Could anyone here tell me how to get to ridley without the power grip? There's this ugly creature, that can only be killed by those insects, standing in my way in Norfair... Is there any way to get through or round it?
To be honest, I can't imagine that getting the ice beam without the grip would be much fun...maybe I'm just pissed off after bomb jumping for three hours for the varia last night!
Plus the MB battle would fuck you as soon as you got knocked off of one of the platforms.
You could always just wall jump up the left side and back onto a platform. Or you could freeze a Rinka and use it as a platform to get back up onto the platforms.
You could always just wall jump up the left side and back onto a platform. Or you could freeze a Rinka and use it as a platform to get back up onto the platforms.
That's it! :D I think it shold be no big problem to run through ZM without the Power Grip. But there's this stupid wall...
I think it shold be no big problem to run through ZM without the Power Grip. But there's this stupid wall...
Power Grip CANNOT be skipped. Many many people have tried. Did you see the pic StarmanHaxor posted just a bit ago?
If you manage to get to this spot (this is the room just right of the main Brinstar-Norfair elevator) WITHOUT picking up power grip, the "plant barrier" thingy will block your progress. This was put in intentionally by the designers to prevent you skipping the power grip. There are other things put into the game to prevent you skipping anything that the game designers deemed ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL to finishing the game. I'm guessing they wanted to prevent anyone "accidentally" skipping a required item on the first playthrough, then getting irretrievably stuck/trapped at some later point in the game.
Did you see the pic StarmanHaxor posted just a bit ago? If you manage to get to this spot
Thanks for your explanation, I saw the picture. and I'm able to reach this spot. ;-) It's a pitty that the designers did such a great work, preventing gamers from skipping thoose essential items... :(
Maybe so, but at least even the essential items have their own variables, so that you can collect them whenever is best for your route. Big difference from Fusion, where the upgrade sequence was hard-coded. That was just lazy on the programmers' part.
I wouldn't call that laziness. It was necessary because the game was structured into a story. If it were possible to get the upgrades out of order either the text would be messed up or it would require an unbelievable amount of text to account for all the possible sequences, not to mention flags like the larvae turning into cocoons and then insects. Fixing the order in which things need to be done/gotten was inevitable from the design decision to include a story and a lot of before/after states.
Exactly, it's a sort of...I want to make a word based on "ethnocentrism" but I can't work it out...viewpoint that only takes sequence and sequence breaking into account when you say Fusion's hardcoded barriers were lazy. Fusion was merely a different kind of game, far more story-driven than any other Metroid game.
Point taken. In fact, normally I'd be the one making such points -- I take a very dim view of the "sequence breaking is all" philosophy that leads to Retro-flaming and such. But something just feels wrong about event++. The fact that a player can find an ingenious way to get a Power Bomb tank early, only to be unable to use it, is really frustrating, and runs counter to the inventiveness that so many of the best games reward.
Fusion's story is one of its greatest strengths, but the story didn't need to be so... fused to Samus's upgrades. There were already other mechanisms in place, like the various Security Door levels. Yes, it would have been hard to design the game to allow for getting some powerups out of order, but it couldn't have been much harder than designing it to keep Samus out of each area until she had the abilities she needed, and Nintendo did that flawlessly. (It's only because of ARs that we even know about the event++ problem.) A happy medium must exist, and I'm just sorry they didn't find it.
Besides, they could at least have made the dialogue scenes skippable. Tell me THAT'S not laziness.
I can relate, Starman. The main reason I took so long to win the final SA-X battle is that I had to screw up my courage each time just to face that thing -- not exactly good conditions for formulating a strategy.
And I don't care what the rest of you say, I love Fusion's story. No game has ever had such a brilliant excuse for the character having to re-acquire every powerup.
Well, for me the gameplay trumps all for Metroid (and Castlevania) and if the developers say that Samus left the Varia at the cleaners, then I'd play the game and find the Varia anyway.
I still wonder why Dark Samus was nowhere near as intimidating in my opinion.