Above: A Metroid fan: *growl*
Zelda fans have had an unearned reputation of being feisty at anyone who criticizes Zelda. I have learned this is not true. Dissent and debate is more encouraged in Zelda circles (probably due to all the timeline theories and all). When I expressed that I didn’t like the choo-choo train in Spirit Tracks and felt like Zelda has really fallen as well as desiring a return to more combat, more action, some people got angry. But I was never asking Zelda to be something it wasn’t. Zelda fans can see why fans of the earlier Zelda may feel out of place with the more puzzle orientated, ‘character driven’, Zelda games.
It’s a total different story with the Metroid fans. Here, take a look (someone emailed this to me).
The reason why I am responding to this thread is…
1) They never dreamed I’d respond to them.
2) To illustrate the hostility of fans when someone says something they don’t like… even if it is on his own website.
3) The continued effort of the Human need to feel superior, e.g. attack the messenger and not the message and they aren’t even getting the message right.
The reason why online discussions of games have been held hostage by a young group of fans is because of old timers are literally pushed away. Since the old timers do not understand why everyone is so excited about something they were not, they conclude that they have outgrown gaming and move on.
But now, things have changed. I am realizing that I didn’t leave gaming, gaming left me. And it is important for those of disinterest to speak up.
As usual, Malstrom takes one tiny piece of information concerning video game hype and speculation and he goes on an unnecessarily long tirade against EVERY SINGLE THING Nintendo has “committed against” a certain franchise. And he has some outrageous hate for narrative of any kind in video games.
That isn’t why I wrote the narrative post. I’ve been consistently vocal against narratives for a long time. Remember that IGN post that praised Wii Sports Resort for its ‘narrative’? I was like, “WTF! What narrative? hahaha” This called more attention to that article and people were laughing at it. IGN was very unhappy with me that day, haha.
There is no such thing as a narrative in a video game. Narratives are not about allowing the player to have control. What you end up with is watching a movie of computer animation while twiddling your thumbs… and a bad movie at that.
I’ve noticed a disturbing trend of game developers somehow, someway, always throwing in ‘narratives’ into their games. For example, Sonic the Hedgehog 4 was said, by a developer, to have a new ‘story arc’. I can tell you people did not play Sonic the Hedgehog for its amazing story. If you put game developers into a room, you would eventually end up with them making a movie. I’d say, “Guys, you’re doing it wrong.” Did you not see the post of me being in stunned disbelief over how ridiculous Heavy Rain was? The post wasn’t spurred by Other M.
1. It is about time for change in the Metroid Series, the story throughout needs to be tied together, and tied together GOOD.
2. The gameplay looks fine, it is a different type of game, obviously it isn’t like Metroid Prime and of course it isn’t like Super Metroid, anyone that can see the trailer can deduce that.
3. I think that it is good that they do cinematics.
4. If people are scared that it will be like the manga…. damn really? I mean… Personally I don’t even know how to answer this.
5. This just seems to be exactly like Metroid Prime, like everyone has said here, people were on the edge and said MP was going to suck, “blah blah blah.” Well it didn’t. Now there is always a chance the game can suck I mean we don’t know much about it but hey, give it a chance. It just seems to me that some people are afraid of change and they have grown accustom to Metroid Prime so any type of change that they have never experienced before automatically because a “hell no” on their list. Well man up people, give it a chance. You were told specifically at E3 last summer… “This Metroid game will be like no other.” That should have been the hint.
1. If you consider Metroid to have a ‘great story’, then why not other games that were out at the time? Why doesn’t…say… Contra have a ‘great story’? It certainly has a more interesting intro:
“Let’s attack aggressively!” But it isn’t much of a story. While I never felt maternal feelings during Super Metroid, I definitely felt some testosterone during Contra 3!
2.You cannot say the gameplay looks fine. We haven’t been shown any gameplay yet. Not trying to rain on your hype, but I do not think it is a good idea to get hyped up on a title before it has shown any gameplay.
