Poll: Metroid: Other M killed Samus

[Monk Ed]

Yes! Hell, it probably wouldn't have hurt them to try and show in the cutscenes how she wasn't such a failure anymore. Because you know, whining about something that happened when you were a teenager or something doesn't exactly scream I AM A WELL ADJUSTED AND STRONG INDIVIDUAL NOW. They really needed to bridge the gap between cutscene samus and gameplay samus somehow, and of course get rid of those abysmal monologues that just exacerbate it all.

I agree with you so much, except that I don't think Samus needs to be well-adjusted to be interesting or watchable. As someone before me said, I like that Samus is sad over what happened to the hatchling. And having hangups over how she parted ways on bad terms with her father figure also seems reasonable -- and she gets over those anyway, as we see, and by the direction I take it we are meant to believe that that's truly in the past and she won't have these "daddy issues" in future games, so she did grow as a character, if in a manner poorly told.

Hm. I think in your most recent post you're going a bit far with the sexism angle. I didn't read into it at all that Samus feels like she "needs a man" for anything. The reason she subordinated herself to General Malkovitch in the first place was to earn back his trust, not because she felt like she needed a man's guidance.

 

[Aiddon_v1legacy]

Wtf.... What the hell are 45% of escapists thinking...

Her responses are very human, and very normal. You would rather she had the emotional capacity of a rock? "Emotional mess"? what utter garbage. She is extraordinarily composed (not to mention speaks honestly and intelligently) considering she has never known her parents, watched her friends die, stares down certain death at every turn, and has the fate of galactic civilization squarely on her shoulders.

Pretty much what I thought; at most she had ONE emotional outburst with Adam and ONE freak out over Ridley. She beat Ridley so hard that it was a miracle that she didn't kill him. She shed tears over Adam's death and then she got right back up and finished the task he entrusted to her. She didn't ***** at Adam or the other members (nor should she have) about her problems, she didn't let her feelings jeopardize the mission, and she acted professionally with flying colors. And while I'm ranting, here's something I said elsewhere:

"The criticism's of Samus' characterization also brings up ANOTHER ugly habit of the games industry: the refusal to let a protagonist fail or show negative emotions and insecurities. It always seems that developers find some way to sidestep the protagonist legitimately failing in some context or showing negative emotions such as fear, sadness, or trauma.

It's almost become an unspoken rule for developers to make it so we never have to see more troubling emotional issues and whenever a game DOES do that it seems that we backpedal as fast as we can into a comfort zone just so we don't have to deal with the personal issues of a character. This goes manifold for Samus due to her iconic status since we've held her to an impossible standard and when it came time for her to get down and dirty about her flaws we chickened out and refused to accept it. This is the creative equivalent of backing out of a relationship the second it got serious so you don't have to risk heartbreak and probably having to learn some things you don't want to hear from the person."

Just when I thought this epic tantrum by the community was finished someone just HAS to fan the flames again

 

[Wintermute_]

They didn't ruin Samus in Other M.

True, their characterization wasn't the best. But really, how can you characterize Samus well when she's become a badass on par with (or better than) Master-fucking-Chief without saying a single word throughout the entire series? And personally, I like the way they characterized her, especially her still being upset over the Metroid Hatchling getting killed by Mother Brain.

Baby...BABY...BABY-BABY... BABY BABYBABY BABY IT WAS CRYING JUST FOR ME!!!!

They could have characterized her in many ways. They just didn't have to take her from one extreme to another. Hell we see some glimpses in fusion and zero mission. Even in the Prime games, such as in Echoes when you beat Dark Samus for the second time she moves like she's going to try and stop Dark Samus from falling to her apparent death, and it Corruption when Gandreda or whatever her name is turns into Samus in her death throes, Samus gets a really freaked out look on her face. It gives an impression that though Samus does this, she's aware that she can die and seeing something that looks eerily like herself die troubles her and makes it seem too real, or perhaps I'm reading too much into it. But that's how subtle characterization works, small gestures and movements without shoving exposition that halts the plot and gameplay down the player's throat while they just sit there with their thumbs up their ass waiting for the stupid cutscene to end. Even if they wanted to give her a softer more feminine side they could have pulled it off without turning her into a weak, spineless failure who constantly whined how she couldn't ever do anything however long in the past it was and how the man was always right and who could never actually do anything without some man there to help or guide her along.

