Genre: Action platformer
Developer: MercurySteam
Publisher: Nintendo

Metroid Dread isn't the prototypically pretty video game: the game's areas have lots of discordant colors and visual elements. But this contrast, cheap looking user interface aside, makes for a one-of-a-kind thematic beauty of its own, with the unsettling aesthetic coming to a peak in the nightmarish, film grain-filled "EMMI" zones. While it's worth noting that the game has impressive resolution and framerate stability, the more important thing is how it innovates in other ways, within the constraints of the hardware: to name a pair of examples, the fluid dynamics are phenomenal, while the animation system is maybe the best one to ever grace a 2D video game.

Like its predecessor in "Metroid Fusion", this entry opts for some industrial-synth fusion atmospheric tunes, and songs like the "Cataris II", "Dairon", and "Ghavoran" themes are particularly interesting in the sense that they've come about in an era where music in video games is hardly even an afterthought, much less a point of emphasis. Best of all, the song samples all have a strongly pronounced DSP sound to them: superb! The game's sound effects aren't quite as interesting or as functional in world building, but the "EMMI" noises are unforgettable.

While it's always awkward playing a 2D game with an analog stick, Dread has an excuse: its big control innovation is the ability to aim at arbitrary angles by holding the left bumper-- it's revelatory! Ledge grabbing is retained from "Fusion", and feels more useful and fluid than before. The in-game map is vector-based and so can be zoomed in and out freely-- better still it's labeled, so it's easy to see which areas are newly-accessible after acquiring an upgrade. The challenging pattern-based boss battles are a real highlight. The "EMMI" zones feel somewhat half-baked, as they are too trial-and-error oriented, plus each death is separated by a several-second re-loading period.

The 2D Metroid games have always had a difficult time striking the balance between being too constrictive, and not enough. Dread errs towards the "Fusion" side of things, but unlike that game's constant ham-fisted dialog sequences, instead guides the player gently through elegant level design. While the game is still too linear for this reviewer's liking, always putting artificial and frustrating plot device mechanisms in place to keep the player from straying, it gets closest among all of the 2D series entries to striking the right chord. When combined with its memorable soundtrack and distinctive aesthetic, Metroid Dread is even better than its classic forebears.