Metroid: Other M

Metroid: Other M is the eleventh Metroid game announced by Nintendo at E3 2009 and developed by Team Ninja and Nintendo. Taking place between Super Metroid and Metroid Fusion, Other M is said to feature a similar storytelling style to Fusion while retaining the "traditional Metroid feel". The designers are putting an emphasis on adventure, and aim to have a "seamless and natural" interaction between gameplay and cinematics. The game is played with a sideways Wii Remote similar to the NES Controller, while aiming it at the screen switches the view to a first-person perspective similar to the Prime series.

A demo for the game was released at the Nintendo Media Summit in San Francisco along with E3 2010.

Plot


The game begins shortly after the end of Super Metroid, with Samus Aran dreaming about her climactic battle against the Mother Brain and the death of the Baby Metroid which was the last surviving of the Metroids on planet SR388. She awakens in a Galactic Federation hospital in her Zero Suit. She is directed into another room by the Head Quarantine Officer to enter a training sequence. Satisfied with the results, Samus reports that the planet Zebes and Metroids had been annihilated in the mission. Weeks pass, and while reflecting more on the Baby, she picks up a distress signal, dubbed Baby's Cry, from a derelict Bottle Ship. She believes that it is crying for her.

Not too long after landing in the ship, Samus encounters the Galactic Federation 07th Platoon, and is recognized and greeted by Anthony Higgs, an old friend from her days in the Federation Army. Leading them was Commander Adam Malkovich, her former commanding officer when she served under the Federation Army. Adam asks why she is here. After explaining the circumstances that brought her there and asking the same from Adam, he responds that such information was not for an "outsider". Samus decides to stay on board for the sake of the others, but since it was not authorized by Adam, she decides not use any of her upgrades.

The team discover a dead body of a Lab Worker, and are soon attacked by a large mass of Brugs, a battle in which Samus and the platoon work together in taking it down. After destroying it, Adam requests Samus' cooperation in their mission, under the condition that she obey his orders and does not use certain weapons and equipment until he authorizes their use. Samus is then invited on the team, and is briefed on the details of the mission. Seeing how the situation of the Bottle Ship is extremely critical, Adam orders everyone to gather information and secure the safety of any survivors. He sends Lyle to Sector 1, Maurice to Sector 2, Anthony to Sector 3, James to the Control Bridge, and K.G. to the Bottle Ship Residential Area.

Samus is first ordered to reactivate the Bottle Ship's electrical system, then is ordered to find the Exam Center in Sector 1. She runs through the tropical territory, encountering a small, furry creature that stares at her. After fending off a swarm of Kihunters, Samus finds the creature violently devouring the remains of their hive, regarding it as a "disgusting beast" that used her strengths to hunt its food. She later finds the Exam Center, and meets up with the platoon there. Investigating, Samus discovers the cybernetic body of a Zebesian with the insignia of the Galactic Federation on its chest. The platoon discovers that the purpose of the Bottle Ship was to conduct research on bioweapons, a practice that is strictly prohibited by the Federation. They learn the person in charge of the project is a woman called "Dr. Madeline Bergman". When investigating if she was still anywhere in the building, Samus is ambushed by more cybernetically enhanced Zebesians and is separated from the others. After fending them off, she finds the platoon being attacked by a large lizard-like creature, who viciously attacks Samus upon her arrival, with the others fending off other creatures. After being struck by Anthony Higgs' Plasma Gun, the creature flees. The group discovers the body of Lyle, who failed to rendezvous with them. Samus also discovers a trail of green blood, which leads her to the molted shell of Little Birdie. She is ordered to follow the lizard creature.

Descending down a shaft into Sector 3, she tracks the creature, being attacked by Vorash, a large lava creature attempting to eat her. Soon, Adam orders her to go to Sector 2. While there, she discovers the body of Maurice, and sees a young woman who turns out to be a second Mother Brain with a connection to all the animals (enemys) on the bottle Ship guiding them mercilecley against Samus, the Platoon, and other people like the Lab Workers. staring at her before fleeing. As Samus tries to convince the woman that she only wants to protect her, she refuses to cooperate, believing that the Galactic Federation is there to silence the scientists on board the ship, and that Samus works for the Federation. The woman also implies that Maurice was killed by another soldier. The two of them are then attacked by a soldier wearing a Galactic Federation Power Suit driving an industrial construction vehicle, and the woman is separated from Samus. After the vehicle is destroyed, Samus finds its driver missing. Adam notices that the wavelength frequencies of the lizard-like creature battled earlier is causing some creatures aboard the ship to become more aggressive, and is stationed at the Pyrosphere. Along the way, Samus believes there is a traitor within the 07th Platoon, and nicknames him "the Deleter" until she learns his true identity.

