Minor Bitching About Smash Bros.: Metroid Edition

Super Smash Bros. is the land of missed opportunity. For every attention to detail or faithful recreation, there are a dozen more oversights. I know I'm a spoiled fanboy, but I also know I'm not alone in making these arguments. I believe that there are just some things that, if implemented, would have made Smash Bros. Ultimate go from a 10/10 game to a 11 or 12/10. Sakurai is a fickle god, however, so I highly doubt any of these would make it into the series or even have been considered during any point of development. Masahiro Sakurai presents himself as a tirelessly dedicated perfectionist of a developer, but to me, lately, he just gives off the persona of a dude who puts his singular vision above all else, game balancing and fanservice be damned. Still, a nerd such as myself can dream. Here is the first of a however-many-long series of posts sharing my insights on how Smash Bros. could better implement fan service. This time, I'm going to start with a series that got quite a bit of love in Ultimate, but even still just fell short of being absolutely perfect: Metroid.

Characters

• Samus  - When discussing characters who are underpowered in Smash compared to their own games, Samus takes the cake. I'm not asking for her to become busted, but there are a lot of little things that would Samus feel more "true to form."
• Give Samus her voice back. It's annoying she's still making robot noises like Smash 64 when she's had multiple games since show she can talk through her suit. At the very least, give her the scream from Prime (or Super/Fusion) when she gets star KO'd and a few grunts when she gets hit. While we're on the topic of Samus's personality, her taunts need adjustments. Get rid of the salute and the "gun button thingy" that make no sense. Make her gun arm pose look more like her famous kneel, give her a taunt where she appears to be using her Scan Visor, and make the last taunt a thumbs up/nonchalant hand wave like she does in some of the Prime games. Inject character into this character!
• Her movement feels pretty much on point. I would make her a bit faster on the ground, but otherwise she's good here.
• Her normal attacks are "fine," with only one that I think needs tweaking. Her dash should look even more like the Speed Booster animation, including the afterimages. Samus would also go into the shoulder bash and extend the range of the attack if the attack button is pressed again during her initial dash attack (giving this move some more options). Maybe this could be made more unique by allowing her to dash attack off of a platform as well?
• Her specials need an overhaul. Here we go:
• Neutral Special should keep the Ultimate changes, but also add in the beam options from Prime/Super. Samus can quickly flick the control stick in different directions to change the beam she fires (similar to Shulk's Monado): Plasma shoots a longer laser that goes through opponents and has a fire effect; Wave travels through walls and has a much larger hitbox with an electric effect; Ice moves more slowly but freezes when it hits (duh); Dark also travels slowly but slows characters down with a glob of darkness; and Light has an extremely short range but has a "shotgun" effect with a sweetspot from its center beam that has high knockback. Her beam stays "active" until she changes it again.
• Side Special is actually ok. The only change I'd make is letting Samus aim diagonally.
• Up Special should give Samus the option to jump again, but similar to Pikachu's Quick Attack she would need to activate the change in direction before the move has fully finished.
• Down Special needs to let Samus do proper bomb jumps, instead of just one little pathetic boost at a time. Being able to chain bomb jump was a thing in Melee, and should come back in a big way.
• I'm all for more costumes. Samus could use a return of her Dark Samus costume. She also would look great in an all gunmetal gray costume. I think bringing in more suits from other games would be fantastic too, like the yellowish basic armor from Super, the Phazon Suit from Prime, or a genuine alt for the Fusion suit (with its own color variations). I also like the idea of Samus having costumes where she isn't wearing her helmet, maybe even one where she's wearing the sunglasses from the ending of Super too.
• Zero Suit Samus
• I rarely play this character and personally think she's cancer, but I get why she's in the game. The only changes I'd make to her are cosmetic. Her personality is also poor and her voice samples for taunts/victories should change to better reflect Samus's actual character. The "Try me!" type stuff just seems too aggressive and "faux badass" for Samus, but maybe that's just me. I'd like to see those get replaced with more genuine lines that reflect Samus's attitude in her games.
• Costumes would go a huge way for this character. The lack of a "Justin Bailey" alt is downright criminal, with the green hair, purple leotard, and pink tights/sleeves. I also think giving her the black one-piece swimsuit from the ending of Super would be neat, as well as something referencing her swimsuit from the endings of the original two games (maybe give her pink and gray versions of her crop top alt?). Oh, and as an alt have her sport the military look from Other M -- that would make Zero Suit have a completely different presence on the stage, but I'd be all for it. I'm also pretty sure she'd look badass as hell in a "Dark Zero Suit" alt too, with the translucent blue skin and skeletal features Dark Samus sported at the end of Metroid Prime 2. Which brings me to my next character....
• Dark Samus
• Like most people, I'm glad Dark Samus is in the game. Also like most people, I agree that making her an echo of Samus is not very true to her character. I won't get into the minutiae, but I do believe her moveset should be far more aggressive and she should be a much frailer character than Samus -- basically a glass cannon. A phazon gimmick similar to Lucario's aura and Pichu's electricity would be neat too. Basically, Dark Samus would take increasing damage from using her phazon based attacks. However, they become stronger as she takes more damage as well. Maybe even as an added gimmick her phazon attacks could cause a poison effect on her opponents? That would be really neat. Her specials should also more accurately reflect her abilities. Give her the phazon sparks that home in, the spikes that rise from the floor, a dashing attack that slams the shit out of her opponents, and so on.
• Costume wise, I just want her to have a SA-X costume and something resembling her "skeleton" look from the end of Prime 2. That's all.
• Ridley
• Ridley is pretty much "exactly" what I wanted. I would've liked to hear him cackle or talk, but I get why they chose not to have him speak. He should have a little more weight to him, but he's pretty much okay as is.
• For costumes, I'd like to see him get back the two cut from the demo: the gray/green costume and the black costume. I also think a white costume referencing his baby form from Other M would be cool. For other ideas, how about a black and red costume, because it would look kickass? I also think costumes based on the other bosses from Super Metroid would be cool. A bright green and yellow for Kraid, a gray and yellow for Phantoon, a red and orange for Crocomire, etc. 

