Zero Punctuation: Metroid Other M

[88mph]

the gameplay was okay, but the story was total ass, and they destroyed Samus as a character

i mean can you imagine if a Halo game had Master Chief piss his pants when he saw an elite and need rescue by some random marine? what the hell, femshep is officially more brave than Samus

 

[SAMAS]

When phazon is invloved nothing makes sense, and a planet blowing up is more than a few degrees! Have you played super metroid? The explosion was gigantic. Samus says in the begining Ridley was gone without trace and that she believed it was over. In the article in which a veteren suffers from ptsd watched the scene he said that barbeques cause him to have attacks now but he still has them every so often. Samus has ptsd; this is cannon she can fight it if she's ready, like that veteran, she can fight it and battle. But she wasn't ready to fight ridley and that is why she panict (why can't i spell that right now?).

But why does she have PTSD now? Why did she show no trace of it the other times she fough Ridley? As someone else said it would make sense if Ridley got PTSD but Samus has killed Ridley so many times now it should be virtually routine for her.

Because fighting Ridley ain't the traumatic part. Remember, this is after Super Metroid, in which Samus lost both the Hatchling she had come to care for (the entire reason she came back there), and her second childhood home, possibly all in the space of a single day.

Ridley was just a symptom. The straw that broke the camel's back. "This was supposed to be over. I slaughtered the Space Pirates. I killed Ridley. I completely destroyed Mother Brain. The whole damn planet, my home, blew up. WHAT THE HELL IS HE DOING HERE?"

I thin the main reason people are angry is that Samus has always historically been used in debates to show that Videogames aren't misogynistic, but after Other M that arguement doesn't hold up.

How is Other M Misogynistic? This what is meant by overreaction.

 

[daxterx2005]

5 minuet video tearing a game apart saying its horrid.
links to places where you can purchase the game online.....

:V

 

[RTR]

I continue to stress that the only time Samus' character ever had some sort of development was at the end of Metroid II, where she couldn't bring herself to kill the last baby Metroid because it thought Samus was it's mom, eventually leading to the events of Super Metroid so "free independent spirit" seems to be a little out of context. For all we know, that was the only thing that kept Samus from being a complete blank page, with Other M being the single time her character has even come close to third-dimensional. I mean, just because she's a badass that hunts aliens for a living doesn't mean she's also human.
Also, I think there is a point to the monotony of her voice: for the most part it's not dialogue with other characters and more of a monologue inside her head. Kinda reminds me of Max Payne or Guy Pearce's character in Memento (the monologuing, that is).

 

[StriderShinryu]

I haven't played the game but, based on everything I've seen and heard about it, I imagine I would have the same reaction. Sure maybe it wasn't really spelled out in the previous games what sort of personality Samus really did have, but when her character is pretty much agreed upon by every single Metroid fan I think that still holds a lot of weight. Either the turns shown in Other M are a major break in Samus' characterization or Nintendo just knowingly and willingly bitchslapped everyone who had been a fan of her before. Which is worse is up to you.

Anyway, I've noticed one thing of interest based purely on reading comments about the game. I'm finding it hilarious that the majority of people who are defending the game label it as a Nintendo title, but many who have complaints are often pushing the angle that it was actually made by Team Ninja. Team Ninja may have a history of objectifying their characters, but most of their female leads are actually fairly strong women and they are known for quality action titles. I'm failing to see where having to integrate the Wiimote, something that definitely hurts the action gameplay, and (depending on who you ask) making Samus a weak subservient female character falls under something Team Ninja would do given their history.

 

[Neferius]

Boy... I can't Wait until Team-Ninja gets around to releasing "Devil May Cry : Generic Teenage Emo Smoker" --maybe THEN some crazed (but loyal) Fan might actually consent to putting Tameem Antoniades's ass out of existence ...maybe some Bald chap wearing a business-suit with a bar-code tattooed on the back of his Neck O.ó.

