Metroid: Other M

Metroid: Other M is a new Metroid game announced by Nintendo at E3 2009 to be 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". It will not make use of the Wii MotionPlus or Wii Balance Board. The designers are putting an emphasis on adventure, and aim to have a "seamless and natural" interaction between gameplay and cinematics. The game will be 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 Francsico.

Plot
According to Yoshio Sakamoto and Yusuke Hayashi, the game takes place between Super Metroid and Metroid Fusion. The blond-haired woman at the end of the trailer is not "a second Samus" of any kind, but another "very, very important character". The Living body arms development lab and the Bottle Ship are the only new named locations, thus far. Cutscene segments show a Galactic Federation base as well as Tourian. A rainy landscape area, a forest area and an ice area were seen in the second trailer.

The game begins with a cinematic detailing the battle with Mother Brain during Super Metroid. After escaping the exploding Planet Zebes, Samus awakens from the dream on a Galactic Federation ship. After leaving, she receives a distress call from a dormant Bottle Ship, which is floating a short distance away from a Federation vessel.

Upon stepping into the ship, Samus encounters a group of Galactic Federation soldiers, led by Anthony Higgs, who fought alongside her before she defected from the Federation. She also finds Commander Adam Malkovich, who used to be her commanding officer when she was in the Federation Army. Something happened that caused Samus to leave the army, causing Adam to be standoffish and guarded, calling Samus an "outsider" and ordering his team not to reveal any details of their mission to her.

However, after defeating a large purple tentacled creature, Samus is welcomed onto the team and briefed on the details of their mission. They all split up to explore different parts of the ship, in hopes of the discovering the threat that they are up against...

E3 Trailer
The trailer demonstrates combat and movement mechanics in third-person, with first person segments for ranged attacks. It featured Ridley, Mother Brain, and Adam Malkovich as well as Samus Aran. Recurring creatures include a swarm of Reos, Ki-Hunters, and a type of Space Pirate that has only been seen in Metroid Fusion and the 2002 Metroid manga. Samus is seen wearing both the Power Suit and Varia Suit during the trailer, most resembling their appearances in Super Metroid. Suit upgrades seen include the Power Beam, Charge Beam, Missiles, and Speed Booster. This adventure sees Samus making heavy use of dynamic melee attacks, along with her usual abilities. The trailer did appear on the Nintendo Channel, along with several other previews and trailers for other games.

Teaser Movie
A second movie entitled "Teaser Movie" was shown at the Nintendo Media Summit, and features Samus staring out the window, speaking. Adam Malkovich is also seen in a flashback that may depict events from the 2002 manga; this scene also depicts a younger Samus wearing her Zero Suit. This is one of only two trailers to not feature gameplay at all. It was later released on Metroid.com.

Around the same time as the summit, the intro, filmed with an iPhone camera, was posted on YouTube against the terms given by Nintendo to the media to not film gameplay. It was later removed, though several users had already copied it and posted it to their accounts. The intro only goes up to the beginning of the training sequence.

Gameplay Movie
A gameplay trailer was released on March 30, 2010 which showed more gameplay than the previous videos. Samus wears the Power Suit in most of the trailer and can also be seen wearing the Varia Suit in some scenes. The Ice Beam, Morph Ball, Screw Attack, Wall Jump, and Super Missile are also seen being used. A large number of the game's enemies, bosses and environments were also seen in the second trailer. Recurring creatures include Dessgeega and Geemers. It showed how the game would be played with the Wii Remote sideways for 3rd person view, and when the Wii Remote is pointed at the screen, the first-person view is shown. Also given away are some new environments, one of them being a luscious rainforest-like landscape much like Crateria and the Tallon Overworld. It also shows off several impressive looking finishing blows. At the end of the trailer, it shows in HD the cutscene from the beginning of the game - the climax of Super Metroid.

Third Trailer
On May 20, 2010, a new trailer that may just be footage was leaked to YouTube. The trailer, at the beginning, features the intro scene depicting Super Metroid ' s ending, with scenes from the original version put in for comparison. After this, Samus is seen in her gunship; this is the scene where she picks up the distress signal from the Bottle Ship. Samus speaks in Japanese throughout the trailer. Where the speech is taken from is unknown, but it is possible that what is heard around the Super Metroid climax is from the intro scene showing Samus in her Zero Suit, and the speech heard in the gunship scene is in fact meant for that scene.

Demo
A demo of Other M appeared at the Nintendo Media Summit in San Francisco. It delivered more details of the game's plot and showcased the gameplay and controls of the game. Abilities seen are the Bombs, Power Bombs, Five-Bomb Drop, Morph Ball, Power Suit, Missiles, Scan Visor, Power Beam and Charge Beam. Samus also can use several melee moves during the demo.

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 entitled 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.

Title
The title of Metroid: Other M is abbreviated to "MOM", and the subtitle is an anagram for "Mother", strengthening this game's connection to maternal themes from the series history, such as Mother Brain (who appears in the trailer).

It may also refer to an infamous line from the end of Metroid: "THE GALAXY MAY BE INVADED BY THE OTHER METROID. PRAY FOR A TRUE PEACE IN SPACE."

Yoshio Sakamoto, the co-creator of Metroid, confirmed that the name will have significance in several instances, indicating that Other M is the final title.

Trivia

 * Because Samus speaks in the trailer, this will mark the first Metroid series game where Samus actually speaks vocally (not counting Super Metroid and Metroid Fusion, as she spoke in text boxes; her voice was previously only heard as grunts of pain in the Metroid Prime trilogy, or the Zero Suit Samus taunts in Brawl).
 * Yoshio Sakamoto claimed in an early Super Metroid that he was the only person to know "where Samus's beauty mark is," which was not visible until the Metroid: Other M trailer, where it could be seen under the left side of her lip.
 * 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). However, this was later proven false.

Videos

 * GameTrailers (420p, poor sound)
 * GameVideos
 * IGN (Poor sound)
 * Trailer 2, Nintendo Everything
 * Trailer 2 (Japanese version), GameTrailers