Tag: metroidvania

Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth – Game Diary

Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth is a Metroidvania game developed by Team Ladybug and released in 2021 across multiple formats. I picked up a physical copy of the game for the Switch because I thought it looked cool and also because I own a copy of the Dreamcast RPG, Record of Lodoss War. 

The following is a spoiler-filled account of my time with the game, with some opinions and observations sprinkled throughout.

Session 1 – Tuesday 17th September

After a short break following knocking Visions of Mana on the head, it was time to play something a bit different. Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth was sitting on my shelf, and I fancied a Metroidvania. I’ve never watched the anime, I’ve never read the book, and I’ve played Record of Lodoss War on the Dreamcast but barely remember anything about it. I’m also quite inexperienced with Metroidvanias (I’ve finished Metroid Dread and that Shadow Complex game on Xbox 360 and that’s about it) so this will definitely go well. Let’s go!

Right, the whole thing has a nice pixel art style (even the title screen and the developer logos) and I was treated to a minimal intro explaining that Deedlit and a group of heroes once saved the island of Lodoss, and Deedlit fell in love with one of them. She woke up in a stone circle not knowing what was going on, and control was handed over to me. Six pages of tutorial text later and it was time to adventure.

A few first impressions; the game looks very pretty, Deedlit is really nicely animated, and the music is pretty cool. The controls seem precise, and the directional attacks are fun to pull off. The game started in the aforementioned stone circle, and Deedlit and I thought we’d be traditional and headed off to the right.

Our first enemy was an imp, which we stabbed with our sword, and it dropped a spear. Deedlit equipped the spear and we moved on. There are barriers and locked doors in the next few areas that we’ll have to come back to, and enemies respawn when you go back into a previously cleared area. There’s a dice theme going on, with enemies having a pair of die displayed under their health bar, but I don’t really get it. I should have read those tutorials.

We soon found Sylphid … I mean Sylph (still thinking about Visions of Mana), which is a wind spirit that gives Deedlit wind moves and allows her to hover. We then found a statue of Marfa, who is a goddess, apparently, and this allowed us to save and regain health. That was all the Metroidvania basics covered, now it was time to go and hover somewhere.

We passed by the stone circle again and Deedlit saw someone called Parn, and then a sorceress-looking woman appeared (whose name I didn’t catch) and asked for Deedlit’s loyalty. Deedlit refused and the sorceress said something about “trials”, and mentioned that another lost soul is coming and that it will be interesting to see who gets their wish first. A while after this, there was a small underwater area, and it became clear that Deedlit cannot hold her breath for long at all.

We found a fire spirit next (called Salamander, not Salamando) and now Deedlit can swap between fire and wind modes. There’s a mechanic where you can fill up your fire and wind spirit gauges if you don’t get hit. The more full each gauge is the more damage that element of attack will do, and if one or both are completely full, it’s possible to gradually regain health. You can also absorb attacks of the same element.

Moving on, we found a place with a big, hanging, half-eaten dragon flank and hitting it caused quite a bit of slowdown (and filled the spirit gauge). We found a bow next, and Deedlit seemed to be getting kitted out pretty early. We found some spirit magic pretty soon after this, and could use some magic points to shoot a load of balls of light at enemies. Handy.

We bumped into someone called Slayn (this was, like the sorceress earlier, preceded by a kind of video glitch effect). Slayn was all vague and then he ran off. Deedlit seems to know these people but they clearly aren’t being themselves. Poor Deedlit, she must feel very isolated. She met someone called Ghim next, and he was acting weird and evasive too, but appears to be the game’s merchant. We couldn’t afford anything from him that looked good, so we moved on.

After a bit more Metroidvania-style progress, we encountered a large, snake-like dragon called Abram the Blue. Again, Deedlit seemed to recognise the dragon and tried to converse but he was hell-bent on throwing down, so we obliged. We took him out first time, and Deedlit got a Soul Crystal Ball, but we don’t know what it’s for yet.

We soon found a snake statue that granted Deedlit the ability to slide, which enabled us to explore another area through a low gap. We met a Dark Elf girl called Pirotess (Deedlit called her this but she didn’t like being identified as such). She killed us. She was quick and tough, repeatedly leaping and throwing knives. We then fell to her a second time, and I was realising that I probably needed to stop taking this game lightly now. We got her the third time. She wasn’t dead, though, and she nicked our soul orb thing before she legged it, which was very rude.

Progressing to the next area after this fight led us to “Stage 2”, which had a different vibe and a background theme that kind of looked like the inside of a great hall that’s seen better days. I felt like we’d missed stuff, so we backtracked for a bit, but the only unexplored areas I could find seemed to still need other items or keys to get to. We went back to the Stage 2 area and got killed very quickly by some nasty bird-type enemies. Things were getting real in Stage 2, it seemed. Axe-throwing kobolds, goblin archers, and big, angry birds were absolutely everywhere.

We got the video glitch again (which I now realised flashes up a large eyeball thing) and Deedlit met someone called Woodchuck. This guy seems to offer a gambling mini-game. I’m good, thanks. This last bit of progress marked the end of Session 1, and the now-traditional wall of words this entails. I’ll try to keep the entries shorter, but I can’t promise anything.

Session 2 – Tuesday 17th September

I was excited to get going again with session two, and Deedlit immediately fell into some spikes and died. We will not be discouraged! She then died in spikes again because I pressed the wrong button, and then she died again moments later because I got knocked into spikes by a giant centipede enemy, and I decided that I’m going to stop keeping count of her deaths at this point. The Stage 2 area can very appropriately be called a difficulty spike.

After some cool sections where Deedlit needed to bend her arrow shots using magnets, we encountered a boss fight in the form of a couple of Djinn type creatures, one wind-based and one fire-based, and the fight required Deedlit to use her element-swapping powers to avoid and dish out damage. We beat these guys first try, acquired the double-jump, and encountered a character called Etoh. She too, is vague and unhelpful.

After a bit more exploring the game crashed on me while trying to use one of the fast-travel points. Luckily, everything was fine when I reloaded, and I’d saved moments before.

Upon reloading, Deedlit and I made some really good progress, exploring past some green doors (because hitting one green switch seemed to open all of them) and finding a better melee weapon, but then got absolutely shafted upon returning to one of the larger rooms by a combination of charging skeletons, pixies, kobolds and spikes. We lost a lot of progress, but that’s Metroidvanias for you.

