Metroid Dread

Thanks for the heads up on the game length. I had no idea the game was so short - 7.5 / 9.5 / 11.5 hrs for main story, +extra, completionist.

I guess I can wait on this, I already have quite the backlog anyway.
 
MavericK said:
Thanks for all the info, I will more than likely revisit it someday.

I just got 100% in Dread, other than beating the final boss. Some of the speed boost stuff I had to look up, as well as a couple of the final powerups. Some of them require you to basically fire randomly at walls with zero indication that there is a secret area. Not a big fan of that when you have the built-in mechanic with the flashing map where a secret is, but in some instances the game just decides, nah. Overall getting full completion felt like a real slog, but at least after I finish the game I don't have to go back again.
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The Pulse Radar didn't help with that?

I may have actually soft-locked mine. Apparently I wasn't supposed to go to a certain area yet, and kill a certain boss, and now I don't have certain missiles! I'm going to push on a little further anyway, but without those, I can't get through certain doors. I may have to start over. :mad:
 
J3RK said:
The Pulse Radar didn't help with that?

I may have actually soft-locked mine. Apparently I wasn't supposed to go to a certain area yet, and kill a certain boss, and now I don't have certain missiles! I'm going to push on a little further anyway, but without those, I can't get through certain doors. I may have to start over. :mad:
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It does sometimes, but I've also encountered some blocks that do not seem to show up on the radar. I am not sure if it's a bug, or by design, but it's frustrating either way. I ended up having to look at a completed map for a couple of the areas to get 100%.

RE: game length, the game felt plenty long to me. I think for 100% I spent at least 11 hours.
 
twonunpackmule said:
That length is average for these types of games. Honestly, if they're longer...they tend to get boring fast.
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I tend to agree, though 7 hours is a bit on the short side IMO. 10-15 is good for me. I've been playing this very leisurely, and have already put in 6 hours, and have about half the game left. So that's about spot-on for me. It'll probably end up a bit more than that even. I may have to restart though, so that'll add a few more :D
 
Mav451 said:
Thanks for the heads up on the game length. I had no idea the game was so short - 7.5 / 9.5 / 11.5 hrs for main story, +extra, completionist.

I guess I can wait on this, I already have quite the backlog anyway.
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Metroid games have been on average 5-6 hours long playing casually the first time, making this one longer based on those numbers.
 
Update: I did NOT soft lock it, though it is possible where I'm at for that to happen. Apparently I missed a step. :D I'll have to try it when I get home from work. I hate looking things up, but I'm positive I need that to get where I need to go next, and I didn't get "them"... :D
 
Yeah, 2D Metroid games absolutely should not be 15 hours long. They aren't that kind of game
 
I think 7-10 hours is fine for this kind of game but I get the it is over already? Feeling from it. Feels like there should of been a little more after the final boss.
 
Yeah, next up: Trying hard mode and then I'm gonna see if I can do a sub 4 hour run. Sadly the length of the game is gonna make speedrunning a bit obnoxious, unlike the other Metroid games that I finished in the past few weeks - 5+ hours real time is a decent chunk of time for a speedrun.
 
J3RK said:
Update: I did NOT soft lock it, though it is possible where I'm at for that to happen. Apparently I missed a step. :D I'll have to try it when I get home from work. I hate looking things up, but I'm positive I need that to get where I need to go next, and I didn't get "them"... :D
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There's usually another way out...even if it doesn't take you forward. You can usually go back at least.
 
twonunpackmule said:
There's usually another way out...even if it doesn't take you forward. You can usually go back at least.
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Oh, I figured it out shortly after. That was the thing in this instance. I couldn't actually go back, so I had to figure out how to go forward. It was a little ambiguous, but not a huge deal. Just took a little more attention than the rest of the game.
 
