Project AM2R - Another Metroid 2 Remake

Today is a very special day. A day where several events that changed the course of my life happened. Not all of them at the same time, or in the same year, but around August 8. Let 's see… 40 Years Ago - Metroid was released Happy Birthday Samus!!! When Metroid was released, I was a 6 year old kid that loved to play Wonder Boy, Bubble Bobble, and occasionally Out Run. Visiting the Arcade was pure magic, and the birthplace of my dream of some day in the future becoming a game designer. 30 Years Ago - The Famicom Days I’m just reminiscing about this part of my life, not necessarily a specific date. Now, during the 90’s, the most popular console here in Argentina was the Famicom. Well, whatever clones would make their way here. I rented and enjoyed a lot of games, all of them unlicensed carts. The Famicom Disk System didn’t make it here, so I missed out on Zelda and Metroid.  It would take many more years to eventually discover those franchises, and I’m so glad I did. 20 Years Ago - M...

  Happy 38th birthday,   Metroid ! Happy 8th birthday,  AM2R ! It's anniversary day, and this year was truly special. Since the last blog post, two of the projects I worked on were released.  No Rest for the Wicked is an isometric souls-like with beautifully crafted environments, rewarding exploration and lots of verticality.  Being able to finally share what I've been working on at Moon Studios is super rewarding. I'm super proud of the world we crafted, and seeing people discover it and enjoy the exploration is truly magical. The game was released in Early Access on Steam , if you want to contribute with the development of this game, feel free to give it a try and leave your feedback. A couple of weeks ago, Bo: Path of the Teal Lotus was released. A hand drawn metroidvania, inspired by Japanese folklore. I was in charge of level design, and other tasks to bring this world to life. If you enjoy challenging platforming and cute, memorable characters, you shoul...

It is time. It's the big anniversary party! Happy 37th birthday, Metroid ! Happy 7th birthday, AM2R ! Happy 2nd birthday, Skippy ! To celebrate, I just released another huge update for Skippy the Bot. New mechanics, a new environment and the challenge of 10 brand new levels await you. 30 memorable, hand crafted levels in total New mechanics and set pieces Performance optimizations and various fixes Flatpak release for Linux / Steam Deck updated DOWNLOAD / PLAY HERE Flatpak Release Now, with 3 episodes and 30 levels Skippy is starting to feel like a complete game. I have plans for a final episode for the next update, but I'd really like to hear from you. Feel free to share your playthroughs, or at least your best time for your favorite level. I'm open to cool ideas for an epic finale. Thank you all so much for the support you've shown over the years! Feel free to follow me on Twitter:  @AM2RGame - @DoctorM64

 Today is a special day. Metroid , a game franchise from which I learned a lot about game design, was released 36 years ago. AM2R , my personal 10 year project from which I also learned a lot, was released 6 years ago. Skippy the Bot , the most popular of my little games on Itch, is now 1 year old. I'm still working full time as a game designer, and there's a lot I'd like to show you. Don't worry, I'll be posting here as soon as I can reveal anything. To celebrate the occasion, I released a huge update for Skippy.  Double the amount of levels (20) New water physics mechanics Episode and level select menus Record and collection tracking Flatpak release for Linux / Steam Deck users Many Quality of Life features Download / Play in Browser HERE Flatpak Release This little game got quite some attention, surprisingly. So I've been slowly adding contents to it. Now, 10 short levels might not sound as much, but each one is crafted to feel unique. There's entire game...

Today is Metroid's 35th Anniversary! HAPPY BIRTHDAY SAMUS! It also happens to be the 5th anniversary of AM2R being released. To celebrate, let me share a (non copyright infringing) story in this universe with you: PLAY IT HERE AM2R is 5 years old as of right now. Seeing people recommend AM2R as a way to experience Metroid 2 in anticipation for Dread is really humbling. I'm very grateful for all of this.  The legal situation hasn't changed, I'm not developing, updating or distributing the game. Nevertheless, the community has managed to add new content via patches, mods have been developed, and the speedrun community is still very active. The game is still alive and relevant. What happened during these last 5 years? Well... AM2R received a DMCA takedown notice, development and distribution ceased AM2R was nominated for Fan Game of the Year at the Game Awards, for a couple hours AM2R was featured at Pixel Museum in France Awesome youtubers that I admire played the game...

A new story...

