Metroid: Samus Returns

This game wasn't bad, but I feel like I got much more out of entries that have already existed before this. Boss battles towards the end were great, however.

if you think AM2R makes this game's existence useless, there's at least the fact that the team likely re-used many of the programming from this game for developing Metroid Dread

Definitely better on a replay than the first go around. Maybe it's because I really enjoyed Dread, but I feel more appreciative of the changes from the classic games. I still think it relies entirely too much on the counter move, especially earlier in the game and some of the boss fights are tedious. I said this about Dread , and I'll say it here, too. It feels very off brand. Like the developers didn't really want to make a Metroid game. At the time I was very unhappy with how it compared to AM2R, but I think it's a good game in its own right.

I only played a couple hours of this and can't bring myself to return to it. Every enemy feels the same when you can beat them all with a counter, there haven't been any notable boss encounters, and all of the settings have felt pretty similar.

Does this get any better? I really liked Dread but something is really missing here in comparison despite having a similar formula.

i feel like Dread being a thing brings a lot of this game's shortcomings into sharper focus

fun but hurts my hands... i always have to stretch them or take breaks because of how bad the cramps get

technically well done but it left me feeling a bit empty. the counter attack really does ruin the pacing for me