), especially the fantastic multi-year Dominion War story arc. I think Voyager gets to much crap really, I enjoy the show overall. I do think Seven of Nine helped (not just because of her looks, she was an interesting character), but also getting away from the lame Kazon (who the producers even admitted that the fans hated them) helped.

As for "The Best of Both Worlds", I like these two episodes but think they are over-rated. They are not even the best TNG episodes, yet alone the best Trek episodes or best sci fi.

Sun, DS9 DOES hold up. I watched every episode again last year and they are still great. The best seasons are 4-7. Season 1 is kinda boring, it helps once they get the USS Defiant and can start really exploring. Delving deeper into the Bajorans and their religion, interacting with the Dominion, and story arcs like Nog becoming the first Ferengi in Starfleet are nice (and the season 7 episode "Take Me Out to the Holosuite" is a nice break from the war and seeing the crew play baseball against a all-Vulcan crew).

Enner, no rights issues. They just didn't want to put all 700+ episodes in the Trek universe up at the same time.

Bah! They should have thrown caution in to the wind. If they were really that concerned, why put up 4 out of 5? :p
Anyway, I'm curious to go back to the first two seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation. I want to confirm the quality for myself. I vaguely remember some really goofy moments.

Ah, I forgot that the podcast crew talked up some Doctor Who (2005)! I really like the weeping angels. The production is able to get so much out of statues. I like all the Steven Moffat episodes from the early series and really like what he's done as a the show runner from series 5 and on. I do worry about him being too clever with his timey-wimey, wibbly-wobbly stories.

The first two seasons had some good moments, but IMO there were very few entire episodes that were good (I especially disliked Dr. Pulaski). Season 2 also has the distinction of having the only clip show in the history of Star Trek, "Shades of Grey", which was so poorly received that they decided never to do it again.

Season 5 of the new Doctor Who was not bad, but Matt Smith is nowhere near as good as David Tennant was (but is better than Christopher Eccstein), and I don't think Steven Moffat is as good of a show runner as Russel T. Davies was. I especially liked the World War II/Dalek episode though. I wish Tennant had wanted to stay on the show though, he was popular with fans and I think he was the best Doctor (though I tended to not like the specials).

How can you even do a clip show for a show like Star Trek? It works for comedies since some of the jokes can still work in bite-sized pieces, but I didn't think it'd work for a story-driven show...

The plot of the episode was that Riker got this alien infection or virus or some crap like that (I don't feel like looking it up), and the only way to get rid of it was for Riker to re-live his memories. Nevermind the fact that some of the clips of Riker's "memory" were events that he wasn't present at. Supposedly it was done because the show had gone way over-budget that season, so they filmed like 12 minutes of new footage (mostly on the bridge) and did clips. The episode got poor rating and is constantly cited as the worst Trek episode ever, so the producers promised to never do one again.

It didn't work for a story-driven show.  That's kind of the point.  The episode had Riker knocked out by a poisonous substance while exploring one of those really terrible early-TNG backstage planets, and he spent the episode "dreaming" of past episodes.  It was really terrible, and it was the season finale for TNG's second season.

I'm loving the Metroid discussion here, as well as the differing opinions surrounding Other M. I want to know though, what do you guys want from a new Metroid? What style and for which console? Or should there be a Metroid-break?

2D game on 3DS. Ideally, kind of like Other M played and felt like but more like Zero Mission/Super Metroid e.g. no first-person gameplay.

I cant speak to other M since i haven't played it (although like i said earlier if i find it dirt cheap I'll get it) all I know is that if they insist on having a story this time they should actually show Samus bounty hunting, like the bosses could be the targets she's chasing or whatever. Not having samus loose all her items at the start while finding new/original upgrades would be nice too.

the core gameplay of other m, like the 3rd person full 3-d but still restricted like 2-d seems like it would work fine (minus the point and click adventure, i don't need to play the game to know that sounds terrible), I also really like the WiiU scan visor/map idea that somone suggested in the podcast (although i cant remember who said that)

I recommend people pick up Super Paper Mario that haven't.  I loved it.  Combines classic mario gameplay with rpg elements.  Instead of the boring "my first rpg" combat of the others.  The story is enjoyable as well.  The space levels were a nice tease when I was anticipating Mario Galaxy.

That last Nintendo Selects game you guys couldn't remember was Animal Crossing: City Folk.

I don't know if it should happen, but I do think it will be a while before we see another Metroid game. If I remember rightly, Metroid Other M is one of the most expensive games Nintendo have ever published, and I don't think it sold well enough for them to consider it worth the investment. So the next Metroid is going to be much lighter on story simply because it won't have the budget for CG scenes.

As for gameplay, I'm hoping that it will be a more refined system from Other M. The only issue I had with it were the controls, so if they tighten those up and allow use of the Wiimote and Nunchuk, it would be fine. It should be on a real planet, with larger, more open worlds. I'd want it on a home system, not a portable, so I guess it'd be the Wii U and not the Wii. But hopefully Wiimote + Nunchuk would still be an option.

Super Paper Metroid...make it happen, Nintendo!!!  :D

Please no.

What, no mention for the great pick-up-and-play game that is Metroid Prime Pinball? All sarcasm aside, it's a fantastic pinball version of the first Prime game, and a fairly solid, if unorthodox, pinball game in its own right. I highly recommend giving it a try, if you can find a copy someplace.

As for the series overall, I also love how the latest Sakamoto games have made Samus more agile, but I absolutely loathe and detest Fusion and Other M's idiotic decision to limit where you can go next. I don't mean their telling you "go here next" (although I prefer the Prime games' approach), I mean their " you can ONLY go here next" idea. It's extremely un-Metroid to me. Fusion's otherwise good enough to overcome that, but Other M...is not. I don't think I'm ever going to bother beating Other M; the first four hours have really turned me off to the game. Glad I only spent $15 on it!

I want to know what this Horse DS game is. I do not see a review for a Horse DS game.

My son like Horses.  I like EBA.  It could possibly work.

I've always had the opposite experience of some of the people on the podcast.  While I love the original Metroid and Super Metroid, I've always had trouble actually making it through any of the Prime Games, even though I own all three of them.  I don't know why, other than I find the considerable time investment to be an obstacle these days.

Then how about Samus' Epic Yarn?  The antagonist could threaten to "tear the very fabric of space and time." :P:


Seriously, though, I agree it will be quite a while before we ever get another Metroid.  I would enjoy it if Nintendo would get over there "prequellitis" and get back to making a true narrative sequel, but I'd honestly be more satisfied with another 2D platformer on the 3DS.  I'm hoping that either Metroid or Super Metroid will make 3D classic status, because I will be getting those.



noname...I recently found Metroid Prime Pinball at a used books and games store, but I haven't really played it at length.  I guess that I need to give it another go.

Metroid II: Zero Mission (or whatever you'd call it). Though I've never played the first Zero Mission, so I'd just be happy with it coming to the 3DS eShop.

Finally listening to this...

I enjoy how Andy and I both have similarly written reviews of Let's Golf 3D, but when we talked about them, I came away more positive and he came away more negative.

Good man!  ;D  Please let me know what you think: I don't know too many others who I can discuss it with.