This just made the game even more deeper, also I have a theory that every SA-X we encounter, isn't even the same one, bc there's more than one. I would've loved a level were you have to runaway from a SA-X with your speedbooster, that'd be cool.
To anyone who isn’t aware this is a bad translation and it’s a corrupt branch of the federation that is working on the Metroid breeding program. Not the federation as a whole but simply a corrupt branch. This is why in Dread (which happens after Fusion) Samus is still working for the Federation. It’s not a well known fact but yeah it’s supposed to be a corrupt branch
I love how in Dread when you play it, if you look closely, you can still see the organic parts of her suit of Fusion, they said her suit is slowly regenerating the plating, which is interesting, but it also shows that the colors on the organic parts are those horrible yellow instead of orange, orange is the color of the plating she has. I do think Dread's version of her armor is the best version of it, it looks very interesting.
Wasn't my first Metroid game, but I've always loved it. The overly linear progression is forgivable because of how effectively the game creates atmosphere and tension. It also has some of the best boss fights in the series in my opinion. It's probably my second favorite 2D entry, after Super Metroid.
FYI, you can skip the opening cutscene in the future if you let it play out then press: L + R + START + SELECT which soft-reboots the Gameboy Advance and you'll now have a save file at the Main Deck ready to start with 00:00 on the clock, no time has passed. You can go back to the main menu and copy this save to another slot then you'll always be able to restart quickly for another run.
This video just popped in my feed today and I really enjoyed watching it, I like the way you comment, there were no dull moments, keep doing videos like this!
So much love for that one. Its creepy like super metroid, bosses fights are very good and finally a metroid that is different of the others but doesnt destroy the franchise. Its one of my best with SM and ZM
My first 2D Metroid game right after playing prime that same summer. Fusion is such an amazing game. I’m glad it’s getting more recognition now. Can’t believe it’s turning 20 years old this year.
Metroid Fusion was my first game of my childhood. After that, I was learning much about gaming IT and have very good experiences with it. Thanks to Nintendo, which he created the Metroid 5 (Metroid Dread).
I liked the atmosphere it had like the shadow of the nightmare in the background of one of the sector moving around all eratic makes me think he was being chased by the x at the time and when it breaks out its because the x finally caught him and assimilated him and then theres the defense bot that attacks you earlier on showing up later having been infected by the x because we damaged it in the first fight
I love Metroid Fusion. Some of the best atmosphere/isolation/tension/dread in any 2D game, period. I think too often people forget that the incredible atmosphere this game has is made possible BECAUSE the game is linear in structure. People love to trash on the linearity and praise the atmosphere, not realizing that the atmosphere is what it is because of the games structure. How does can fusion be non Metroid like if it follows the footsteps of Metroid 2, a game that came before super.
One thing I love about the Megaman Battle Network games is that pressing the select button will usually skip the entire cutscene and give you back control of Megaman. Super and Fusion would've benefited massively from this. I really enjoyed Fusion. I was apprehensive going into it as so many swore up and down that it was too linear and that it sucked. Not only did I love the story but I happily got 100% in the game. I've heard people say that Fusion has the hardest Shinespark puzzles but I didn't find that too bad. I can see the criticism of the computer turning out to be the real Adam and being the one to come up with the final plan but after playing Dread and seeing him return briefly I enjoy it.
shinespark puzzle , or sequence break? because fusion only has 1 of those and i did it , and it is indeed the hardest intended puzzle design i've played from all of the 2d metroids
this was one of the first games i ever played and i still love it to bits. also happens to be the only game i can sort of speedrun through, though not at anything near record pace
Fusion was not my first Metroid game but it is absolutely one of my favorites. My first time beating it, I immediately started a new file and began a new play through. I love the story so much!
When I started the game, I half-expected we were just going to go back to SR388 just like we went back to Zebes in Super Metroid, but was pleasantly surprised to see the game took place almost solely (outside of the one cutscene) on the BSL Research Station. I liked it as a setting though it was a little strange to have a sort of hub zone with all of the elevators right from the start. Far less confusing to navigate, though, which was probably the point. Though it does get bad later on right around the aquatic area where you're constantly searching for hidden spaces. I *hate* hidden tunnels. Super Metroid had a lot of them, which... yeah. I just like seeing where I can go. The X-Ray Scope was a really nice addition to make up for it, but it's kind of like selling water to someone you set on fire and I probably only liked it because I used a romhack that added a ton of improvements like widening the x-ray's beam. Wouldn't have killed them to add the X-Ray Scope to Fusion, though, if they were just going to repeat that mistake. I wasn't too off-put by the way health and ammo pick-ups worked in this game, but I won't lie: I preferred when my enemies didn't respawn if I didn't grab their goo fast enough. The new suit style was kind of interesting. Nothing will ever beat the look of the Varia Suit for me, though. _To this day I'm still kicking myself for never getting the Samus Returns amiibo pack._ Before it got so ridiculously expensive and hard to find. Perfect suit, perfect pose... If I stop being an idiot, after vacation I need to pick up the Dark Samus amiibo while that's still affordable, too. 5:09 Yeah, I noticed pretty fast when I didn't grab a missile upgrade mentioned in a guide I was looking at early on before beating the Arachnus-X boss. The second I dropped into that boss pit, I wasn't getting back up there until practically the *end of the game.