Metroid Other ZM - A Metroid Zero Mission Hack

[MultiKoopa]

Space Pirates drop Missiles, but the droprate is relatively low. I'm experimenting with different droprates at the moment to make it neither too annoying nor too easy to just blast you way through. If you find it too difficult, you can always come back later with more ammo.

Bachelor Thesis is eating up my time, though. Next update will take a while.

Good luck with the Thesis :)

[makazuwr32]

aaand i made it!
i complete the game on normal with only 14% items.
morph ball, bombs, speed booster, ice beam, power grip, 4 normal missle tanks, 4 super missle tanks, 1 energy tank
that was really-really hard. but because i actually don't need unknown itmes for completeng the game i could get more missles/super missles and more energy.
the hardest moment was run through chosodia for ice beam - i had only 20 missles and i tried not to spend them if i could run away
and the second hardest was final fight with 2 black pirates.
in total 11 hours 21 minutes and 17 seconds with using only ingame saves.
i don't know how i'll get with less than 15% items through the game on hard...

[renkoha]

hi i got version 3.7 from romhacking.net, i have played up until kraid and have found a bug with map here is a pic

[renkoha]

hi everyone i think i'm stuck in kraidf i got the speed booster and now i can't get out, i have a savastate before going down to lower part of kraid, is something i use to do in original game to calmly explore and then go right where i need, now i'm stuck because when i get to the room with three entrances i can't access to lower left one, according to previous post this room has both missile blocks that once destroyed don't respawn and some that do, i destroyed one in left side before going down and when i got sb i destroyed another in right side, i came back to the room with the big wall of screw attack and space jump blocks but i can't get past to left side of that wall which leads out of kraid and onto next areas, so i need some hints if i have everything right or precise instrucctions if i didn't do something right before going down to kraid's lower part, thanks for your time guys and to creator great hack! reminds me of my favorite hack for super metroid, redesing, both hacks are great

edit: nevermind guys i figured it out myself, i'm having my way with norfair right now

[renkoha]

hi everybody any advise for getting super missile tank in chozodia? (ship part you can access early in the game, the one close to the room with four floating spheres)

[renkoha]

guys i'm stuck in ridley, i'm in the rooms before ridley chamber but can't get trough missile blocks in the room that connects upper and lower level, i tried bombing and shooting from above and below but there doesn't seem to be anything unusual and all missile blocks reappear when going out and back in, any hint?

[makazuwr32]

guys i'm stuck in ridley, i'm in the rooms before ridley chamber but can't get trough missile blocks in the room that connects upper and lower level, i tried bombing and shooting from above and below but there doesn't seem to be anything unusual and all missile blocks reappear when going out and back in, any hint?

did you tried shoot missles at the floor?

[renkoha]

guys i'm in my second run in hard mode and i think there is a bug because in in the room next to escape ships but the door there is gray and the floor is made of screw attack blocks, i can't take other routes bacuase they are sealed up by missiles or fall trough blocks, has this happen to anyone? pd i had no trouble at all in normal mode

[renkoha]

alright i finally finish my third run on this hack and after carefully consider good and bad points i'll give this hack a 8/10 rate why?

well the hack sure is really fun you can notice the creator innvested a lot time a effort into this project and for that i'm gratefull however there are a couple of bugs and failures that needs to be fixed in order to ensure no bad surprises are waiting around the corner, i'll begin with bugs then good and bad point, and last but not least my suggestions for this project

bugs

1) on either normal or hard mode when you get the missile tank in brinstar that is protected by an unknow item block and which is in the same vertical level than super missile protected by screw attack blocks the brow enemy turns into a dark blue rectangle with yellow letters, although if you go out and re-enter the room everything is normal

2) when you get the later screw attack and recharge at that chozo statue ammo counters palette's mess up, but this is fixed by recharging at any other place.

3) in metroid room you can go in and out if you get caught by a metroid and exit the room with metroid you permanently get stuck with underwater speed regardless the suit you have at the moment, however i obtained this effect while wearing normal/varia/gravity but wasn't unable to test if obatining another suit afterwarsd removes this effect

4) kraid has two bugs with map, the first one is a misplaced marker for a hidden passage that leads to lower right part of the room with three entrances and has the missile block that must be accessed from two sides in order get past this point, when you access this passage the map jumps to upper right part of kraid not allowing you to mark that section in your map, however all upper right part of kraid is correctly marked, the second bug is related to total items count missile tanks to be specific, the counter says there are 9 tanks but in reality you can obtain 10, i tried completing the game with this tank collected and got a 100% item count and a 99% without the tank so this means the game has the total item count right since i never got an over hundred item count, but map counter does not

5) i don't know exactly why but on my third run i got the early power bombs and when i got to the pipe you can break by setting a power bomb that glass didn't shattered, i used multiple bombs but got no result, this however happened when it was raining and before getting full suit, after getting the full suit the glass sattered normally

