Zexion

I wanted to like this one, as a huge fan of most 2D metroids and a handful of modern metroidvanias as well, but this one just doesn't hit. Like so many other modern games that lean on retro aesthetics, this one feels like it's trying too hard to be something that it isn't. Movement and gunplay feel extremely slow, dated, and clunky, while enemies feel like they're designed for much more modern games - bosses (and minibosses) especially tend to zoom around at mach 12, spam the entire screen, and take heavy advantage of the player being limited to 8-directional aiming. Very reminiscent of Mina the Hollower, and that's not a compliment. 3 hours in and every beam upgrade still feels like a peashooter, missiles feel mandatory but health and ammo drops are obscenely rare. The full map being limited to navigation rooms is obnoxious for no reason. On top of that, the story is basically nonexistent. There's a lore drop in the intro, some slight environmental storytelling, and that's it. Overall it feels like a bizarre interpretation of Super Metroid without really understanding what made that game work, and so far it doesn't feel like it's trying to be its own thing either.

The ultimate love letter to classic Metroid. Gonna be hard to beat this one out

Great metroidvania with somle really cool and new ideas, has a bit of that retro game unfair difficulty at times unfortunately

Fantasic metroidvania 10/10

Difficulty: NES

very good