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+--- Thread: Metroid quipping (/showthread.php?tid=7609)
Metroid quipping - Dark Jaguar - 15th November 2025
Well, the preview reviews of Metroid 4 are coming along and we're getting word that early in the new game, you rescue a guy who, from that point on, constantly makes Marvel movie style quips about every little thing you encounter. There's a number of fans who are afraid this is going to ruin the mood of the game, and I think I'm one of them. I know Nintendo have more and more loved their little sidekick characters in their main franchises. Breath of the Wild was notable in it's LACK of a sidekick making comments as you went along, for example. Some of them are very annoying, like Fi, and others are actually very compelling and well written, like the fun Pixar character they turned Pauline into in the newest DK.
But I've never seen a Nintendo game with a constantly quipping Marvel character before... and I gotta tell you... it was already getting old in Marvel movies. There's a reason the new Fantastic Four movie's lack of such quipping was such a breath of fresh air. Sincerity and the willingness to just hang on a moment and allow some tension are a good thing now and then, perhaps even as the default. I just... I don't like it. I don't have a holistic view of the game to really say whether or not it "works" in this particular game or anything, but taken by itself? I don't like it.
RE: Metroid quipping - Dark Jaguar - 29th March 2026
Now I DO have a holistic view of the game, and I still really don't like it. It's not ever-present, which is a mercy at least.
RE: Metroid quipping - Sacred Jellybean - 30th March 2026
Is it out? How is it otherwise? I'm not surprised, a side-kick character makings quips is bloody awful. Sounds like it ruins the tension and atmosphere. Metroid is about feeling isolated in a strange and alien world. Keep that comedic relief out of there!
RE: Metroid quipping - Dark Jaguar - 31st March 2026
I'm not even opposed to some cuteness or comedic bits once in a while, like the little critters teaching you techniques in Metroid 3, but yeah, why did every Marvel character turn into SpiderHyphenMan?
Anyway, I'll give a more general opinion of it. The Amiibo unlock motorcycle functions, such as a music player and some side "missions" to grind up distance driven for skins. The skins are meh, but the music player is mission-critical! So, that motorcycle. The game is very much like the previous Metroid games, but with a central "hub world". It's a big BIG desert full of rather dull collectibles that every other section links to, and which you need Samus' new "Samus Cycle" (available in time for Christmas at your local K.B. Toy Store) to get around in. At this point, amiibos are so annoyingly disappointing that I say just download a phone app to use the phone's NFC to emulate whatever Amiibo you need. They aren't being used for anything novel at this point, just expensive DLC. That desert is the biggest gripe of the game's design. It's dull, it's sandy, it gets everywhere, and the "music" isn't much to listen to while in it either. That's why I called that radio unlock "mission critical". It lets you play whatever song you like, Grand Theft Auto style, and fill that dead air.
Alright, those are the three criticisms I've got. The typical paywalled content of any Nintendo game supporting Amiibos these days, the quipping little sidekick guy, who mercifully comes and goes so he's not ALWAYS there, and the largely empty desert hub location. The rest of the game? It's classic Metroid Prime. It's not bad, not bad at all. If you can get past those points of friction, you'll enjoy it... at least until you have to go into the desert or listen to Quips McGee. Man just... shut up and look pretty over there somewhere. There's women at work.
I'm not going to call it a bad mark on an otherwise spotless franchise mind you. Metroid 2's "dark world" had a lot of dead ends that required far too much backtracking even for a Metroid game. Metroid 3 broke up the world into individual planets that weren't as interconnected as one would expect from the genre. Metroid 4 just continues that steady trend. The developers seem to REALLY love focusing in on storylines with the Federation soldiers and... I'm not sure how many people actually care that much about the Federation. To me, they're set dressing. They can introduce interesting plot elements, but I really don't want them to be the narrative focus. We get Other M that way.
Oh, about Other M! I recently found out that a lot of the major complaints are a result of VERY bizarre translation choices. Apparently, Samus WAS in fact a strong independent woman in the Japanese script, and while she did develop an admiring relationship towards Adam in that version, she wasn't sworn to obey his orders. She actually spoke out against him numerous times in the Japanese script and objected to specific orders not to use her various powerups at multiple parts. Something as simple as that really changes the whole feel of the story, to such an extent there's a fan translation that uses the Japanese voice acting with better translated subtitles that's becoming the favorite way to play the game. It doesn't fix ALL the issues with the story, but it fixes ENOUGH to make it tolerable, ENOUGH that I no longer feel the need to insert my head cannon she's a mentally stunted clone. It works "well enough" now that it doesn't butcher Samus' whole personality. Now, as to WHY they made such bizarre translation choices, apparently Nintendo's own internal localization teams weren't used for the game. Since it was developed by Platinum, their localization team was used instead, and they made those choices. I do hope if they ever decide to port Other M to modern systems, they take the time to fully retranslate the game.