To the Stars and Back: A Metroid Series Ranking

Strap in for my tiered ranking of every Metroid game — from the ones I struggled to make it through to the ones I wish I could experience for the first time over and over again.

Screw Attacks, Third Impacts, and Other Interstellar Horrors

As a medium, video games are defined by different forms of touch. Both the interface between player and game and the action of most games itself relies upon a set of simple rules — what kinds of responses a particular touch will engender, and what groups of pixels can and cannot be safely touched. Games have their own language for these interactions: collision detection defines the act of in-game touch, and hitboxes measure where and when that touch brings pain. In most games, this becomes a kind of broad and neutral framework: a foundation on which mechanical and narrative structures can be built. But in Metroid, touch becomes its own singular kind of horror.

In Abandoning Perfection, Rain World Finds Nirvana

Rain World has a certain reputation in the gaming sphere: a hellishly difficult 2D platformer largely panned by critics at release, but that found a second life via a relatively small and deeply dedicated community of fans. I had tried to play it several times over the past few years, emboldened each time by various accomplishments in other "difficult" games — and each time I found myself unable to make it past the first few levels. This time, I broke through with the help and advice of some friends on the Waypoint forums, and behind that initial wall I found a piece of art that, especially in its "remixed" form, has more to say about that idea of video game difficulty than any other game I've played.

Everything Everywhere All At Once vs. the Decade of Cynical Art

As we all slowly drift away from the media landscape of the 2010s, I've found myself obsessed with what might be its most unwavering aesthetic pillar. From the Marvel Universe's cinematic sprawl, to our final great shared cultural object in the form of Game of Thrones, to the explosion of reality TV, to a set of Best Picture winners that includes films like Argo, Spotlight, and Birdman — our last decade of popular culture was defined by a specific and enduring strain of cynicism. Film and television, particularly American film and television, particularly American film and television that might be seen by anyone outside of tiny arthouse theaters or tight-packed city centers, had to guard itself against the charge of taking itself too seriously. This was the decade that American film and television became afraid of its own potential, and I think a lot of people never want to leave that comfort zone behind.

Disco Will Not Save the World Unless it Saves You First

At its core, Disco Elysium is a game about the "post-" in words like postcolonial, postrevolutionary, posthistorical, postmodern; it is about living in the nebulous after, in the shadow of a happening much larger than whatever small piece of the world we can identify ourselves. And so, its version of a new way forward becomes almost unrecogniable — like a creature blending with the reeds.

Twelve Reasons Why Twelve Minutes is the Worst Game I’ve Ever Played

Twelve Minutes does not have that excuse. As far as I can tell, it was created by a team of adults. No nepotism magicked it into existence, or gave it a starring role in Annapurna's 2021 lineup of games. It's sheer existence is a mystery — or, at least, a web that wouldn't be worth my (or anyone's) time to delve into. Because, put simply, it's the worst game I've ever played. And here are twelve reasons why.

Metroid II: Return of Samus: Crafting the Genocide Run

There’s something eerily beautiful about the ending to this game. In a way, it does mirror the first Metroid — the shafts filled with metroid larvae that appear just before Samus fights the queen feel much like the entrance to Tourian, and it fills the space after its final boss with an ascent. But this ascent isn’t timed and frantic; it’s really the only moment of peace this otherwise relentless game has to offer. It also is the only moment the game forces Samus to wait for anything, as the hatchling gnaws through otherwise impermeable barriers. It is, in a way, as if it’s asking her to stop and recollect — and it comes as close as it can to a feeling of revelation.

Metroid, and the Art of Getting Lost

Metroid wants to disorient you, to leave you confused and scared and wondering wait, have I been here before as you backtrack through its labyrinthine world, and the result is an environment that feels like its own kind of enemy. And its lack of a visual map — a design choice almost unheard of in decades since — is essential to that feeling; all you have to rely on is your notes and your memory, and both are set up to let you down.

Another Metroid 2(021) Rewind: Mission Statement

After almost two decades in limbo, a game called Metroid Dread will be coming to the Nintendo Switch in early October. In the meantime, join me for a deep dive into why that matters — not just for longtime fans of a seminal series, but for anyone interested in the way video games developed as an art form and storytelling medium. So, over the next three months, I will be playing through the entirety of the Metroid and Metroid Prime series. Welcome to my 2021 Metroid Rewind.

Black Mesa is my Game of the Year | GOTY 2020

In the end, Black Mesa draws power from that limitation; it clarifies and rewires Half-Life's undercooked tale of invasion and colonization — one that continues with humanity itself colonized by an unimaginable cosmic empire. In that sense, Gordon arriving to Xen with his arsenal of weapons feels fitting; in a year like 2020, it should be clearer than ever that the mistakes, evils, and constraints of the past always ripple forward into the present and future.