We found a power-up for the wind spirit attacks next, and then did a bit of double-jump led backtracking and found a room with four intimidating dog statues. There wasn’t really anything here and the dog statues didn’t come to life. Maybe next time. Some more backtracking saw us find a power-up for the fire spirit attacks. It’s nice to feel powered up.

We stepped into another obvious boss area (they’re marked by a green haze leading into them) after exploring most of Stage 2, and the sorceress (who Deedlit called Karla) returned. She said some stuff and then we had to fight a gigantic red dragon called Shooting Star. That’s a very cute name, but it was a very tough fight, with a green poison attack and a green orb-firing attack proving especially hard to dodge. This took three or four tries, but we got it in the end, and were led into Stage 3. This is another outside area with a misty wood in the background. I liked it. It was filled with plant-type enemies and we also spotted some harpies and zombies.

We found an appropriately sneakily hidden invisibility spell and scouted out a save point, and it was time to end the session. I had to go and get some pizzas for me and the youth because, sometimes, pizza is all you need.

Session 3 – Tuesday 17th September

At the start of this session, a ghostly man turned into a key. It was the soul of a thief, apparently, and it is supposed to open a locked door. Not the one right in front of it, though. A little further on Deedlit and I found an MP boost behind a cracked wall, and we realised we’re going to have to really keep our eyes peeled for those secrets.

We found a boomerang weapon and it’s got great damage and great range. How are we going to ever go back to a regular old sword now? Incidentally, it’s worth pointing out here that even though I’ve never played any of the Metroidvania style Castlevania games (I’ve only played Castlevania: Lords of Shadow and its sequel), Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth definitely leans more towards the “Vania” half of the Metroidvania genre. Deedlit even leaves those shadowy echoes of herself as she moves around, just like the effect in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night.

Deedlit and I found a long, nicely furnished hallway area filled with zombies and demons, all of whom were easily slain with our new boomerang. We also met a new enemy called the Lesser Dragon, and this is clearly the creature that’s been slaughtered and hung to make the meat that we keep finding around the place. They’re annoying so I don’t feel bad for them.

At the end of that hallway we found the switch that opened the yellow doors, making a fair amount of new areas accessible. We checked a suspiciously blank area on the map and found a water spell that causes a cascade of water. We also encountered a creepy, shadowy enemy called a Shadow Stalker, that only becomes corporeal when Deedlit is looking away. Lobbing boomerangs and then looking away before they come back catches these shadowy fellows out, but I’m not sure how we would’ve dealt with them if we didn’t have the boomerang.

We fought some Medusa enemies with bows, who kept turning Deedlit to stone and then shooting her with arrows, and then we found another ghostly figure who gave us a key. This one was a craftsman. Deedlit then overheard Karla and Pirotess talking about reviving Ashram. I don’t know who Ashram is, but he or she sounds like bad news. Pirotess swore loyalty to Karla and Karla gave her a magic sword. We found King Kashue next. Deedlit seemed to recognise him but the familiarity was not mutual. I think he’s probably nuts (because Kashue sounds like cashew … never mind). He was as vague as everyone else and mentioned an archery training range just past him. We tried it and got an F.

Next we found a ghostly sorcerer with a key, and I wondered at this point if these are Deedlit’s pals as this guy looks familiar. A big hexagon shape in the floor had a message saying we don’t have enough keys, though. A little later, we encountered some bug-looking enemies that made the area around them dark until we smashed them. Then we found a ghostly priest with a key, and I’m pretty sure it was Etoh, so I definitely think these guys are Deedlit’s pals.

There was a fight against Karla herself next. Somehow, we got her first try, but then she transported us to a void and made us fight a female, Templar-looking warrior called Flaus. This chick killed us twice, but we got her the third time. There was no explanation after this battle as to who she was or what she had to do with Karla. We got a knight key off of a knight apparition afterwards, and this meant we could activate the hexagon. As we did so, we received an ominous message about descending into the abyss. Alright, calm down, Nietzsche.

There was another boss fight pretty soon after this, and it was Karla again followed by a horned, winged female with armour called the Demon God who summoned wolves that were seemingly made of blood. We managed to survive both of these fights on our first try, and Karla said some more vague nonsense before fleeing.

The next area is identified as Stage 4, and it has a sandy ruins feel and there is rock music playing! We found a spell called Wind Storm, and on the way to picking up this spell we were forced to fight Goblin Shamans and Valkyries. What an odd combination. Why are they teaming up against us, eh?

In a random cavern a little while later Pirotess seemingly killed Parn and Deedlit vows revenge. I wonder if Parn is the guy you play as in Record of Lodoss War on the Dreamcast.

The difficulty has really spiked again here in Stage 4, with Minotaurs, death scorpions, soul-firing mummies and flying lizard everywhere, often placed in really annoying and awkward locations. I was planning to finish up soon, but we did manage to find the underwater breathing item, and quickly nipped back to a previous area of the map using the fast travel doors to find a shadowy magic spell beyond a waterlogged section I’d noticed long ago.

That small, crocodile-killing victory was enough for the night, and the third and final session of the day came to an end.

Session 4 – Wednesday 18th September

I started up this session forgetting that Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth had actually gotten really difficult lately. Just seeing the sandy brick décor of the ruins I loaded into reminded me, though.

We went straight into a boss fight, just to compound this feeling, and this one was with a huge black dragon called Narse. In the brief exchange before the fight, it was clear that Deedlit recognised this guy, too, but she didn’t seem to expect to be friends with him, like the other dragons. Some things the dragon said possibly implied that Deedlit is stuck within her own mind. Is this whole labyrinth a metaphor?

Narse was a pain in the arse. It took many deaths before Deedlit and I finally slew him. We knew what we needed to do, it was just easier said than done to do it. Narse had a really annoying attack where he’d create alternating screen-high walls of fire and wind power and zap Deedlit with pink lasers, and it was really giving us trouble. We were gradually getting the hang of avoiding it each time, but when we actually beat the dragon we managed to pile on enough damage to drain his health bar before he entered that phase.

Beyond Narse was the button that opened the red doors. We went through a nearby red door and found some new rooms, and we spotted Pirotess in a save room. I found my self using a tactic I’d used before here, where I’d been taking advantage of the quick room transitions and respawning enemies to farm spirit gauge. It’s viable but it can slow the pace a bit.