3. Why is cinematics so good for Metroid? I do not understand.
4. Manga does repel many people. The success of Metroid was never due to any manga.
5. Who said it was going to suck? I, myself, have said that I am in a ‘wait and see’ mode on the gameplay. The only thing that scares me are Sakamoto’s quotes where he describes Other M as exploring Samus as a woman and her tough yet sensitive feelings. Oh geez…
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This fellow needs to be smacked. Hard. 
EDIT: 
Sakamoto-sama deserves hugs, kisses, and chocolate! WE LOVE YOU SAKAMOTO-SAAAAAAAAANdesu-
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Are you guys Metroid fans or Sakamoto fans? There is a difference.
I am detecting a high degree of ‘Game God’ worship. As for me, I slay Game Gods because they are more trouble than they are worth. The notion of ‘Game Gods’ I have found to be very destructive to gaming. It allows a developer to make games for himself (instead of for customers) and makes young people want to join the ‘Game Industry’ so they, too, can become a ‘Game God’ (and ignore customers).
Sakamoto is no Game God. Neither is Shigeru Miyamoto. The only ‘Game God’ is the customer.
Whoever this guy is that wrote that article knows nothing about being a Metroid fan. People aren’t scared over what the game is going to be. People have expressed concern with gameplay and such but Sakamoto has it under control. To say his disconnected from the consumers, this guy is blowing it out his ass.
ugh I can’t talk about it no more without getting a headache.
What we are witnessing with many of Nintendo’s main franchises is a clash of generations. With Zelda, there is a generation that thinks Ocarina is the bee’s knees. But there is another generation that prefers the style of game found in the original Zelda or Link to the Past or even Zelda 2.
With Metroid, people who played the original NES game when it was new (and knew what the heck they were doing) have to be over thirty years old now. You do not hear from this group online much because they are too busy with real life. I am one of these people.
If this generation is showing anything, what is said online in gaming forums often ends up being very different than what happens in the market.
But, reader, note how I am not allowed to disagree. They are saying I am not a ‘Metroid fan at all’. And you know what is ticking them off? It isn’t anything I’ve really said about Other M. I have no idea what the game will be because no gameplay has been shown. What is stirring them is that I am laughing at Sakamoto when he makes those crazy quotes. I am laughing at the Game God. That is blasphemy!
I do confess that when Sakamoto talks about the Metroid series in a way of exploring the womanly issues surrounding Samus Aran, I burst out laughing. It’s funny.
I can just picture an old school gamer walking into a game store and see “Metroid: Other M” on display. So he goes, “Hey, I like Metroid, and I need a new game after buying a Wii for Mario 5.” So he takes Other M home with him expecting a traditional Metroid experience. I would love to be in the same room to see his reaction! What would he think when exploring Samus’s womanly issues? What about when exploring Samus’s relationship with Adam? I’m not bashing Other M, I just find that scenario funny.
Excuse me Sean, just a minute. I’m not happy for you, and I’m not going to let you finish. Super Metroid was one of the greatest games of ALL TIME.
…so i really don’t think anything you say is credible when you talk about it like it sucked or something. Screw you, guy.
Super Metroid wasn’t that hot when it was released. It got overshadowed by Donkey Kong Country when that came came out a few months later.
The game has aged incredibly well. But anyone saying Super Metroid has a ‘great story’ must think comic books are ‘great stories’ as well. There is no real story at all in the game.
Super Metroid was, at its heart, a remake of the original Metroid. You fight the old bosses again of Kraid and Ridley. You go to the same areas again like Norfair.
Super Metroid is a great game and a triumph of the use of sound and music. However, the game was incredibly easy and a cakewalk after Metroid I and II. Since games have gotten easier that don’t really require much skill as the arcade style games used to require, Super Metroid has become more popular today than it ever was when it was released. However, the game is probably overrated especially in discussions online.
You know, I would have written a whole essay how this guy fails a everything he does, but unfortunately I don’t have his email nor be able to write comments.
So I think it’s for the best to just swallow our hate and avoid this man like a plague… At least until we know how contact him.