6) this is something tht happened on normal mode only, in hard mode the didn't happende, in norfair in the room where you must fight the insect cocoon in the ceiling, there is an entrance that is blocked during the fight and cleared once you make the cocoon fall to the ground and then leave and re-enter the room but in normal mode that entrance in cleared since the begining making possible to skip the fight

7) this happened in hard mode as well but i will try to confirm it for normal mode, after getting early power bombs if you go all the way up to your ship you'll find is not there, apparently someone took it for a short ride XD since after beating mother brain your ship returns to where is supposed to be, and trust me when i tell you i was glad to see it there, otherwise i would have been done for

that it for the bugs i have found so far, i'll give this thing a fourth run later and check if i didn't miss anything

[renkoha]

now onto the good and bad points.

good points

1) routes redesing is as stated by creator, they were made for experienced and or advanced players, personally i loved how they were made

2) despite being slow at the begining, after the first run when you have learned what you need to traverse the areas, the game flow feels good through later runs, making you to feel confortable and raising significantly your chances of finding things you missed on previous run, so i belived that game progression is good as it is right now

3) the posibility of skipping boss battles as well as getting certain upgrade before if you are skilled enough is a good point since feels as a reward for being good at understanding and deciphering the game

4) back in the original game i always wondered why and how the f**k samus get to the staring point since is blocked by bomb/speed/powerbomb blocks it just don't make any sense at all, that's why i'm glad to see the adventure begins where the spaceship is, that make a lot more sence for me, is the same with removing the charge beam from the worn miniboss, it was good because since he never used any beam attack there is absolutely no reason for him to have that thing, even if it was meant as a reward for defeating him, if you ask me energy and missiles are more than enough 

6) adding a special upgrade for skipping the power grip is also a good thing, i liked that challenge, is a bit annoying sometimes but is nothing you can't get past with the right timing, but as you said is rewarding, although i'm pretty sure i won't be skipping the power grip in every run, i did it more to see what is was like

now onto the bad points

1) i'll begin with the biggest exploration problem in kraid, here is the issue, as you may know there is a room in lower right kraid that has three entrances two on left side and one on right side (this one is hidden in a small passage) this room has missile blocks that must be destroyed in order to clear the path so you can pass from one side to another, however in order to understand the trouble i'll name the entrances like this, 1 for left upper, 2 for left lower and 3 for right lower, now once you clear the missiles you can pass from 1 to 3 or from 2 to 3 in that order any other combination or order is impossible, in order to not get stuck in here you need to get to this room from 2 and then from 3 but if you don't get here from 3 then when you obtain the speed booster and try to go up you'll be totally blocked and you'll be forced to restart your game, why? well even thought you can go back to the room where elevator is you are blocked by space jump and screw attack blocks which you don't have at the moment, going back the way you came in is impossible because the way is blocked by power bomb, space jum and fall through blocks leaving you with no choice but to use the 3 entrances room to get to the room that will allow you to return, so in order to solve this problem i propose this, around that area is a missile tank protected by unknow item blocks which has a fake access to the tank getting you close to it but impossible to get from there, so i was thinking that since this is above of where you need to go you could set some fall trought blocks in that dead end and you are good to go, problem solved without too much redesing or tedious work, unless you want redesing the 3 entrances room structure, now i know you may say that space jump blocks is not an issue because you can get it for that moment and yes you are right, but given its location i believe most players won't have it by that moment at least not on their first run, that's why i suggest this change, of course if you don't want to spoil this route location you can always set the route someplace else, as long as you guarantee the existence of that route and you can get to it i'm fine regardless of location

2) Crateria, i always believed this area was a wasted space, why? well in super metroid redesing this area is heavely modified making it much more richier than before and i liked that because before that hack it was just empty space, so i think this place requires more work in order to effectively use it, for example i didn't like how some morphball shine spark items were removed from here, it makes the power bomb blocks in the elevator that leads to norfair and the speed block with gravity suit totally senseless that's why i'd like to request more love on that area (redesing, puzzles and items)

3) charge beam, i understand why you set it in that location, i also understand the effect you set on it but i'm not agree with it, why? well to begin with is an upgrade like long beam, "universal" to the type of beam, but don't get me wrong i'm totally agree with using only one type of beam at a time that adds a lot strategical gameplay however i also like the logic/reasonable mechanics, that's why i think that giving the charge beam the effect of allowing you to combine all kind of beams is not quite logical, this upgrade should be obtained late in the game (when getting full suit) but as screw attack and power bombs it should have a super secret early route so you can once again prove your skill, and removed that beam mixer effect, which should be given to a new item but i'll explain those details for next post which will contain the suggestions to improve the hack

4) although chozodia redesing is good i didn't like some item locations be removed i.e. energy tank close to mecha ridley in where you had to be good with space jump in order to get it, that was something i liked, as well as some shinespark pickups which you obtained going from one side to another above the glass pipe you can break with power bombs, and talking about that pipe, i think an item should be set in that room it doesn't have to be something big, a missile tank would be ok