* Because not only do they block off your path in several parts so you need to get more upgrades to get back, but by the time you come back later thinking "maybe I can get there now" there's literally a new obstacle in your way that requires power bombs to detonate, so you have to go get *that* upgrade too. It wasn't a huge deal, but I was like "yeah, this game clearly doesn't want you leaving the areas it tells you to go to". That's just one example, too, I noticed in many sections I would go explore and think I'd find something new like previous games and then there'd be either a higher security lock, like a red door in the way, or like you said, one of the doors would be "arbitrarily locked" and I'd just have to turn around and go back to the section I was supposed to be doing like the good little player I was. It didn't kill my enjoyment of the game, but it's definitely not the right direction for the 2D Metroid series. It kills that sense of reward you felt for exploring in previous games and I'm glad they didn't mess up Metroid Zero Mission in the same way when they later remade it. I sucked at wall-jumping in Super Metroid and it was painful trying to get out of that one hole where you're taught the mechanic, but I could *NOT* get the timing right in Fusion and idk what I was doing wrong. It could just be the d-pad on my system or maybe I'm just awful at it in general. It's not a feature I ever want to rely on, which may be part of my problem with Super Metroid because there were at least two situations, including the optional area you can get stuck in to learn that feature, where it's pretty much *required* for you to perform it. The SA-X is probably one of my favorite concepts of this game. It gives you a good sense of how dangerous Samus is when fully-powered by putting you on the raw end of that power for once. I like how you struggle to kill the SA-X in the final battle before it escapes only for an Omega Metroid to absolutely wreck it in like two hits, showing you why the Metroids are so dangerous and why the X consider them their greatest adversary. Also vindicating the Chozo for creating the Metroids in the first place, despite the risk and danger that comes from making the ultimate predator. It was a little weird to see the SA-X come in and almost kind of protect Samus from the Omega Metroid. I know it wasn't likely the intent, it just reformed in the room and picked the most dangerous target, but I almost rooted for the SA-X in that moment because the Omega Metroid absolutely wrecks Samus without the Omega Suit. Samus losing agency sounds kind of like what I remember people complaining about Other M for doing. Making Samus feel weaker and more vulnerable. That game had Adam in it, I think? From what I looked up on the wiki, I recall him being in that game, at least. So it's kind of funny that any game with Adam in it seems to cause Samus to suddenly be less competent. I don't have a huge problem with another character taking the spotlight for a minute, we've already seen what Samus is capable of in previous games, but I do see why you'd consider it to be poor writing. That being said, Samus says right from the beginning that the voice reminded her of Adam, so it's not like the game wasn't giving you hints. I mean why else would she continue to treat this robot (which I didn't even realize was a computer until later on) like her old c.o.? Part of her probably guessed and that's why in a moment of exasperation she says Adam's name. It *kind of* works. Could have been hinted at more, though. I've said before I don't feel like Metroid considers plot to be its primary motivation. It's there, it works and it has a little bit of depth, but this isn't Shakespeare. Nintendo doesn't really do deep stories, it's just not their thing. Gameplay-first is their mantra. 19:51 I only got 44% of the completion bonus, so you're telling me I missed like 56 optional items with most being endgame unlocks? Jeez... that's _excessive._ Especially for a game that doesn't reward deep exploration the way previous titles did.
Metroid Fusion could have also used checkpoints. I know there are plenty of save points in save rooms, but if you just play without saving, just to have fun, and if you mess up late in the game and died, you have to start the whole thing over again. It could at least respawned you at the begining of a sector instead of the begining, or at the last save point you visited
I agree! I actually got pretty careless in one of these playthroughs and died to the SA-X and lost about an hour of progress, which was kind of annoying. Checkpoints were a very welcome addition in Samus Returns.
FINALLY got around to fusion myself recently and besides getting my face kicked in by bosses till I found the trick each had I think the game was pretty rad. Though playing it before zero mission and super is going to make those feel even easier now heh.
I always thought it was weird that fusion expects the player to distrust the Federation right off the bat. Super Metroid literally starts with Samus leaving the baby Metroid with them at a very similar space station. Somehow it's cool to leave a super dangerous Metroid with them for "research purposes" but now they want to do the exact same thing with the X parasite and suddenly it's not chill and they're treated as a bunch of corrupt war profiteers. I get that the danger of the X is on a whole other level than having a single Metroid in a glass tube, but it seems like a pretty abrupt heel turn. My personal reaction to learning that they were cloning Metroids and accelerating their life cycle was "oh good, they were supposed to use the baby Metroid research for the good of mankind, and now they can keep going since Ridley isn't there to screw it up". Then when it was revealed that they wanted to do the same with the X I was like "okay, sure. Samus supported them using the Metroid for the benefit of mankind, so it makes perfect sense that they would do the same with the X. What's the problem?" Obviously it was a very misguided idea that was based on a lack of information on how dangerous the X are, but up to this point the games have led me to believe that the Federation is trustworthy. It was genuinely jarring to have the game act like the Federation is no different than the space pirates when I just played 3 other games that told me they were okay. Legit, the previous game in the timeline starts with the words "the last Metroid is in captivity, the galaxy is at peace." Who do you think was in charge of the captive Metroid? The Federation!
From my understanding (and I believe at least one other person commented about this already), the English translation for this game leaves out an important detail in the game's story, and that apparently it's only a smaller, corrupt faction of the Federation that want to weaponize the X, not the Federation as a whole.
@@basedsamtv I did actually know that trivia fact, however learning it well into my adult life after being ignorant the entire childhood I spent playing was still confusing. I like the angle of a splintered faction of federation officials pulling the strings and being shady. That being said, I live in America and wasn't given the information to know about the Metroid illuminati, so the reaction I described is understandable. I don't wanna make it political, but I feel like it's worth noting that I accepted the bad guy government without question as a kid lmao perks of being American XD
There were like 3 or 4 lines of this video where I thought… I know I heard that before! Then I remembered the Geek Critique. Good video to take inspiration from.