After many years, I finally invested again in portable gaming. I bought a new 3DS XL, just in time to play Samus Returns. I don't have any means to record 3DS footage, so I took notes instead. Every time something interesting happened, I paused the game and wrote down my thoughts. This might look a bit random and unpolished, but they're pretty much my honest reactions to key moments in the game. I'll let you know my overall impressions later in this post. SPOILER WARNING!!!!! Ok, this is my first 3DS game, let's see what all the fuzz is about... Holy shit, the cockpit of Samus's ship looks amazing in 3D.  Alright... This is starting to hurt... Maybe using the 3D slider on 50% will work better. Ah, seeing the intro artwork in 3D makes a lot more sense than what I saw on trailers. Specially the one with the pirates stealing the Metroid. Wow. SR388 looks awesome in 3D. Oh. The effect looks fuzzy when the camera scrolls too fast, I'm having Avatar fl...

Looks like I had to announce it earlier than anticipated. :-) Some time ago, the CEO of Moon Studios (creators of Ori and the Blind Forest) reached out with an offer. They needed a level designer for their upcoming sequel, Ori and the Will of the Wisps, and I was a potential candidate for the job. I gladly accepted the offer. Ori is one of the many games I was able to enjoy lately. One can see the love and attention to detail that went into its design. I feel like I'll be right at home working with this team. It's a pretty huge change in my life, since it's a full time job. But dreams are there to be chased, my family supports this decision and it could be the beginning of a new career. I want to thank you again, awesome people that kept AM2R alive with your motivating words, your lets plays and reviews. Without you, I wouldn't be sitting here writing this post with a huge smile on my face. As for my personal project, I'll keep researching and slowly expan...

Wow... a whole year passed since the release of AM2R, and 31 years since the release of the original Metroid. Time flies by, and a lot happens in the meantime. AM2R was very well received. People from all over the world played and enjoyed it. Even with the inevitable legal issues, I keep hearing people calling it a real Metroid game. And that's amazing. So, what's been going on this year? Everyone involved in AM2R moved on. Some found their place in the world, a new job, or the drive to keep creating. I played a lot of games, something I kept leaving for later. I'm really happy that I got to spend time discovering Axiom Verge, Ori and the blind forest and Guacamelee, among others. I also started a new project. I'm researching the Unity engine, and slowly building the foundation of a new, original Metroidvania game. It's really early in development right now, but I'll make sure to have something cool to show whenever I decide to make it public. You c...

After a lot of careful deliberation and internal squabbling, we are excited to finally announce Another Sonic 2 Remake! The blue blur has returned for his second adventure again! Sonic 2 was special to many people, and we have a soft spot for the second part of a bangin’ series. We are using all of our development and production experience to craft a rad remake of an awesome game. Now, our experience revolves around isolation and exploration in Metroidvania adventures. Some elements that we think Sonic should have explored in his glory days. It’s the time to revisit Planet Mobius the way it was supposed to. Expect ever more zones by the time AS2R reaches a home console near you. Gain new abilities and allies, who will help you reach new zones. Find the super secretly hidden Chaos Emeralds to unleash Sonic’s ultimate power. With abilities, items, and powerups from modern Sonic games (and the classics) you’ll make Dr. Robotnik cry like a Metroid fan at E3. ...

Here's an album I compiled, with music that ended up in AM2R, and some tracks that didn't make it into the game. I remastered every track, and some songs sound a lot better with minor changes. These tracks were going to be a part of the 1.2 update, but now you can enjoy them. SoundCloud MP3 - MediaFire  - Mega FLAC - MediaFire - Mega Also, it includes a bonus track from Falcool, the awesome composer who did the Area 5 songs. Thank you very much for following this project.

Nintendo of America, Inc. has filed a takedown request under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). I received the request on my personal email, so I'm complying with their requests. There will be no more AM2R updates, and no more releases under any platform.  Thank you for the support during all these years.

As you may know already, AM2R received DMCA notices in all the download hosts, and some parts of this blog. So far, no C&D letter was received.  This project began a long time ago, while I was actually trying to learn the programming side of Game Maker. Instead of moving on with something else, when I learned a better way of doing something, I reiterated and improved the old code. Eventually, I learned to program in C#. Now I'm making a living as a professional programmer thanks to what I learned developing a fan game.  Technically speaking, I'm satisfied. Artists started offering help. First with the main enemies, then with sprites, enemies, bosses. The forums started to come alive with fans making feature suggestions, and always being positive and optimistic about the project. I added new contents, trying to be respectful about the established lore. Demo after demo people liked the game. Then the game was out, and for a brief time, players enjoyed the game the...

