The game's style, focusing on exploration and searching for power-ups used to reach previously inaccessible areas, influenced other video games, and the varied endings for fast completion times made it a popular game for speedrunning. Metroid was lauded for being one of the first video games to feature a woman, Samus Aran, as a heroine. Nintendo Power ranked Metroid 11th on their list of the best video games made on a Nintendo video game console. On Top 200 Games lists, Metroid was ranked 6th by Game Informer and 69th by Electronic Gaming Monthly.

Gameplay

Samus faces off against Mother Brain.

Metroid is an action-adventure game in which the player controls Samus Aran in sprite-rendered two-dimensional landscapes. The game takes place on the planet Zebes, a large, open-ended world with areas connected by doors and elevators. The player controls Samus Aran as she travels through the planet's caverns and hunts Space Pirates. She begins with a weak gun as her only weapon, and with only the ability to jump. The player explores more areas and collects power-ups that grant Samus special abilities and enhance her armor and weaponry, allowing the access areas that were previously inaccessible. Among the power-ups that are included in the game are the Morph Ball, which allows Samus to curl into a ball and roll into tunnels, and the Screw Attack, a somersaulting move that destroys enemies in its path. In addition to common enemies, Samus encounters bosses whom she needs to defeat to progress. Defeating an ordinary enemy typically yields additional energy or ammunition, while defeating a boss usually unlocks new weapons or abilities.

Plot

Space Pirates attack a Galactic Federation-owned space research vessel and seize samples of Metroid creatures. Dangerous floating organisms, Metroids can latch on to any organism and drain its life energy to kill it. The Space Pirates plan to replicate Metroids by exposing them to beta rays and then using them as biological weapons to destroy all living beings that oppose them. While searching for the stolen Metroids, the Galactic Federation locates the Space Pirates' base of operations on the planet Zebes. The Federation assaults the planet, but the Pirates resist, forcing the Federation to retreat. As a last resort, the Federation decides to send a lone bounty hunter to penetrate the Pirates' base and destroy Mother Brain, the mechanical life-form that controls the Space Pirates' fortress and its defenses. Considered the greatest of all bounty hunters, Samus Aran is chosen for the mission. Samus lands on the surface of Zebes and explores the planet, traveling through the planet's caverns. She eventually comes across Kraid, an ally of the Space Pirates, and Ridley, the Space Pirates' commander, and defeats them both. Eventually, Samus finds and destroys Mother Brain, triggering a self-destruct mechanism and forcing Samus to escape the collapsing lair.