I've played plenty of Metroid games prior to this. I never beat any of them prior to this one, though. Why? I'll blame it on my short attention span when I was younger. With the release of Metroid Dread looming over the horizon, I figured I should probably delve back into the series. I decided on diving back with this one, seeing as it's a remake of the original Metroid, which I have played. I'll admit, though, the original Metroid is not particularly great. Environments were very samey and the lack of a map system made it extremely confusing and often irritating to navigate. This remake basically fixes every issue I ever had with that game and creates something truly special.

Honestly, I'm hesitant to even continue calling this a simple remake. It's more like a beautiful re-imagining. Everything about this game is consistently wonderful, from the pretty sprite-work, to the fast and tight movement, and the fun exploration. Also, the "stealth" section near the end? Just epic. It's short length also works to its benefit, as even just a day after beating it, I already felt inclined to give it another go.

I feel kind of bummed that I didn't dedicate myself to this series much as a kid. Super Metroid felt grand, but the amount of one-way doors and my lack of inexperience with Metroidvanias left me quite stumped at times. Metroid Prime felt fresh with its gorgeous 3D environments, but its slow movement made backtracking and finding my way through its complex maps tedious. As it stands, this game has once again reinvigorated my hype for this franchise and I'm eager to go back and give those games and the rest of the series another go. Here's to hoping that Metroid Dread is worth the wait.