Samus returns to Pyrosphere to investigate the Geothermal Power Plant, and along the way discovers Anthony being attacked by a Rhedogian, threatening to drop him over a pool of lava. Samus manages to reach him in time with her Grapple Beam, and the two fight the creature off. Anthony brings up Adam, in which Samus reminisces about the time Adam's brother Ian was killed in an incident. Parting from Anthony, Samus continues her investigation when she encounters the empty husk of the lizard creature. She enters the Geothermal Power Plant and sees Anthony targeting her. He fires at the creature behind Samus, the same one that they had been hunting earlier, which has now developed wings and able to breathe fire. Samus decides to confront it alone, and to her shock the creature appears to be none other than her arch-nemesis Ridley, who she thought was annihilated with the destruction of Zebes. Overcome with shock and unable to respond, Adam tries to get through to her when he is suddenly attacked. Noticing Anthony's presence, Ridley then grabs Samus and flies into the air with her, with her state of shock causing her Power Suit to deteriorate. Ridley then dodges a blast from Anthony's Plasma Gun, dropping Samus. Anthony draws Ridley's attention and challenges him, but is quickly struck by the creature's tail and knocked off the ledge into the lava below. Samus reactivates her suit and attempts to rescue him, but Ridley quickly blocks her path, intentionally preventing her from saving him. Samus' anger empowers her to the point that she causes Ridley to flee after they do battle.

Leaving Pyrosphere, Samus realizes she cannot contact Adam, and fears that the Deleter may be targeting him. She arrives at the conclusion that Adam may have known everything that was going on from the very beginning, and may now have been aware of the Deleter, making him the biggest threat in the assassin's eyes. She then spots one of her comrades walking away, perhaps the Deleter, and pursues him to Biosphere. Realizing he is being followed, he hinders Samus' pursuit by disabling a bridge and destroying its controls. Overcoming the obstacle by defying Adam in activating her Space Jump and Screw Attack, she pursues the Deleter to the Bioweapon Research Center.

Once there, she instead finds the mysterious woman again, who identifies herself as "Madeline Bergman". She informs Samus about the secret operations there: the Federation was secretly gathering Zebesians and other deadly organisms to serve as bioweapons. The Zebesians were also enhanced to serve as a Special Forces Unit for the Galactic Federation, modeled after the Space Pirates on Zebes. The project became disastrous when a certain presence caused the life forms to suddenly become aggressive beyond their control. Madeline grew fearful that the situation could result in the resurrection of the Space Pirates, thus causing her to send the distress signal. Samus finds holes in this argument, as only a malicious force would lead the Zebesians down that path. The Federation could have easily destroyed the Bottle Ship in order to erase their mistake, and yet they sent an assassin to silence everyone instead to protect something on the ship. Madeline then reveals that there was more; the scientists were propagating Metroids as well, which were cloned from remains found on Samus' armor after the events of Super Metroid. Madeline also explains that the scientists did not recognize the small white creature as Ridley and believed his form was harmless, giving him the nickname "Little Birdie" and raising him as a pet, until one day the creature escaped after murdering a scientist. It is also revealed that an AI named "MB", modelled after Mother Brain, had been created for the purpose of controlling the Metroids. MB and the Metroids were stored in Sector Zero, a recreation of the Space Pirate base on Zebes, Tourian. Samus leaves Madeline in the laboratory for Sector Zero, who then reveals that Adam was the one who authorized the bioweapon project. With Samus gone, Madeline is then approached by the Deleter before a gun is fired.