You may email me at seanmalstrom@yahoo.com.
i want to know how many people that played Metroid did not realize that huge f’in Metroid was the hatchling? Anyone not know that? I mean it’s the first Metroid you see in the game near the end, the obvious fact it didn’t kill you means something.
still can’t keep from wanting to punch him
Such violent thoughts! But I never said, and Sakamoto never said, that people didn’t realize the big Metroid was the hatchling. Sakamoto said that he thought he illustrated Samus’s ‘maternal feelings’ with the Metroid, and I am laughing at Sakamoto.
I also consider his interest in a digital video game character’s feelings to be… honestly, a little creepy.
The fact that this guy doesn’t like Super OR Fusion makes me scratch my head. How is he even a metroid fan at all?
I mean, I agree with him about metroid not having a consistent direction and suffering from retcon-itus, but why the hell is he even bothering to comment on Other M if he didn’t like the rest of the series?
I liked Super Metroid. I would have liked Fusion more if they ripped out all the ridiculous dialogue from it. “Oh Adam…” “Oh Samus…”
I think Sakamoto’s eccentricities were excused from Fusion and Zero Mission due to those games being 2d Metroid. Now that Sakamoto is upping on the eccentricities and not making a 2d Metroid, I am going to enjoy seeing how this game is received.
I think he did that purposely because he doesn’t want pissed off fans barking at him. And really …who does? But he has a right to think and believe what he wants to. I’m not going to rain on his parade- even though I disagree with him.
I have Nintendo fans pissed off at me all the time ever since I started putting on my ‘Elder Gamer’ hat and stopped talking exclusively about Nintendo’s business strategy. But this is more about the clash of generations.
And I didn’t write the narrative post because of Other M. But I do wonder why there is a trend for game developers to want to make computer animated movies instead of video games.
No, that scene didn’t develop Samus at all. It did, however, show that Metroids are not entirely mindless killers, and that they can have at least some level of emotional attachment. After nearly killing Samus, it not only stopped once it realized who she was, but paused for a moment and chirped in remorse before flying off. And thus does the player realize that it’s the once-tiny hatchling, now freakishly altered. For Sakamoto being such a bad story writer, he certainly conveyed a lot of realization and emotion through a wordless 16-bit scene. Any schmuck could do that, right?
Again, reader, note that they are annoyed not because of what I said but because I am disagreeing with SAKAMOTO THE GAME GOD.
The player does not realize the Metroid had been altered through radiation or anything else. It is just a bigger sprite.
And Sakamoto did screw up. Where did all the other Metroids in Super Metroid come from? Super Metroid starts off saying the baby Metroid was the last Metroid in the galaxy. And the only way for there to be more Metroids is if there was a queen or something else. It wasn’t explained. And it is a giant plot hole. Someone should ask Sakamoto where all the other Metroids came from and why it wasn’t explained.
You want a scene that made consumers believe that Samus was a maternal being? How about ten minutes later when she’s devastating the Mother Brain in a burst of emotion after having witnessed the death of the ‘Last Metroid’ who had just given its life to save her? That was one of the most powerful and memorable scenes of the SNES era.
Because clearly games like Final Fantasy IV or Final Fantasy VI or Chrono Trigger just can’t compare to that scene. Oh no, not at all!
But then Sean goes on about the lack of Metroid evolution as being a plot hole in Super. (Might as well make it a plot hole in Metroid, MZM, and every game of the Prime series as well.)
Sure, why not? The storyline in Metroid doesn’t make much sense. Much of the problem of this is because the original Metroid is remade again and again.
Metroid
Super Metroid (a remake of Metroid)
Metroid Prime (Putting the remake of Metroid into 3d)
Zero Mission (a remake of Metroid)
It does confuse the storyline.
Considering that the hatchling (of which he was apparently not aware) was not only a baby at the beginning of the game, it grew because of experimentation (radiation, I believe) and not because of maturity. I don’t think it (or its clones which were born even later) had the time to mature and evolve. I could shoot off some fan theories, but the point is, the only “hole” is in Sean’s reasoning. He even advocates Metroid Prime which clearly lacks those same steps of evolution. Good job, Sean.