5) ice beam and metroids, well something i never fully understood in original game is, why is the mission objetive to exterminate all metroids and they only appear in tourian? i mean shouldn't they be in all areas? that would make more sense to me, considering all that happens in the game the mission objetive should be defeat space pirates instead of "exterminating all metroids", that's why i think more metroid rooms should be implemented in the game i.e. it would be really interesting and exciting to see them trying to get you in crateria in the beginning and other areas, and mark those rooms with special colors like heated and secret rooms, that would add a lot more to carefull and strategical exploration, now about the ice beam, i think this needs a tweak, why? well if you get unknow items you could defeat kraid and ridley and then go to tourian without the ice beam and then you'll be a dead man

that my first review so i'll like to know your opinions about this guys

[Gunky]

Howdy! This hack intrigues me greatly as I've played and beaten Zero Mission hundreds of times since getting it in 05. I'm always looking for a new challenge (try doing the whole game without using the L button - it's tricky at first!), and this here just might be the ticket. When I first saw the Morph ball upgrade, figured out how to get to it, then died twice actually making my way there, I knew I'd be in for a hell of a good time. I was already hooked by the time I blasted those Power-Bomb-turned-Shot blocks and spent a good 20 minutes trying to wall jump from the door leading to the Missile tank to that raised platform which leads up to where the Varia Suit would be in the original. After connecting with and making a second wall jump off of that platform to get up on top of it (and failing miserably by forgetting to press right) a grand total of twice, I figured I'd come back and explore the place once I had my faithful Bombs to bounce indefinitely with, but...

[spoiler=I've figured out the cause of my woes! It turns out that the versions of VBA I was using were incompatible with the patched ROM. 1.8 works!]...Unfortunately, I seem to have come across a pretty big obstacle to my joy: upon acquiring the Bombs, the game itself hangs as soon as the Bombs item is activated. It doesn't hang if I touch the item while Morph Ball is deactivated, allowing me to pick up the Bombs as a deactivated item, but when I go to enable the Morph Ball then the Bombs the game immediately freezes once I hit Select to enable the Bombs. The emulators I've used (VBA-M on PC and VBA GX on the Wii) function properly. The game doesn't crash to the title screen or spazz out with audio glitches. It just sort of locks up with the music continuing as normal. It's a bit eerie. Has anyone else encountered this problem? If so, is there any way I might be able to rectify it? Alternatively, is there an older patch which doesn't have this very early game-ending bug? I've tried saving, not saving, getting and avoiding the Brinstar Map, getting to the bombs without dying, reloading the game from a save file from just before I get the bombs, patching the ROM, patching a different ROM, and loading the vanilla ROM with the patch in the same folder, but nothing seems to rectify the issue. Come to think of it, the only thing I haven't yet tried is playing the game on Easy instead of Normal. For reference, I'm using Patch 3.7 with an American ROM.[/spoiler]

I'll be editing this post periodically with feedback, thoughts, etc as I experience them.

[spoiler=Firstly...] I feel that this particular block, depicted here in both its Natural and Revealed states, should be tweaked to stand out a little more from its surroundings, whether it be extra crumbly, the "red dot" block in the midst of plenty other samey blocks, or just distinct in some manner. It would probably be of great help to those who find themselves in this room on the way to the Speed Booster. The little guy moving around up there gave me the subtle clue that I should see if I can find a way to join him, but bombing what I had thought was everything yielded no results. Considering there is A LOT of ground to cover in that room, and there's very powerful enemies which yield little to no reward, it was a bit daunting to go around bombing everything and I wound up missing the timing for a "reveal the ceiling" bomb while trying frantically not to die. Granted you get all the time in the world once you've disposed of the little red bastards, but I think having the block you're meant to destroy stand out from the crowd (and maybe upping the missile drop rate on the red guys) would go a long way to nudging the player in the right direction without giving it away on a silver platter. The ReadMe states to keep an eye out for things that look out of place. My concern is that this block doesn't seem "out of place" enough, and early-game you don't have enough missiles to blast the entire ceiling to look for the one block they will actually destroy in this room.[/spoiler]

[Spoiler=So I happened to find...] The shortcut leading from Norfair to Kraid. I've decided to skip the Power Grip to see if there's any benefit to skipping it (AWESOME use of that dead space in Norfair by the way! I've always wanted to see something fancy in there.) so I didn't have the luxury of hanging on that E-Tank block to shoot a missile diagonally at its original location. I shot two at the wall on a whim, and imagine my surprise when the second one blew up inside the wall!
Where are you hiding, Power Bombs?! I need that suit! [/spoiler]

[Spoiler=I've found a Map bug] This room seems to display the minimap/Pause map data for this room, while this side of the room points to the map square to the left of it. 
I've outlined where the map for the purple room should be in red, while Samus's location displays being in the left side of that purple room. [/spoiler]

More to come as I play!

