Sometime last week, one of the creators of Metroid — and, more importantly, one of the principle designers currently working with Team Ninja on the upcoming Metroid: Other M — Yoshio Sakamoto spoke with Famitsu about what they’re planning with the new Metroid game. Here’s a small portion of what he had to say:
However, different from the rest of the series, this time we’re strongly depicting the human side of Samus through such things as movies. She’s a strong woman, but she also has a fragile side. We want to make a game whose charms can be felt from the story areas and these human touches as well. It’s an action game, but it’s capable of having a clear emotional side.
My first thought: it’s about damned time.
My second through twenty-eighth thoughts are slightly more verbose.
When Nintendo fans talk about what they want to see Nintendo “upgrade” most in their properties from one generation to the next, at the top of the list is almost always “give Link a voice” (as in, voiceover work in Legend of Zelda). It used to be “make a 3D Mario”, but that desire was satiated with Super Mario 64, and then, done even better with Super Mario Galaxy. But I digress.
What I personally have always humbly requested is that Samus become a more dynamic character.
Because she is incredibly flat.
A-hem.
First and foremost, Samus is a kick-ass bounty hunter. We get it. This is not a point that requires debate. However, the argument has always been that Samus is a lone interplanetary bounty hunter living an isolated life out in space. And while that’s all fine and dandy, why does that existence automatically preclude any need for emotion or depth?
Living the solitary life of an interplanetary bounty hunter is exactly the sort of thing that warrants a deeper investigation into the heart and soul of a person who is willing to lead such a life. I’m tired of the persistent silence of our favorite heroine. Samus isn’t a cardboard-cutout, strong, silent action hero. She is a highly-trained, very intelligent woman who happens to kick some major space pirate ass when you attach a mercenary-grade weapon onto her arm.
We’ve been offered tiny, nearly insignificant pieces of her backstory in games like Fusion, Zero Mission, and Corruption. But she still feels like this static element that Nintendo trots out whenever they want to please the hardcore Nintendo fanbase. Just don’t ever expect more than a female character model skin grafted onto last year’s top action hero from another game. Because that’s all we’ve ever gotten up to this point.
And I’m thankful that Sakamoto not only realizes Samus’ lack of depth, but plans on addressing exactly that point in Other M. I crave a deeper story, I yearn for a more complicated character. In every other game I play, I manage to be able to form some sort of connection with the protagonist. But in Metroid, Samus has always been just a girl in a suit.
I look forward to that changing.
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I’m all for a story driven metroid and I most certainly want the background of Samus to be explored as well as showing a side of Samus we rarely see.
What concerns me most however, is if Samus has the personality of a typical japanese rpg/anime sensitive chick. This is something that I seriously do not want to see in Samus at all (although it is understandable if that side is shown when she was still young and her parents were killed, or when Samus worked with the Federation or even in her first mission). That website teaser they showed a couple of weeks ago seems to prove my fears a bit. Another fear I have is of Team Ninja over sexualizing Samus.. we really don’t need one of the most iconic female protagonists to be portrayed in such a way.
Also, while I loved the story driven moments in Fusion, it almost seemed like it slowed down or paused the intensity of the usual metroid action, as well as also made it feel very linear.