Metroid Zero Mission, the expanded remake of original metroid from NES, released in 1986. While easily being better than the original, to no one surprise, it's not without it's fair share of flaws.
Pros:-
>gameplay being up to the modern standards of 2D Metroid games of that time & fast-paced & level design

>visuals, while may not be superior to Metroid Fusion's extremely varied landscape, it's still pretty great, which is ironic considering it's made on a modified engine of Fusion

>the "expanded" part of this remake, which is the new maps Chozodia, Chozo Ruins & Space Pirates' Mothership, which begins with Samus in her most vulnerable state, blue Zero Suit, where she has no choice but to avoid any confrontation with enemies & sneak her way through the areas to look for her Power Suit & escape, also adding more of her backstory lifted from the Metroid manga, which I found exceptionally cool.

the mixed:-
~the music, either hit or didn't. Most notable ones are Brinstar, Norfair, Kraid's Lair, Ridley Boss theme, Escape from Tourian & Mecha Ridley boss theme. Rest all are lacking either the creepiness & omnious vibe of Fusion or straight up trash

the bad:-
>the mini-bosses, all but one (Imago the giant bee stinger one) sucked balls, only added to increase the playtime just for the sake of it, which is baffling considering Metroid Fusion literally had more boss variety & are still memorable

>disappointed with new final boss mechanically (no pun intended), Mecha Ridley. While I understand it was supposed to be an unfinished prototype, it still should've put more fight. Rather, it was as easy as the first mini-boss of the game, Mua the One-Eyed Centipede, which is insane.

Final rating: 7.5/10

Perfecta reinvención de Metroid 1.

Visualmente bonito, con fondos estilo cómic reemplazando a los negros vacíos del original, mayor variedad de enemigos, más jefes y mayor énfasis en la historia, aunque tampoco tanta como parece.
El sprite de Samus es bastante alto y la cámara está un poco más cerca que en Fusion, parece una chorrada pero me gusta como queda.

El juego te coge de la mano en bastantes secciones al señalarte a qué parte del mapa ir, pero en el camino del punto donde estés hasta donde te indica seguramente encuentres algún otro camino con algún objeto, siguen siendo los de siempre, aunque a veces de encontrarás algunos que no te dejarán usar aún.

Estos objetos son las bombas de energía, lo malo de esto es que se desbloquean justo en los últimos 10 minutos del juego, así que si buscas hacer el 100%, te va a cortar todo el ritmo épico de aventura final y tendrás que recorrer el mapa entero de nuevo buscando bloques que solo se puedan romper con esas bombas.

Algunos otros secretos son bien rebuscados, como hacer una serie de shine sparks en puntos randoms concretos, cosa que no corrigieron hasta Dread.

Los jefes nuevos son monstruos randoms, no están mal la mayoría, aunque algunos se sienten como esponjas de daño que se mueven de un lado a otro.

El movimiento es muy cómodo, acercándose a lo visto en Fusion, haciendo así que los mapas tengan muchas mejoras en puzzles al poder agarrarte a salientes, hacer saltos más precisos o poder disparar en más direcciones.
Lo malo es que los misiles vuelven a estar separados a diferencia de Fusion donde estos "evolucionaban" al encontrar versiones más poderosas en vez de mantenerse como cosas separadas.

El juego tiene un "epílogo" con Samus con el traje Zero que puede hacerse un poco castrante al volverse un juego de sigilo con varias partes bastante estresantes o complicadas por la gran cantidad de vigilantes que hay, por suerte hay varios puntos de guardado para hacer de checkpoint, ya que sino habría causado traumas.

El remake le da más conexión a Samus con los chozo y como el planeta fue donde pasó la mayor parte de su infancia, con más diseños de estructuras parecidas a estos aliens y un combate en la sección de Samus Zero que muestra como es digna de llevar el traje.

The most vanilla "Metroidvania experience".

Started with this game to metroid franchise and all I can say that this game is... exists. It's not a full hate or love situation. It's the kind that after you played it kinda goes away (except it's epilogue part that I am going explain at the end) kinda similar to my zelda ocarina of time experience.

So this game is the Remake of Metroid 1 From Nes with the abilities that included from Metroid fusion with some little tweaks from what I understand. Not just that it does have new expanded areas and new bosses. It's a great look at first glance.

But problem is this is the remake of Metroid 1. What I mean is new additions really doesn't change your experience entirely most of the time. For example fusion's added powers rarely used for main progression, they are mostly for side collectibles (that demands pixel perfect timing from you for some reason? And that makes me unable to fully complete this game).

Even the added bosses feels... inconsequential. The bosses are like... here I am I guess? Then you obliterate them in seconds because they really are not balanced for your new power ups for some reason.

Not just that map feels a bit uninspired. Here is your lava zone, grass zone, sand zone etc. I barely remember any of them except the epilogue and that's not a good sign in my opinion.

Also it's quite linear. Not as much as the fusion but it's still is with the chozo statues marking your map so you can progress (I know you can get past them with some glitches but I am talking about the vanilla experience). I guess that's because they do this to make sure people on the right path because sometimes that marked locations can be completely opposite part of the map that you can't have any idea to check. But they could make it more organic rather than this... easy way out.