Right tho? The subtle characterization from prime and fusion/zero mission was great. I have nothing against giving samus a little bit o' character, but i mean, she becomes her polar opposite (at least what i imagine her polar opposite would be): a whiny, 50's style women who needs the big man to be there. and with all the amazing bad-assery she's committed (she's taken down entire civilization's people!) she is now a cowering wimpy little girl who's biggest regrets are not following orders? remember in zero mission, she doesn't like taking orders? I don't count this as canon

 

[FinalHeart95]

The problem is that Samus is a character that wasn't given any personality at all. So people started filling in personality for the character. The personality given in Other M doesn't match the one they gave Samus, so you'll hear things like "Samus wouldn't do that!"... when there was barely any characterization given to her anyway.

It only ruined Samus for those who let that get to them.

 

[internetzealot1]

Let's just hope that this was a one-off, and that Samus will return to her roots in the next game.

 

[Monk Ed]

Wtf.... What the hell are 45% of escapists thinking...

Her responses are very human, and very normal. You would rather she had the emotional capacity of a rock? "Emotional mess"? what utter garbage. She is extraordinarily composed (not to mention speaks honestly and intelligently) considering she has never known her parents, watched her friends die, stares down certain death at every turn, and has the fate of galactic civilization squarely on her shoulders.

Pretty much what I thought; at most she had ONE emotional outburst with Adam and ONE freak out over Ridley. She beat Ridley so hard that it was a miracle that she didn't kill him. She shed tears over Adam's death and then she got right back up and finished the task he entrusted to her. She didn't ***** at Adam or the other members (nor should she have) about her problems, she didn't let her feelings jeopardize the mission, and she acted professionally with flying colors. And while I'm ranting, here's something I said elsewhere:

"The criticism's of Samus' characterization also brings up ANOTHER ugly habit of the games industry: the refusal to let a protagonist fail or show negative emotions and insecurities. It always seems that developers find some way to sidestep the protagonist legitimately failing in some context or showing negative emotions such as fear, sadness, or trauma.

It's almost become an unspoken rule for developers to make it so we never have to see more troubling emotional issues and whenever a game DOES do that it seems that we backpedal as fast as we can into a comfort zone just so we don't have to deal with the personal issues of a character. This goes manifold for Samus due to her iconic status since we've held her to an impossible standard and when it came time for her to get down and dirty about her flaws we chickened out and refused to accept it. This is the creative equivalent of backing out of a relationship the second it got serious so you don't have to risk heartbreak and probably having to learn some things you don't want to hear from the person."

Just when I thought this epic tantrum by the community was finished someone just HAS to fan the flames again

I agree with just about everything in this quote, (except I don't think characterizing the opposition with the word 'tantrum' helps anything).

Funny thing is, I always figured that Samus had problems just by dint of her tragic backstory. For years as I've watched Samus go around hunting through the lonely ruins of an ancient civilization, blowing up obstacles, I wasn't thinking, "Wow what a badass I want her to be my mommy-girlfriend who can protect me and take care of me and I bet she screws like a tigress" (Okay I was partially thinking that on some primal amazon-worship level) but rather "I wonder what kind of pain she hides deep inside. These lonely adventures must be some kind of therapy for her. Oh Samus, won't you please tell me what hurts you so?"

...Of course I got more than I bargained for in the form of Other M's terrible execution of my wish, because let's face it, her soliloquies are really badly written.