We quickly came to another boss fight, and sure enough, it was Pirotess again. It was another tough one, Deedlit fell many times, but we got her in the end. I like the bosses in this game. They really start to ramp up in difficulty after Stage 1, but if you get killed, you always feel like you can beat them if you try again. It’s easy to retry thinking “next time I just need to do this differently” and eventually, something will work and you’ll achieve victory. It’s good, and I’ll maintain this opinion until I get to something I can’t beat later.

Some story developments occurred after this battle, as Pirotess seemed to use her life force to resurrect Ashram. The camera cut to a spooky throne somewhere that looked like it had the opening area’s background, and a scary, warrior-king-looking fellow appeared on it. Ashram, I presume? After this, Deedlit woke up in what might have been her house with all of her items and abilities (save the rapier that she started the game with) missing. There was a sword in a nearby cabinet called “Heritage” that Deedlit could pick up and equip, but upon slashing it she’d go through a very long animation of trying to heave it back up. Symbolism? I don’t know enough about Deedlit’s lore to be sure.

There were enemies outside the house called Lifeless Kings that looked like reapers crossed with sorcerers. Deedlit could only do scratch damage to them, so we decided to run past them, although this was easier said than done as the last one was very annoyingly positioned. Deedlit’s pals were beyond this area, but they looked all desaturated and faceless. They would turn around whenever Deedlit walked past them, implying that she couldn’t look at their faces. Standing next to them made them disappear, and then Deedlit woke up in the boss arena again.

Moving on took us to Stage 5 (every time there’s a new stage a six-sided die is used to show the stage’s number, so I’m assuming there will be six total) and it has a grand mansion vibe with spooky green flames in the fireplaces and on the candlesticks. Sometimes this game really reminds me of Rogue Legacy, visually at least. That’s a Roguelike, not a Metroidvania, though. The first enemy we encountered here was a large griffon, but we didn’t get far before I had to save and quit. Other responsibilities were calling.

Session 5 – Wednesday 18th September

I had a late session tonight accompanied by some chocolate digestives. Deliciously sustained, Deedlit and I dove into the new Stage 5 area. New enemies types found here included; claw beasts (pale lions that never landed a hit on us once), earth magic-flinging gnomes, and giant spiders who skittered around rather creepily on the back walls. Incidentally, I found that Deedlit could now handle the aforementioned “heritage” sword with ease, but only because we’d found a better sword, as well as a handy homing bow.

I had another game-closing crash following fast travel after this. Like last time, a reload solved it and I’d saved moments before. Annoying but not game breaking.

A little more progress resulted in us finding another boss room and a bit more video tape fuzz. This time we were greeted by a cloaked, armoured guy who introduced himself as Beld. Again, Deedlit seemed to recognise him, but she called him Emperor Beld. He didn’t know anything about being an emperor, but he liked the idea, and a fight ensued. We beat him first time. I wasn’t expecting that this late into the game.

He caused a cave-in upon defeat, and Deedlit was unable to backtrack. In the next area we encountered a creepy, wooden soldier that repeatedly reanimated itself after we slew it. At first I thought it was scary, but then I realised it was a walking spirit gauge farm. After fighting this thing for a while we found the super flying double-jump item in order to gain even more height.

Following a spider and dryad infested climb Deedlit encountered Pirotess again. I thought she was a goner! She recited some more dialogue that hints at the “this whole thing is a dream” theory, and also hinted that Parn isn’t actually dead. Not that I thought he was. A very fiddly spike-filled room followed this, featuring elevators that we needed to operate by firing arrows at cog wheels, but once we got through those we found ourselves back around the area where we couldn’t backtrack due to Beld’s antics, and Deedlit and I did some exploring with the new extra jump height. We located a firestorm spell and a dryad spell.

Getting back on track, we quickly found another boss room, and Ashram was sitting on his throne in the background (although I could have sworn this wasn’t the room he appeared in during the cutscene). He stepped down and we fought, man to elf, and he had similar moves to Beld but was much tougher. We got him the third time with liberal use of the dryad spell, but he then puked green stuff and turned into a strange, green-coloured jade golem-looking thing. Deedlit was killed very quickly.

This second fight was even tougher, and every time we died we had to fight the first phase again. Luckily, we’d gotten the hang of the first fight, and handled it pretty well almost every time, but it still took us a lot of tries to get that second phase. This was a fucking tough fight. Once we finished him off, Pirotess reappeared and told Deedlit that she loved Ashram, before fading away. Looks like Deedlit and Pirotess were two sides of the same coin.

Parn appeared not long after this and led us to the purple door switch and a nice new bow. It was a dead end, though, and he’d disappeared, so definitely that whole dream theory is getting more and more likely.

I could’ve kept going, but I’d spent a lot of time on those boss fights, so it was time for bed.

Session 6 – Thursday 19th September

The die rolled six, and Deedlit and I entered Stage 6 to start this session. This next area had a semi-creepy, dark temple feel mixed with an almost technological vibe evoked by green, cuboid lights and dark stone patterned with straight lines. Weirdly, it reminded me of the alien base in Subnautica. There was also some cool, synthy music here.

There were lots of scary monsters for Deedlit to plough through; colour-changing dragon things, huge basilisks, nearly invisible dudes, and the return of the lifeless kings. This area was more of a simple monster rush than a maze. We got through it, and found the switch for the light blue doors. I noticed that there were no fast travel doors in this area so far. We still did a bit of old-fashioned backtracking and managed a very fiddly jump through different-coloured forcefields to get a not-all-that-great bow, though.

Back to the task at hand, and we met Karla again in another boss area. This time, she kicked off a boss rush! Abram, the two djinns, Shooting Star, Karla herself, Flaus (the Templar-looking woman), Demon God (the winged woman), Narse, Pirotess, and that’s as far as we got the first time. We went again, and got a bit further. Beld and then Ashram followed Pirotess, but Deedlit was killed again because I pressed the wrong button when trying to drink a potion while fighting Ashram.

We were stuck here for a while. Annoyingly, despite beating him easily when we met him earlier, and getting past him the first time we met him in this boss rush, too, Beld was proving to be the roadblock with his variety and combination of attacks. Luckily, one of Ghim’s shops was nearby, and we blew our Lodoss bucks on a load of HP and MP potions. It was the first time we’d held more than one potion.

