Metroid

1986 action-adventure shooter video game

Metroid (メトロイド, Metoroido) is an action-adventure video game made by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan on the Famicom Disk System on August 6, 1986. In 1987 and 1988, it was released in Europe and North America on the Nintendo Entertainment System. Years later, it was released for the Wii.

Metroid
Developer(s)Nintendo R&D1
Publisher(s)Nintendo
Director(s)Satoru Okada
Yoshio Sakamoto Edit this on Wikidata
Producer(s)Gunpei Yokoi Edit this on Wikidata
Designer(s)Gunpei Yokoi (producer)
Yoshio Sakamoto (director)
Composer(s)Hirokazu Tanaka Edit this on Wikidata
SeriesMetroid Edit this on Wikidata
Platform(s)Famicom Disk System, NES, Game Boy Advance, Virtual Console
ReleaseNES

  • NA: August 1987


Virtual Console

Genre(s)Action-adventure
Mode(s)Single-player

Metroid is the first game in the Metroid series and stars the character Samus Aran. She later appears in all of the later games.

Gameplay change

Metroid was one of the first non-linear video games. This means that it did not force players to play through the game in one way. Players could explore and go to all of the areas in whatever order they wished. The basic gameplay is a mix of adventure, platform shooter, and action. The player controls the main character Samus while exploring the game's cave-like environment. Because Samus starts only with a weak attack and a short jump, players must find power-ups to make the attack and jump stronger, in order to get to new areas of the game. While there are many different small enemies that players meet, there are also large bosses who must be killed in order to reach the last level of the game.