Arriving at the entrance of Sector Zero, Samus encounters an Infant Metroid that reminds her of the Baby (having a flashback of its hatching in Metroid II: Return of Samus). Unlike before, she decides she must kill it, but before she can she is suddenly struck from behind and collapses, losing her suit. The Metroid decides to take advantage of the situation but is struck by a freeze gun. Samus recognizes her attacker as Adam, who claims that Metroids in Sector Zero were genetically manipulated to be unfreezable (despite the infant that tried to attack Samus). He also explains why he is credited on the military report. He had written it with the explanation of why it shouldn't happen, and despite the Federation's agreement, a small group within the Federation co-opted it for their own purposes. Adam reveals to Samus that he plans to enter Sector Zero to set off its self-destruct mechanism and cause it to detach from the Bottle Ship. Before leaving to Sector Zero, he orders Samus to locate a survivor in Room MW toward the rear of the Bioweapon Research Center and to defeat Ridley. Sector Zero then detaches with Adam inside and a loud sound of an explosion can be heard.

Swearing to finish the mission, Samus returns to the research center, and finds the body of James Pierce, as well as the drained remains of Ridley. She later discovers the survivor Adam mentioned, who opens a large, dark room. Samus discovers that the room is filled with Metroid Eggs, and battles a Queen Metroid occupying the area. Samus faces the Queen in a long, difficult battle when the ship's emergency brakes suddenly become active. In a sudden move, Samus resorts to an old tactic and grapples into the Queen's mouth to Power Bomb her stomach. The survivor absconds from the destroyed chamber. Samus manages to catch up and calm the woman down, who also identifies herself as Madeline Bergman. Showing her identification, the real Madeline explains that the young woman Samus met earlier was actually MB. At first the android displayed amazing skill and learning capability, and developed a consciousness of sorts with the Metroids, but soon began to develop emotions with an nascent sense of herself, eventually developing the same personality as Mother Brain. Becoming self-aware, she began to disagree with the scientists and argue against them, to the point where they thought it was necessary to alter her programming. Feeling betrayed by the scientists and calling out to Madeline to help her, who could only stand by and watch, the android fought back and unleashed all of the experiments to run rampant throughout the station, killing all scientists but Madeline and setting the events for the game.

Samus and Madeline are then confronted by MB herself, pointing a Freeze Gun at them. Despite Samus' protests, Madeline attempts to negotiate with MB, who insists that all humans should be judged. She is then frozen by a group of Federation Marines, but she quickly thaws off, summoning the Bottle Ship's most dangerous creatures to attack everyone. On The Colonel's orders, MB is killed by the Marines. Madeline, devastated and heartbroken at the sight of her fate, is quickly restrained. The Colonel compliments Samus' efforts but orders a Marine to escort her back to her ship, as she is no longer part of the Federation due to everyone in the platoon dying. Much to everyone's surprise, the soldier reveals himself to be Anthony, and due to Adam's orders being authorized by the chairman, he and Samus are allowed to take Madeline with them. He also reveals that he was the one responsible for hitting the emergency brakes on the Bottle Ship while Samus fought the Queen Metroid. The three of them leave for Galactic Federation Headquarters, with Samus questioning whether MB was truly evil all along, or if she was a mere android who had a consciousness awaken in her, only to be driven mad by the greed of humans.

Days after the incident, the Galactic Federation has decided to destroy the Bottle Ship by utilizing its self-destruct mechanism. Before then, Samus flies back to recover an important treasure. She re-explores the Bottle Ship and is confronted by her old foe Phantoon before she is able to work her way back to the location where Adam sat and left his helmet. He had witnessed the conversation where Samus told MB that she would go to Sector Zero to destroy the Metroids, quickly grabbed his guns and hurried out to stop her, leaving his helmet behind. Samus clutches the helmet in an emotional moment. It is interrupted when the ship's self-destruct sequence is activated. With Adam's helmet in her possession, Samus quickly escapes the Bottle Ship suitless before it is utterly destroyed.

Development
Yoshio Sakamoto has said that the primary focus of the game was to show Samus' personality, since the Prime series left many players with their own idea of who she was, and he wanted her to be consistent for any future titles. The game was also intended to seamlessly blend cutscenes with gameplay. As a result, the story and gameplay were developed simultaneously. Sakamoto said that he sees the game as another 2D Metroid game due to its simple controls and "elegant" gameplay, and calls it an extension of Metroid Fusion. 

He claimed later in an interview that he regretted absolutely nothing about the project and felt that very little could have changed or been done better. It entirely reflected his original vision of the game. He was concerned about how the fans would take the Search View feature's lack of movement, but he didn't want to add the confusion of figuring out where players were after switching between the two views; he anticipated backlash but felt it was still the right way to go.