 

[Monk Ed]

Right tho? The subtle characterization from prime and fusion/zero mission was great. I have nothing against giving samus a little bit o' character, but i mean, she becomes her polar opposite (at least what i imagine her polar opposite would be): a whiny, 50's style women who needs the big man to be there. and with all the amazing bad-assery she's committed (she's taken down entire civilization's people!) she is now a cowering wimpy little girl who's biggest regrets are not following orders? remember in zero mission, she doesn't like taking orders? I don't count this as canon

A whiny, 50's style woman who needs the big man to be there? That's going way, way out there I must say. As I said before, nothing in the story indicates that Samus "needs a man". What she wanted was to earn back the good regard of the last surviving person who was some kind of parental figure to her -- she being a multiple-times orphan. Adam's gender was far below tertiary compared to that; compare, for example, how she treats Anthony almost like a child she has to protect. And the fact that Samus stated her hatred of taking orders in Zero Mission (which would have been reiterated to remind the audience if this were a better-told story) is not so much a contradiction as it is an indication of just how badly she wants back Adam's positive regard. There is nothing "whiny 50's woman" about that.

 

[Flamma Man]

Funny thing is, I always figured that Samus had problems just by dint of her tragic backstory. For years as I've watched Samus go around hunting through the lonely ruins of an ancient civilization, blowing up obstacles, I wasn't thinking, "Wow what a badass I want her to be my mommy-girlfriend who can protect me and take care of me and I bet she screws like a tigress" (Okay I was partially thinking that on some primal amazon-worship level) but rather "I wonder what kind of pain she hides deep inside. These lonely adventures must be some kind of therapy for her. Oh Samus, won't you please tell me what hurts you so?"

...Of course I got more than I bargained for in the form of Other M's terrible execution of my wish, because let's face it, her soliloquies are really badly written.

I'm on the same boat as you, which is why I loved the previous games because they were subtle and SHOWED not TOLD.

"Other M" pretty much throws this rule in the trash and just has her gob about how her life, blah, blah, to the point of it becoming overbearing and annoying.

Very poor execution.

 

[Monk Ed]

Funny thing is, I always figured that Samus had problems just by dint of her tragic backstory. For years as I've watched Samus go around hunting through the lonely ruins of an ancient civilization, blowing up obstacles, I wasn't thinking, "Wow what a badass I want her to be my mommy-girlfriend who can protect me and take care of me and I bet she screws like a tigress" (Okay I was partially thinking that on some primal amazon-worship level) but rather "I wonder what kind of pain she hides deep inside. These lonely adventures must be some kind of therapy for her. Oh Samus, won't you please tell me what hurts you so?"

...Of course I got more than I bargained for in the form of Other M's terrible execution of my wish, because let's face it, her soliloquies are really badly written.

I'm on the same boat as you, which is why I loved the previous games because they were subtle and SHOWED not TOLD.

"Other M" pretty much throws this rule in the trash and just has her gob about how her life, blah, blah, to the point of it becoming overbearing and annoying.

Very poor execution.

The question is, did that cause you to think that Samus was "ruined" or what-have-you by that execution? At first I thought such, but ultimately I put the bad marks on the director rather than her character. I just can't bring myself to attribute the adjectives "overbearing" and "annoying" to Samus herself, because Samus herself isn't actually telling anyone any of these things. It's less like she's "whining" and more like we stole her journal and get what we deserve for immorally peeking into her innermost most private thoughts.

 

[kotorfan04]

I am going to chip in for my two cents.

Anyways I think it was a good move to try to humanize the character and give her a voice in her head that wasn't just the players.

It is just a shame they chose a voice that was horrible for the CHARACTER.

Now obvious Samus hadn't received much official characterization but I doubt anyone who played any previous metroid game thought of Ms. Aran as some girl who would blindly follow the orders of her crush/co and who would choke up in the face of an enemy.

Yes this is their IP and canon never said she WASN'T a scared girl trying to make it in a man's world but the player did. We WERE her, we were the little voice in her mind who would do damned near anything to get the job done our way. We made samus the queen killer, an unstoppable force of reckoning, something that could singlehandedly plow through an enemy invasion in a few hours and consider it a days work. Then we saw her turned into the very antithesis of that idea and were powerless to help it. Hell the game encouraged us to play along and roll with it and I think that is a lot of the problem.

