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Sometimes I find it hard to believe that Metroid is a nearly 40-year-old series. It still feels young next to the likes of Mario, which has countless games to its name. The Metroid library is comparatively slim, with 15 games split across a main 2D series, the Prime side-series, and a few oddball spinoffs. With massive gaps in time between games, it sometimes feels like Metroid has only been around for half that time.
A lot has changed for the series in the past 10 years, though. After a failure to expand the series into a co-op multiplayer game, developer MercurySteam successfully reinvigorated the traditional 2D gameplay the series made its name on, while Retro Studios saved its long-dormant Metroid Prime series with an excellent remaster and a solid, if uneven, stab at Metroid Prime 4. With all of those new developments recontextualizing the series, it feels like the right moment to reevaluate Metroid as a whole and see how each game stacks up in 2025. Where do Metroid Dread and Metroid Prime 4: Beyond land on the list? Equip your visor and start scanning.
15
Metroid Prime: Federation Force
I’d like to say that Metroid Prime: Federation Force was a fine game done dirty by circumstances. After all, the initial negativity around its 2015 reveal had more to do with the fact that it had been so long since we’d gotten a true Metroid game that a co-op spinoff felt like a slap in the face. After revisiting it recently, though, there’s no redemption arc for this Nintendo 3DS dud. Federation Force is a collection of dull multiplayer missions linked together by an even duller story. If anything, it’s only gotten worse with age, as its already offputting visuals look even harsher nearly a decade after its release. It’s only worth remembering for the shockingly huge role it plays in Metroid Prime 4: Beyond.
14
Metroid: Other M
The weird thing about Metroid: Other M is that it probably plays better than a few of the games featured above it. Its fusion of first- and third-person gameplay is handled in a creative fashion that gives the Wii game its own unique texture. That strength isn’t enough to make up for the fact that it features Metroid’s worst storytelling to date. Built to explain more about Samus Aran and her relationship to the Galactic Federation, developer Team Ninja delivers a melodrama that saddles its hero with daddy issues while chipping away at her autonomy. It’s so bad that many fans don’t even consider it canon, citing a host of plot inconsistencies that leave it feeling like a poorly thought-out endeavor.
13
Metroid
Don’t let its placement on this list fool you: the first Metroid game is an incredibly important work that deserves its flowers. It helped build a genre that has only grown more popular decades later. You don’t get Hollow Knight: Silksong without Metroid. But you can appreciate the NES game’s importance while acknowledging that the thing is an absolute pain to get through today. Stiff movement and punishing enemies make for incredibly difficult platforming and exploration. The atmosphere is perfect and the bosses are iconic, but Metroid is the kind of game you can deeply revere without actually liking it very much.
12
Metroid Prime: Hunters
If there’s any Metroid game that deserves some critical reevaluation, its Metroid Prime: Hunters. The Nintendo DS shooter was the series’ first black sheep, trading in freeform exploration for a strange attempt at multiplayer and a linear single-player campaign. Though it’s certainly one of the weaker overall games in the series, there is some charm to be found if you go in knowing what to expect. The stylus-based control scheme is novel, the cosmic sci-fi story is surprisingly wild, and it’s the first Metroid game that introduced us to Sylux. Sure, it’s a weird attempt to make Metroid a proper shooter, but it’s held up better than you’d expect given its reputation.
11
Metroid 2: Return of Samus
Metroid 2: Return of Samus finds itself in a similar position to its predecessor, leaving players to struggle through an early draft of a series that hadn’t quite cracked its feel in the Game Boy era. But in several respects, Metroid 2 actually cemented the series’ identity more than Metroid itself. You get an even stronger sense of atmosphere here, trading in heroic sci-fi for haunting ambiance that veers ever-so-slightly into horror. That ambiance is reinforced by a shockingly dark story, where Samus carries out an alien genocide and is left to reflect on her reckless behavior in a silent trek back to her ship in the game’s conclusion, baby Metroid in tow. It’s arguably the single most powerful sequence in the whole series.
10
Metroid Prime 4: Beyond
More than any other game in the series, Metroid Prime 4: Beyond wildly oscillates between high highs and low lows. It contains some of the series’ best world design to date, riffing on staple Metroidvania biomes in creative ways that marry traditional theming to narrative. The story of a dying alien race’s desperate attempt to save their legacy is a morose highlight, and biomes play out like excellent 3D Zelda dungeons. Those strengths are counterbalanced by annoying NPCs, an underdeveloped open-world transport hub, and a disappointing use of Sylux in a toothless villain story that goes nowhere. It all evens out to make a serviceable installment elevated by the best visuals you’ll find in a modern Nintendo game.
9
Metroid Prime: Pinball
Look, I’ll go to bat for this one any time of the week. Is Metroid Prime: Pinball a bizarre spinoff born from a time where Nintendo was desperate to capitalize on Metroid’s growing success? Yes. But it’s also a dang good pinball game that creatively remixes Metroid Prime’s most iconic elements. Even the very idea of using Samus’ morph ball form as a pinball is a stroke of genius. With well-designed boards and smart riffs on boss fights, Metroid Prime: Pinball is the one head-scratching Metroid spinoff that actually worked.
8
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
A lot of problems I have with Metroid Prime 4: Beyond could also be levied against Metroid Prime 3: Corruption. The Wii game was just as eager to fill in the silence with talkative NPCs that disrupted the series’ signature isolation. Corruption just wasn’t quite as annoying about it, teasing a larger world beyond Samus’ suit without saddling her with yapping companions. It was uninvasive enough to let players focus on Corruption’s solid motion control integration, giving the Prime series an extra dose of physicality.
7
Metroid: Samus Returns
Creating a modern remake of a Metroid 2 is no easy task. The Game Boy was defined by its limitations, so any attempt to redo Samus’ second adventure would need to be very transformative. Developer MercurySteam rose to that challenge beautifully with Samus Returns. While it drops the ball on the original game’s elegant ending, the 3DS game served as an excellent way for the studio to experiment with the Metroidvania format and rethink how Samus can move and shoot in 2D space. Free aiming and counters cracked the formula wide open, opening the door for more dynamic action. Dread would go on to perfect the idea, but Samus Returns gets credit for pioneering those concepts.
6
Metroid Prime 2: Echoes
Following up on a game like Metroid Prime is a daunting task. How can you live up to its legacy without just doing the same thing again? Metroid Prime 2: Echoes handles that with a dark-light twist that imbues the sequel with the same bit of classic Nintendo design that helped The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past stand out from other top-down Zelda games in its day. It added a welcome layer of risk-reward play to the combat while giving Samus some of the coolest suits you’ll find in the series. More memorable, though, is the way Echoes paid off Metroid Prime’s secret ending by turning Dark Samus into the menacing doppelganger our bounty-hunting hero needed at the time.