[TheDruggedMetroid]

Nice Hack! Very Challenging! :yay:

[Xoryd]

Alright, I just wanna say, I'm having a blast and a painful experience at the same time.

First, I'm intensively stuck After Bomb jumping up here http://imgur.com/a/fatWx

And seeing that Super missile door I'm kinda pissed.
I'm trying to get back to Crateria where Samus' ship is because I know there's stuff there I can get because I read the sequence (although I'm skipping the power grip to hone my bomb jumping skills and Special Varia suit seems cool)

And my anger is fed by the one room with the hives, they keep respawning, I've gone through the room 3 times and they still spawn back.

But despite the fact I'm backtracking to everywhere and back I'm still seeing the beauty in this and like your concept behind the face items despite my hatred against them ;)

Edit: I found the path in kraid, and got the speed booster, It was obvious and I feel dumb.
I really like how when I figure it out it gives the nice "I did it!" excitement moments

[Luce Seyfarth]

Uh... wow. I think my Mail Account failed to notify me about all your comments... which is why i reply only now -.-

Please forgive Bad spelling, my phone hates me right now...

@renkoha
@Xoryd
Sorry, thank you for all these comments! I'll reply in Detail later because I'm on my phone now, which Not only is unconfortable to read, but right now it tries to "correct" EVERY.SINGLE.WORD I write to german -.-



Was also gonna Post an Update regarding Progress and current Plans. Will add that in a few hours as well. Again, forgive my spelling this Time...

[Juice]

I just beat the game for my first time and it took me 6 hours in game time. Saldy I beat the game with the use of Mage a number of times :blush:. This is the first that that I was frustrated and enjoying a game at the same time. I got a couple of likes and dislikes for you.

What I love about this game.
1)   It's challenging, just like you said. Especially the beginning of the game where energy tanks are scarce and well hidden whilst enemies are buffed. You did what you were aiming for good sir.

2)   Exploration. This game makes Samus explore Planet Zebes. For example, it is possible to explore a bit of Chozodia just after getting missiles or bombs (I got killed within seconds during the first enemy encounter).

3)   I like the beginning. Its where  MZM ought to start.

4)   I like that you added that you have to choose your fire arm. Having Ice beam in Chozodia really helped me out in a couple of rooms, whereas wave beam was favorable in searching items/killing enemies in a safe distance. But since when is it possible to use all of the beams at once?

What I dislike about the game.
1)   Too much backtracking. For example, you have to [spoiler]clear Kraid and Ridley for the first time, search chozodia to activate machinery for the ceiling and go back to kill Kraid and Ridley[/spoiler]. I don't mind that you did this. But I do mind that whilst backtracking you have to do the same route, except this time you do not have to destroy the irreformable blocks. For examble, it would be cooler if you could backtrack faster by using the obtainable item.

2)   Speaking about irreformable blocks, I dislike the rooms which you need to enter it from multiple entrances, to destroy irreformable blocks, to open a path for a specific entrance. I wouldn't mind doing this once, but your whole level design is surrounded by this idea. Also, this idea is not well implemented in Kraid. You can be stuck if you didn't destroy the irreformable blocks before grabbing speedbooster.

3)   Most upgrades are too tediously hidden. I know, I know, you have warned me about this, but I still dislike some hidden items. For example, I hate the upgrades obtainable by shooting the covered unknown item block. There is no way knowing how grab those items until you either have the unknown item or you check in MAGE/DH.

[Luce Seyfarth]

Now, first a few comments on the bugs you've found.

1) on either normal or hard mode when you get the missile tank in brinstar that is protected by an unknow item block and which is in the same vertical level than super missile protected by screw attack blocks the brow enemy turns into a dark blue rectangle with yellow letters, although if you go out and re-enter the room everything is normal

2) when you get the later screw attack and recharge at that chozo statue ammo counters palette's mess up, but this is fixed by recharging at any other place.

I can not confirm it atm, but I believe you. I've seen the same thing happen in an earlier version of the Plasma Beam room, where I had placed an armada of Rippers, which would get messy like the other enemy you mention under 1) when you recharge. The fix for 1) would be easy (remove that enemy), as für 2), I'm not sure... I thought about removing the ability to recharge at Chozo Statues before, which would fix this issue alltogether, but did decide it wouldn't mix well with low droprates. I thought the problem is limited to other sprites (enemies) in rooms with Chozo Statues, and the statues themselves, but...
I'll see if I can fix it right away, thanks.

3) in metroid room you can go in and out if you get caught by a metroid and exit the room with metroid you permanently get stuck with underwater speed regardless the suit you have at the moment, however i obtained this effect while wearing normal/varia/gravity but wasn't unable to test if obatining another suit afterwarsd removes this effect

That is... not good :(
I have no idea how to fix this. Well, I have, for hardcoding that specific room, but... I need to think for a moment on this one...