Many aspects of the original Metroid game came about due to technical limitations--he cited the Ice Beam as an example. They couldn't add any major changes to the code for upgrades, but simply changing enemies' color and collision settings led to one of the most iconic and dynamic features in the series. He sought to recreate these limitations in Other M's development by forcing the use of only one Wii Remote, hoping this would lead to inventive workarounds for issues rather than just powering through them like other companies do.

Gameplay/Differences from Past Games
Samus does not collect her powerups in this game as in previous games. Rather, Adam Malkovich will authorize her to use certain powerups, as she has apparently retained all her items from Super Metroid rather than losing them prior to or at the beginning. Instead of losing them, she has to wait until she is authorized to use them bar some exceptions later in the game. Some "new" powerups, such as the Accel Charge, are collected in a more traditional manner, however.  Doors no longer need to be shot with a beam to open; they open automatically on approach.

Enemies do not drop health and ammo, rather Samus generates them herself through a new game mechanic called Concentration. All missiles can be regenerated by holding the Wii Remote vertical and holding the A button down. If Samus' health is 24 or less with no energy tanks full, she can replenish one or more energy tanks (based on the number of E-Recovery Tanks she has) by holding the A button down longer after missiles are regenerated.

There are four upgrades (three being new items) in the game. The upgrade that was previously used in other installments are the Seeker Missiles. The newer items are the Diffusion Beam which appears to be similar to the Diffusion Missile in Metroid Fusion, the E-Recovery Tank, which increases the number of energy tanks filled when continuing after death or using the Concentration ability, and the Accel Charge upgrade, which increases how quickly Samus can perform a charge shot, super missile, or power bomb.

Besides the new upgrading system, Samus's character model has also changed as well. The Power Suit is now yellowish in color (like in Super Metroid, with a redder helmet, and Samus's face cannot be seen through the greenish glow emitting from her visor, unless in a cutscene. Samus only seems to activate the greenish glow during cutscenes when attacking or when she is under attack. The Gravity Suit appears, but no longer alters the colour of the suit and instead adds a purplish glow and makes the lights on the suit pink. It has the same use as other games. Damage reduction returns, having been missing in the last Wii Metroid game, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption.

Hard Mode is also different in this game. It can only be obtained by beating Normal Mode with 100% item collection, which requires coming back and defeating the optional boss after the credits. The enemies in Hard Mode are identical to Normal Mode in that their attacks are the same, they do no more additional damage, and they take no less damage from Samus' attacks. However, Samus is unable to acquire optional pickups such as Energy Tanks, Missile Tanks and Accel Charge upgrades, which limits her to 99 health and 10 missiles for the duration of the mission. Beating Hard Mode does not unlock any rewards, and the post-credits epilogue cannot be played. The game is not saved after destroying MB, so loading a Hard Mode save after seeing the credits will place Samus at the last time she saved before the end of the game. If the player saves as often as possible, that means the save will be right before the Queen Metroid.

Finally, Samus has learned the ability to dodge when sensing an incoming attack, called Sense Move. If an attack is about to hit Samus, pressing any direction on the control pad will cause her to dodge in the pressed direction, making her invulnerable for the duration of the dodge. If the fire button is held down during this time, she can also instantly build up a fully charged shot while dodging. Sense Move cannot be used to dodge all attacks; some must still be jumped or otherwise avoided.



Teaser site
Metroid.jp revealed a small teaser site for the game on January 29 2010, that consisted of an image from the trailer, a new song, and Samus speaking in Japanese, "A dream. It's as if I was watching a playback of a tragedy that really happened." Metroid.com has also since been updated with the English-speaking line, "A dream. I had been reliving the tragic moments of my recent past." A short video titled Teaser Movie, with no actual gameplay, was added to the site on March 2, 2010. A gameplay movie was also added to the site in late March 2010, showing off several features. On June 3, 2010, the entire Japanese site got revamped. On 21st August, 2010, the English site was also updated to include the same features as the Japanese site. Links to the main Nintendo website are also present now.

Title
The title most likely refers to the Character of Melissa Bergman, or "MB", implying that Melissa is a "Second Mother Brain." Other M can also be rearranged to form the word, "Mother"; the acronym of the title is "MOM". It is possible (although unlikely) that as the word 'Metroid' means 'Ultimate Warrior' in the Chozo language, the title refers to the other ultimate warrior of the series - Samus herself.