It didn’t happen straight away, but soon we defeated Beld and Ashram, and the last fight in this hectic rush was gooey green Ashram, who we took down without issue. That whole boss rush felt pretty awesome.

The next room finally had a fast travel door (not that we used it – I was satisfied I’d found everything I was going to) and then beyond that was a section with extra-strange architecture and some trippy music. Deedlit experienced some haunting encounters with her pals in this area, all of whom said something strange, and a mysterious voice was speaking about Deedlit choosing to stay in this world. This whole area was like a spiral, and there were no monsters.

It looked like the final boss was going to be in the centre of this spiral, but we bumped into Parn first. Deedlit remembered at this point that Parn lost his life years ago. Wow. I could’ve done with that information. If I was a Lodoss enthusiast, would I have known that Parn had been dead for years? Whatever this version of Parn was, we had to fight it, and throughout the fight it took on the forms of all of Deedlit’s pals. It was a pretty easy encounter, though, and we were victorious first time.

The background changed at this point, and a huge, creepy, greenish statue (of Parn, I assume) raised up. Deedlit rejected it and it fell, and a huge eyeball creature emerged. It was the creature from the title screen and the one that briefly appeared in the video glitches. The energy bar called it Nihil.

This was another somewhat easy fight. While it did have some potent attacks that were hard to dodge, it was very easy to keep pummelling it with the water or light magic spells and keep one or both spirit gauges full so that Deedlit’s health would regenerate. I don’t remember even using a health potion, but we may have used one.

The actual Parn seemed to appear after this, and Deedlit had some words of endearment for him, then she disappeared. She woke up in the same house that she woke up in earlier in the game, but it was much brighter this time and the music was a lot friendlier. I was able to control Deedlit again and moved her outside, where she met a person called Leaf. Deedlit began to tell Leaf about all the people she encountered in the labyrinth but because Deedlit also encountered them all in real life, Leaf just thought she was talking about that and told Deedlit that “everybody knows that stuff.” Not me. I didn’t know any of that stuff. Maybe if I had I would’ve known that Parn had died years ago!

Deedlit and I continued through this pretty area with lots of birds and trees and a couple of nice, rustic buildings, and we eventually found the stone circle that the game started in (it momentarily shows the stone circle as it was at the start of the game; all dark and spooky). Deedlit seemed to finally come to terms with Parn’s death, and the credits rolled.

There is a quick post-credits scene where a young lad was in the woods calling for Deedlit. He said that she was needed because “an age of war has come to Lodoss once again”, but then a strange sound was heard and he fell to the ground. Deedlit found him and knelt next to him, and “The End” was displayed in the same spooky, green text that the game over screens have used. I have no idea what any of that is all about.

Well, I enjoyed that. It was nowhere near as complex as Metroid Dread, and much more combat focused, but it was a fun game to blast through and a nice-looking one, too. I don’t think I’ve been inspired to look into the greater franchise, but you never know. A Boss Rush mode was unlocked upon completion, but I think I’m done with Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth.

I’m glad I made the journey through Deedlit’s grief-fuelled dream labyrinth, though. She has some cool boss fights floating around in her head.

***

Some additional info; I read up on the story behind Record of Lodoss War: Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth later in the day, and found out that not only Parn, but all of Deedlit’s companions that we see throughout the adventure had died long ago. Deedlit has presumably outlived all of them due to elves in the Lodoss lore being immortal or long-lived like Tolkien’s elves. This explains why she is greeted by a character called Leaf at the end of the game, and not Slayn or Etoh or Woodchuck or someone. This gave the whole game a much more sobering tone, looking back, and Deedlit becomes an exceptionally sympathetic character.

I also learned that in the aforementioned Dreamcast game, Record of Lodoss War, you do not play as Parn, and instead play as a nameless hero resurrected to oppose an evil god. The story of that game has little to do with the greater lore of the franchise, it seems.

Sorry to any Lodoss aficionados reading, but at least I’m learning!

Metroid Prime Remastered – Game Diary

Session 1 – Friday 9th August

I’d been thinking about starting Metroid Prime Remastered all day, but didn’t get around to it until returning home from a meal at the Admiral Hood pub in Mosterton. I was extremely full. The burger wasn’t especially large but the cheese in it was overwhelming to the point that I could feel it slithering through my veins and coagulating around my heart more and more after every bite. I added garlic mushrooms, too. They really add something special to a burger, you know?

Anyway, Metroid Prime Remastered was started on the evening of Friday 9th August. Things kicked off on a space station platform with a simple tutorial section, and then I directed Samus inside. I was really digging the atmosphere once we got to poking around the damaged hallways and science rooms. There’s nothing quite like seeing insectoid aliens in specimen tanks and dead critters scattered about the place before you get a chance to interact with the live ones.

It took most of this bout of space station exploration to get to grips with the scanning and firing mechanics, as I kept pressing the wrong trigger and trying to scan space pirates (which does give a bit of information) or blasting switches and info panels (which doesn’t achieve anything). Eventually, Samus and I faced off against a parasite queen and finished her off by blasting her through the gaps in a rotating light shield. The parasite queen fell down into some kind of reactor, which caused an explosion that started off a tense escape sequence, during which we were almost overwhelmed by the swarms of bugs in the tubes, and Samus lost all of her upgraded suit powers. We made it outside though, after freeing a pterodactyl-like creature that I know (just from general video game culture absorption) to be called Ridley, and Samus got to her super-cool ship and made planetfall.

I enjoyed exploring the opening areas of the planet (whose name I didn’t catch) and eventually made my way to the Chozo Ruins. Now, I know a bit about these Chozo fellows thanks to finishing Metroid Dread, the only other Metroid game I’ve played, but I must admit I wasn’t digging the atmosphere here as much as during the opening. For those not in the know; this area has a “desert ruins” vibe.

I found the missile and the ball upgrades, and then had a fight with an armoured bug, during which I could’ve sworn I saw a spooky face appear for a split second on the screen. After further investigation, it seems that Samus’ face reflects on the visor if an explosion goes off close enough to her helmet. A cool touch that initially made me think my TV was haunted.