4) kraid has two bugs with map, the first one is a misplaced marker for a hidden passage that leads to lower right part of the room with three entrances and has the missile block that must be accessed from two sides in order get past this point, when you access this passage the map jumps to upper right part of kraid not allowing you to mark that section in your map, however all upper right part of kraid is correctly marked, the second bug is related to total items count missile tanks to be specific, the counter says there are 9 tanks but in reality you can obtain 10, i tried completing the game with this tank collected and got a 100% item count and a 99% without the tank so this means the game has the total item count right since i never got an over hundred item count, but map counter does not

Fixed the misplaced room bug. No idea how that slipped in there...
As for those missile containers, I have no idea how that happened. I counted all the expansions just now and there are exactly 11 in Kraid (2 energy tanks, 9 missile tanks). Unless there is one expansion that somehow increases the counter by 2, I have no explanation. Are you sure you didn't cheat or anything? What are your final capacities for missiles, energy, etc.?
Can someone else sonfirm this?

5) i don't know exactly why but on my third run i got the early power bombs and when i got to the pipe you can break by setting a power bomb that glass didn't shattered, i used multiple bombs but got no result, this however happened when it was raining and before getting full suit, after getting the full suit the glass sattered normally

I know of this one. If you can shatter this tube is based on events. I left it there because I was short on doors - There are two separate rooms, one for raining and one for not raining. I had no door there to connect this room back to Crateria. Now that MAGE is around, I can just add that door and make the glass shatterable at any time. Thanks for the hint though.

6) this is something tht happened on normal mode only, in hard mode the didn't happende, in norfair in the room where you must fight the insect cocoon in the ceiling, there is an entrance that is blocked during the fight and cleared once you make the cocoon fall to the ground and then leave and re-enter the room but in normal mode that entrance in cleared since the begining making possible to skip the fight

...It is not locked on normal? I can't believe this. There are 3 versions of that room and when you fight Imago here the top left door is hardcoded to be just a wall. Now I have to make a playtest myself...

7) this happened in hard mode as well but i will try to confirm it for normal mode, after getting early power bombs if you go all the way up to your ship you'll find is not there, apparently someone took it for a short ride XD since after beating mother brain your ship returns to where is supposed to be, and trust me when i tell you i was glad to see it there, otherwise i would have been done for

That, too, is a result of multiple rooms for a single screen. I simply hadn't had the knowledge to make event based connections to link the upper right door of the room left of the landing site to the non-rainy version of the landing site. Should be fixed in a moment...
Well, here you go!


I will go over your bad points next. Thanks for the good ones, by the way :) No need to talk about them in detail, that is all...

1) i'll begin with the biggest exploration problem in kraid, here is the issue, as you may know there is a room in lower right kraid that has three entrances two on left side and one on right side (...)

Whoa long block of text just for this room :D
Alright. I won't take that one out, but I admit it bothered quite some people so far. I will think about another solution for the next release...

2) Crateria, i always believed this area was a wasted space, why? well in super metroid redesing this area is heavely modified making it much more richier than before and i liked that because before that hack it was just empty space, so i think this place requires more work in order to effectively use it, for example i didn't like how some morphball shine spark items were removed from here, it makes the power bomb blocks in the elevator that leads to norfair and the speed block with gravity suit totally senseless that's why i'd like to request more love on that area (redesing, puzzles and items)

Oops, that one about the useless puzzle slipped me. I will move another item there then, or just redesign it. Thanks.

As for redesigning Crateria, the main problem is the lack of rooms and items to do anything interesting with it. There is too much space already for what little items there are. But, consider yourself lucky, because I have a very good plan for Crateria in the future, when Biospark releases the version of MAGE that can add more rooms easily. I don't want to do assembly hacking every time for that myself...
Read my upcoming post about future plans for that ;)

3) charge beam, i understand why you set it in that location, i also understand the effect you set on it but i'm not agree with it, why? well to begin with is an upgrade like long beam, "universal" to the type of beam, but don't get me wrong i'm totally agree with using only one type of beam at a time that adds a lot strategical gameplay however i also like the logic/reasonable mechanics, that's why i think that giving the charge beam the effect of allowing you to combine all kind of beams is not quite logical, this upgrade should be obtained late in the game (when getting full suit) but as screw attack and power bombs it should have a super secret early route so you can once again prove your skill, and removed that beam mixer effect, which should be given to a new item but i'll explain those details for next post which will contain the suggestions to improve the hack

I added this feature to Charge Beam because it was easier assigning this to an already existing item. In the future I would like to add a separate Spring Ball though, that requires making a new item... sort of. When that is finished, I can imagine splitting Charge Beam and Beam Combinator into two separate items as well.