Reception
Early reviews of the game have been mostly positive, with some negative/mixed reviews.


 * Metroid: Other M received a score of 8.5 out of 10 from IGN.
 * X-Play gave Metroid: Other M a 2 out of 5, saying that Samus's character was unacceptable and the controls were too clunky.
 * GameInformer Australia gave Metroid: Other M an 8, but GameInformer US gave it a 6.25 out of 10.
 * GameSpot gave Metroid: Other M an 8.5 out of 10.
 * GameTrailers gave Metroid: Other M an 8.6 out of 10.
 * GamesRadar gave Metroid: Other M a 7 out of 10 in its Super Review.
 * Joystiq gave Metroid: Other M 4.5 stars out of 5.
 * The Official Nintendo Magazine gave Metroid: Other M 91%.

Much of the criticism was aimed at the long cutscenes, the possibility that Samus's character's portrayal is sexist, the weak plot (compared to past Metroid games), the contradiction of Samus's reaction to Ridley compared to previous games, and some bad dialogue. However, some reviews praised these qualities and did not view them as negative. The game was positively received overall, and most reviews believed that it was a good example of the traditional Metroid formula, although it did not have as much impact as previous groundbreaking titles.

Trivia

 * Metroid: Other M is the first canon Metroid game where Samus Aran speaks, as she did not speak in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption. She had previously spoken through text during the intro of Super Metroid, at various intervals during Metroid Fusion, and in two instances in Metroid: Zero Mission. Samus had grunts of pain in the Metroid Prime Trilogy, and spoke in all of her taunts as Zero Suit Samus in Super Smash Bros. Brawl.
 * Yoshio Sakamoto claimed in a Super Metroid interview that he was the only person to know "where Samus' beauty mark is," which was not visible until the Other M trailer, where it could be seen under the left side of her lip. A mole was also marked on concept art for Samus' face in Metroid Prime, but was not added to the model.
 * During one of the ending scenes of the first Metroid: Other M trailer, two sets of numbers briefly appear in the upper-left hand corner of the 2010 screenshot. The numbers show 3 and 25 in what looks like a Missile count. At the time, many fans believed it was the release date (3/25/2010 or March 25, 2010). However, this was later proven false as the actual release date for North America was August 31, 2010.
 * Metroid: Other M is the first Metroid game to receive a 16+ PEGI rating.
 * Metroid: Other M is the first game in the Metroid series to have orchestrated music.
 * Metroid: Other M is the third game in the Metroid series to not have an ending based on clear time or completion percentage, the first being Metroid Prime Pinball and the second being Metroid Prime Hunters. The Zero Suit sequence at the end was most likely intended to be the ending.
 * Metroid Other M has many traits that set it apart from many games in the series.
 * Metroid: Other M is the only 3-D game in which the Speed Booster and the Shinespark appears.
 * Metroid: Other M is the only Metroid game where the Super Missiles have recoil.
 * Metroid: Other M is the only game that requires Samus to actually run through superheated areas before being allowed to use the Varia Feature/Suit.
 * Metroid: Other M is the only Metroid game that requires 100% completion to unlock Hard Mode.
 * Metroid: Other M is the only Metroid game that has a Hard Mode that removes optional upgrades from the game.
 * Metroid: Other M is the first in the series to feature melee combat.
 * Metroid: Other M is the only Metroid game that has no Energy Capsules or Missile Ammo dropped by enemies. Instead, Samus must use either Concentration or a Navigation Booth to restore them.
 * Metroid: Other M has the most ways to get an instant Game Over.


 * Metroid: Other M has the same number of bosses as Metroid Fusion, with a total of thirteen.

Videos

 * GameTrailers (420p, poor sound)
 * GameVideos
 * IGN (Poor sound)
 * Trailer 2, Nintendo Everything
 * Trailer 2 (Japanese version), GameTrailers
 * Trailer 3
 * Metroid: Other M NEWEST action trailer (720p HD)
 * Metroid: Other M Commercial 1 (Japanese)
 * Metroid: Other M Commercial 2 (Japanese)
 * Metroid: Other M UK Commercial 1
 * Metroid: Other M UK Commercial 2
 * Metroid: Other M US Live Action Commercial
 * "Metroid and Me" Retrospective
 * Metroid Other M Begining
 * Metroid Other M Ending

Gallery
For concept art, see Metroid: Other M's Gallery.