J3RK said:
Update: I did NOT soft lock it, though it is possible where I'm at for that to happen. Apparently I missed a step. :D I'll have to try it when I get home from work. I hate looking things up, but I'm positive I need that to get where I need to go next, and I didn't get "them"... :D
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I apprechiate your vagueness here. There's an art to looking through the walk throughs without seeing anything you don't actually need to see at the moment. I'm personally waiting for house guests to leave so I can die on the same boss fight some more. Although, I checked and I've got all the stuff, so I 'just' have to pay attention to patterns and suck less. Never finished Samus Returns because I couldn't beat the last boss, oh well.

Reminds me of the old hint books with the red film 'decoders', so you'd only see the hints you needed (in theory).
 
toast0 said:
I apprechiate your vagueness here. There's an art to looking through the walk throughs without seeing anything you don't actually need to see at the moment. I'm personally waiting for house guests to leave so I can die on the same boss fight some more. Although, I checked and I've got all the stuff, so I 'just' have to pay attention to patterns and suck less. Never finished Samus Returns because I couldn't beat the last boss, oh well.

Reminds me of the old hint books with the red film 'decoders', so you'd only see the hints you needed (in theory).
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This is definitely how I try to approach this. I did look up one boss' pattern, because it just didn't click for me. I also looked it up when I thought I locked myself. I generally don't blame a game or say I've locked something unless I REALLY think that's what's happening. This was one of the few things I did look up, and there WAS actually a softlock reported for the area. I almost restarted the game based on that information, but then decided fuck it, and pushed on anyway. I soon discovered that my game was fine, and found what I needed to progress. It wasn't even an "I don't know how to progress" situation. I knew that I needed a certain projectile (obvious in these games), but thought that I didn't get the drop when I was supposed to. Turns out the drop was right after that point, which threw me a little bit.

I had to work on some projects this weekend, so my progress stopped for a bit, but I'd say I'm about 85% or so now. I don't know that I'll 100% the game as there are a few shine spark puzzles that while I know what I have to do, I'm not sure I want to invest in them for missile upgrades. (I already have something like 165 missiles or some-such.) :D Then again, I did the path of pain a few times on Hollow Knight for basically no real reward... We'll see. :D

I should be finishing up this play tonight or tomorrow. I've enjoyed it thoroughly.
 
toast0 said:
I apprechiate your vagueness here. There's an art to looking through the walk throughs without seeing anything you don't actually need to see at the moment. I'm personally waiting for house guests to leave so I can die on the same boss fight some more. Although, I checked and I've got all the stuff, so I 'just' have to pay attention to patterns and suck less. Never finished Samus Returns because I couldn't beat the last boss, oh well.

Reminds me of the old hint books with the red film 'decoders', so you'd only see the hints you needed (in theory).
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I 100% most of it without a walkthrough. I did use a map once or twice because nothing was blinking anymore. However, I had all the major upgrades by then. So, honestly, looking at the map isn't that much of a spoiler. Oh, and those speedbooster blocks. Three of them are...tricky. That's me being kind. HAHAAH! I watched videos for those.

I still haven't completed the game but I 100% the maps. So, next up is to actually beat it.
 
I'm taking my sweet ass time in my first playthrough and am really enjoying it. I think MercurySteam has created a solid foundation for 2D Metroid games going forward. I am still eagerly awaiting what Retro has in the works, though.
 
toast0 said:
Never finished Samus Returns because I couldn't beat the last boss, oh well.
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Hah, that's me and Dread right now. It's become an exercise in frustration and at this point I'm kinda like, fuck it.
 
MavericK said:
Hah, that's me and Dread right now. It's become an exercise in frustration and at this point I'm kinda like, fuck it.
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Breathe. Pay attention to the patterns and use your arsenal. Also, remember to parry his attacks if you see the light blink.
 
twonunpackmule said:
I completed it last night. Took me basically 16hrs to go through it 100% first time.
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I'm just about done. I'll end up with 90-something percent, as I'm just not that compelled to hit a few of the shine spark things. Otherwise, I've had an absolute blast with this game. I'll probably come in around 13-14 hours I think, but we'll see.
 