Strange game entry in the series, but I started playing metroid in 2018 in my second year of uni; so this game felt like a cool idea. I assume if I was a longtime fan at that point I might have had a more negative reaction to how linear it was. The SA-X was incredible, very anime feeling where the power scaling gets shown to you "this is you in the last game, look at how your lasers bounce off of your old armour". Also the "Alien" (xenomorph) inspiration is massive in this series. The introduction of Adam leaves as sour taste in my mouth
My first Metroid game was Metroid Prime, and I liked Fusion. I think the people saying a game in the Metroid series is 'not a Metroid game', what they really mean is that it doesn't feel like Castlevania.
I really love Fusion, this was a great video about it! There are some things I wasn't crazy about though. I agree that there needed to be a way to skip dialogue. I was also confused as to why Ridley was even in BSL, it felt like it was just shoe horned in as a boss fight at the end for fan service. Also, why is the final boss of Fusion an omega metroid? That also felt kinda underwhelming. I also noticed since I've been replaying it on Switch, the game is quite difficult! I somehow didn't realize in my first play through, but Samus is really squishy lol
I played this metroid game first I used it to get used to the combat (i have high adaptability) Then I played zero mission, getting used to the maze-style gameplay Those 2 games gave me the skills and intuition to play the rest (it was all this year XD)
Unrelated, but there's a rom hack for Fusion called "Samus Goes to the Fridge to Get a Glass of Milk". I assume it's a joke about how linear the game is because Adam requests you to, you guessed it, grab him a glass of milk from the fridge at 2AM.
"People who think it's too linear, and people it was their first Metroid game" While yes it was my first Metroid game, and yes I agree it's pretty linear, I still love it to death, especially with Dread being the next game in the chronology. The X Parasite were so interesting to me and learning that the Metroid creatures, these hated things I hear so many people complain about, is the bioengineer predator of these things? Cool as hell.
I think Fusion is my favorite Metroid game. I think for replayability, the complete lack of handholding is the best approach. For widespread mass appeal you do as much handholding as possible. Fusion did half and half while still maintaining the classic metroid formula as best as possible. While I wouldn't suggest that they make future metroid games with a heavy emphasis on story or suspense, I do think that the small amount that they did on this game works well to help you feel invested especially as a first time player of the game. I don't think sequence breaking is essential to the metroid experience. Pretty much all games are linear. Just because you can do things out of order doesn't mean you should, nor does it make that act enjoyable. I don't object to giving people the option to get things slightly out of order but I wouldn't consider it good game design.
fusion is a good game and i enjoyed it , but i do also think it can somewhat debated if it's a proper metroid game , due to how it tries to blend more game generas into the mix with following an unskipable story from a narrator , hard locking the sequence breaks down to an measly inconsequential 1 , and the survival horror events also maybe the reason the omega metroid had different weaknesses this time is due to it being genetically endangered and cultivated by the federation
OK, so Fusion... Hooooooboy, Fusion... This is one of those ones that really just missed for me, personally. While I won't say that linearity makes it a non-Metroid game (never understood that argument, myself), I'm a damn fool for a nice sequence break. But what really hit me wrong was the audio. Not the musical composition or anything like that. The SFX and "instruments" in the music just hit my ears like nails on chalkboard. Compositionally speaking, the music's quite good. Not on the level of Super Metroid, but definitely not bad by any means. I just accept the lore from this one and call it good, lmfao...
Wait? This game is HARD? How? Except for Neo Ridley, all of the bosses in Fusion have patterns that are fairly easy to memorize... Oh well. Too bad you didn't enjoy Fusion as much as me and others, but I'm glad you pointed at its contribution to the series in terms of gameplay, graphics, story telling and ambiance.
It can be hard. While if you're cautious you can probably avoid dying, enemies are punishingly powerful. One hit from an enemy costs you about a full health slot and killing them almost never gives you a red X-parasite to absorb, meaning you're either getting a missile refill or a tiny bit of health. Compare that to Zero Mission where large health drops were not uncommon and you can see why this game might be considered more difficult to players who don't want to walk through every room like they're trying to avoid stepping on razor-blades without shoes on.
I plan to eventually try out Metroid Dread, but I worry about how well I'll be able to handle it without the crutch of save states. Metroid Fusion could be really hard, you rarely ever got back even a quarter of the health lost from a scrap with an X-parasite even with the more basic ones, but it did feel mostly manageable, I guess. I've also always wanted to get into the Prime trilogy. I did actually try the first game back on Gamecube a long ways back but I never really beat it. I might pick up the remaster on Switch someday, but that's only one of three of those games. Perhaps it'd be better if I just emulated on Gamecube instead and used save states there. It's a different sort of game, so I won't *need* them maybe, but anything that alleviates difficulty goes a long way towards just letting me enjoy the game. I'll have to think on it. For now, I guess I'm finished with the Metroid series, but I'll absolutely be replaying Zero Mission and Fusion again in the future and most likely AM2R. I'll give Super Metroid another shot down the line, but there's no telling how far in the future that'll be.
My favourite thing about Fusion is the art. Holy hell does this game look GOOD. So crisp, clean and colourful - almost like a Mega Man X game. The red outline on the environments is a stroke of genius, and the fusion suit is pimpin. Zero Mission looks like crap in comparison. The high-fidelity, high-contrast backgrounds just look cheap next to Fusion's pixel art.
i actually kinda like zero mission's art design because it's very reminiscent of the original NES game, while improving all the details and making everything more visually distinct and less copy-pasted everywhere. both games also look better if you play them on emulators and change their color palettes to be less blown out and high contrast, which i believe is something nintendo themselves does on NSO haha
Anyone notice that the jump mechanic is sometimes a bit unresponsive? Like sometimes you only jump halfway, even if you press the button normally? Could be a switch thing.