 

[The Great JT]

Y'know, Moviebob made an interesting little video on this very subject.

In fact, here it is. [http://gameoverthinker.blogspot.com/2010/09/episode-40-heavens-to-metroid.html]

Do I think Other M ruined Samus? No. Up to this point we've really been using Samus as sort of an expy for the main character from Aliens. Really up to this point Samus has never had a personality. You'd find more personality in Master Chief, and he's a personality-deficient brick. In Other M, her dialogue shows that she has fears, doubts, respect and other emotions that I can't recall off the top of my head, in fact Samus also seems to be showing signs of post-traumatic stress disorder. In other words, people are getting their panties in a bunch BECAUSE SHE WAS GIVEN A THREE-DIMENSIONAL PERSONALITY. Now yes, I do think they could've done things a little differently, but give the Team Ninja writing crew some credit, they at least didn't make Samus strip down to a bikini and seductively feed another woman a strawberry like they've done with other franchises.

 

[CheckD3]

Samus is an odd character, I feel like from what I know about the original Metroid, the suprise was the fact that she was a SHE. Nowadays they play on us knowing that it's a woman underneath and are using that to sell, who else has fantasized about Zero-suit Samus? Come on, sexy woman in skin tight suit, yes please!

At least you can call Metroid a "fresh" series with a serious face. When 2D got redundant, they didn't kill it off, adding some nice titles in Fusion and Zero Mission for GBA, but gave us a new perspective with the Prime trilogy, which even though I haven't finished the 3rd yet, is a great series, with some of the best graphics the GC can boast and a story line that's, well it's redundant but it's Metroid and Nintendo, what did you expect?

Now you have Other M, a game that take the Prime triology and the classic 2D style games and merges them, attempting to build on Prime 3's lead into voice acting the story and giving Samus a personality. It may not have been done right, but it's a step in the direction that leads to greatness.

I'd rather have them play around with Samus (or myself playing with Zero-suit, rwawr, lol) as a character while working with new gameplay mechanics then them doing what they did to Mario. Making the same kind of adventure that they've done since the begging of Mario. In a sense, Other M breathed life into the empty shell of a woman that was Samus, who's now a person that has an identity. Maybe an ill designed identity but an identity none the less

 

[Monk Ed]

Y'know, Moviebob made an interesting little video on this very subject.

In fact, here it is. [http://gameoverthinker.blogspot.com/2010/09/episode-40-heavens-to-metroid.html]

Do I think Other M ruined Samus? No. Up to this point we've really been using Samus as sort of an expy for the main character from Aliens. Really up to this point Samus has never had a personality. You'd find more personality in Master Chief, and he's a personality-deficient brick. In Other M, her dialogue shows that she has fears, doubts, respect and other emotions that I can't recall off the top of my head. In other words, people are getting their panties in a bunch BECAUSE SHE WAS GIVEN A THREE-DIMENSIONAL PERSONALITY. Now yes, I do think they could've done things a little differently, but give the Team Ninja writing crew some credit, they at least didn't make Samus strip down to a bikini and seductively feed another woman a strawberry like they've done with other franchises.

Someone hasn't read this topic at all.

To be fair, it's close to 200 posts now, so let me provide a summary of the issue for those jumping in just now.

1) Those with misgivings about Other M's characterization of Samus are not primarily complaining about the fact that she was given a personality, but the fact that the style of portraying her personality suddenly whiplashed from her saying almost nothing to her telling us absolutely every little detail about her feelings, thus creating the impression that she is "whiny" and "overbearing". Even on a non-relative level, the exposition is amateurishly overwritten.

2) Team Ninja did not write the story, Nintendo did. Specifically, Yoshio Sakamoto, who if I recall has been the main writer of the series since Super Metroid. (Correction: since the original.)