J3RK said:
I'm just about done. I'll end up with 90-something percent, as I'm just not that compelled to hit a few of the shine spark things. Otherwise, I've had an absolute blast with this game. I'll probably come in around 13-14 hours I think, but we'll see.
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I'd recommend doing one of the three really tricky ones. There's a video that states 7 hard ones...there's like three if you do the trickier ones first. As the rest are "easier" once you understand how it works. If you can do that...you can do all of them. Just be prepared to buy a new controller. HAHAHAHA!

Protip: Learn to use the Left Trigger to go in and out of Morph Ball. Don't rely on the directional stick. The hardest part of the process is learning not to use the stick during momemtum unless you need to.
 
Blackstone said:
Kraid is such a BITCH been stuck on him for a week. Hand gets so cramped in handheld mode!

Edit: Beat him!
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I'm using an 8bitdo SN30+ for this game. No way was I going to go through the torture of trying to use the Joy Cons with this game. I could never get my hands into a comfortable position trying to play the Switch in handheld mode.
 
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I can manage for a while, but my hands definitely do not enjoy it. I use Pro Controllers when I'm in the living room, but otherwise, I play handheld with JoyCons, despite the awkwardness. It'll probably kill my tendons eventually. :D
 
Blackstone said:
Kraid is such a BITCH been stuck on him for a week. Hand gets so cramped in handheld mode!

Edit: Beat him!
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I got stuck on him for a bit, but figured out a handy pattern, then beat him quickly after that. The first several tries though were rough.
 
Blackstone said:
Kraid is such a BITCH been stuck on him for a week. Hand gets so cramped in handheld mode!

Edit: Beat him!
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Yeah... that's where I have to go back to... haven't been playing for a while because of house guests.

Edit: Beat him too! Opened up a bunch of stuff, yay!
 
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There is a lot of trial and error in the boss fights, which can be frustrating because a lot of the time it will start you a little ways back from where the boss room is when you die. The final boss is the worst with that elevator ride every time.

I still haven't gone back and beaten the final boss - I may still, but I tried a dozen or so times and just got frustrated. Though, apparently some attacks you can parry, but that was not apparent to me in any of the attempts I made. That was another frustration I had - some of the parry-able attacks are not as obvious as others, despite supposedly having the little "flash" associated with it.
 
Yeah, final boss's first phase can ONLY be defeated by parrying. It's also, frustratingly, the only boss in the whole game like that. Once you figure out where to parry though, that phase can be over in around 30 seconds.
when he does the huge purple charge up on the side of the screen that looks like it covers the whole screen - turn into a ball.
After that parry sequence, when he starts glowing gold, whenever he stops and taunts for a second, run towards him and it'll give a huge opening for parrying. You can also parry a charge move but the timing is way more precise

I honestly didn't have much trouble with any bosses in the game other than the Final Boss so I can't be of much help here, a few of them took a couple tries - but nothing exhausting for me. I had way more trouble on optional shinespark puzzles.
 
TheSlySyl said:
Yeah, final boss's first phase can ONLY be defeated by parrying. It's also, frustratingly, the only boss in the whole game like that. Once you figure out where to parry though, that phase can be over in around 30 seconds.
when he does the huge purple charge up on the side of the screen that looks like it covers the whole screen - turn into a ball.
After that parry sequence, when he starts glowing gold, whenever he stops and taunts for a second, run towards him and it'll give a huge opening for parrying. You can also parry a charge move but the timing is way more precise

I honestly didn't have much trouble with any bosses in the game other than the Final Boss so I can't be of much help here, a few of them took a couple tries - but nothing exhausting for me. I had way more trouble on optional shinespark puzzles.
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Yea all bosses even the final boss had simple patterns and not much RNG to them. The final fight was only difficult cause it was a pretty long fight compared to the rest of the game's bosses. I really didn't find this game to be that hard. It wouldn't of been a lot easier if I had a better controller then using the joycons. I had playing 2D side scrollers using the thumb stick for movement.
 
I was using a Pro controller the whole time, so it wasn't that, though I do struggle a bit with the controls and keeping all of the shoulder buttons straight. They certainly do utilize pretty much every button on there.
 
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