Sex and the Zero Suit: Why Samus was Great Only in Metroid Prime

[menx64]

RolStoppable said:
Seeing Samus without her armor at the end of a game hardly differs to seeing bigger mansions in Luigi's Mansion after completing the game with more money. The former can be interpreted as reward for men who like to look at women while the latter can be interpreted as reward for people who like to look at big houses. Taken to the extreme, the former is sexist while the latter makes greedy bastards who like to walk all over others to get richer feel good. But...

They are just video games. Essentially, you get to see more the better you played. And that's it.

We live in the age of the internet which is full of porn. It's outright ridiculous to view Metroid games as designed for men just because you can see Samus without her armor at the end of the games. The implication is that guys play a video game for a couple of hours to see a short scene or picture of a woman without her armor. What a load of nonsense. That's not why anybody plays the games. It also doesn't make Samus worse as a character. She's a woman, why shouldn't we be allowed to see her? What's wrong with her being portrayed as beautiful on top of being powerful? The only people who could have problems with this must be feminists or ugly chicks.

But this defense only applies to the first three Metroid games and the Metroid Prime trilogy. When Samus hops around in her Zero Suit or when she talks during the middle of the game as in Fusion, Zero Mission and the worst offender Other M, that's when her character is damaged in various ways. The games shouldn't be interrupted by dialogues and monologues, because these things weren't in the first batch of games. They do not belong in the Metroid series and additional information must be fed to the player like it was done in the Metroid Prime. Echoes and Corruption have characters that give you instructions which is still acceptable, although preferably Metroid games should be without them. Isolation and loneliness are staples of the series, after all.

As for the Zero Suit specifically, it's easily the worst section in Zero Mission. I don't think anyone really likes it, it's simply accepted because it doesn't take away too much from an otherwise well made game. Other M is wrong on so many levels, but that has been talked about enough in the last couple of years. Simply put, Other M is a different game in a Metroid coat.

Lastly, I have no idea where I am going with this post, but I have written all this and don't want it to go to waste. So here it is, all posted.

I for one dont believe the other m was that wrong. The problem with the other M is basically that it doesnt match with what the previous games tried to convey. For me, the past games were created with the fundamentals of isolation, exploration and a silent character. Nintendo has said several times that Link doesnt talk because that would affect the relation between the player and link, which it makes sense in some ways, but in regards to metroid her silence was only a way to create a more isolated world, a world were words, personalities or thoughts were not necesary. The sole purpose of Samus was to carry various suits on her shoulders, similiar to a pupet.  The Prime series continued with that legacy of silence that was abruptly broken by the other M. The other M tried to expand what zero mission first showed us, a samus that even if she was following orders was able to think, to express herself even if she didnt say anything to anyone but herself.