4) although chozodia redesing is good i didn't like some item locations be removed i.e. energy tank close to mecha ridley in where you had to be good with space jump in order to get it, that was something i liked, as well as some shinespark pickups which you obtained going from one side to another above the glass pipe you can break with power bombs, and talking about that pipe, i think an item should be set in that room it doesn't have to be something big, a missile tank would be ok

No. While that first puzzle was good, you already have the original for that.
I also won't add random items to random places. That glass tube room is an easy way back to Crateria once you have Power Bombs, nothing more.

5) ice beam and metroids, well something i never fully understood in original game is, why is the mission objetive to exterminate all metroids and they only appear in tourian? i mean shouldn't they be in all areas? that would make more sense to me, considering all that happens in the game the mission objetive should be defeat space pirates instead of "exterminating all metroids", that's why i think more metroid rooms should be implemented in the game i.e. it would be really interesting and exciting to see them trying to get you in crateria in the beginning and other areas, and mark those rooms with special colors like heated and secret rooms, that would add a lot more to carefull and strategical exploration, now about the ice beam, i think this needs a tweak, why? well if you get unknow items you could defeat kraid and ridley and then go to tourian without the ice beam and then you'll be a dead man

Okay, two things:
1) You could run into Tourian without having Ice Beam in the original Zero Mission as well. Granted, it was unlikely, but if you did you were also stuck then and there. I don't plan to change that, especially because a save room is just a room before the first Metroid room...
2) I don't think there are enough event flags in the game for me to add Metroids everywhere that stay dead once killed :P
The idea is interesting and I considered adding them in a few places. But then I went with the story, because they would just respawn once killed - like the ones in the mothership right now. Now, The mothership explodes in the end, so I found this justifiable...
Oh, and then there is the bug you mentioned when moving through doory with Metroid attached -.-

[Luce Seyfarth]

@Gunky
Glad you also liked my hack to far :)
Sadly I cannot see where you put the pictures for your comments :(
...Well, now while replying to you I can see the links. Strange...

Unfortunately, I seem to have come across a pretty big obstacle to my joy: upon acquiring the Bombs, the game itself hangs as soon as the Bombs item is activated. (...)
(...) I've figured out the cause of my woes! It turns out that the versions of VBA I was using were incompatible with the patched ROM. 1.8 works...

A word on this. I added some new code in assembly that is located way at the end of the game file. I don't want to get too technical, but some emulators can't read adresses there, which is why you encountered those problems.

[spoiler=Firstly...] I feel that this particular block, depicted here in both its Natural and Revealed states, should be tweaked to stand out a little more from its surroundings, (...)[/spoiler]

I get you there. Maybe I will change that in the future.

[Spoiler=I've found a Map bug] This room seems to display the minimap/Pause map data for this room, while this side of the room points to the map square to the left of it. 
I've outlined where the map for the purple room should be in red, while Samus's location displays being in the left side of that purple room. [/spoiler]

Fixed that already, but thanks anyway.



@Juice
Well, what a surprise. Thanks for the feedback as well :)

I just beat the game for my first time and it took me 6 hours in game time. Saldy I beat the game with the use of Mage a number of times :blush:. This is the first that that I was frustrated and enjoying a game at the same time. I got a couple of likes and dislikes for you.

What I love about this game.
1)   It's challenging, just like you said. Especially the beginning of the game where energy tanks are scarce and well hidden whilst enemies are buffed. You did what you were aiming for good sir.

2)   Exploration. This game makes Samus explore Planet Zebes. For example, it is possible to explore a bit of Chozodia just after getting missiles or bombs (I got killed within seconds during the first enemy encounter).

3)   I like the beginning. Its where  MZM ought to start.

4)   I like that you added that you have to choose your fire arm. Having Ice beam in Chozodia really helped me out in a couple of rooms, whereas wave beam was favorable in searching items/killing enemies in a safe distance. But since when is it possible to use all of the beams at once?

3) Small thing, but thats exactly one of the reasons I first started this :D
4) Charge Beam makes it possible to combine the other beams; it's description will also say this ;)

What I dislike about the game.
1)   Too much backtracking. For example, you have to [spoiler]clear Kraid and Ridley for the first time, search chozodia to activate machinery for the ceiling and go back to kill Kraid and Ridley[/spoiler]. I don't mind that you did this. But I do mind that whilst backtracking you have to do the same route, except this time you do not have to destroy the irreformable blocks. For examble, it would be cooler if you could backtrack faster by using the obtainable item.

2)   Speaking about irreformable blocks, I dislike the rooms which you need to enter it from multiple entrances, to destroy irreformable blocks, to open a path for a specific entrance. I wouldn't mind doing this once, but your whole level design is surrounded by this idea. Also, this idea is not well implemented in Kraid. You can be stuck if you didn't destroy the irreformable blocks before grabbing speedbooster.

3)   Most upgrades are too tediously hidden. I know, I know, you have warned me about this, but I still dislike some hidden items. For example, I hate the upgrades obtainable by shooting the covered unknown item block. There is no way knowing how grab those items until you either have the unknown item or you check in MAGE/DH.

