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Discussion [Take From Kotaku] Dear Metroid Dread: Samus Doesn’t Need To Be An Emotionless Robot To Be Badass

lemonfresh

lemonfresh

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Not linking it to not give kotuku clicks

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Spoilers For Dread Ahead:
Further into the adventure, Metroid Dread rewrites a crucial piece of Samus’ history with the reveal that the Chozo DNA she was imbued with as a child came not only from Gray Voice, a member of the Thoha tribe, but a Mawkin as well. That’s right: Raven Beak is basically her bird dad.

Again, this elicits zero reaction from Samus. This is partly because the info is shared with the player during one of Metroid Dread’s many exposition dumps rather than a full-on cutscene, sure, but as with Quiet Robe’s death, it’s a moment in which you’d expect someone to react, to angrily deny the truth, something. And yet Samus doesn’t even flinch. She’s a cipher to a fault.

Samus is such a stereotypical badass in Metroid Dread that she doesn’t even drop the act during loading screens. While transitioning from area to area, the game treats you to these moody little scenes of Samus riding an elevator or standing in a train car or floating through space as she teleports. They’re really cool the first few times, but watching Samus stand motionless for several minutes, not even fidgeting or checking her weapons, just ends up being awkwardly funny.
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She has an emotion, angry!

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Lichtsang said:
As I said in another thread:
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Having a game about that is out of character for Metroid. This is the series where the hero stops to save some cute little animals because they helped her out. Luckily Dread goes out of its way to explain why Samus is acting weird.
 
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I don’t get the complaint for the loading screen. Do you want her to monologues while she waits for her ride end lol.

Her body language speaks for itself.
 
She shows many emotions in Dread, which are, for the most part, more subtle.
And to whom on this planet was she supposed to talk to? An AI or herself? Please.
 
I'm trying to be an emotionless robot, and not break down crying like every female badass who has to prove women can be tough yet vulnerable at the same time, about the sudden spoilers in the first paragraph of the article (and the first paragraph of the OP excerpt) when it's not quite self-evident that a discussion about Samus' general portrayal would dive right into it.

Edit: Thanks for adding the tags, @lemonfresh!
 
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He's calling emotionless the woman who brought down an entire ship like a fucking comet over pure anger and screaming.
 
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Brock Reiher said:
Yup, she's the narrator for the game. This continued in Fusion and Other M and I believe Zero Mission.
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Eh. I would not count the opening of Super Metroid really as "she narrarates the game". It was mostly a summary of 1 & 2 and it never happened again in the game.

I also never thought inner monologueing fit her character tbh. Dread depicts her perfectly without hitting you over the head with it.
 
Lichtsang said:
Eh. I would not count the opening of Super Metroid really as "she narrarates the game". It was mostly a summary of 1 & 2 and it never happened again in the game.

I also never thought inner monologueing fit her character tbh. Dread depicts her perfectly without hitting you over the head with it.
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Dread is the first game to not do it. She also has someone to talk to in Dread unlike super but doesn't. It's a significant departure.
 
While the transition screens do go on for too long that's not her fault and adding more dialogue to the game would be over doing it, people already moan about the Adam stuff going on towards the start.

Adam also says he can't contact her so she'd be talking to herself about herself which is odd when she does have someone to talk to if she wanted at the various rooms..

Alternatively she could just say what she's going to spend the bounty on or have a brief panic over whether she left the oven on or not before she left.
 
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As for the example quoted in the OP: why should Samus react in shock to the sci-fi equivalent of a sperm donor? She hasn't had any sort of interaction with Raven Beak before this point, there's no relationship there.
 
Jencks said:
0 IQ take. WTF is up with Kotaku lately
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Most of, if not all of the talented staff has left. I believe with Totilo gone none of the original staff is still working there. It's mostly clickbaity headlines and hot takes nowadays.
 
Parshias said:
As for the example quoted in the OP: why should Samus react in shock to the sci-fi equivalent of a sperm donor? She hasn't had any sort of interaction with Raven Beak before this point, there's no relationship there.
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True, but I think it's also supposed to be meaningful Mercury Stream just didn't stick the landing.
 
kotaku really on a roll with these terrible dread articles.

no, samus doesn't need to be anything. she is what she is, it's not her fault people are used to annoying MCs who can't shut up and constantly talk to themselves.
 