 

[DreamingMerc]

Perhaps this isn't my place to argue, given I've played a whole three hours collectively of any and all Metroid games ever made, but this outside perspective may have some merit.

Now if Metroid's wiki page is to be believed Samus has been running and gunning across the galaxy for some ten to fifteen years, most of which solo. And given that there's been a regular new Metroid title released, I can assume the collection of big bad guys killed has steadily increased. Also coupled with the fact that at least as far as I can read into things Samus has never particularly had any issue lighting up her threats with lethal force. Now has she ever really expressed any doubt about herself or her abilities, again as far as I can see from the outside.

Taking all that into consideration, to hear that this latest title prominently features character aspects that have Samus locked in fear and doubt and some levels of character dependency of others. All this just seems out of place, and from my perspective looks like a bastardization of the character.

Argue what you will fans about how all these aspects of Samus's character are true and just burred beneath the skin. It still feels weird and to a negative considering the stark contrast of character to the previous titles.

Now with all this in mind, I can understand why a fan would be royally irked about Other M. Furthermore I would agree to the argument that Other M is one of the weakest iterations of the series.

 

[Gasaraki]

All he did was spout the same thing that people have been spouting on the internet since the game's release. IMHO moviebob made a much better argument about Other M on screwattack than Yahtzee did in this video. Overall fairly meh, he sounded more like a troll than a critic.

 

[GloatingSwine]

Because fighting Ridley ain't the traumatic part. Remember, this is after Super Metroid, in which Samus lost both the Hatchling she had come to care for (the entire reason she came back there), and her second childhood home, possibly all in the space of a single day.

If they'd actually pushed the effects of the loss of the hatchling as the driving element of Samus' character development in this instalment, that would have been a good way to add depth to the character and show the emotional effects of what she's been through.

Except, y'know, that's not the driving force of the narrative, her relationship with Adam is. So all of this is poorly integrated within it's own plot, as well as inconsistent with previous characterisation.

And, of course, even if they'd tried it the ineptitude of the writing and acting would have killed it. Hell, even with the current plot decent actual scriptwriting, understanding of narrative construction (not only the forgotten Deleter plot thread, but most of what was actually going on on the Bottle Ship is given to you in an infodump after the last boss.), and not cheaping out on a first time voice actress without a decent voice director to actually make sure the performance was tolerable.

Of course, the abilities unlocking when you're told they can be, rather than by finding them like in a proper metroid game, and the inconsistency with why they are locked in the first place (the stated reason is to prevent civilian casualties, but in that case why is the Varia Suit locked, it's a HEP suit, it's not a weapon in the slightest, and the way the game locks you into a fixed path with little to no freedom of motion, also unlike proper metroid games (even Fusion gives you freedom to backtrack and move around to some extent, even if it otherwise leads you around rather than just dumping you in the world and letting you get on with it) would still have been a kick in the face to anyone who wanted an actual Metroid game with their badly written and performed cutscenes.

 

[88mph]

I continue to stress that the only time Samus' character ever had some sort of development was at the end of Metroid II, where she couldn't bring herself to kill the last baby Metroid because it thought Samus was it's mom, eventually leading to the events of Super Metroid so "free independent spirit" seems to be a little out of context. For all we know, that was the only thing that kept Samus from being a complete blank page, with Other M being the single time her character has even come close to third-dimensional. I mean, just because she's a badass that hunts aliens for a living doesn't mean she's also human.
Also, I think there is a point to the monotony of her voice: for the most part it's not dialogue with other characters and more of a monologue inside her head. Kinda reminds me of Guy Pearce's character in Memento (the monologuing, that is).

my problem with their portrayal of Samus is that the character is almost 25 years old, and during the majority of that time the character has been a silent completely isolated protagonist

the Samus in Metroid Other M isn't experienced or mature, you don't sense any history with this game's Samus; if this were a prequel of the first game that'd be fine but this is the 4th game

it seems obvious to me that the writer wanted to insert emotion into Samus, but when you just insert it so haphazardly and without any subtlety to a character people have already had their own ideas about for almost 25 years, yeah people aren't going to like it

 

[internetzealot1]

I'm having a little trouble here. Are the fanboys the ones attacking the game or the one defending it.