1) Yes, I know. At least you only have to really backtrack to either Kraid or Ridley once by going Speed Booster/ Super Missile -> Zipline activator -> the area you hadn't been to before -> shortcut (Norfair <-> Kraid) to reach the other area. Going to both Kraid and Ridley first makes Chozodia easier at the expense of more backtracking. If you get an Unknown Item in Kraid/ Ridley, you get to skip parts of the other area.
It's also possible to get early Power Bomb and skip the Zipline activator (and Ice Beam) alltogether. Or activate it, skip the bosses instead and go straight for Mother Brain. Plenty of options there, I think.
As for the structure of each area itself... You have a point. Could make shortcuts for when you already have the item of an area or the other ones that require this item. I will add that to my notes, but I think that point will have to stick behind the other points for now. Could be a while until I get back to it...

2) As for Kraid, I'm working on it. The others I need to think about how to replace them. I promise I won't be using this gimmick for the new areas in any case!

3) Hehe, that was a good one, right? :P
Yeah, I'm trying to come up with more good tricks to hide these items instead of removing good ones :P
The dedicated player will most likely find the answer when backtracking with all the powerups. The reaction to such things when you find them yourself (without MAGE or DH) is just too good to pass up, I think ;)

[Luce Seyfarth]

**UPDATE POST**


So I have to admit, in the past couple months I've been very busy. I had a great idea to implement in Metroid Other ZM but sadly, to this day, it didn't go anywhere. I've realized this is because of too many unanswered questons with the concept. I need to sit down and plan out more details, answer questions to myself, etc. before really starting... and not doing so in the past has lead to me not really moving on as I had wished. Then I lost interest for a while. After that, Biospark released MAGE, and that coupled with Doctorm64s VERY interesting fan remake of Metroid II (AM2R) got me thinking again.
...I have two concepts right now. I'm just waiting for a version of MAGE that can finally add new rooms to the game. Then I can really get rolling again... Without this I was stumped, because I sure as hell don't want to add all these rooms via hex editor myself. Also, doors. My main problem back when I

So I would like to share my ideas with you guys beforehand. I didn't want to do this in the past because of surprise factor, but at this point I think its just better to do so. Will keep me motivated to finish this, hopefully. If you'd like to be surprised instead, don't click on these spoiler tags...



[spoiler]
1. Justin Bailey mode

- inspired by the original Metroid, obviously
- will replace/ be added to Time Attack mode -> You need to clear the game first and can only play on normal
- you start at you ship in Crateria and have the Zero Suit - That emergency pistol can damage most enemies, by the way
- goal is to kill Mother Brain and escape (needs special script to make the game end there), thanks to Zero Suit all the important areas of Chozodia can be explored
- biggest issue are the following items (which are many):
    a) Morph Ball -> By default, Samus can use her gun while in Morph Ball mode... Because of crawling maybe I'll remove it alltogether
    b) Bombs, Power Bombs: not usable by default, also not needed (the bombs anyway) because of the Stun Gun. Maybe just leave them in...
    c) Speed Booster: Zero Suit Samus has no running animation. Animations of Full Suit Samus are used instead. Either cut Speed Booster alltogether or make graphics myself (could take a good while...)
    d) Varia and Gravity Suit, obviously.
    e) All the shooting weapons. Enabling Missiles shouldn't be too big of a hassle (of course I say this now...). Beams are another story, however. I had this idea where Long Beam would make the Stun Gun charge instantly. The others I have no idea at the moment...

I'm also playing with the idea of just giving Samus all the powerups she needs (a la new game plus), and remove them alltogether, but that seems a little boring...

- riding an elevator uses Full Suit grafics, instead of existing Zero Suit ones. Shouldn't be too hard to change
- loading a save from your ship freezes the game. I've fixed that one already, fortunately

There are many more things that could be said here. Obviously getting 100% items won't be possible and adding passages for only Zero Suit Samus will be necessary.
If I decide to finally start on this for real, it WILL take a long to complete. Please don't get too excited for now. My guess is I will probably do the other things I want to add first. First I need to sit down and answer these open questions for myself...
[/spoiler]

[spoiler]
2. Add Spring Ball

Exactly what it says. Could be used as a key item with Speed Booster (Ballspark). Would probably hidden in a new area. Also, I would like to separate Charge Beam and the beam combinator ability.
[/spoiler]


3. New areas

This is the big one. I have concepts for 4 new sub-areas now:
[spoiler]
a) Wrecked Ship (Crateria Map)
b) "Lower Kraid" (no proper name yet, Kraid Map)
c) Research Lab (Tourian Map)
d) Pirate Stronghold (Chozodia Map)

