Live Blogs Mother, May I See Metroid: Other M

Korval2012-05-18 15:55:43

Metroid: Other M is the ninth game in the popular Metroid series from Nintendo. Other M was developed in tandem between Nintendo of Japan and Namco's Team Ninja, the latter responsible for games such as the Ninja Gaiden series and the Do A games. The game was released in 2010 to some initial fanfare, which quickly degenerated into hellish flamewars and a cacophony of Ruined FOREVER chants. Much has been said about this game, some in bestial rage, others in impassioned defense.

And now I'm going to look at it. But not all of it; just the story. Why?

Because I'm not playing this game. It's that simple.

To play this game would ultimately mean giving financial compensation to Nintendo for it in some way, shape, or form. That would mean tacitly rewarding them for having produced this game. And I will not do that. Buying something, or not buying it, is the only real means of control consumers have over those who produce things in a capitalist society. To purchase a product is to give approval to the producer for that product. To not purchase it is the only means of saying "DO NOT WANT!"

Yes, I could buy it used or something. But I'm still not going to do that.

This all being said, I also refuse to discuss the game based entirely on online play-throughs, Let's Play's, and other such freely available material. To do so would be entirely unfair; watching a game is a fundamentally different experience from playing it.

And that is why this is just a look at the story of Other M, because watching a story is no different from playing it. The game has a special Theater Mode that shows off the story. The game designers have clearly gone through the trouble of making it into an actual first-class mode. They stitch the various cutscenes together with enough "gameplay" for you to understand what's going on. And since it clocks in at a bit more than 2 hours in total, that makes it the equivalent of a feature-length movie.

Now, you might say that it's unfair to discuss a game's story based on just watching cutscenes. I disagree, if for no other reason than that the game developers created Theater Mode. This isn't some people online shoving the cutscenes together. The game developers themselves thought that people would enjoy the story outside of the gameplay; they felt that the story was strong enough to stand up without gameplay. They were so certain of this that they spent time and effort building this special viewing mode just to promote such behavior.

Consider how few game developers think their story is strong enough to work outside of the gameplay.

That being said, and in all fairness to Other M, I do recognize one simple fact: Theater Mode is still just a bunch of cutscenes stitched together. Therefore, I'm making some ground rules about what I can't complain about, in order to at least be somewhat fair to the game.

Ground Rules

No pacing: Many of these cutscenes were intended to be viewed with significant time between them, representing various bits of gameplay. But Theater Mode sticks these cutscenes right next to each other. While Theater Mode may be a legitimate form of experiencing the story, that doesn't change the fact that the game, the primary mode of play, puts significant gameplay between some of these scenes.

Since I am not playing the game, and therefore cannot accurately gauge how much time has passed, I will not make any significant comment on the pacing between cutscenes. For example, if there is repetition among cutscenes that have gameplay between them, I will ignore it. That's simply the nature of videogame storytelling; the user could have stopped playing between then and now. So you need a way to get them back up to speed. Even if they didn't actually stop play, that could still have been hours ago.

Do note what I said: "pacing between cutscenes." Pacing within a single, continuous scene is fair game. And yes, I do know which scenes are continuous and which aren't; I may not have played this game, but I am familiar with it.

No gameplay: I am covering Other M's story, and only the story. Gameplay will be mentioned in the event that it actually directly affects the story narrative in some way. And even then, it will be limited to how it affects the story narrative; how it affects the player will be irrelevant.

No visual storytelling: Metroid is a series that's known for finding unusual ways to do storytelling. Dialog is generally not the go-to place for Metroid storytelling. Indeed, the Metroid game (before Other M) that had the most dialog was Fusion, and that's something quite a few fans hold against it to this day. The developers at Retro Studios came up with the scanning mechanic as a way to have exposition without having to have dialog. In general, Metroid games tend towards visual storytelling when possible. Even Fusion. By visual storytelling, I mean using the environment and aspects of the visuals besides text as a storytelling device.

I've seen a lot of Other M. I've seen it several different people play it from beginning to end. I don't feel that it does visual storytelling very well (or at all, really). But at the same time, I haven't played it. So I don't feel comfortable calling the game out for visual storytelling or any lack thereof.

No Yoshio Sakamoto: Yoshio Sakamoto was the director behind Metroid, Super Metroid, Metroid: Fusion, and Metroid: Zero Mission. So basically, almost all of the 2D Metroid games were done under his direction. And he was the director of Metroid: Other M as well.

Much has been said of his involvement in the process of making the game. Some of it is conjecture, some backed up by evidence from interviews, etc. And if you want to read that, that's great. But that's not what this is about, so I'm not going to say the man's name. I will talk about the makers of the game, but only in a vague "the writers" sense, which I would do for any other story.

So if you're looking for a personal hit-piece*

Comments

nomuru2d Since: Dec, 1969

May 23rd 2012 at 9:14:57 PM

Oh man, I didn't think I'd make it through the gigantic wall. So much deconstruction that it's ridiculous, but it's a very well thought-out read.

MadWritter Since: Dec, 1969

May 24th 2012 at 4:02:44 AM

Hey, China called. They want their wall back!

