General Hack Ideas

[PKstarship]

I have an idea for a new item for Super Metroid: the Scan Visor. It would be a less powerful version of the X-ray Visor, only penetrating one block into the wall so you could see hidden blocks but not much else, and you would start the game with it. The new part would be that you can scan enemies to learn their name, weakness, attack style, and possibly their biology, like in Metroid Prime. This way, you could, for example scan spore spawn to find out that it takes triple-damage from charge shots. I would also have the game save the data in a database accessable from the pause menu by pressing L on the map screen.  Data for aquired items would also be stored here. This would be a seperate percentage from the item collection percentage, and could lead to some very interesting "100% scanned" speedruns. I do not know if this is truly possible in Super Metroid, but if someone wants to use this idea in their hack, I just ask that I possibly get a spot in the credits  :^_^:

[Kitsune_Phoenix]

*deleted post*

[PKstarship]

My only problem with LUA scripts is that, to me, they kinda feel like cheating, because it's not technichally part of the rom, and you usually can only use them on a very specific emulator. I don't know much about hacking at all, so feel free to point out how wrong this may be: when you use the visor, the game temporally pauses. could a special tile appear where an enemy is when it pauses, and when the scan beam comes in contact with it, a message box appears and similtaneously unlocks the entry in the database? and, would it be possible to expand the Super Metroid rom so that you could fit these extra features in? and, I've seen people talk about ROM mappers like MMC5 for the NES and how changing them expands the possibilities of the game. Is it possible to do something like this for Super Metroid, albeit more difficult? Again, I'm sorry if these questions make me sound dumb :neutral:

[Quote58]

However, I don't think it would be possible in SM's engine without somewhere in the neighborhood of two thirds of the game having to be recoded from nearly the ground up.

Nope, it could be done. Something I'm working on in fact could be turned into it if I thought it would be useful.
The only annoying thing with the scan visor is where the information goes, and also writing up all that information. If you have a third screen dedicated to it, that would work fine, but you still have to write up a huge number of strings for it. It's like how you can give each room a name and have it show up on the top line of the hud, or in the pause screen or whatever, but it's waaaay more effort than you think at first, to code all of them in (unless you do a thing with xkas that I haven't messed with yet but could make this sort of thing much easier).

[bradzx]

I don't mean same as Zero Mission as you think title mean because it already made Super Metroid Zero Mission  I just wonder if there is possible make a hack for Super Metroid in Metroid.  For derp way, make Metroid in SNES version for Super Metroid hack.   Can anyone make one?   It will be awesome to play.

[PKstarship]

Another idea I have for Super Metroid is Easy and Hard modes, similar to Metroid: Zero Mission and Fusion, And the ability to save your best speedrun for each difficulty. This seems like a simple hack, but I do not think anything like it has been made. This kind of hack would be great for Metroid newbies, and people who want a little extra challenge from the game they mastered. It would be interesting if Energy Tanks and ammo expansions were halved on hard mode too. this is probably way more possible than my last idea :lol:

[Quietus]

Another idea I have for Super Metroid is Easy and Hard modes

You could check the hacks page. :neutral:

HARD

Challenge
Deathtroid
Elite
Expert Edition
Impossible
Nightmare
Precision
Veteran
And all those listed as 'Hard'.

EASY

Super Easy

[PKstarship]

Oh, I meant a hack where when you start a save file, you get to choose easy, normal, or hard as the difficulty before you start playing, just like Metroid: Zero Mission. And the layouts don't change, just the damage you give and recieve. I accidentally made it sound like I wanted two seperate games, not all that on one game. I'm sorry :pale:

[Jordan5]

There was a competition hack a while back (maybe THE contest or the winter solstice one) where there were separate .ips patches for normal and hard modes. So maybe check that out and see what you think.

[Quietus]

I believe Super Zero Mission also comes with two difficulties.