Anyway, I found lots of places that I didn’t have the equipment to interact with yet, like a super-heated room and some half-pipe-looking things that seem to require a ball boost. Not long after fending off a horde of War Wasps summoned by a big, beaky, three-faced Chozo machine, I found a save room and called it a night.

Session 2 – Saturday 10th August

Session two was a handheld session because the family were playing loud music in the living room, but the earbud experience might have actually boosted the immersion a bit. If my eyesight wasn’t so shot handheld would possibly be my chosen way to play.

Samus and I continued our traversal through the Chozo Ruins, and I realised that the map screen is very interesting, again probably thanks to playing in handheld. It feels really sci-fi scrolling and rotating the 3D map. Oh, and the planet is called Tallon IV. Some ancient Chozo scriptures reminded me.

Anyway, the music is pretty cool in this area. I found the Charge Beam near a room filled with toxic fluid. I thought I’d accidentally let Samus die in the danger water but it turns out she had an extra health bar. I didn’t realise this until I found another health boost later on and saw that it adds 100 health. That is a not insubstantial health boost. There’s no chance I’ll ever let Samus die to anything now. That was foreshadowing.

Oh, and the constant low health alarm coupled with Samus’ laboured breathing is a bit much. I was desperately looking for bugs to shoot so that I could get a health pick-up and some peace and quiet.

We fought a wasp hive with a flamethrower drone underneath it. This drone was spewing fire at Samus and at the hive, agitating the wasps so that they came after Samus. Doesn’t seem fair. Beating that thing gave us bombs to use when Samus is rolled up into a ball, which also lets her hop around in ball form, opening up lots of new areas. We used these newfound traversal abilities to get some more missile capacity upgrades.

Eventually we made it to a big, flowery bug boss, and it was going pretty well early on, but then I couldn’t figure out how to get underneath the boss after I’d shot all the light-reflecting mirror things, and Samus was killed. Oh well, so much for all that health. The explosion and subsequent mini cut-scene with Samus’ shattered helmet was a bit intense.

I was too hot and sweaty to continue, so I decided to come back to it another time.

Session 3 – Saturday 10th August (evening)

I enjoyed this Metroid Prime Remastered session while also enjoying Co-Op smooth and creamy toffees. Encouraged by the sticky, sugary goodness, Samus and I killed the big flower thing. Third time lucky. I figured out what to do the second time around (turns out the boss was knocking the mirrors back into place and I didn’t notice), but had lost some health by falling into the toxic fluid in the previous room. Nailed it third time, and earned an armour upgrade in the shape of some meatier shoulder pads. They call it the Varia Suit, here on Talon IV. Beating this creature also made all the water turn nice, so I let Samus splash around a bit before moving on to the next distinct area.

This next area was called Magmoor Caverns, according to the elevator down to it. Magmoor sounds like magma, and I just got the heat resistant suit. It’s all adding up. I’m not usually a fan of lava areas in games, but we’ll see how it goes. The ominous chanting in the soundtrack as Samus started exploring the red-tinted caves gave a decent idea as to what’s to come.

Early on in the Magmoor Caverns I got Samus to scan a creature called a Grizby, and the game told me I’d filled 25% of my log book. Nice.

Anyway, sure enough, there was lots of lava deeper in. I did actually let Samus die again as we fell off an intricate ball-rolling area and couldn’t get out of the red stuff in time. I almost gave up for the night as the save point was miles away, but stuck with it. I got through that area on the second try and found an elevator to a different part of the overworld, before happening upon Samus’ ship again. It’s a save point, so I used it, and that was enough for this session.

Session 4 – Sunday 11th August

I found a snowy area. Something Drifts. Where’s the lava boss? I was expecting a lava boss, but I guess I got swerved. Anyway, the snow underfoot doesn’t show Samus’ footprints. Always disappointing.

I kinda like this area, but the little fellas with ice armour and ice breath are pricks. I sure hope there’s not a massive version of them that I have to fight later. That was foreshadowing.

Anyway, I finally got the boost ball.

Samus and me got a bit lost after this, and while we were wandering the computerised voice that gives us map hints sent us to the overworld, where Samus used a half-pipe to get a double jump upgrade! We did some more exploring and found an Impact Crater (I guess this is where the poison meteorite spoken of in the Chozo texts hit). This was a pretty cool area, and I liked the enclosed glass walkways. The area with all the artefact statues reminded me of an area in Halo 2. Also, from what I read in the Chozo texts, I’m not sure we should be collecting these artefacts. Won’t it unleash the poison? Gotta do what the game tells me, I guess.

Anyway, Samus and I did lots more exploring with the new ball boosters and double jump, and ended up back in the icy locale. We found an area with a power-up that was spirited away before Samus could pick it up, and we had to fight a small swarm of the aforementioned ice armour critters. Then we had to fight a massive one, but it got the better of us. Samus death number five. I hadn’t saved for ages. That one stung. Time to call it a day.

Session 5 – Friday 16th August

Time to fully discover how much my save point carelessness set me back last session. I had to rediscover the Impact Crater, re-find the artefact in the Magmoor Caverns, and re-get to the icy bit with the massive creature. Luckily, this time I remembered to visit the save point in the large, external icy area. The house-sized monster (a sheegoth) was still a prick to fight, though. I actually paused when Samus’ health got low to have a quick Google search and make sure I was going about the fight in the right way. I don’t feel guilty about this, because I don’t think the game was very good at indicating that I was doing damage. The sheegoth just went kind of purple for a moment and moved its head a bit. It turns out I was on the right track, though, and finally Samus and I squashed the big, icy bastard with around ten health left. An annoying fight.

Anyway, this gave Samus the Wave Beam, which lets her open purple doors and opens up new combat options, and enables her to kill those energy orbs that we had to run around previously. Not long after this, Samus and I found the Super Missile, but I couldn’t remember the controls to activate it so never actually used it.

After exploring some laboratories and finally encountering a titular metroid, I found another area that annoyed me. A visible missile upgrade lay at the end of a suspended length of metal grating that Samus had to roll over in ball form, and the camera angle kept changing, which changed the directional inputs along with it. I fell off a few too many times.