That's probably a Switch thing. I was playing on my RG35XX Plus and didn't feel that was an issue. I did struggle getting the pattern down for space jumping in this game, though. You have to jump just as you're going down and if you didn't jump high enough it's easy to mess it up and make it feel impossible to space jump at all. I found it a little frustrating, but managed well enough by the end to get through some tougher sections.
i love the Metroid series so much, really but i have never really dug Fusion. The suit looks beyond stupid and the constant handholding not only ruins the isolation but also the exploration. But for a GBA title, it's pretty good.
I remember this as one of the best games I played as a kid. But we only had the Japanese version. I never understood the story. Was this uncommon? 😂 I finished the whole game based solely on context clues 😆 If only I knew about walkthroughs back then...
I actually hated using the R button for missiles. One thing I always felt was superior about Super Metroid was that you could toggle on missiles and LEAVE THEM ON, rather than always having to remember to press yet another button. It was just replacing the annoyance of the run button with another annoyance. It's been an ongoing frustration for me because I much preferred being able to use that button for diagonal aiming, and that it led to the modern free aim mode being the same way actually increased the frustration because then you have to hold one button to aim, a second to use missiles, and a third to shoot, where in the old way you would just need to aim diagonal with one button, and shoot freely with the other because missiles would remain activated.
I really disagree with most conclusions here. I think the story is amazing. Even that moment where Adam suggests a better plan. Adam is the ONE person Samus knows who is a better tactician better than her. Meaning when she comes up with a “good plan” it makes sense Adam comes up with a “better plan” I don’t think a single moment in the game is contrived.
Thanks! Good review. I tried this recently and it was pretty decent, but eventually I got tired of the clinical linear setting, and being told what to do. Much preferred Super and Zero Mission.
I'm glad I'm not the only one who feels Fusion isn't a fun game to revisit. I really enjoy what Fusion did for Samus as a character and how it ties together her arc of suffering through the karma of committing genocide on the Metroids and suffering the consequences of her actions and accepting it through becoming a Metroid and eradicating the X-Parasites herself, and the tighter gameplay innovations Fusion introduced are also really good, but the linearity and unskippable text just make the game not fun to replay. Zero Mission has all of the benefits of Fusion's tighter more refined gameplay without the strict linearity and unskippable text, which is why I just prefer to replay that game instead for a much more fun time. I do really respect and appreciate what Fusion did for Samus's story though, and think it's a very unique game, even if I don't plan to ever replay it myself.
Lmao in what way is Prime 2 the "hardest game in the entire series"?! Metroid Dread is WAAAAAY harder. In fact, I think almost every 2D game is harder than any of the Prime games, the kind of casual ease of the Prime games compared to the 2D games is one small part of why I enjoy them so much. Although, Dread is my favorite 2D game in the series, despite its absurd difficulty. "The atmosphere of Dark Aether hurting you and having limited ammo for your beams" is probably the most commonly cited reason I've heard for Prime 2 supposedly being hard but, umm, there are light beacons to heal you, just try not rushing through Dark Aether and the Beam ammo thing really isn't a problem if you know what you're doing. Just use the opposite Beam to get ammo, it's not that hard.
This was uploaded before Dread came out. The parts I mainly had trouble with in Prime 2 were the bosses, specifically on the GameCube version since you can't jump in morph ball for Spider Guardian and can't look up as easily for Quadraxis and Emperor Ing among others. I actually liked the ammo management aspect of the game lol.
I didn't like Fusion, but for different reasons than what you listed in your 2 Camps. I dislike Fusion because of how much Fusion seemed bent on that subversion. It was rough, because I can deal with "you can't get here... yet" text walls, but why is Samus, who up until this point was a lone wolf bounty hunter, now, suddenly, rank and file? I dislike the entire game because the entirety of the game takes away my agency, not Samus's agency. There's always a "this is the order you're supposed to do things in" but up to this point, you never needed to follow that any more than you wanted to. In Fusion, you're playing a room by room platforming puzzle adventure, which isn't really a Metroid game, so much as a Mega Man game. This game was really unfortunate and I don't consider myself a fan of anything after Metroid 3 due to all of these decisions. Even future games pulled the same kind of thing, and I was never really able to get back into the series because of all this development decisions nonsense.
Oh my GOD, I never realized the SA-X treats you like a Metroid (now that it has the capability to kill one) until you pointed that out…that’s amazing
It freezes you and shoots you with a super missile, just like how you would kill a Metroid.
She really is Metroid Fusion
But what if Metroid was a girl?
It was just missing the X-Ray Visor
This just made the game even more deeper, also I have a theory that every SA-X we encounter, isn't even the same one, bc there's more than one.
I would've loved a level were you have to runaway from a SA-X with your speedbooster, that'd be cool.
To anyone who isn’t aware this is a bad translation and it’s a corrupt branch of the federation that is working on the Metroid breeding program. Not the federation as a whole but simply a corrupt branch. This is why in Dread (which happens after Fusion) Samus is still working for the Federation. It’s not a well known fact but yeah it’s supposed to be a corrupt branch
But are they corrupt though? 😅
@@justsomeguy28Maybe not corrupt but very shady.
I love how in Dread when you play it, if you look closely, you can still see the organic parts of her suit of Fusion, they said her suit is slowly regenerating the plating, which is interesting, but it also shows that the colors on the organic parts are those horrible yellow instead of orange, orange is the color of the plating she has.
I do think Dread's version of her armor is the best version of it, it looks very interesting.
Wasn't my first Metroid game, but I've always loved it. The overly linear progression is forgivable because of how effectively the game creates atmosphere and tension. It also has some of the best boss fights in the series in my opinion. It's probably my second favorite 2D entry, after Super Metroid.