Korval Since: Dec, 1969

May 24th 2012 at 7:22:36 AM

Yeah, that was kinda lengthy. Especially when you realize that the entire scene is only about 7 minutes of Theater Mode, and the egregious part is 1 minute.

I felt the length was necessary due to how often and how vehemently people actually defend this. It really amazes me how often it is that people really don't get what the problem is with this scene.

On the plus side, none of the other sections will be as long. There's one that gets somewhat close, but that one is more due to the sheer density of stupid in the scene being described.

Korval Since: Dec, 1969

May 24th 2012 at 9:54:41 AM

I've split it up into three parts, to make it less text-wally.

nomuru2d Since: Dec, 1969

May 24th 2012 at 10:42:22 AM

It's okay by me, man.

Tuckerscreator Since: Dec, 1969

May 25th 2012 at 12:05:07 PM

There seemed to be a conspicuous lack of uproar at "Ridley is a Furby". Perhaps that's because of the sheer idiocy of the "Samus freezes up" scene. But I thought it sounded like a strange idea at best, a dumb one at worst, for Ridley to be a fluffy thing. Good to hear that's the case.

crazyrabbits Since: Dec, 1969

Aug 31st 2012 at 3:50:34 PM

I remember when Samus actually took her helmet off at the end of Prime 1, and stood there for a moment looking at the destruction while holding said helmet in her hand. Other M screwed the pooch when it came to her suit's powers.

Wraith_Magus Since: Dec, 1969

Sep 5th 2012 at 9:22:40 PM

I know it's sort of late and a side-bit, but actually, there was some justification for the suit disintegrating from previous Metroid works.

Chozo suits (and the Chozo's psychic powers themselves, in a sense) function on an ability to turn matter into energy (or maybe just shift them into a pocket dimension at will) and back into matter again at extremely high rates of speed.

First, consider that missiles are essentially phased-in on demand without needing any sort of belt feed or ammo clip even though Samus can literally carry hundreds at a time. Ammo is held as energy inside her suit capacitors.

Second, consider her right arm - for a long time, fans of Metroid considered Samus's cannon to be a prosthetic because it clearly occupied the same space as her forearm. Parts of Prime contradict this, since the X-Ray visor lets you see arm bones inside the cannon (even nearly to the tip of the cannon, which leaves no space for that cannon to actually charge up energy), but generally, it's implied that Samus's forearm is actually turned into energy when her arm cannon is in play.

Third, the Morph Ball doesn't involve Samus just tucking into a ball. Read that part in Prime 1 where you read the datalog about Space Pirates trying to copy the morph ball again - it actually involves turning Samus's body into energy and morphing the shape of the armor around the energy ball her body was turned into. In fact, you can outright see this in Hunters, and to a lesser extent in some of the Prime balls after you get charge ball.

Fourth, the whole suit comes off at will like it does in Other M at the end of Prime 2 and converts her back to "zero suit". Meaning, basically, that her whole suit, or any part of it (she can just take off the helmet, for example) materializes or disintigrates at will.

Finally, in the comic put into parts of the old Nintendo Power magazines, there was a Metroid comic. At one point in the comic, right before the first boss in Brinstar, Samus was being accompanied by another bounty hunter, presumably just so she had someone to talk to, since the comic would need some dialogue to keep things interesting. (Notably, he was portrayed as generally incompetent and Samus was having to save him frequently in between her insistence that he go home and leave things to her.)

At one point, however, in the middle of talking to the other bounty hunter, a spike trap pops up and spears Samus in the arm, right through her power armor. The other bounty hunter freaks out, and drags her off the scene, and flies her to the "only family she has", which is her Chozo wizened old kung-fu mentor guy. He explains that the power armor is based upon her will and concentration, and will not properly materialize if she doesn't stay in the right frame of mind. When the bounty hunter sheepishly asks if he was at fault for distracting Samus, the chozo responds that it was unlikely, and that it was more likely that she was disturbed by the disappearance of the Metroid Hatchling. (Incidentally, he heals Samus with the power bomb heal trick.)

Leopoldshark Since: Dec, 1969

Oct 15th 2012 at 12:43:31 AM

For the missile thing, would Samus be able to use any type of energy to form a missile? In the games, different ammo pickups were separate. Health was also a separate pickup. If Samus could use any type of energy, you could logically assume that Samus would be able to convert health energy into ammo if she needed, and vice versa.

That being said, I would think for a warrior like Samus who has undergone extreme physical and mental training, maintaining the suit during crisis situations would be extremely important. She probably was trained extensively just for that. The Chozo battle suit is regarded as one of the most powerful weapons in the galaxy not because it is rare, but because Samus is probably the only being who is able to use it.

Still, I don't like the whole "materialize" thing. Seems too magical and less sci-fi. For Morph Ball, I had always thought that her Chozo DNA allowed her to contort her body in ways that other beings could not (curling up into a ball is a Chozo-unique ability and they did it for ritualistic purposes if you look at the Chozo statues with their palms open).

You probably know more about the source material than I do, but sometimes the source material makes just about as much sense as the games.