Not long later, Samus located the Thermal Visor (and I earned a pop-up stating I’d found 25% of items) and this was followed by a legitimately intense and elongated lights out section, where the visor was very much required. I also wasn’t sure if I was going the right way because there was a door Samus couldn’t open and I was aware of the possibility that it might have required the Super Missile thing, but there were new enemies and encounters on the way back, so we kept going. Eventually, Samus and I made it outside, and made our way all the way back to the overworld. I was keeping an eye on the map, looking for purple doors that we could open, but called it a day when we reached Samus’ ship again.

Still, progress was made, and that’s important.

Session 6 – Sunday 18th August

The search for purple doors!

Well, not really – we found a couple of missile upgrades (one of which we’d found already before the whole dying-to-the-sheegoth-without-saving incident) and then the map app bleeped and told us to go to the chilly area. You know, So-and-So Drifts.

At this point, I was forced to learn how to shoot Super Missiles to get through a certain door. I guess it had to happen eventually. We ended up in a big arena and fought an enormous rock monster. It was a bit of a pain in the arse because we ran out of missiles, but Samus got the big stony bastard first try. Her reward was the Spider Ball, which I was correct to assume was for the magnetic tracks.

Samus and I zipped around and found some areas where the Spider Ball was useful, and eventually came to a pillar-smashing set piece in the Chozo Ruins that needed 60 missiles to complete, and it spawned enemies that you could only kill with missiles and also had other enemies that deflected your missiles patrolling around the areas you had to hit with the missiles. We had to keep going back to a nearby corridor to farm missile ammo drops off of the little Metapod-looking things.

Anyway, we managed to solve it and the Wavebuster weapon was our reward.

Later, we found a room where a Chozo Ghost attacked us, and I found this fight to be very long and tough, because I misread the word “invulnerable” as “vulnerable” in the scan data and continuously attacked it with something it was immune to. Once I realised my mistake, Samus took it out pretty quickly.

Next was a half-pipe room with toad enemies in it, which led to the Ice Beam, which opened up lots more areas for us to explore. One such area was the inside of the big, crashed research ship on the overworld, which is mostly waterlogged. Samus and I were exploring this lovely, submerged area with its atmospheric, beautiful music and its Subnautica vibe, when I realised how late it was. Luckily, there was a save point deep inside, and I called it a night.

Samus will be alright standing around underwater until next time, right?

Session 7 – Wednesday 21st August

So, we had to turn back pretty much straight away. The very next room in the waterlogged vessel had a section that required a suit upgrade to progress. At least we found a nice Health Booster in there. This would be important later. Anyway, it looks like Samus and I have to go to What’s-its-Name Drifts next. Which elevator was that?

We found our way to a watery area in the Drifts, and I did not like being forced to go into an underwater tentacle nest with next to zero visibility. Samus took it like a pro, though, and we soon found her swimsuit! It’s more respectably known as the Gravity Suit, which would allow Samus to move unimpeded through water, and gives a visibility boost underwater too. It also gave Samus’ armour and visor a fetching blue tint.

We headed back to the submerged parts of the research vessel and made some progress, getting through lots of rooms with fiddly, tentacle-impeded platforming and using the heat vision visor to find power conduits for locked doors. At the end of all this was an elevator to the Phazon Mines. The “intense radiation” warning was ominous.

I quite like the Phazon Mines. The rock walls and metal walkways remind me of the queue areas in Disney World. Maybe it’s Nintendo’s trademark colourful take on gritty sci-fi. Anyway, unlike the Disney queue areas, it turns out you can shoot the pipes to get through blocked off areas.

We partially solved a Krypton Factor-style puzzle with different coloured ball tracks and reached an elevator to another area of the mines. Samus was doing fine, but I was flagging at this point, and was looking for a save point. Instead of a save point we found a gigantic elite pirate. We put him down and had lots of other fights across various complex rooms with variously-equipped pirates and no save point in sight. Eventually, we had to fight a very nasty invisible thing that Samus couldn’t scan or even lock onto. I was determined not to lose all of our progress, but things got pretty close. We beat it with 35 health left (told you that Health Booster would be important), but even that wasn’t the end. We had to do an electrified ball maze to get the bomb upgrade, and Samus’ health bar took a few more zaps before the end.

Luckily, the next room had a save point, and it was both literally and figuratively a light at the end of a tunnel. Session over.

Session 8 – Thursday 22nd August

Another handheld session today, and Samus and I went straight to exploding some rubble in the way of doors with the newly-acquired Power Bombs. We quickly learned that they have limited ammunition. How unnecessary! Anyway, we backtracked and found the map room, but every route forward seemed to take us through pure, sparkly blue, health-draining Phazon, so it was a bit of a no go.

I was finding the mines difficult to navigate in handheld mode. The map hint system was sending us back to the surface but then shortly after gave me a hint for a different room in the mine. It would later become apparent that this was the Krypton Factor room, but I couldn’t remember that room at the time and I was getting somewhat perplexed. There were lots of enemies too, including another gigantic Elite Pirate, and a bunch of different pirate types that forced constant beam changes.

Anyway, Samus and I were finally able to complete the Krypton Factor room thanks to the Power Bombs, and this led us to the Grapple Beam. Finally! That should open a few new routes. After fiddling about in the first large Phazon Mines room with the crane and getting nowhere, we headed back to the overworld for some grappling.

Almost immediately, the X-Ray Visor was located, and then we took a jaunt to the Chozo Ruins to find an artefact in the arena-looking area. We quickly made our way back to Samus’ ship after that, and I chose to call it a night. Playing Metroid Prime Remastered in handheld is not good for my demeanour.

Session 9 – Saturday 24th August

We kicked off today’s session by heading back to the Magmoor Caverns. I’ve realised the music here kind of feels like it could be in a Zelda game. Maybe in some kind of Goron settlement or something. The music just doesn’t feel all that sci-fi to me – it feels better-suited to a volcano dungeon or maybe a gigantic Dwarven forge town.

Anyway, Samus and I found the Plasma Beam after a particularly painful section in which Samus had to roll around on the walls with lots of lava below. It took us a while and a few tries to get to the top of this room, but I got a sense of accomplishment and the Plasma Beam is super powerful and fun to shoot things with, so it was totally worth it.

Except, we had to do the whole thing again because Samus fell into the Phazon after being attacked by a shitload of pirate troopers with different beam immunities while at fairly low health thanks to the repeated dips into the lava due to the aforementioned wall-based ball-rolling. Samus death number six.

