"Treat our lost assets with care, Lady."
--Adam, Metroid Dread
Metroid Dread, in its original form, is one of gaming history's most infamous cancelled projects, having been in development for the original DS before getting scrapped--and surprisingly resurrected as a project aimed at the Switch more than a decade later. The wait has not been wasted on the developer's side. Metroid Dread builds upon the melee actions developed in Samus Returns for the 3DS, expands on the franchise lore in ways that no previous Metroid game did before, and through its E.M.M.I. machines introduces a worthy successor to the renowned SA-X that would relentlessly hunt players in certain sequences of Metroid Fusion. On the level of gameplay, Samus has never before been so mobile, so smooth in her movements and transitions, and so capable of escaping or countering enemy attacks. Metroid Dread is yet another example of Nintendo making the most of their own system and IPs.
Production Values
It might not rival the graphics of the latest home consoles that cannot be played in handheld mode, but the visual side of Metroid Dread is right at home on the Switch, free of jagged edges, consistently muted colors, and slowdown. The colors are diverse, with lots of blues, reds, and greens, among other colors, having prominence. Just like in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption and Metroid: Other M, there is voice acting, but Samus returns to her normally quiet self for this game. You get to finally hear what Adam's AI voice sounds like, as the AI bearing his name only spoke in onscreen text in Metroid Fusion for the Game Boy Advance. Samus herself even speaks, but I will refrain from detailing what she says to avoid major plot spoilers! In other areas, the sound excels, especially with Samus's weapons and the music. The music just lacks the same level of intensity and distinctiveness the series has enjoyed in the past.
Gameplay
Throughout the middle of the game, Samus travels through the different regions of ZDR via train-like vehicles and teleporters, and she often revisits familiar areas to find or use items that open up new pathways. In a masterful balance of open-ended exploration and subtle environmental hints, there is actually little more than occasional words from Adam and one or two places to use new abilities right after getting them that tell you where exactly to go. Unless one is paying attention or simply has an excellent memory, it could be very easy to get lost by accident and wander around in a vain attempt to find the next mandatory item or boss. Each new ability required to actually open doors or navigate through a region, though, is always placed very close to something that it can be used on.
The one class of abilities that are not strictly necessary to progress are the Aeion abilities, such as the phantom cloak and pulse radar, but these are very useful, especially the first one attained when it is used to prevent E.M.M.I.s from noticing Samus. E.M.M.I.s are extremely difficult to consistently counter once they grab her--other enemies can be far more easily countered by an uppercut. The only way to actually defeat them permanently is to obtain the "omega blaster" in each E.M.M.I. section and strategically use it to destroy their facial plating, after which the beam resets to whatever variation of the power beam has been acquired thus far. In the meantime, players are likely to die again and again while navigating the maze of rooms in E.M.M.I. territories--but there is a cloaking ability that is gained, which, although it can drain health, might let the E.M.M.I. not detect you. It can still collide with Samus by walking into her, so it is not as if she is phasing out of the physical plane or into another dimension.
Other enemy types that are less commonly encountered than the E.M.M.I. can still be a pain in the ass, taking so much damage that they can reduce five to seven energy tanks down to nothing in only a few successful attacks. Even just physically contacting them when they are not attacking might deplete the health of one or two energy tanks. There are enough of these tanks that by the end of the game, players can amass at least around seven of them without going so far out of their way that they become lost. Energy parts even return from Other M. Like pieces of heart in some Legend of Zelda games, energy parts must be collected, in this case four of them, to form a new energy tank. This is a first for the side-scrolling games. Also unique is that ordinary missile expansions now grant the capacity for only two additional missiles instead of five, while special missile expansions give the capacity for 10.
Story
Some spoilers are below.
Samus visits the planet ZDR when video showing an X parasite prompts the Galactic Federation to send seven E.M.M.I.s, powerful robotic humanoids, there, only to lose all contact with the machines. She is almost immediately confronted with a living, hostile Chozo--a member of the same species that raised her following the deaths of her parents. Defeated in their initial encounter and stranded deep underground, Samus searches for a way to the surface of ZDR, guided by Adam's AI, which she can interact with at scattered terminals. As she meets the E.M.M.I.s one by one, it becomes clear that they have glitched or are being controlled so that they hunt her. Destroying them one by one with a rare energy type, Samus faces the history of the Chozo during the ordeal.
Intellectual Content
The normal environmental exploration and collectible hunting of Metroid games is here in great form, but the more abstract side of Metroid lore is actually left out. In Metroid Prime, messages left by the Chozo elaborate on the gravitation of the species towards spiritual, abstract, and scientific discoveries, with many members of the species eventually either dying off after the Metroid Prime brought phazon to the planet or shedding their physical bodies for spiritual forms. Different classes or castes of Chozo were mentioned. In Dread, one sees firsthand how Chozo warriors might fight and what ideologies they might hold. Of the two Chozo encountered in Dread, the distinction between the kind of Chozo spoken of in Metroid Prime for their pursuit of truth and the kind that might crave power above all else is made clear. An entire species, after all, is highly unlikely to share the same goals, worldviews, and behaviors. It is just that Dread does not elaborate upon the philosophical heights of the Chozo or do much with this distinction, which in one sense does withhold a level of thematic depth from the game.
Conclusion
The end of the core Metroid storyline in the side-scrolling titles, at least for now, Dread is a finale that unites classic but evolved Metroid gameplay with more prominent lore than many other games in the side-scrolling series could reveal. It also ends up accomplishing all of this with a fairly minimalistic story that still never shortchanges the history or competence of Samus and yet is secondary to the environmental progression that marks the other games in the series. The gameplay is the biggest success, and Nintendo and Mercury Steam did an excellent job of revisiting older franchise items, norms, and creatures while bringing plenty of new ones. It is clear that Dread takes the best of Samus Returns and only improves upon it. Perhaps Dread's development and popularity will even lead Nintendo to authorize more classic-style Metroid games for the Switch or beyond.
Content:
1. Violence: Mostly bloodless shooting and physical attacks are used by both Samus and some of the creatures or entities she faces.
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