Draygon was such a pain in the arse the first time I played.



Unfortunately I found this secret out way too late.

@OP
It's hard to give it a single difficulty rating, as it's all over the place with some bosses much harder than others. Also, I found a lot of the diffiulty coming from exploring; trying to progress in areas that I wasn't supposed to yet.

I just beat the game for the first time last month and yeah, it was pretty easy. I think I died once near the beginning because I got cocky, and then I forgot to save that entire time and had to replay it, and then maybe once during Draygon and Ridley, and that's about it. Mother Brain was way too easy for a final boss.

Metroid Fusion is way harder yes, but Super Metroid wasn't "embarrassingly easy".

The game's difficulty didn't lie in combat and the enemies though I agree with that at least, save for some of the bosses, but in the exploration and the isolation. Having a game where you don't die that often doesn't necessarily mean it's an easy game.

Great OP, Rol. SM's advancements are very much like Castlevania 4 in that they make the gameplay much smoother, better and more refined.

Is SM too easy? Nah. It presents a reasonable challenge. I just replayed a few zones a few months back and if felt about right. I came close to dying once and might have actually died once, I can't remember, and I was always way better at the game than anyone else I knew back in the day. Much like Zelda, the NES versions of these games were definitely tougher than the SNES sequels, and in many ways less creepy and exhilarating. This was due to often having to scribble your own map on paper, weaker controls, the first time experiencing a game in the genre and the mysterious detail-lacking back backgrounds.

No question the original is harder, but I wouldn't say better. The one thing any sequel can never capture though is the mystery of a game without the conventions that come from having a predecessor.

Fusion is easier. And Prime 1 and 3 are too.