After doing it all again and surviving the tricky room that claimed us last time, Samus and I explored the Phazon Mines a bit more, looking for places to swing with the Grapple Beam and red doors to bust with the Plasma Beam, but we ended up making our way to the Magmoor Caverns again and found a Power Bomb ammo upgrade, with the game informing me that Samus had found 50% of items.

I had to stop at this point to dispose of a giant spider that I spotted on the wall near the TV. I used a mug and a coaster. This harrowing experience will definitely negatively affect how I view Metroid Prime Remastered. Shame on you, Nintendo.

Back to the game, and back to the overworld, because I remembered seeing a red door on the map there. Samus jumped across some invisible platforms and found a missile ammo upgrade. Still no actual game progress, then. Luckily, the map hint system piped up once more and directed us back to the Phazon Mines. Looks like we missed something.

Sure enough, it was invisible platforms again. So the game let me find the invisible platforms in the overworld that are highlighted by rain falling on them before requiring me to find the ones in the Phazon Mines that have no visual clue that they’re there unless you use the X-Ray Visor. Is that good game design? Or are invisible platforms just bullshit? I’ll let the cosmos decide.

Anyway, not long after this invisible platform room I got Samus killed again after being careless in a rolling section with lots of Phazon spread around. I’d saved not long ago, so we decided to call it a night. Seven deaths in nine sessions. That sounds like a positive to me.

Session 10 – Tuesday 27th August

Back to the mines. I directed Samus through some very aggravating platforming from glowing mushroom to glowing mushroom over radioactive goop while trying to grapple onto a stupid flying creature of some kind. Luckily, we found a save point in one such room. Or at least, I thought we did. Turned out it was just a missile recharge machine. What the heck? There isn’t even anything nearby that needs a lot of missiles! What a dupe.

Unless the missiles were for the boss, maybe, but that was quite a few rooms away.

Anyway, I saw an artefact in a hole and tried to tank the Phazon damage to get it and Samus died again. That’s eight deaths. Definitely need Phazon immunity to get that particular shiny.

Next stop, the Omega Pirate. This thing was tough, but at least it was kind of clear what to do. Knowing what I had to shoot at didn’t stop me from getting Samus killed again, though. Twice. Yep, that’s ten untimely demises. Is this a decent average or am I absolutely pants at Metroid Prime Remastered? Maybe I don’t want to know the answer to that. We got the big jerk the third time anyway, and Samus was looking super cool in her sleek, black Phazon Suit that dropped from its radioactive corpse. With Phazon damage a thing of the past, we went back to get the artefact, but then got assailed by metroids painted all the hues of the rainbow.

These things were really annoying. They tended to get right up in your face no matter what, and switching between weapons and then getting head-slurped by the one you’re not equipped to deal with and having to morph and drop a bomb and then repeat multiple times was a pain in the ass. I did not like the rainbow metroids, and wanted to leave the Phazon Mines behind for good at this point.

Samus and I eventually managed to get the heck out, leaving a couple of mysteries unsolved that I was aware of (namely the unpowered crane in the first large room, and a red door behind a forcefield in the corridors with the destructible pipes across them). We then headed back to the overworld, as the map hint told us to get our asses back to the Impact Crater.

What will we find? Well, I’ll find out next time. Time for bed, and all that.

Session 11 – Thursday 29th August

To the place where the artefacts are!

Upon arriving at the artefact place, Samus and I found that the other clues were available, so we went on a little artefact hunt. Also, I noticed that you can really see Samus’ face better through the visor of the Phazon Suit. Am I imagining that? I just feel like her eyes are more visible. Anyway, we headed to the Chozo Ruins first, and picked up an artefact in the room once occupied by the flower boss.

On to Magmoor Caverns. Samus and I found an artefact in the lava lake, and then headed back to the Chozo Ruins and got the artefact gizmo below the Chozo statue in the Hall of Elders, then it was time to go to What-the-Heck Drifts again. We found an extremely cheekily hidden artefact doodah at the top of the tall cave in the drifts, and then found another artefact doohickey under an icy Chozo statue. Then we came to a bit of a grinding halt.

I’ll be honest, I don’t know how to get the other Drifts artefact. The clue mentions a tower to collapse, but there are two areas named “tower” on the map, situated very close together, and I couldn’t find any way to collapse either of them, and couldn’t find anything of note in the room that connects them. It also didn’t feel like there was anything hidden there. A bit of gamer’s intuition, you know? Still, there must be something somewhere.

Aside from that one, the last artefact is hidden in the Phazon Mines and seems like it’ll require another fight against another big boy pirate. I couldn’t be done with that tonight either, so Samus and I decided to save the game and call it a night.

Session 12 – Friday 30th August

This one was likely to be a shorter session, because I had plans coming up. I thought I’d see if I could find at least one more artefact, though.

Samus and I travelled back through the Phazon Mines and got said artefact from another oversized, elite jerk. This just left the artefact in the Drifts of Whatever, the one that refers to the “tower”, and I thought I’d have a go because we got the first artefact so quickly. We trotted back to the Drifts and made our way back to the towers area (and I now saw that three areas in the map are named “tower”, because of the Control Tower between the East and West Towers), but I still couldn’t work out what to do. I felt like I’d hit a bit of a dead end. No fake walls. No mysterious things I could scan. Nothing.

So, is it still cheating if your wife looks up the solution on her phone instead of you? At first I just asked her to check if I was in the right place, because I at least wanted to know that, but this progressed to her basically telling me the solution. I was supposed to look out of the window in the East Tower (the window area doesn’t even seem to be a proper place, it just kind of feels like it’s out of bounds) and melt some ice and then explode some fuel tanks attached to another tower in the background with a missile. Apparently, I’d already melted the ice in my past searches through these accursed towers, because I only needed to fire the missile. Tower toppled. Final artefact claimed.

Look, I’m a grown adult with plans and responsibilities. I can’t be pissing about chasing some vague clue about towers. Additionally, in my defence, that was quite an obscure solution that doesn’t really fit with any of the other methods I’d used to find hidden areas in other parts of the game, and the tower you have to topple isn’t on the map and just seems like some background dressing. I think I’d gotten to the point where it was look it up or play something else.