You’re making up stuff that was never in the game. The game never said or showed that the baby Metroid was experimented on or that the other Metroids were clones. If the other Metroids are clones, why aren’t they all big Metroids? You cannot insert things into the game that exist purely in your imagination (unless you agree with me that games and narratives do not co-exist). Good job, anonymous forum dweller.
As for Metroid Prime, it was clearly a spin-off and wasn’t trying to fit into any ‘storyline’. It was just trying to be a good game… and it was.
I skimmed some of the rest of the blog and closed the window before completing it. Misinformed droll is nothing more than misinformed droll, afterall.
Awesome! Less email to stuff my mailbox then! =)
I wish I had the innate power to piss people off like he does, but I have too much good in me to do so. And I’d spend the whole time just making jokes giving me away.
In any event, arguing with morons will turn you into a moron.
This is very good advice. It goes, “Do not argue with an idiot because people will be hard pressed to tell the difference.” So I am taking a professional risk with this post.
What is hilarious is that I am not bashing Other M, I am still in the ‘wait and see’ camp. I am worried though based on what Sakamoto has said. And I quoted Sakamoto (accurately) and then I laugh at what he is saying. And you guys go bonkers!
You guys say you want to punch me, want to inflict violence against me. Why? What did I ever do to you? How does posting my own thoughts on my own personal website bring out these violent thoughts?
If I was a jerk, I’d register at the forum and come in and have some ‘fun’. But what would that accomplish?
I am seeing a pattern that anyone who thinks what Sakamoto was saying about ‘maternal feelings’ with Samus or ‘strong woman’ kinda odd to be attacked.
Why can’t people have different opinions? And why the commotion of a game that has showed no gameplay? And why the cult-like devotion to Sakamoto? (I’m against all Game God cults, even ones to Shigeru Miyamoto. I don’t think they are healthy for the gamer, for the developer, or for the industry in general.)
If you guys think that Sean Malstrom’s opinions on Other M are pathetic, his opinions on Zelda are worse. Much, much, much, much worse. He wants all puzzles removed, he wants zero plot whatsoever, and he wants Zelda to return to its “arcade roots.” I’d link to these articles, but I don’t want the thread getting too off topic.
But here’s something funny from December. He basically loses it when he sees pictures of Wii disc cases that have a recycling logo on the inside. He says that such an act is “unacceptable.” He claims that such an “abominable” act has inspired him to quit blogging forever.
Yet here he is two months later. 
Seriously, this guy is an idiot.
Do you people even know how to read? In my Christmas day post (which I was cranky since I had been up 36 hours straight), I was never ‘inspired to quit’ because of the packaging. I’ve been wanting to quit for a long while. (That’s just the straw breaking the camel’s back.) What is keeping me going is how I keep having an effect like, for example, telling the truth of why the original Metroid sold. By the way how Sakamoto talks, he doesn’t seem to know what Metroid is about. Since no one else is saying it, I’ll be the one to do so. Pioneers always get the arrows.
And about Zelda: puzzles and “scripts” are not the reason why Zelda became popular in the first place. All you have to do is play the earlier games, and you will see that. There are no puzzles or scripts in the early Zelda games.
While I don’t browse forums much, I never heard a Zelda gamer say he wants to punch me in the face or dream of other acts of violence against me. The intolerant reputation of Zelda fans is undeserved, Zelda fans are far more kinder and gentler than these Metroid fans.
But I don’t even think they are Metroid fans. They are Sakamoto fans first, Metroid fans second. They are literally worshiping a ‘Game God’. When Sakamoto says something, they rewrite their opinions to match his. “Yes, Sakamoto! We felt Samus’s maternal feelings in Super Metroid too!”
One thing from that thread you will not hear is this: what if Sean Malstrom is right? What if Metroid is not about Samus Aran? What if Metroid is about something else… such as zapping Metroids? This question isn’t even considered. I laughed at their ‘Game God’, so I committed blasphemy, therefore I must be tossed into the volcano.
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