I know we'll make it in time. See you then. EDIT : Project AM2R now has its own Twitter Account . Stay up to date with the latest news, anticipating the release. Countdown Clock

As always, every time a new boss is added to the game, it ends up being too difficult for the average player after some playtesting. The Queen was no exception, even if she's not completely finished. So, I'm taking some extra time to balance her, including how the attack types are distributed, and how the player can replenish resources during the fight. Besides that, there was an overall revision of many details on all the areas. Some of the tilework that hinted at hidden areas without actually having anything there was changed. The last couple of items was added, some of them having dedicated rooms with small puzzles. Log entries were updated to their latest revision, and the map data is pretty much finished. We're getting closer to a complete game, and I appreciate that you followed the process all this time.

Music production is, for the most part, done. There's just a couple songs left to polish, likely to be finihsed during the week. Now the production is being focused on the Metroid Queen. It's proving to be a very interesting process. I was able to make a nice looking animation cycle for its legs, using the knowledge I gained while developing the other Metroids. It doesn't look as static and robotic as it used to. The Queen has its original Metroid 2 attacks, and I'm experimenting with some new ones. The thing is, the limited space Samus has to move around the room also limits the variety of new attacks I can add without feeling cheap and frustrating to avoid. Unfortunately, I can't fill the screen with projectiles. So, new attacks need to be mostly timing based, making them fairly easy to predict when you learn them, but also making the fight feel predictable and formulaic. While the Queen fight works right now, it's going to take a bit of experimentatio...

This year's April project was a lot of fun. It took a couple months worth of lunch breaks to write the script. At first, it was going to be a complete text adventure, with room structure, inventory and events. But it was going to be pretty complex to produce, way too much time for a side project. Anyways, as for the progress of these couple weeks: Music production continues. Creating the right atmosphere and choosing the right instruments is quite a challenge, especially with the last couple songs. Also, the intro sequence is mostly done. There's a very brief Super Metroid style text intro describing the mission, followed by some brief cutscenes of Samus arriving at SR388. The timing is still being tweaked, and the music for this sequence requires the exact duration of the intro, so I can properly sync it. As always, thank you for following the project, and for all the support.

After some headaches with the screen resize code, I was able to successfully build AMTA as an HTML5 app. I also fixed some typos and grammar issues, and added a way to speed up the text. This makes replaying the game much easier and faster. The next feature should be to make the entire script read from a text file, allowing easy customization and expansion of the story, for people who enjoy modding. Here's the updated download info: AMTA Another Metroid Text Adventure v1.0 DOWNLOAD Windows - Mega - MediaFire Linux - Coming eventually What is it? It's the ultimate Metroid text adventure. Choose your own path, survive the dangerous caves of planet SR388, uncover the secrets of the ancient Chozo, and take part in the most important event in the Metroid universe. Multiple paths CRT Style text Easy to read font, even on mobile Multiplatform Feel free to discuss the game at the forums . Please be mindful of spoilers.

I started the last stretch of music production. Music is something I usually leave behind priority wise, compared to other duties. The later parts of the game have the coolest songs in the original, it'll be a nice challenge to remake those songs and keep the tense atmosphere. Also, I received help from a very talented composer for the original Area 5 song. Composing over Skype was a pretty interesting experience, quite different from other collaborations. The Omegas are looking pretty good now, even if they are still missing a couple more frames. Making revisions to eliminate cheapness and exploits is very time consuming. We're getting closer to the end.

Here are the screenshots I promised. Right before the main facility of area 5, Moheeks are pretty deadly underwater. The water effects were redone, the blue tint is a lot less intrusive than before. The upper part of area 5 isn't flooded. So it looks and plays like a traditional area. The caves right before the final area. This is the first normal metroid you encounter in the game. Please bear in mind that things are improving all the time. The metroid sprite is made of smaller moving sprites, and still missing the electricity effect. It looks a lot better in motion. Testing is still going on, now also including the late areas. The two big things that are going to be the final challenges in development are the Omega and Queen metroids, specially their AI and balance.  I'll get back to coding, have a good week!