I like how sa-x screw attack and spacejump look visually different than the one we get in the game to represent super metroid
Fusion is so good, you can talk about it for 14 minutes without even needing to mention the SA-X yet lol
FYI, you can skip the opening cutscene in the future if you let it play out then press: L + R + START + SELECT which soft-reboots the Gameboy Advance and you'll now have a save file at the Main Deck ready to start with 00:00 on the clock, no time has passed. You can go back to the main menu and copy this save to another slot then you'll always be able to restart quickly for another run.
Really? I've played metroid fusion growing up and never knew that.
@@theprussianviking I think it's in a couple of speed-run guides if you want to see it happen.
This video just popped in my feed today and I really enjoyed watching it, I like the way you comment, there were no dull moments, keep doing videos like this!
So much love for that one. Its creepy like super metroid, bosses fights are very good and finally a metroid that is different of the others but doesnt destroy the franchise. Its one of my best with SM and ZM
My first 2D Metroid game right after playing prime that same summer. Fusion is such an amazing game. I’m glad it’s getting more recognition now. Can’t believe it’s turning 20 years old this year.
You forgot to mention the X was infecting Samus HERSELF, not just her power suit.
Yes this would have been more accurate to say, especially since her suit is biologically part of her
Metroid Fusion was my first game of my childhood. After that, I was learning much about gaming IT and have very good experiences with it. Thanks to Nintendo, which he created the Metroid 5 (Metroid Dread).
I liked the atmosphere it had like the shadow of the nightmare in the background of one of the sector moving around all eratic makes me think he was being chased by the x at the time and when it breaks out its because the x finally caught him and assimilated him and then theres the defense bot that attacks you earlier on showing up later having been infected by the x because we damaged it in the first fight
5:48 is taking me out lmfao
I love Metroid Fusion. Some of the best atmosphere/isolation/tension/dread in any 2D game, period. I think too often people forget that the incredible atmosphere this game has is made possible BECAUSE the game is linear in structure. People love to trash on the linearity and praise the atmosphere, not realizing that the atmosphere is what it is because of the games structure. How does can fusion be non Metroid like if it follows the footsteps of Metroid 2, a game that came before super.
One thing I love about the Megaman Battle Network games is that pressing the select button will usually skip the entire cutscene and give you back control of Megaman. Super and Fusion would've benefited massively from this.
I really enjoyed Fusion. I was apprehensive going into it as so many swore up and down that it was too linear and that it sucked. Not only did I love the story but I happily got 100% in the game. I've heard people say that Fusion has the hardest Shinespark puzzles but I didn't find that too bad.
I can see the criticism of the computer turning out to be the real Adam and being the one to come up with the final plan but after playing Dread and seeing him return briefly I enjoy it.
shinespark puzzle , or sequence break? because fusion only has 1 of those and i did it , and it is indeed the hardest intended puzzle design i've played from all of the 2d metroids
this was one of the first games i ever played and i still love it to bits. also happens to be the only game i can sort of speedrun through, though not at anything near record pace
Fusion was not my first Metroid game but it is absolutely one of my favorites. My first time beating it, I immediately started a new file and began a new play through. I love the story so much!
When I started the game, I half-expected we were just going to go back to SR388 just like we went back to Zebes in Super Metroid, but was pleasantly surprised to see the game took place almost solely (outside of the one cutscene) on the BSL Research Station. I liked it as a setting though it was a little strange to have a sort of hub zone with all of the elevators right from the start. Far less confusing to navigate, though, which was probably the point. Though it does get bad later on right around the aquatic area where you're constantly searching for hidden spaces. I *hate* hidden tunnels. Super Metroid had a lot of them, which... yeah. I just like seeing where I can go. The X-Ray Scope was a really nice addition to make up for it, but it's kind of like selling water to someone you set on fire and I probably only liked it because I used a romhack that added a ton of improvements like widening the x-ray's beam. Wouldn't have killed them to add the X-Ray Scope to Fusion, though, if they were just going to repeat that mistake.
I wasn't too off-put by the way health and ammo pick-ups worked in this game, but I won't lie: I preferred when my enemies didn't respawn if I didn't grab their goo fast enough.
The new suit style was kind of interesting. Nothing will ever beat the look of the Varia Suit for me, though. _To this day I'm still kicking myself for never getting the Samus Returns amiibo pack._ Before it got so ridiculously expensive and hard to find. Perfect suit, perfect pose... If I stop being an idiot, after vacation I need to pick up the Dark Samus amiibo while that's still affordable, too.
5:09 Yeah, I noticed pretty fast when I didn't grab a missile upgrade mentioned in a guide I was looking at early on before beating the Arachnus-X boss. The second I dropped into that boss pit, I wasn't getting back up there until practically the *end of the game.* Because not only do they block off your path in several parts so you need to get more upgrades to get back, but by the time you come back later thinking "maybe I can get there now" there's literally a new obstacle in your way that requires power bombs to detonate, so you have to go get *that* upgrade too. It wasn't a huge deal, but I was like "yeah, this game clearly doesn't want you leaving the areas it tells you to go to". That's just one example, too, I noticed in many sections I would go explore and think I'd find something new like previous games and then there'd be either a higher security lock, like a red door in the way, or like you said, one of the doors would be "arbitrarily locked" and I'd just have to turn around and go back to the section I was supposed to be doing like the good little player I was. It didn't kill my enjoyment of the game, but it's definitely not the right direction for the 2D Metroid series. It kills that sense of reward you felt for exploring in previous games and I'm glad they didn't mess up Metroid Zero Mission in the same way when they later remade it.