Items/Assists

• The series actually has good representation in this department. My only (minor) complaint is that Mother Brain didn't double as a boss in any single player modes and her "dinosaur" form isn't in the game anywhere (to my knowledge). Also, Gandrayda from Prime 3 I always thought would be a neat Ditto-like Assist Trophy, but that's an aside...

Stages

• They could have totally brought back Pyrosphere and just had Ridley not appear if Ridley was playing on the stage, Alfonzo-style.
• Also kind of surprised SR-388 wasn't brought in as a new stage, considering the Metroid II remake was the most recent Metroid game at the time of Ultimate's release (but I guess it wouldn't be very different from Brinstar or Norfair...)

Music

• There is a very heavy leaning towards bringing in ripped tracks from the Metroid Prime games and remixing Ridley's boss theme, which just needs to stop. Would have loved to hear some popular tracks like "Red Soil Swampy" from Super or "Phendrana Drifts" and the "Crashed Frigate" from Prime, maybe even the theme from when you battle "Nightmare" in Fusion. I also always thought "Tourian" from the original NES Metroid, the "SA-X Battle" music and the music from when you battle Mother Brain from Super would've been cool to hear in the background of Smash as well. 

Miscellaneous

• This is where I just mention a few other things I would've appreciated seeing in the game. 
• Etecoons and those bird things from Super/Fusion. Where are they?
• Adam as the computer. Is he a spirit? I don't know. He should be in there.
• Quadraxis anything would be interesting. Is that a spirit too? It should be.
• As much as people hated it, any representation from Federation Force would be welcome in my book. I want to see any and everything from a series pop up in Smash, warts and all. Even if it's just a dumb spirit or a Blitz Ball mode or something, I'd be happy with it.

Overall, Metroid would get a solid B+ from me for representation in Smash Ultimate. It gets a lot more respect than it did in prior Smash titles, but it still has room for growth. It isn't anywhere near as bad as F-Zero, but it's nowhere near the representation of larger series like Mario, Pokemon, or (shudder) Fire Emblem. Actually, it's kind of on par with Zelda... I wonder if I should do that franchise next?