100% Hard Mode Completed in Metroid Dread (6 hours)

 Well, I played it through a 3rd time (I must like this game). This time, I did Hard Mode.

Hard mode is... well, after beating the game twice on normal, it honestly didn't seem that much harder. I think the only real difference is that the enemies hit harder - maybe 150% or even 200% of the ordinary damage. Still, the main skill you develop over multiple playthroughs is dodging attacks. My recollection of playing Super Metroid was that I'd tend to worry more about getting damage in when I could and hoping I killed the boss before it killed me - avoiding attacks if I could, but focusing on damage outputs.

I think that the ease with which Samus controls, especially in the way it allows you to quickly and precisely aim your attacks, means that if the damage the bosses did was the same they did in Super Metroid, it'd be too easy.

In a lot of ways, the bosses feel a bit more like World of Warcraft or Dark Souls/Bloodborne designs. What I mean by that is that the first time you face one of them, you're going to be blindsided by tons of devastating attacks. Mastery, then, is mostly about reading tells and knowing how to dodge the attacks. For example, I've gotten way better at letting the latter two Elite Chozo Warriors, in their second phase, aim at me with their goo-spit and then Aeion Flash out of the way right as it goes off. (It's a bit harder to do so with Raven Beak's charge beam in his final phase, as if you stay on the ground no place on the ground will be safe when it goes off).

Item collection is of course the same in Hard Mode (I shocked myself by getting the Burenia Shinespark puzzle in what was effectively the first attempt). One thing about this game is that even if you collect everything, you'll sometimes be surprised at how what seemed like the only route on an earlier run is in fact just one of many.

For example, I almost accidentally skipped the Chozo Robot duo in Burenia beacause I just happened not to go into that room. I think I ultimately had to in order to get the missile expansion in that room, but if I weren't going for 100% I probably never would have fought them (also, for some reason on this run those fights went way, way faster and easier).

I certainly did not remember some of the rooms and puzzles for the items even having gotten 100% on my first run. Also, I think there were some teleporters that I hadn't found in the first or second run. I remember hearing that at some point you'd be able to use the teleporters to go to any other one as a sort of fast-travel, but that appears to be incorrect unless I'm missing something.

Anyway, I want to praise the final Raven Beak fight as a really fantastic boss fight. Even though my first go around I was incredibly frustrated before I realized you had to actually shoot in order to get the parry animation to play on the second phase (the first run he must have had that gold armor for a solid 10 minutes while I tried to figure out how to push him into the next phase).

I also realize I could parry one of his more aggressive melee attacks, which I always used to just dodge, which not only supplied me with some missiles and health, but also helped me push him farther into the fight faster. (Just gotta be very careful that you don't try to parry him when he gets Shinespark, which looks similar, as that will take off like 4 or 5 energy tanks with one hit).

On Hard Mode it only took me three attempts to down Raven Beak, and all three saw me getting to the final stage. My sense is that he's immune to the wave beam in phase 1, and of course immune to everything except in the parry-animation in phase 2, but after that point, you can just hit him with the beam, and I think it's actually more efficient to spam the beam in the parry-cutscenes than to hit him with missiles, though it's hell on your hands (the last time I did it on my kill I just wound up spamming ice missiles to keep my hand from cramping up - ah, aging!)

The EMMIs are practically identical on Hard Mode. The only difference I'd imagine is that the light blue EMMI (the one with the ice missiles) deals more damage when it freezes you - most of the EMMIs don't actually do damage, so there's not much of a difference.

Man, I wish there were just more of this game, though I also recognize that "leaving you wanting more" is a sign that they did a good job.

One thing I would be really into would be if they were to do a Zero Mission/Samus Returns-style remake of Super Metroid using Dread's engine. While a nearly unchanged remake would probably please a lot of old school fans, the game's presence on the Super Nintendo Collection makes that a bit redundant, and I think you could take advantage of some of the changes brought with Dread.

The thing I always hated about Super Metroid was having to fumble with the select button to choose missile types and other equipment. With modern controllers having way more buttons, you could fix that issue.

I'd go a bit further and make it so that the controls were basically identical to Metroid Dread, but I'd then make Super Missiles the kind of "charge beam" for missiles (kind of the way Storm Missiles work in Dread). They could still be kept as a separate ammunition if you wanted to totally preserve the flow of Super Metroid, but I think it'd also be ok to remix things slightly - maybe putting Super Missiles later in the game.

I'd also love to see the bosses of Super Metroid given the complexity and cinematic treatment that bosses in Dread have. You get the Morph Ball early enough in Super Metroid that I think you could also preserve Samus' slide from Dread (which was honestly a major selling point) and just make the route to the Bombs one square higher to keep you from getting in there early.

I just want to play more Metroid, Nintendo! Which means you did a freaking amazing job on Dread.