I sucked at wall-jumping in Super Metroid and it was painful trying to get out of that one hole where you're taught the mechanic, but I could *NOT* get the timing right in Fusion and idk what I was doing wrong. It could just be the d-pad on my system or maybe I'm just awful at it in general. It's not a feature I ever want to rely on, which may be part of my problem with Super Metroid because there were at least two situations, including the optional area you can get stuck in to learn that feature, where it's pretty much *required* for you to perform it.
The SA-X is probably one of my favorite concepts of this game. It gives you a good sense of how dangerous Samus is when fully-powered by putting you on the raw end of that power for once. I like how you struggle to kill the SA-X in the final battle before it escapes only for an Omega Metroid to absolutely wreck it in like two hits, showing you why the Metroids are so dangerous and why the X consider them their greatest adversary. Also vindicating the Chozo for creating the Metroids in the first place, despite the risk and danger that comes from making the ultimate predator. It was a little weird to see the SA-X come in and almost kind of protect Samus from the Omega Metroid. I know it wasn't likely the intent, it just reformed in the room and picked the most dangerous target, but I almost rooted for the SA-X in that moment because the Omega Metroid absolutely wrecks Samus without the Omega Suit.
Samus losing agency sounds kind of like what I remember people complaining about Other M for doing. Making Samus feel weaker and more vulnerable. That game had Adam in it, I think? From what I looked up on the wiki, I recall him being in that game, at least. So it's kind of funny that any game with Adam in it seems to cause Samus to suddenly be less competent. I don't have a huge problem with another character taking the spotlight for a minute, we've already seen what Samus is capable of in previous games, but I do see why you'd consider it to be poor writing. That being said, Samus says right from the beginning that the voice reminded her of Adam, so it's not like the game wasn't giving you hints. I mean why else would she continue to treat this robot (which I didn't even realize was a computer until later on) like her old c.o.? Part of her probably guessed and that's why in a moment of exasperation she says Adam's name. It *kind of* works. Could have been hinted at more, though. I've said before I don't feel like Metroid considers plot to be its primary motivation. It's there, it works and it has a little bit of depth, but this isn't Shakespeare. Nintendo doesn't really do deep stories, it's just not their thing. Gameplay-first is their mantra.
19:51 I only got 44% of the completion bonus, so you're telling me I missed like 56 optional items with most being endgame unlocks? Jeez... that's _excessive._ Especially for a game that doesn't reward deep exploration the way previous titles did.
Metroid Fusion could have also used checkpoints. I know there are plenty of save points in save rooms, but if you just play without saving, just to have fun, and if you mess up late in the game and died, you have to start the whole thing over again. It could at least respawned you at the begining of a sector instead of the begining, or at the last save point you visited
I agree! I actually got pretty careless in one of these playthroughs and died to the SA-X and lost about an hour of progress, which was kind of annoying. Checkpoints were a very welcome addition in Samus Returns.
“As was the style at the time.” - Grandpa Simpson
@@Podzhagitel "If you don't save, the game's not responsible."
-Graggle Simpson
Thats sounds more like a you-problem that an ingame issue.
Metroid never had checkpoints.
Metroid doesn't need checkpoints.
3:34
Think about "the baby"
That little fella was so adorable, but also showed how metroids aren't agressive by nature
This was my first metroid game and I'm glad it helped me navigate on where to go
FINALLY got around to fusion myself recently and besides getting my face kicked in by bosses till I found the trick each had I think the game was pretty rad. Though playing it before zero mission and super is going to make those feel even easier now heh.
You never mentioned Ridley, or how the 100% run makes the Omegas tougher like you did in Zero Mission. 😢
Fantastic video, really surprised you have so few subs because this was great
I always thought it was weird that fusion expects the player to distrust the Federation right off the bat. Super Metroid literally starts with Samus leaving the baby Metroid with them at a very similar space station. Somehow it's cool to leave a super dangerous Metroid with them for "research purposes" but now they want to do the exact same thing with the X parasite and suddenly it's not chill and they're treated as a bunch of corrupt war profiteers. I get that the danger of the X is on a whole other level than having a single Metroid in a glass tube, but it seems like a pretty abrupt heel turn.
My personal reaction to learning that they were cloning Metroids and accelerating their life cycle was "oh good, they were supposed to use the baby Metroid research for the good of mankind, and now they can keep going since Ridley isn't there to screw it up". Then when it was revealed that they wanted to do the same with the X I was like "okay, sure. Samus supported them using the Metroid for the benefit of mankind, so it makes perfect sense that they would do the same with the X. What's the problem?" Obviously it was a very misguided idea that was based on a lack of information on how dangerous the X are, but up to this point the games have led me to believe that the Federation is trustworthy. It was genuinely jarring to have the game act like the Federation is no different than the space pirates when I just played 3 other games that told me they were okay. Legit, the previous game in the timeline starts with the words "the last Metroid is in captivity, the galaxy is at peace." Who do you think was in charge of the captive Metroid? The Federation!
From my understanding (and I believe at least one other person commented about this already), the English translation for this game leaves out an important detail in the game's story, and that apparently it's only a smaller, corrupt faction of the Federation that want to weaponize the X, not the Federation as a whole.
@@basedsamtv I did actually know that trivia fact, however learning it well into my adult life after being ignorant the entire childhood I spent playing was still confusing. I like the angle of a splintered faction of federation officials pulling the strings and being shady. That being said, I live in America and wasn't given the information to know about the Metroid illuminati, so the reaction I described is understandable.
I don't wanna make it political, but I feel like it's worth noting that I accepted the bad guy government without question as a kid lmao perks of being American XD
Just watched your zero mission and super videos! Great stuff! Fun fact: ZM's my favorite Metroid game too!
There were like 3 or 4 lines of this video where I thought… I know I heard that before! Then I remembered the Geek Critique. Good video to take inspiration from.