[Quote58]

If I recall correctly, the rinka hack has different difficulties depending on the save file chosen

[The Monster of Surrealton]

Posted this in MST's chat over a lifetime ago, and keep forgetting to post this idea in greater detail here.

A hack where you start with everything, and instead of collecting items, you collect artifacts that unlock certain metal doors and paths at the cost of removing a specific item linked to that artifact from your inventory permanently. For example, one artifact will unlock a gate to progress at the cost of Morph Ball, while another removes an E-Tank.

Basically, you start at 100%, but become weaker as the game progresses, until you only have a few items.

There are several different paths to the same destinations, so you can control which item you're willing to sacrifice, and effectively control the difficulty of the game.

With the alternate paths, You can finish the game without essentials like Morph Ball, Bombs, Ice Beam, or Missiles. Also, Metroids can be killed with anything, and Mother Brain's Hyper Beam will be weaker (30-ish damage) in the event you toss all your E and Reserve Tanks.

A 100% run would leave you with nothing at the end.

[Quietus]

You could perhaps tie Mother Brain's stats in with it somehow, and offer an incentive by having your reward for 100% would be a bonus drop in her stats over the 99%.

[The Monster of Surrealton]

You could perhaps tie Mother Brain's stats in with it somehow, and offer an incentive by having your reward for 100% would be a bonus drop in her stats over the 99%.

You mean like making Mother Brain stronger/weaker depending on the % of items you have left?

Also, I just realized tossing all the items should result in a naked suitless Samus ending.

[Quietus]

You mean like making Mother Brain stronger/weaker depending on the % of items you have left?

Yes, and then a bonus reduction from 99% to 100%, meaning that you're both facing each other on equal, minimum terms.

[Mayo-chan]

I didn't read further back in the thread, just here to toss a random idea out the window, but what if somebody made a Contra-like Action Metroid kind of hack, where Samus always dies in 1 hit (all attacks do 99 damage) and your goal is to simply survive across several linear stages to the end? You could add in little side paths to have the different beam/weapon upgrades and E-tanks, and make the firing rate much faster and make movement more snappy in general, and change the way death works so you don't have to wait a good minute before you reload from the beginning. Sure there are a lot of good run 'n gun games out there, but I'd like to see it done in Metroid's style.

[Quietus]

That could work. A bonus would be managing to have certain enemies / orbs drop PLMs for the weapons. :cool:

[PKstarship]

I have an epic idea for a Super Metroid hack, which I call "Super Metroid: Dark Zebes". This would be a full scale hack, which combines Super Metroid and Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, with many new power-ups in addition to all the original ones.

-The Story-
[spoiler]This would start with Ceres station, and remain somewhat faithful to the normal Super Metroid plot, only having a new map to explore. That is, until you beat Mother Brain. The Baby Metroid grants you the Hyper Suit in addition to the Hyper Beam, and when you escape Tourian, only Tourian blows up, not the entire planet. When you escape Tourian, you end up on a path back to the landing site. When you arrive, Samus looks up, and you see an ENORMOUS asteroid hurtling towards Zebes that crashes into the planet, and an animation of Zebes splitting into Light and Dark Zebes. you end up finding a dark rift (a Dark Portal) and enter it. A cutscene appears where Samus is being weakened by the air of the dark world, and she gets attacked by a dark blob, which steals her Hyper Suit and Hyper Beam. It then turns into Dark Samus and blasts Samus back into the portal she arrived from. You have every normal item from Super Metroid except the screw attack at this point, and you gain access to new regions that opened up due to shock waves from the asteroid. you start finding new items and eventually can go back into the dark world and explore it, albeit with some difficulty. you also raid a space pirate research base on Zebes and steal a Dark Suit from them, which they developed to help them explore Dark Zebes. You have to defeat corrupted versions of the original bosses to unlock the path to the final area where you can fight Dark Samus. After you defeat it/her and successfully escape, the Dark World can be seen fading away as you fly away from Zebes.[/spoiler]