 

[jayjaykoolaid]

Extra Zero Punctuation video will be him telling all his fans this will be his last review. For some reason, I have a weird feeling in the pit of my stomach that might be true... Though it wouldn't surprise me =/

The Thought of Yahtzee being done with reviews makes my stomach turn and my head spin. If that's what it's about then I'm done with the world.

 

[SAMAS]

Perhaps this isn't my place to argue, given I've played a whole three hours collectively of any and all Metroid games ever made, but this outside perspective may have some merit.

Now if Metroid's wiki page is to be believed Samus has been running and gunning across the galaxy for some ten to fifteen years, most of which solo. And given that there's been a regular new Metroid title released, I can assume the collection of big bad guys killed has steadily increased. Also coupled with the fact that at least as far as I can read into things Samus has never particularly had any issue lighting up her threats with lethal force. Now has she ever really expressed any doubt about herself or her abilities, again as far as I can see from the outside.

Taking all that into consideration, to hear that this latest title prominently features character aspects that have Samus locked in fear and doubt and some levels of character dependency of others. All this just seems out of place, and from my perspective looks like a bastardization of the character.

Argue what you will fans about how all these aspects of Samus's character are true and just burred beneath the skin. It still feels weird and to a negative considering the stark contrast of character to the previous titles.

Now with all this in mind, I can understand why a fan would be royally irked about Other M. Furthermore I would agree to the argument that Other M is one of the weakest iterations of the series.

I think the main problem with the "As I see it" argument is the fact that we haven't seen much. Moviebob points it out in his vid, and he has a point. The Metroid games have given us only the tiniest glimpses of Samus' character. We see her running around alone shooting hostile wildlife, and most people have assumed she must always be like that.

Now I know that Spoony said he disregarded the official manga (seriously, it was shown on Nintendo's website), probably because it disagreed with him. But even taking that out, we have two, maybe three looks into her actual character.

Bob mentioned Metroid II, where she decide not to kill the Metroid Hatchling. But he forgot to mention most of Metroid Fusion, the one time she actually talked to someone else. In this case, the ship AI she named after... guess who? Adam Malkovitch. Samus mentions that she gave it that name because it reminded her of him. She also mentions Adam (both the AI and the man) having an authoritative personality. She also mentions a somewhat secret code ("Any objections, Lady?") between the two of them, hinting at a relationship that was noticeably closer than simply Officer and Subordinate.

A possible third moment is that shot in Super Metroid's intro where she is shown shaking hands with the scientist she gives the Hatchling over to. It's not exactly something an emotionless soldier-type would do.

I'm having a little trouble here. Are the fanboys the ones attacking the game or the one defending it.

[Kosh]Yes.[/Kosh]

 

[mastiffchild]

I realise Yahtzee has a rep and MO to keep to which usually leads to a slight over savaging of the game but here he didn't go far enough. Sure, the story, writing and general portrayal of Samus as someone who couldn't possibly do her job much less all the stuff from the previous games being so crippled with self doubt and daddy issues was poor for games in general and a SIN for a Metroid game was worth ranting over but, for me, the controls deserved a bigger kicking.

First off I thought we were told the whole having to use the Wiimote sideways(what an ergonomic joy for us all!)and suffer THAT D-pad was bad enough but kind of understandable because they wanted to hark back to 2D Metroid's SNES control scheme with the two buttons. However, then they told us about the FP stuff which just made a mockery of it and meant they'd have been infinitely better off using the nunchuck and analogue stick. Limiting our movement in the aiming bits would have been OK if our normal movement wasn't borked and having to mess about with the Wiimote and point now and then felt tacked on like difficulty through the controls rather than through game design. It was shit.

I miss proper Metroid, I'm a massive fantart, and this wasn't nearly good enough. Traded in a week.