The security robot is actually mother brain, as when it is defeated in the second round
Strange game entry in the series, but I started playing metroid in 2018 in my second year of uni; so this game felt like a cool idea. I assume if I was a longtime fan at that point I might have had a more negative reaction to how linear it was.
The SA-X was incredible, very anime feeling where the power scaling gets shown to you "this is you in the last game, look at how your lasers bounce off of your old armour". Also the "Alien" (xenomorph) inspiration is massive in this series.
The introduction of Adam leaves as sour taste in my mouth
My first Metroid game was Metroid Prime, and I liked Fusion. I think the people saying a game in the Metroid series is 'not a Metroid game', what they really mean is that it doesn't feel like Castlevania.
Wrong.
The term "Metroidvania" comes from Metroid and Metroid alone.
The Castlevania games in question got all their inspiration from Metroid.
Are you saying Castlevania isn't a good Metroid game?@@sidnew2739
I really love Fusion, this was a great video about it! There are some things I wasn't crazy about though. I agree that there needed to be a way to skip dialogue. I was also confused as to why Ridley was even in BSL, it felt like it was just shoe horned in as a boss fight at the end for fan service. Also, why is the final boss of Fusion an omega metroid? That also felt kinda underwhelming. I also noticed since I've been replaying it on Switch, the game is quite difficult! I somehow didn't realize in my first play through, but Samus is really squishy lol
2 days straight thanks to official nintendo players guide. Good game.
I played this metroid game first
I used it to get used to the combat (i have high adaptability)
Then I played zero mission, getting used to the maze-style gameplay
Those 2 games gave me the skills and intuition to play the rest (it was all this year XD)
Unrelated, but there's a rom hack for Fusion called "Samus Goes to the Fridge to Get a Glass of Milk". I assume it's a joke about how linear the game is because Adam requests you to, you guessed it, grab him a glass of milk from the fridge at 2AM.
i covered it in my most recent video!
14:38
The sa-x scares me more now after playing super
Because now I know what it can do
I put my hat in for more reviews on other series.
"People who think it's too linear, and people it was their first Metroid game"
While yes it was my first Metroid game, and yes I agree it's pretty linear, I still love it to death, especially with Dread being the next game in the chronology. The X Parasite were so interesting to me and learning that the Metroid creatures, these hated things I hear so many people complain about, is the bioengineer predator of these things? Cool as hell.
I think Fusion is my favorite Metroid game. I think for replayability, the complete lack of handholding is the best approach. For widespread mass appeal you do as much handholding as possible. Fusion did half and half while still maintaining the classic metroid formula as best as possible. While I wouldn't suggest that they make future metroid games with a heavy emphasis on story or suspense, I do think that the small amount that they did on this game works well to help you feel invested especially as a first time player of the game. I don't think sequence breaking is essential to the metroid experience. Pretty much all games are linear. Just because you can do things out of order doesn't mean you should, nor does it make that act enjoyable. I don't object to giving people the option to get things slightly out of order but I wouldn't consider it good game design.
fusion is my favorite of the 2d games! :D
Thx for your work :)
fusion is a good game and i enjoyed it , but i do also think it can somewhat debated if it's a proper metroid game , due to how it tries to blend more game generas into the mix with following an unskipable story from a narrator , hard locking the sequence breaks down to an measly inconsequential 1 , and the survival horror events
also maybe the reason the omega metroid had different weaknesses this time is due to it being genetically endangered and cultivated by the federation
OK, so Fusion... Hooooooboy, Fusion... This is one of those ones that really just missed for me, personally. While I won't say that linearity makes it a non-Metroid game (never understood that argument, myself), I'm a damn fool for a nice sequence break. But what really hit me wrong was the audio. Not the musical composition or anything like that. The SFX and "instruments" in the music just hit my ears like nails on chalkboard. Compositionally speaking, the music's quite good. Not on the level of Super Metroid, but definitely not bad by any means.
I just accept the lore from this one and call it good, lmfao...
Wait? This game is HARD? How? Except for Neo Ridley, all of the bosses in Fusion have patterns that are fairly easy to memorize... Oh well.
Too bad you didn't enjoy Fusion as much as me and others, but I'm glad you pointed at its contribution to the series in terms of gameplay, graphics, story telling and ambiance.
It's hard because the enemies do a huge amount of damage, it's not just about pattern recognition
This is one of the easier metroid games I thought. It's still a great game.
It can be hard. While if you're cautious you can probably avoid dying, enemies are punishingly powerful. One hit from an enemy costs you about a full health slot and killing them almost never gives you a red X-parasite to absorb, meaning you're either getting a missile refill or a tiny bit of health. Compare that to Zero Mission where large health drops were not uncommon and you can see why this game might be considered more difficult to players who don't want to walk through every room like they're trying to avoid stepping on razor-blades without shoes on.
I plan to eventually try out Metroid Dread, but I worry about how well I'll be able to handle it without the crutch of save states. Metroid Fusion could be really hard, you rarely ever got back even a quarter of the health lost from a scrap with an X-parasite even with the more basic ones, but it did feel mostly manageable, I guess.
I've also always wanted to get into the Prime trilogy. I did actually try the first game back on Gamecube a long ways back but I never really beat it. I might pick up the remaster on Switch someday, but that's only one of three of those games. Perhaps it'd be better if I just emulated on Gamecube instead and used save states there. It's a different sort of game, so I won't *need* them maybe, but anything that alleviates difficulty goes a long way towards just letting me enjoy the game. I'll have to think on it. For now, I guess I'm finished with the Metroid series, but I'll absolutely be replaying Zero Mission and Fusion again in the future and most likely AM2R. I'll give Super Metroid another shot down the line, but there's no telling how far in the future that'll be.