I won't name my concepts but some of the names will may speak for themselves. Pirate Stronghold will have an extra gameplay mechanic which I think will be pretty interesting. I'll put it under an extra tag:
[spoiler]
Upon crash landing after defeating Mother Brain, most of your major upgrades will get stolen and taken to Pirate Stronghold. What you didn't collect WON'T be added there. After getting Full Suit, you can go there to take the stuff back. Why would you do that for optional items that can be skipped and collected later from their original position? Because getting them to appear in Chozodia will open up certain passageways or do other things. Health, Missiles and Power Bombs will be preserved and not get stolen. Item percentage will be reduced until you get the powerups again.
[/spoiler]
[/spoiler]

Other than these things I will start to fix the more complex bugs tomorrow. There will be a small release when those are fixed. Until then, thanks again for all the support and reports :)

[Juice]

Lovely to see that you are still planning to make big changes in your hack  :yay:

**UPDATE POST**
I've realized this is because of too many unanswered questons with the concept. I need to sit down and plan out more details, answer questions to myself, etc. before really starting... and not doing so in the past has lead to me not really moving on as I had wished.

Well it seems you just learned a valuable lesson, I myself also made this mistake as well . I want to start a new Metroid project, but before I start I want to know what's possible and plan accordingly. I have a couple of technical questions about how you did a couple of things with your hack (I'm still a noob with hex editor and I'm hoping you didn't use that). Do you mind if I ask you these questions?

[Luce Seyfarth]

Yeah, and pretty much every change that needs to be done for Justin Bailey mode are going to be ASM functions out into the game with my trusty hex editor :P
Thats also why planning is not exactly easy. Slow and steady will do it, I suppose.

I don't mind questions about hacking, no - maybe send me a PM if it's got nothing to do with Other ZM per se and I will answer as best as I can.
But, to tell this right away, the things that couldn't be done with Double Helix (no MAGE around as I did all of this) had to be done by hex editing. From changing Samus' starting room to implementing exclusive beam selection or how the special Varia Suit in Brinstar gives you Full Suit. Also, making Ridleys appearance independend from getting Gravity Suit, but that was just a change of one byte in his AI routine (the searching for that byte, however, was another task...).

Sadly, the website which I used that had instruction sets for asm got taken in down - lucky that I made a copy on my computer, though. I'm also pretty sure a quick google search for "Game Boy Advance assembler" would be effective here. Sadly, that website I used also had a nice tutorial on hex editing - which I didn't need, but may have been great for you.
I also use a debugger version of the VBA emulator to find things in ROM and RAM. I think the website of that ALSO got taken down in the meantime, which is really unfortunate, as I can't give you links to get started that way. Without a debugger you can pretty much forget about finding stuff you need in the ROM...
Also, datacrystal.romhacking.net has an (incomplete) map for RAM data, which I found REALLY helpful. I think you can find that data on metroidconstruction, too.

If you still have questions, just ask away. I'll do what I can to answer you.

[DeadSkullzJr]

May I ask how you got the fully powered suit to work with varia? I have been trying to do a bit of ROM hacking myself and can't seem to figure it out. If you could provide a video tutorial for this that would be great!

[Luce Seyfarth]

May I ask how you got the fully powered suit to work with varia? I have been trying to do a bit of ROM hacking myself and can't seem to figure it out. If you could provide a video tutorial for this that would be great!

I don't think you want to see a video of me writing down binary and hexadecimal code, then explaining what it does :D

If you want to permanently tie the fully powered suit to Varia Suit, that would actually be easier than what I did (only tie it to the Varia Suit found at a specific location).

I'll send you a PM about it.

[Luce Seyfarth]

UPDATE:

I think I may have fixed the freezing problem when collecting the bomb upgrade while playing on an android phone. I don't have a phone with android here right now, would one of you mind testing my fix? I have a custom build here:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/tk7fcs1cfeic494/to%20Metroid%20Other%20ZM%20-%20Custom.ips

EDIT: Tested this myself right now (how can anybody actually enjoy this game on a mobile phone despite the bad handling? wow...) and it still doesn't work. Well...



Other than that, I also have a new Version that fixes recently discovered bugs and also revamps the route to escape Kraid, involving a fresh puzzle and removing the need to reload a save if you make a mistake. Should be up on romhacking.net just in a couple of days. Until then, here's the IPS patch for Version 3.8:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/0w308aoql8sciro/to%20Metroid%20Other%20ZM.ips

[renkoha]

@Luce Seyfarth hi man my email didn't notify me either on new messages so that makes two of us, now thanks for reading all my comments and taking the time to respond to all my points, i already got new version and i'm currently playing it however i found something curious on kraid in the part where you get a missile tank after activating zipline and using bombs to enter several morphball cannons in order to clear the zipline path to missile tank, the place has changed a lot in this version but i noticed something weird in left border of cannons part, first vertical line is fake but doesn't seem to serve any purpose so my question is this intended or is a minor bug? also in some spaces where there should be cannons there are purple enemies so once again, is this intended?

[Luce Seyfarth]

No, all these elements are intentional. Empty space is just empty space and the purple rippers serve as a trap.