3) For all the repetitive exposition we get, Samus's apparent inconsistencies of behavior with past entries are not given sufficient context, if they are justified at all. The fact that so many people are having these reactions and questions -- why is she trembling at the sight of an enemy she's beaten four times? Why is she taking orders after stating in Zero Mission how she hates taking orders? -- is sufficient to prove that that context is lacking.

^ Did I hit the major points? I tried to present it as neutrally as possible.

Addenda:

4) Bob's video, "Heavens to Metroid", is not very helpful as it "misses the point by a mile".

 

[Flamma Man]

To be fair, it's close to 200 posts now, so let me provide a summary of the issue for those jumping in just now.

1) Those with misgivings about Other M's characterization of Samus are not primarily complaining about the fact that she was given a personality, but the fact that the style of portraying her personality suddenly whiplashed from her saying almost nothing to her telling us absolutely every little detail about her feelings, thus creating the impression that she is "whiny" and "overbearing". Even on a non-relative level, the exposition is amateurishly overwritten.

2) Team Ninja did not write the story, Nintendo did. Specifically, Yoshio Sakamoto, who if I recall has been the main writer of the series since Super Metroid.

3) For all the repetitive exposition we get, Samus's apparent inconsistencies of behavior with past entries are not given sufficient context, if they are justified at all. The fact that so many people are having these reactions and questions -- why is she trembling at the sight of an enemy she's beaten four times? Why is she taking orders after stating in Zero Mission how she hates taking orders? -- is sufficient to prove that that context is lacking.

^ Did I hit the major points? I tried to present it as neutrally as possible.

You forgot to mention that Bob's video wasn't very informative considering it missed the point by a mile.

 

[Servantes]

In summary this Game didn't happen, It will be stricken from the accounts of anything to do with the character know as Samus, Devil May Cry 2 anyone?

the game at best is a bad story on her background taken to high levels of sappy over the top I'm helpless levels, I could see it as she went into a mental relapse and was sent reeling into the depths of her mind and brought into fruition in she really lost it, and then player/fan could stand back and say "she'll be alright shes a bit insane at the moment." but it wasn't taken that route instead you get a girl who is just lost in her head to the point of
"WTF O RELY? I didn't know that, now tell me 5 mins of I don't care, I can't do shit on my own."

Simply put when it comes off as poorly as it was received, then its just outright a failure on the story telling part, maybe next time we can get a story developer who doesn't think in the age know as The Twilight Saga.

 

[AKmontalvo]

The character isnt "killed," and as far as gameplay is concerned the game is a step forward but Im one of those fellas that preferd samus' ambiguity (I even thought the zero suit was too much... fusion suit was cool tho) she was like a badass enigma, however if she had to be humanized i would have prefered that it had been done MUCH better

 

[Monk Ed]

Now you have Other M, a game that take the Prime triology and the classic 2D style games and merges them, attempting to build on Prime 3's lead into voice acting the story and giving Samus a personality. It may not have been done right, but it's a step in the direction that leads to greatness.

I'd rather have them play around with Samus (or myself playing with Zero-suit, rwawr, lol) as a character while working with new gameplay mechanics then them doing what they did to Mario. Making the same kind of adventure that they've done since the begging of Mario.

THIS! Dear god, THIS! Every word!

One thing I like to remind myself of when I get down about how badly Samus's story was told in Other M is that Nintendo, after Wind Waker, gave the fans what they had been clamoring for in Twilight Princess. I hope that Nintendo will learn from the backlash to this entry and push future portrayals of Samus towards the happy middle ground between her overdone exposition in Other M and her total or near-total lack of it in most previous entries.

What I'm afraid of is the possibility that they'll overreact and go too far back in the other direction to play it safe, though. One thing I fault the Prime games for is that they were much, much too conservative with characterizing Samus. Next to the original Metroid, the Prime games are the absolutely most conservative about Samus's personality -- they are the only ones since the original in which she doesn't even speak in text!

The sweet spot, I'd wager, is somewhere between Other M and Zero Mission. Less tell, more show -- as opposed to Prime, which is just less, period.