Boss Keys 21 - Metroid Dread (Patreon)

Hello!

My new video is available now - it’s the new episode of Boss Keys, and a breakdown of Metroid Dread’s world design. Specifically, focusing on the tricks and techniques that the game uses to guide you through planet ZDR.

Go watch it, and then come back to this post when you're done.

I'll wait.

Okay, thanks for checking it out. Hope you enjoyed it. Now, you may be disappointed to see that there’s no graphs in the video! Can it really be a Boss Keys video without graphs?

Well, it’s your lucky day. Because I did, in fact, make a graph for the game’s structure. But I ultimately decided not to include it in the final video for pacing and clarity reasons. Still, there’s no reason why you lovely Patreon lot can’t see it. So here we go.

Click here for the full image. 

So, just to explain how the graphs work.

S is the start of the game, and E is the end. Diamonds are abilities, and squares are the door (or other obstacle) that you can use that ability on to make progress - they’re always below the lock. Horizontal lines represent all the places you can get to at that point in the game.

So, at the start of the game you can find a spider magnet wall, some speed booster blocks, and a charge beam door. Get the charge beam and you can go through that door and get the spider magnet, which lets you climb that wall, and so on…

In general, Metroidvanias (or Zelda dungeons) with complicated, non-linear, backtrack-heavy structures are short and wide. Games/dungeons that are more linear and straightforward are tall and thin. Dread is pretty tall and thin.

But, there’s a problem with this graph. Which is partly why I didn’t put it in the video. It doesn’t tell the full story.

As I say in the video, Metroid Dread has many “points of no return”, where you are blocked from backtracking until later in the game. So, at various points, many of the nodes on the graph may be inaccessible to you.

Also, I talk about how the game provides fast travel points that take you exactly where you need to go. So, it may look like you get the speedbooster and then need to backtrack all the way to the beginning of the game to use it… but there’s a fast travel station that whips you right back to the correct room.

So, it’s not a perfect representation of the game’s structure. But it gives an indication!

Anyway. Thanks very much for the support this month - I'll be back soon with reading list and playlist posts!

Mark