Super Metroid - Is it THAT good or it's just not well aged?

[Paulinho]

I'm a 2d metroid enthusiastic since when I was a kid. I've played zero mission and fusion lots of times and when i find the rom hacking scene i've played lots of rom hacks from those games too. I've played AM2R too on PC.

After dread was announced i deciced that i had to play the only 2d metroid game I've never played before, and that was Super Metroid (On official SNES emulator on Nintendo Switch)

i've beaten the game with 62% items on a 6 hour playthrough. Although there are clearly some nice moves that we don't have in GBA games, i feel like the game didn't aged well. Samus movements aren't as good as on GBA games for example. I don't have in mind at least for now any idea on playing it again or trying some super metroid hacks

I know the most active metroid hacking scene is on super metroid, but why? Does super metroid gives more freedom to make better rom hacks? Or does in general people prefer hacking super metroid because of nostalgia?

If anyone that only played super metroid after being older could give their opinions on that post i'd appreciate

[alexman25]

I'd say that Super Metroid is generally still a fantastic game. I didn't really get into the series until a couple years ago, so for me I can at least say it's not nostalgia blindness.

While, the game certainly has aged a bit poorly in some places, it's still nothing short of amazing. The controls are a bit clunky, but in general the atmosphere, map design, and many other features about it are a golden standard.

Super Metroid has the most active hacking scene for many reasons.

1: The vast majority of people who've played at least one Metroid game have played Super Metroid. It's simply the most popular good game of the series, so it's the one everyone knows about.

2: Hardware. Being on the SNES, which many ROM hackers are already familiar with from hacking other games (such as Super Mario World), gives Super Metroid an advantage. A lot of hackers won't generally be going in completely blind because they already have some knowledge of what the SNES could do.

3: Age. Super Metroid is an older game than, say, Metroid Fusion. People had more time to get attached and learn about it, and thus start hacking it. To my knowledge, people were already hacking the game in the 90's, and there was a competent editor out by at least 2003 (Hey, that's my birth year). Because of this, there was a lot of extra time to build up information. By the time people were familiar enough with Fusion and Zero Mission's inner workings to create an editor for it, there was already a fully built up scene for a different Metroid game with a lot more information gathered.

Newer GBAtroid editors such as MAGE and Double Helix 2 have the advantage of being far easier to use than something like SMILE, but even that's going away as newer Super Metroid editors are being created to streamline things.

4: Status quo. People have been hacking Super Metroid for a long time. Since it's the most popular option, that means it's what newer interested parties will see, which will then continue to feed into its popularity. As they say: The bigger it is, the faster it grows.

I'm sure there are several more reasons, but these are some of the easiest I could think of off the top of my head. As a NEStroid and Zero Mission hacker myself, I truthfully don't know much about Super Metroid hacking beyond what I've listed here, so others would be better for answering questions in a more technical vein.

To sum things up: Yes, nostalgia is a big part of it , but there are many other reasons too. Super Metroid isn't just well-regarded because we played it while we were young, but rather because there's a damn good game despite a few small rough patches. As with everything, it's complicated.

While I truthfully wish that ZM and Fusion were a bit more popular in the hacking word, Super Metroid has fairly earned its place at the top.

[benox50]

I would add that while ZM is sorta the perfect bland template to start an hack, it doesnt have the amount of variety SM has, mostly in term of enemies. At the other side fusion is amazing in term of content, but has all the linear blockades and a less refined ZM controls (same core gameplay but older). Still, people will go for their prefered game and for most of them will be SM.
Its the oldest metroid game that can still stand straight today, we can agree that m1 and m2 while still worth, have aged poorly and mostly paved the way to the more refined formula we know today of SM and beyond. So we can say that we have a high level of nostalgia backed-up by a solid core gameplay with SM.

Since Im an SM guy and I saw more than the surface level, I can say some parts have indeed aged poorly even in the code compared to modern standards, for example the weapon selection is near garbo. But why this game is so interesting its because its unique and deep. AM2R didnt chose SM core gameplay, joined ZM core gameplay to make a trio, SM still stand alone and unique in its jankiness, but stands strong. The momentum movement gives some of what make sonic great, giving a less rigid, more dynamic platforming. Hacks like Project Base showed us how much of a beast SM can become, upgrading beautifull movements into a majestic and flashy speedrun. This slower exploration game compared to ZM can really be pushed-up, because SM has a really high skill ceiling and is full of technical complexities that add alot of gameplay depth. That technical depth is what some crave and they can put countless of hours into becoming an SM archeologue, discovering new techs and playing with all those options, either if they are faithfull or glitches.

[bluepikachu7]

I think people are also really into the non-linearity of Super. Personally, I'm not a fan of non-linear Metroid games, because I get lost and don't think it's fun spending hours trying to figure out where I have to go, but that's just me. I'm probably about halfway in between a casual and hardcore player. The prime series is my personal favorite.

[FelixWright]

Particularly good metroid games like super and zero mission have a fine balance between linear and nonlinear. Believe it or not even Super has an intended route so if you ever feel lost the path forward is probably gonna be nearby. For example once you fall down red brinstar you need ice beam to go back up so you're locked in that part of the game until you get it. The path of progression is pretty straight forward; you get morph and missiles in blue brinstar, then get bombs in crateria, then get charge and supers in red brinstar. Everything that you *need* to be able to progress is almost always close by.  If you ever get stuck it primarily just comes down to remembering your journey to that point and what tools you have to progress. If that takes you hours to figure out, just remember to use bombs more, or try to fill all the map tiles in a room.

I personally got lost far more often playing the prime games, particularly prime1 because backtracking felt a lot more random. You get the gravity suit in phendrana drifts then you have to go across the entire planet back to phazon mines to get phazon suit... Stuff like that I find particularly unintuitive in a metroid game. And don't even get me started on the mandatory fetch quests at the end of each prime. The only one I was okay with was the one in prime 3 because 1) you didn't need all the fuel cells to get to the last part of the game and 2) skytown provided a map to not only get 100% items but also 100% collectibles. I've 100% items in prime 2 and 3 but have yet to do so for prime 1. Of the three I like prime 2 the most but I much prefer the 2d games overall.

[Zincoshine]

It has it's faults but in my experience if you start fresh after having been away for a year or two, you're going to get sucked into it all over again. It's one of the few metroidvanias that I've played multiple times.