So we went back to the artefact place (saving at Samus’ ship on the way, of course) and Samus got killed by Meta Ridley when he had but a smidgen of health left. My eyes are tired. My plans were looming. I’ll pick it up from that ship save next time.

Session 13 – Friday 30th August

Plans done (we had some some people round for a board game evening), and I settled in for session 13! Samus and I swatted Ridley pretty easily this second time around, and the bird-like Chozo statues surrounding the arena finished him off with red lasers. Kill-stealers. A pillar of light appeared after that fight which I thought might give Samus another power-up, but it zapped us into the Impact Crater instead.

Two rooms later, and we’d found the most annoying room in the game. An elongated, drawn-out platforming section during which Samus is constantly being harried by endlessly respawning Rainbow Metroids. Really, Nintendo? That room can get directly into the space bin. To add insult to injury, it was located between the last save point and the final boss!

Speaking of which; here comes Metroid Prime! I like the title drop. The first stage of the boss was a giant, armoured spider-looking thing. It was quite cinematic, the way it kept retreating deeper underground. It was fiddly but doable, and then the second stage – a floating, squid-like thing with a vaguely human face and a sparkly, translucent body that put me in the mind of Subnautica’s Ghost Leviathans – got pretty overwhelming pretty quickly. Samus was killed. Death number twelve, and we have to negotiate the platformer room with the walls that look like teeth and the endlessly respawning multicoloured bastards again. I’m going to spoil it now, though; this was the last time Samus would fall in battle.

We went in for attempt number two with cool heads and steady trigger fingers, and beat the first stage with health to spare. We took our time in the second stage, harvested the summoned adds for health pick-ups, and used the power bombs when Metroid Prime – Ghost Edition started summoning those horrible multicoloured metroids. After a fraught final few moments, Samus came out on top, and the final boss exploded.

I was expecting a third boss stage, but there was none. I was then expecting a playable escape sequence, but there was none. Just some end credits and a lot of relief. Metroid Prime Remastered: complete.

I didn’t find all the items (I think my final completion percentage was 68), but I’m happy, and can now file this in my completed Switch games pile along with Metroid Dread. Incidentally, I think that was the better game. The bosses in that game were harder, and it took me more tries to get past most of them, but I enjoyed the process of learning the patterns more, whereas in Metroid Prime Remastered I wasn’t always clear with what I was doing, and often found myself just blasting away and tanking damage.

Metroid Prime Remastered certainly had some pain in the ass moments, and wasn’t exactly a stress-free gaming experience, but I definitely enjoyed it, and vibed with the atmosphere for the most part. I’m definitely not finished with this series, and will be looking forward to the next instalment. I’m glad I staved off that cheeseburger-induced heart attack for long enough to see it through. That’s a call back to session one, by the way.

Oh, and completing the game unlocked Hard Mode. I’m alright, thanks. Trying to avoid a heart attack, remember?

Metroid Dread

The Grim Brightness of the Far Future

I’ve been orbiting the Metroid series for a while now, but it wasn’t until this most recent offering that I finally hit the boosters and made planetfall. Metroid Dread is an immaculately polished space adventure in a classic, retro style. Nintendo’s artistry is abundantly evident in the way they’ve brought the side-scrolling action to life with detailed, 3D graphics, flawless animation, and a great sense of consistency, atmosphere and depth to the environments. The story is told through environmental changes and subtle, background elements as much as it is through cut-scenes, and, from what I’ve read, there are countless fascinating links to the larger Metroid universe for the eagle-eyed fan to find. All this makes for an excellent, expertly presented sci-fi narrative experience.

The gameplay is refined and precise. Silent bounty hunter Samus Aran controls with pinpoint smoothness, and dashing through caverns and corridors, latching on to ledges and blasting the local fauna is immensely satisfying. The immersion increases as progress is made and new skills and weapons are unlocked. These skills and weapons also provide the main means of travelling to new areas. Double jumps, weapon upgrades and the ability to roll up into a ball and squeeze through gaps all open up new places to explore and new dangers to face.

The game can be difficult, but this difficulty is mostly limited to the E.M.M.I. encounters, certain boss fights, and the uncovering of secret areas. Even when things do get tricky, it’s never down to fiddly controls or unfair level design. Metroid Dread gives you the tools you need to succeed, you just have to figure out how to use them. Bosses that seem insurmountable at first will be felled eventually once weaknesses and patterns reveal themselves. The learning curve is natural and satisfying, if you’re willing to stick with it.

The most controversial sticking points are the encounters with the E.M.M.I. machines. Samus’ standard weapons are useless against these contorting arrangements of metallic sinew. They stalk through quiet, eerie areas sealed off from the rest of the level, and can form and reform in order to pursue Samus across any surface and through any gap. Their inquisitive bleeps and bloops haunt the areas they patrol, and once one catches sight of its prey, a quick exit is the only way to avoid a nasty demise. These relentless automatons are almost at odds with the rest of the game in terms of visual design. While most of the other enemies are indigenous life-forms or fleshy abominations, these E.M.M.I. creatures look like they were dreamed up by a focus group in an Apple laboratory.

The submerged areas are some of my favourites to traverse. Metroid Dread does a stunning job of creating an immersive atmosphere with its deep and detailed backgrounds.

Speaking of laboratories, Samus will be exploring a few of them, many with life-forms on display in an apparent state of mid-autopsy. One especially effecting area has a huge creature suspended by probe-like machinery, its hideous visage gaping open in the background as its muscles spasm and jolt. There’s a definite sci-fi horror vibe, sprinkled with a seasoning of gross body-horror for flavour. These dark themes juxtapose strangely with that trademark Nintendo brightness, like a coat of bright paint over rusted metal. Or like Aliens if it was directed by Michael Bay. No, scratch that, that’s a horrible thought…

Metroid Dread is an expertly crafted, exquisitely balanced game. Samus is a joy to control and the world is a fascinating one to explore. The E.M.M.I. enemies have divided opinion, and there is certainly a line beyond which being one-shotted by the same invincible horror over and over again goes beyond tense and terrifying and becomes annoying, Alien: Isolation style. In my view, however, the E.M.M.I. encounters just about stay on the right side of the line throughout, and add to a great experience. All of this put together means that Metroid Dread is modern, old-school gaming at its best. Also, Samus is a girl. I know, I couldn’t believe it either.