 

[Samurai Goomba]

I'm having a little trouble here. Are the fanboys the ones attacking the game or the one defending it.

Both.

As for myself, I think the game looks rubbish but I won't commit to a definite opinion without having played it. Although I will say that if the objective of the press, reviews, trailers and fanboy defenses of the game was to make me WANT to get Other M, it has completely failed.

But Halo: Reach is looking pretty sweet. If only they'd start porting Halo to the PC. I mean, COME ON! It's a M$ OS, for goodness sakes! It's like Nintendo refusing to port a Super Nintendo game to a system which has all the capabilities and more of the Super Nintendo and a larger player base, to boot, AND it's their own system brand. Why port the first two Halo games and not the others?

 

[internetzealot1]

And with that, the last dying embers of the Wii have been snuffed out. I can't fathom how unimaginably difficult it must be to be a nintendo fan. Failure is staring them in the face with every game nintendo release.

"Failure is staring them in the face with every game nintendo release"

What?

 

[Hammer_Wizard]

All he did was spout the same thing that people have been spouting on the internet since the game's release. IMHO moviebob made a much better argument about Other M on screwattack than Yahtzee did in this video. Overall fairly meh, he sounded more like a troll than a critic.

Ugh, MovieBobs review was the worst kind. Everybody needs to stop lampshading attacking a strawman as though that makes it alright. It never does. And he up and insulted people that criticized the game, calling them racists and japanophobes. The criticisms levied against the story are legitimate ones, but because moviebob brushes them aside with the stupid strawman sequence. I understand he wants to push the new gameplay, but that is no excuse to try to defend an indefensibly bad story and character development for Samus. He really should stop rating things according to how successful he wishes wishes they were, and judge the on their own merits.

EDIT: I'll do Bob a favor and link his review of Other M for people out of the loop.
http://gameoverthinker.blogspot.com/2010/09/episode-40-heavens-to-metroid.html

 

[SAMAS]

Because fighting Ridley ain't the traumatic part. Remember, this is after Super Metroid, in which Samus lost both the Hatchling she had come to care for (the entire reason she came back there), and her second childhood home, possibly all in the space of a single day.

If they'd actually pushed the effects of the loss of the hatchling as the driving element of Samus' character development in this instalment, that would have been a good way to add depth to the character and show the emotional effects of what she's been through.

Except, y'know, that's not the driving force of the narrative, her relationship with Adam is. So all of this is poorly integrated within it's own plot, as well as inconsistent with previous characterisation.

And, of course, even if they'd tried it the ineptitude of the writing and acting would have killed it. Hell, even with the current plot decent actual scriptwriting, understanding of narrative construction (not only the forgotten Deleter plot thread, but most of what was actually going on on the Bottle Ship is given to you in an infodump after the last boss.), and not cheaping out on a first time voice actress without a decent voice director to actually make sure the performance was tolerable.

Of course, the abilities unlocking when you're told they can be, rather than by finding them like in a proper metroid game, and the inconsistency with why they are locked in the first place (the stated reason is to prevent civilian casualties, but in that case why is the Varia Suit locked, it's a HEP suit, it's not a weapon in the slightest, and the way the game locks you into a fixed path with little to no freedom of motion, also unlike proper metroid games (even Fusion gives you freedom to backtrack and move around to some extent, even if it otherwise leads you around rather than just dumping you in the world and letting you get on with it) would still have been a kick in the face to anyone who wanted an actual Metroid game with their badly written and performed cutscenes.

Hey, that's just what I think they were trying to do. I didn't say they did it well.

 

[Worgen]

You know, I saw the trailers for this game and thought "This is going to be shit, too emo and the controls look hard as hell to use." Thank you for confirming my suspicions.

actually it controls pretty well and the game play is alot of fun but the story is sooooooooooooooo bad, its really amazing, I havent seen a story this bad in a very long time... really I cant remember ever having one this bad

 

[mandrilltiger]

I'm just glad their not making Wii Music.