-New Items-
[spoiler]The boost ball, which you charge by holding run, and releasing run makes you dash, and the spider ball, which allows you to cling to magnetic tracks scattered around Zebes. The Dark, Light, and Annihilator beams, with the ammo system and ammo expansions would be added, with the light/dark effectiveness system from Echoes. Beam/Missile combos would be added, some necessary to beat the game, like the Super Missile, and some that just better equip Samus to face enemies, like the Wavebuster and Darkburst. later in the game, you would get the Planetary Light, which makes the air of the Dark World not harmful to Samus. the Space Jump lets Samus double jump, and the Screw Attack lets her jump five times. there would be a Scan Visor from my idea in a previous post, as well as a Thermal and Dark Visor in addition to the normal X-Ray Scope. There would be a new HUD, with bars that show your current missile and energy count, and your current beam, visor, and beam ammo. there would be a way to switch beams and visors quickly without pausing, and when you morph, the HUD changes to show your Power Bomb count as well as how many bombs you can lay, like Metroid Prime. The beams would take a second to change, shown by Samus fiddling with her cannon for a second, to encourage using each beam for more than five seconds at a time, and the weapons would be more balanced, with ice and wave being stronger, and plasma being slightly weaker. Finally, there would be beam doors scattered throughout Zebes.[/spoiler]

This would take so much work to do, but I think it would be possible. It would probably take a hacking GOD to pull some of these things off though...

Edit: Came up with this idea after I was perusing Spriter's Resource and found this: http://www.spriters-resource.com/resources/sheets/16/17079.gif

[Quote58]

The boost ball, which you charge by holding run, and releasing run makes you dash,

There's a boostball patch on the patches site, just so you know.
However I also just recently built a new boostball from the ground up and it's pretty rad.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhQ13UMyBoQ

and the spider ball, which allows you to cling to magnetic tracks scattered around Zebes.

already a patch available by Scyzer, though it's not very good. She has since made a full fledged M2 style spiderball, and jathys did something similar a long time ago.

The Dark, Light, and Annihilator beams, with the ammo system and ammo expansions would be added, with the light/dark effectiveness system from Echoes.

All pretty easy

Beam/Missile combos would be added, some necessary to beat the game, like the Super Missile, and some that just better equip Samus to face enemies, like the Wavebuster and Darkburst.

Multiple people have made beam combos, most notably imo crashtour's.

later in the game, you would get the Planetary Light, which makes the air of the Dark World not harmful to Samus. the Space Jump lets Samus double jump, and the Screw Attack lets her jump five times.

All done already by various people

there would be a Scan Visor from my idea in a previous post, as well as a Thermal and Dark Visor in addition to the normal X-Ray Scope.

Thermal has been made by black_falcon (and scyzer as well but hers functions differently), dark has been made by me (you can try it in Metroid: Equilibrium on the hacks page), the scan visor as I mentioned before is doable.

There would be a new HUD, with bars that show your current missile and energy count, and your current beam, visor, and beam ammo. there would be a way to switch beams and visors quickly without pausing, and when you morph, the HUD changes to show your Power Bomb count as well as how many bombs you can lay, like Metroid Prime.

All of these have been made before (many of them by me, others by scyzer, and the bomb count by kej)

The beams would take a second to change, shown by Samus fiddling with her cannon for a second, to encourage using each beam for more than five seconds at a time, and the weapons would be more balanced, with ice and wave being stronger, and plasma being slightly weaker.

That's a neat idea actually, about beam switching not being instant.

Finally, there would be beam doors scattered throughout Zebes.

I put a patch up for beam doors a while ago, dunno if it can still be found without me just linking it from my dropbox.