Parshias said:
As for the example quoted in the OP: why should Samus react in shock to the sci-fi equivalent of a sperm donor? She hasn't had any sort of interaction with Raven Beak before this point, there's no relationship there.
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Yeah she knew she had Chozo DNA anyway, don't know what she's supposed to need to do. Did they want her to scream "Daddy" and run up for a hug?
 
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Lichtsang said:
You mean aside from Metroid 1, 2 and 3?
And talking to an AI isn't really "having someone to talk to".
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Including Super. Adam is the second most important character of the series and Samus's closest confidant and only friend in the universe.

I get the impression you made your own version of who Samus is that isn't from what actually happens in the games. Dread is a significant departure from how she's been depicted since Metroid II to the point where they even have a throwaway line justifying it. If you like the change that's fine but it is a change.
 
The fact that she is a Metroid is the big deal, not the Chozo DNA. And to that she reacted through the whole game.
 
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I personally have a problem of talking about an article without not reading to its fullest but I also not wanna copy paste an entire article, because its
disrespectful to the whole site.
What I wanna say is, it really isn't worth creating threads for such luke warm takes that anyone here could make, just because it got published on a site.

But since I read it this morning here my 2 cents behind the Spoiler tag:
When Quiet Robe got murdered, we saw Samus being in shock and of course she knew she had to fight immediately. After the fight, we could see her looking down to his dead body and taking her time. But we couldn't see her eyes, so who knows what she looked like or what she thought. But we really don't need to see her face, to knew that this impacted her, since she took her time. I think she mentally reiterated on her promise the finally end this.
Heck, when Quiet Robe revealed himself to her, her pose of letting her guard down and sitting on the floor showed how relieved she was not to see an enemy and one of the race that raised her.

And heck, before the fight with the endboss, when she shot down the illusion her body language showed how fucking done she was and after the fight... how much more emotions do you need? She got desperate and angry.

Not every game needs to be a fucking B-Movie with Monologues and explaining everything. Heck Samus always was a characters that told so much more throught body language
 
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I’m on the final zone, so maybe I’m missing a key part, but I have no idea what the title is taking about. She seems to me to be dealing with a lot of emotions in what I’ve played. Her few moments to emote hit hard to how determined she is and how much weight the situation holds for her.
 
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Seems Kotaku was too busy writing articles about how to pirate the game instead of playing it.
 
Brock Reiher said:
Including Super. Adam is the second most important character of the series and Samus's closest confidant and only friend in the universe.

I get the impression you made your own version of who Samus is that isn't from what actually happens in the games. Dread is a significant departure from how she's been depicted since Metroid II to the point where they even have a throwaway line justifying it. If you like the change that's fine but it is a change.
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I don't really count Other M in all of this, so yes, I probably see it different than you.
And I don't see how Super is different? For me Fusion is the departure.
 
Lichtsang said:
I don't really count Other M in all of this, so yes, I probably see it different than you.
And I don't see how Super is different? For me Fusion is the departure.
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You made your own version. I'm talking about the story of the series, that's the disconnect. Super started Samus monologing which was expanded upon in sequels.
 
Samus should go up to Raven Beak, and say, "I will destroy you, with Chaos!" and then upon victory she says "MY NAME IS JESSICA. JESSICA BEAK."with ACDC playing from her Chozo phone.
 
But she clearly shows emotions through her actions and movement in just the first few minutes before you gain control of her already.
Lord, I can't imagine how terrible one has to hate characterizing someone based on their actions if the emotional meltdown in Other M was a highlight...
 
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Brock Reiher said:
You made your own version. I'm talking about the story of the series, that's the disconnect.
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Adam wasn't a part in 1-3, he was an human turned AI in 4 and really just an AI (with exactly two scenes of screen time, the rest was just Raven Beak) in 5.
I never got the feeling of a big connection in the mainline games, but yes, could be on me.
 
Lichtsang said:
Adam wasn't a part in 1-3, he was an human turned AI in 4 and really just an AI (with exactly two scenes of screen time, the rest was just Raven Beak) in 5.
I never got the feeling of a big connection in the mainline games, but yes, could be on me.
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It's cool, but I don't think it's fair for the Kotaku writer to have guessed the version of the series you personally have before they wrote the article.

The fact that Adam is barely in Dread is one of the ways Dread is a huge departure from the rest of the series, yes.
 
Lichtsang said:
Nice, an article where a man wants a female character to smile and show warmth in a video game about isolation, dread and corruption.
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Magic-Man said:
Doomguy is okay but Samus isn't, apparently.
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yeah basically. cant put it better myself

Brock Reiher said:
The fact that Adam is barely in Dread is one of the ways Dread is a huge departure from the rest of the series, yes.
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wat. ive played beat metroid 1-3 and prime 1-3 and i dont know who adam is

edit: i know who adam is and i've played fusion and other m, just making a point.
 
Lichtsang said:
I don't get this part, I'm sorry. He's absent in more Metroid games than he's in, how exactly is it a departure?
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Adam was introduced 20 years ago. He has been explicitly the secondary main character of the series and the most important living person to Samus for over 50% of the time "Metroid" has been a thing that existed. Story wise he has had that same roll for half of the games in the time line of the story.

We can't have a conversation if you keep saying "that's true, but I don't see it that way" you know?

Sejes said:
edit: i know who adam is and i've played fusion and other m, just making a point
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the point being that you know who he is because you've played metroid games that released within the past 20 years?
 
But Samus does react

She kicks the everliving shit out of Ravenbeak. That’s her emotion. Beating his ass into oblivion. I’d call that a powerful emotion.
 
Dread turned Samus into one of my favorite video game characters ever. If I love an "emotionless robot" so be it. Gimme more of those please.
 
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My only wish is that they’d found more than one opportunity for Samus to speak. I don’t want a constant dialogue at all, but I really did find that moment with Quiet Robe pretty hype. Perhaps there wasn’t any other opportunities that could have landed so well

I also haven’t beaten the final boss yet, so sorry if this is premature
 
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I thought it would be a poor take from the headline, but when he started praising Other M's portrayal I started getting mad. Well played, I guess.
 
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Brock Reiher said:
Adam was introduced 20 years ago. He has been explicitly the secondary main character of the series and the most important living person to Samus for over 50% of the time "Metroid" has been a thing that existed. Story wise he has had that same roll for half of the games in the time line of the story.

We can't have a conversation if you keep saying "that's true, but I don't see it that way" you know?
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I think this conversation has no use if you are not even trying to look what I wrote.
Yes, Adam is the most important "person" in Metroid after Samus, but that really isn't an achievement considering there are really no other noteworthy NPCs in the five mainline games that could fit that role. But that still doesn't make your argument true that it's a "big departure" to barely have Adam in the game when he only had two games in the franchise where he even had a role, of which one is a game people try to forget even existed.
 
I'd say, if Kotaku's new strategy is harvesting rage clicks, it's working pretty well because they're trending on Twitter again.
 
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Lichtsang said:
She shows many emotions in Dread, which are, for the most part, more subtle.
And to whom on this planet was she supposed to talk to? An AI or herself? Please.
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If Samus doesn't have a snappy one-liner after defeating a boss is the game even worth sixty dollars
 
Lichtsang said:
I think this conversation has no use if you are not even trying to look what I wrote.
Yes, Adam is the most important "person" in Metroid after Samus, but that really isn't an achievement considering there are really no other noteworthy NPCs in the five mainline games that could fit that role. But that still doesn't make your argument true that it's a "big departure" to barely have Adam in the game when he only had two games in the franchise where he even had a role, of which one is a game people try to forget even existed.
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It's a big departure for many reasons, including how aggressive Samus is and the lack of monologing. The game is aware of this and addresses it.

I just don't know why somebody would be excited for Dread to conclude a storyline that you hate so much you have to pretend it doesn't exist.
 
Brock Reiher said:
Dread is the first game to not do it. She also has someone to talk to in Dread unlike super but doesn't. It's a significant departure.
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Dread has her narrate the opening just like in the other openings

Also you're being really weird in this conversation regarding telling a woman about her own reading of the story (yes, this still applies if you are also a woman)
 
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Brock Reiher said:
It's a big departure for many reasons, including how aggressive Samus is and the lack of monologing. The game is aware of this and addresses it.

I just don't know why somebody would be excited for Dread to conclude a storyline that you hate so much you have to pretend it doesn't exist.
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I only ignore Other M though? You really confuse me. I'm sorry that I don't think Adam is a character the world needs to see more off.
 
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