Well done
My favourite thing about Fusion is the art. Holy hell does this game look GOOD. So crisp, clean and colourful - almost like a Mega Man X game. The red outline on the environments is a stroke of genius, and the fusion suit is pimpin. Zero Mission looks like crap in comparison. The high-fidelity, high-contrast backgrounds just look cheap next to Fusion's pixel art.
i actually kinda like zero mission's art design because it's very reminiscent of the original NES game, while improving all the details and making everything more visually distinct and less copy-pasted everywhere. both games also look better if you play them on emulators and change their color palettes to be less blown out and high contrast, which i believe is something nintendo themselves does on NSO haha
Anyone notice that the jump mechanic is sometimes a bit unresponsive? Like sometimes you only jump halfway, even if you press the button normally? Could be a switch thing.
That's probably a Switch thing. I was playing on my RG35XX Plus and didn't feel that was an issue. I did struggle getting the pattern down for space jumping in this game, though. You have to jump just as you're going down and if you didn't jump high enough it's easy to mess it up and make it feel impossible to space jump at all. I found it a little frustrating, but managed well enough by the end to get through some tougher sections.
I've beaten all the 2d metroids besides 2 and its remake and I think fusion is the best. Dread is a close second though.
You should play 2
i never really minded adam i think hes cool
i love the Metroid series so much, really but i have never really dug Fusion. The suit looks beyond stupid and the constant handholding not only ruins the isolation but also the exploration. But for a GBA title, it's pretty good.
1:28
Yes, me
I remember this as one of the best games I played as a kid. But we only had the Japanese version. I never understood the story. Was this uncommon? 😂
I finished the whole game based solely on context clues 😆 If only I knew about walkthroughs back then...
I actually hated using the R button for missiles. One thing I always felt was superior about Super Metroid was that you could toggle on missiles and LEAVE THEM ON, rather than always having to remember to press yet another button. It was just replacing the annoyance of the run button with another annoyance. It's been an ongoing frustration for me because I much preferred being able to use that button for diagonal aiming, and that it led to the modern free aim mode being the same way actually increased the frustration because then you have to hold one button to aim, a second to use missiles, and a third to shoot, where in the old way you would just need to aim diagonal with one button, and shoot freely with the other because missiles would remain activated.
I really disagree with most conclusions here. I think the story is amazing. Even that moment where Adam suggests a better plan. Adam is the ONE person Samus knows who is a better tactician better than her. Meaning when she comes up with a “good plan” it makes sense Adam comes up with a “better plan” I don’t think a single moment in the game is contrived.
Is it bad that my first time beating this game was on a phone emulator while out camping with my family
emulation is based
I didn’t remember how good this game was until I replayed it after Dread. Fusion is a much better game.
Thanks! Good review. I tried this recently and it was pretty decent, but eventually I got tired of the clinical linear setting, and being told what to do. Much preferred Super and Zero Mission.
I'm glad I'm not the only one who feels Fusion isn't a fun game to revisit. I really enjoy what Fusion did for Samus as a character and how it ties together her arc of suffering through the karma of committing genocide on the Metroids and suffering the consequences of her actions and accepting it through becoming a Metroid and eradicating the X-Parasites herself, and the tighter gameplay innovations Fusion introduced are also really good, but the linearity and unskippable text just make the game not fun to replay. Zero Mission has all of the benefits of Fusion's tighter more refined gameplay without the strict linearity and unskippable text, which is why I just prefer to replay that game instead for a much more fun time. I do really respect and appreciate what Fusion did for Samus's story though, and think it's a very unique game, even if I don't plan to ever replay it myself.
Sam Hyde reference.
Subbed.
Lmao in what way is Prime 2 the "hardest game in the entire series"?! Metroid Dread is WAAAAAY harder. In fact, I think almost every 2D game is harder than any of the Prime games, the kind of casual ease of the Prime games compared to the 2D games is one small part of why I enjoy them so much. Although, Dread is my favorite 2D game in the series, despite its absurd difficulty. "The atmosphere of Dark Aether hurting you and having limited ammo for your beams" is probably the most commonly cited reason I've heard for Prime 2 supposedly being hard but, umm, there are light beacons to heal you, just try not rushing through Dark Aether and the Beam ammo thing really isn't a problem if you know what you're doing. Just use the opposite Beam to get ammo, it's not that hard.
This was uploaded before Dread came out. The parts I mainly had trouble with in Prime 2 were the bosses, specifically on the GameCube version since you can't jump in morph ball for Spider Guardian and can't look up as easily for Quadraxis and Emperor Ing among others. I actually liked the ammo management aspect of the game lol.
I didn't like Fusion, but for different reasons than what you listed in your 2 Camps. I dislike Fusion because of how much Fusion seemed bent on that subversion. It was rough, because I can deal with "you can't get here... yet" text walls, but why is Samus, who up until this point was a lone wolf bounty hunter, now, suddenly, rank and file? I dislike the entire game because the entirety of the game takes away my agency, not Samus's agency. There's always a "this is the order you're supposed to do things in" but up to this point, you never needed to follow that any more than you wanted to. In Fusion, you're playing a room by room platforming puzzle adventure, which isn't really a Metroid game, so much as a Mega Man game. This game was really unfortunate and I don't consider myself a fan of anything after Metroid 3 due to all of these decisions. Even future games pulled the same kind of thing, and I was never really able to get back into the series because of all this development decisions nonsense.
Seripusly of all the Metroids ive played, Fusion is the most boring of them all. Which says a lot when you consider the monocolor tedium of Metroid 2.
Zero mission was the best game ever. Fusion was 2nd best