After beating the mother brain with almost sleep walking throughout in the whole game suddenly a new part kicks in that is exclusive to this game. The "epilogue".

It's a quite a linear part that challenges you with "stealth" after taking all of your powers. But unlike the main game it actually does something different and it's certain that all of the development went to this part because there is actually things to get excited about and getting actually challenged.

Just for this epilogue part reason I don't give this game 2 stars with the comment that you can skip this one, I mean you can still skip it if you want with looking up the epilogue but it's your decision. Anyway even with the epilogue I can't say I had a fully good time as a whole and for that reason I ended up with this thoughts.

But I can say this.. next remake that I had played created by a fan includes much more interesting things than this game. That's all I can say.

Jogo bem gostosinho de jogar, é bem fluído e rápido de se movimentar, ainda mais depois de pegar o upgrade de correr. Bem que falam que essa franquia é bem legal, e é cheio dos segredinhos esse jogo, tive que ver vídeo pra pegar alguns tanques de HP e etc, tem momentos que você vai perder muita vida, então veja um detonado só pra ter o suficiente pra poder jogar sozinho. Dito isso, fique atirando que nem doido em todas as direções. Infelizmente eu zerei em 5H e 31 minutos, não consegui pegar a Samus de biquíni T-T

A very cool update to the original Metroid, making it feel a bit more of a filled-out experience with added bosses, maybe none of which are all that amazing, but at least Kraid and Ridley are less stat-checky now. The game actually does a nice amount of work keeping as much of the original atmosphere intact, with a lot of the environmental spritework being dark or even strikingly black like on the NES.

There is something to be missed out on, because enemies are a lot more manageable in this one, and that on top of Samus having a lot more finesse with her movement means this is less of a nail-biter than the original Metroid, when if anything I feel like the difficulty could've been kept since we have a good saving system that doesn't reset you back to 30 energy after you die.

I could also take or leave the added "epilogue" bit. On one hand, there was something almost kinda haunting and mysterious about acquiring items that aren't compatible with your suit. But it almost feels like an anticlimax to just find out they're old familiars that are locked away until you're basically at the final boss' doorstep. The catharsis of plowing through pirates after putting up with a stealth section was nice, but narratively I'm not sure how much it adds. It's the type of Metroid mythos I'm less of a fan of, and feels like it's weirdly there just to be all "See, THIS is how Samus' shoulder pauldrons got huge". Like, okay? And? Who actually cared that Metroid 1 Varia Suit didn't have the big shoulders?

Getting a bunch of upgrades at the last minute also means you gotta get off the pirate ship, go back to Zebes, and do a victory lap to get all the items you couldn't the first time through, and that just sorta killed my interest in 100%ing it. It's got neat and really tricky puzzles to get everything, but eh.

A worthy remake of the original that acts as a cool expansion, even if some of it feels like excess. And if nothing else, it comes with Metroid 1 on the cart, if you REALLY insist.

this game is tight and it makes me tight. atmosphere is still amazing and world design is pretty great with it being a remake of metroid 1, tons of memorable moments and brilliantly designed areas which feel like individual levels like fusion without the more closed off and dense design of fusion which i really like. this game has the best use of cutscenes in any game ive ever played, each of them are no longer than 15 seconds and yet are the hardest cutscenes i've ever seen, none of them are useless and give you information you wouldn't have had otherwise or introducing an area brilliantly. im sorry but just look up these cutscenes i love them (intro especially). Game is pretty short but also has a clear structure up untill you beat mother brain, and when it does switch up, its a well designed subversion of traditional metroid gameplay that won't be brought up until Dread. bosses are a low point for me, either go down in 5 seconds or are very frustrating with either a bunch of stuff on screen (mother brain) or a very small and tiny lil hurt box (mecha-ridley). I played this on emulator with an xbox one controller and 1st off, dont play this with a stick or bad d-pad, 2nd off, the GBA doesn't have enough buttons for good metroid with the controls being kinda clumsy sometimes. What hurts the game possibly the most due to the GBA is the screen size, constant enemies or platforms slightly off screen making it often for you to just run into them or have to guess where platforms are offscreen.
some problems when playing but looking back at this will make it look flawless, but stand strong, because the mind focuses on survival beyond all, and will help you forget bad things to help you move on, but I say to never forget.

Recently did a Hard Mode 100% run and since I didn’t write anything about this game before I am now.

What else can be said about Zero Mission? It’s one of the all time great remakes. Metroid 1 is a game I love but it was really held back by its hardware. It’s weird though because Super Metroid is already kind of a remake?

The thing that makes Zero Mission stand out and probably what most people remember is the zero suit section. It’s divisive for sure but I think it’s really neat and unexpected on a first playthrough. Especially for those who had finished the original. On repeat playthroughs it is kind of just tedious. And I can safely say on hard mode it’s just kind of bullshit. You die in like 3 hits. Getting the full suit and blasting through pirates is really empowering though.

From a Hard Mode 100% perspective I had a good time. The shinespark puzzles were fun to execute. The game is still a breeze though. Only challenge was zero suit and mecha Ridley.

Overall I love this game. It’s pretty short but sometimes all I want is some bite size Metroid.

Played on Analogue Pocket