[PKstarship]

I guess most of those things have been covered then. My thing is I don't have a PC, and might not be able to get one anytime soon, so I can't currently do anything more than patch abilities or perform small hex tweaks, so this idea is an impossibility for me at this time. If someone wants to use this idea, I would be perfectly fine with that. I'm probably better at making ideas than hacking stuff anyways :lol:

Edit: Another item idea I forgot to put in my post: the Seeker Missile. when activated, the game pauses in a way similar to the X-Ray Scope, and pressing up or down makes samus aim her arm cannon slowly up or down also like the X-Ray. a red laser appears from her cannon so you can line the shot up, and pressing fire makes her target the enemy or object you aimed at. you can lock on to up to five different enemies, or lock on to one enemy multiple times. pressing jump makes the game unpause, and makes Samus launch the missiles, one at a time quickly, and a missile locked onto a target actively seeks that target. I would also add a five-second cool-down, and make Samus stand in place until all the missiles launch as to make this weapon less exploitable in boss fights. might be a lot of stuff for the game to process though...

Edit2: Just realized that if this hack was made, it would be probably the only hack where Zebes doesn't get destroyed at the end.

[A Dummy]

I have to say that sounds like a really awesome hack idea, especially having the normal end being the halfway point and having all the Prime items in there.
Although I don't know if it's possible to make a hack of that size, sounds like it would literally be at least 2 times the size of the original.  Then again, considering some of the other huge hacks like Hyper Metroid and Metroid Redesign that we already have, maybe it is possible.

[Kitsune_Phoenix]

*deleted post*

[PKstarship]

An extra idea I had for this hack: when Dark Samus steals Samus's Hyper Beam, it gets powered up by Dark Samus's phazon, and when Samus gets blasted with the Phazon Beam, she gets infected by the Phazon. A bit later, you run across a dead Federation Soldier, similar to the one in Kraid's Lair in the original Super Metroid. You get the PED powerup from his armor, and you can then enter Hyper Mode and use the Phazon Beam at the cost of one Energy Tank. The Energy Bar is changed to a phazon bar while in Hyper-Mode, and Samus becomes invincible, but not eliminating the Phazon makes phazon levels rise and puts Samus in danger of Terminal Corruption, which has a different Game Over screen where she is shown being turned into another Dark Samus. Getting the Planetary Light makes it harder for Samus to get corrupted, as well as shielding against the air of Dark Zebes. It would still be possible to get terminally corrupted, but it would be more difficult. the Planetary Light would not give more defense though, as that might be too overpowered. you would get other powerups like the Hyper Missile and Hyper Grapple to make Samus more powerful and more capable of getting rid of the Phazon easier. Also, the controls would be changed. By default, L acts as the aim button, which behaves as it does in Zero Mission, R selects Beam or Visor Mode, Select switches the beam or visor depending if you are in Beam or Visor Mode, and Y fires missiles, seperate from X firing beams. charging a beam with X and pressing Y executes a Beam Combo, assuming you have the proper Beam Combo item first. When items are aquired, a message box appears saying the item name and how to use it so people aren't left in the dark. For example, if you got a Missle Pack for the first time, it would say "Missile Launcher aquired" and pressing A would make it say " Press Y to fire Missiles. Missile can open red doors, but have a limited amount of ammo". A more detailed description of the items would be available in the scan/item database in the pause menu. The informative message boxes will be an option, so people on their second run can choose to have the message boxes behave like Super Metroid and not Metroid Prime. I've never played Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, but I had the extra ideas for the PED and Terminal Corruption after reading about Hyper-Mode in the Metroid Wiki.

Edit: It would be awesome if I could team up with an epic hacker to make this hack a reality. I can't hack, but with my tons of ideas and beta-testing and someone skilled enough to put these things into a game, this could be the best Super Metroid hack ever! That's probably just wishful thinking on on my part though, isn't it...

[Scyzer]

It would require a lot of optimization, not to mention expanding the ROM from 4 megabytes to 8 megabytes (which I am surprised nobody has done yet)

A couple of people have; we just don't announce everything in big bright red letters.

[Quietus]

That's probably just wishful thinking on on my part though, isn't it...

Yup. You throwing your ideas out within a one-week period, then somebody else working on it for years to get to beta testing stages is ever so slightly out of balance, so it'd be a miracle if somebody agreed. :grin: