What do you think of nintendo making their own Metroid 2 remake?
Kinda scummy. Doesn’t look as good as AM2R. The Parry is unexpected, I guess it follows from Other M. It looks really lame versus the boss enemies, but versus common enemies the parry can hit enemies to varying places depending on the angle of impact, which is very slightly dynamic. Also you can shoot at any angle, which makes sense, more-so than using a trigger button to hold the weapon at an angle.
Also they added an attack to the metroids that lets you farm drops, so you can’t completely run out of missiles to kill them with. I’m mixed on this. It alleviates the frustration of running out of ammo and being stuck with no option, but it also removes the challenge of needing to be ammo efficient.
The level design and boss design looks infinitely more tame than AM2R and less dynamic to boot. The Alpha Metroids in AM2R were amazing, and the ones in this new game look really lame.
The decision to have new areas unlocked by using Metroid DNA put into a scanner is a more sensible diegetic means of conveying progression than random earthquakes on killing enough Metroids.
Also, they added warp points. What the fuck? That’s weird. Metroid is the only metroidvania series to really avoid using warp points until now, only having elevators occasionally. Also Metroid 2 was probably the most linear metroid game besides fusion, so warp points probably benefit it the least. I feel like this breaks canon or something. No telling how it will turn out in the final game.
I may or may not end up playing it depending on what I hear about it on release. It looks like a really different take on 2D metroid than the previous ones due to the new powers that they have tied to a new resource, and it also appears that they’re changing up the game’s original content drastically to make it a very different experience from AM2R (Which already was a significant departure from Metroid 2).
Given that they’re including warp points, that may indicate that they’re being more mindful of non-linear structure, especially since Metroid has garnered a reputation for that in the time since the last game. AM2R didn’t end up being very nonlinear, and was mostly amazing for tight enemy and level design.
And to add to the scumminess of nintendo we have the following quote:
So my question is theirs, which is, why wasn’t there a chance there—or even, has there been a chance—to speak to that, to try to work with a fan creator like AM2R’s Milton Guasti or other fan creators?
So, I think there needs to be clarity in what the line is, and, in our view, the line is when an initiative crosses from being an homage to something that is monetizing our IP. We allow homages to exist in a variety of different ways. And, for me personally, as a fan before I was an executive, I understand the attraction that you could have to our IP. But, when it transitions to something that… now, you’re trying to monetize, you’re trying to sell, you’re trying to profit off of, that is what broaches or breaks through that line for us, where we have to claim our IP protection.
How are you talking about monetization here, because with AM2R, that was a game that anyone could download for free, and again I think, for fans, there was this notion of, “go talk to that person,” or “go talk to other fan creators” and see if there’s a way to not kill that project, to investigate the ideas that happening there that are exciting, who knows.
But again, to differentiate this, we have had conversations with entities that started as fans and became more of a business partner. Those conversations happen all the time, but again, when something transitions to a commercial product, and that’s what [AM2R] was—there wasn’t a charge, but it was now a commercial product.
I guess I need… what’s the definition of “commercial product” for Nintendo?
Well, again, it’s all about… How do we protect our intellectual property? How do our creators, like Mr. Sakamoto, who created Metroid, and Nintendo control that intellectual property so that we can drive where it’s going, versus someone else driving where it’s going.
That’s where the line is very clear for us. And again, we could go on to YouTube and a variety of different places and see fans doing interesting things with our IP. But when it turns to driving the direction of the IP, or somehow monetizing or becoming a commercial project, that’s where for us, the line has been crossed.
Literally what the fuck? What planet is Reggie and Nintendo on? AM2R never earned a cent. Do they seriously consider this and pokemon uranium competition?
Celia Alexis Wagar's CritPoints 
Attention and money are scarce. If free, fun alternatives to paid content are available, most people will choose to play them instead of paying money. That’s lost sales for Nintendo.
Of course, I don’t think that’s really their reason for being so tough on fan games. I think the business in general is just very controlling about how their franchises are presented across all media and protecting the visions and (self-)interests of their respective owners. NO ONE is allowed to re-interpret Mario without Miyamoto’s permission. They’d probably go after fan art and fan fiction, if they could legally (and socially) get away with it.
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And I think it’s really scummy of them to be so controlling of their intellectual property, the same way I think it was historically scummy of Disney to do the same with Mickey Mouse. They could legally go after fanart if they chose to. It is fully within their legal rights to sue anyone using any of their characters in fanart. Doing so would be suicide in comparison to fangames.
I think Nintendo shouldn’t be so scared of competing with a free fangame. They’re supposedly one of the best game companies in the world. They should blow free fangame creators out of the water with anything they make.
As a self-interested consumer, I don’t really care what the company’s agenda is, I care about what’s best for me and people like me. I don’t really care what Nintendo’s vision for the character is except insofar as it benefits me. I respect the existence of a copyright system to protect the ideas of creators, but I think if you’re going to use it to eliminate the creations of fans who are not directly financially competing with you, then that’s scummy as fuck. If Nintendo is worried that people will play this game instead of their own games because this game is better, then that’s their own fault for making crappy games.
Just because they legally have the ability to do it does not mean it’s the right thing to do. They could do this to fanart, fanfiction, literally anything using their characters or other intellectual property, however attacking your fans for reinterpreting your IPs is scummy as fuck, and I’d argue broadly dangerous to culture in general.
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“How do our creators, like Mr. Sakamoto, who created Metroid, and Nintendo control that intellectual property so that we can drive where it’s going, versus someone else driving where it’s going.”
This should say it all, by itself. The rest is bullshit.
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