Fan-made Metroid 2 remake celebrates series’ 30th year before Nintendo does [Updated]

Update, 8/10: As many Ars commenters feared, Nintendo brought down the ban-hammer on the below Metroid fan project by issuing a number of cease-and-desist requests to its download hosts. "I'll continue improving and fixing AM2R privately," its creator wrote in an update on Tuesday. He also acknowledged Nintendo's need to protect its intellectual property and encouraged fans to buy the original Metroid 2 on Nintendo's eShop: "Show them that 2D adventure platformers are still a thing people want."

Original report: Thanks to Nintendo's rise to mid-'80s fame, the gaming company has enjoyed many recent "30th anniversary" celebrations for its famed series. But while Super Mario and Zelda enjoyed official fanfare over their respective "pearl" milestones, the company's most famed bounty hunter, Metroid's Samus Aran, hasn't received as much official attention for her debut launching on Japan's Famicom Disc System in August 1986.

Luckily for Metroid diehards, a group of enterprising game makers has stepped up with the launch of a free anniversary present, years in the making: AM2R, or, Another Metroid 2 Remake. The free game, which had a demo tease launch a few years ago, is finally in a 1.0 "full" release state on Windows (to be followed "soon" by a Linux build). This is a full reimagining of the Game Boy classic Metroid 2: Return of Samus—meaning, this is more than a colorized upgrade from its original, "green-scale" release.

Aesthetically and mechanically, AM2R will delight anybody who enjoyed the Game Boy Advance's Metroid: Zero Mission, which itself was a looks-and-mechanics remake of the very first game. The sequel now gets the same mix of updated mechanics, redrawn artwork, newly arranged songs, and slightly remixed content, along with a deep, newly written "codex" of lore, story, and analysis of everything Samus discovers in her mission to take out a new slew of augmented Metroid creatures.

For anybody who never got into the GBA versions, the controls will feel surprisingly rigid, as the original games' bouncy, floaty jumps have been nixed in favor of tighter movement and abilities like ledge grabs—a progression that began with 1994's Super Metroid. Otherwise, the level of polish here will make fans wonder whether Nintendo was actually behind the release; it's just that good (and might even be better than the upcoming, multiplayer spin-off game for the Nintendo 3DS, Metroid Prime: Federation Force).

Ars has given the game a preliminary spin and can report that this remake looks phenomenal, boasting a classic resolution of 320x240 pixels and yet still looking modern and fetching, thanks to 60 frames-per-second animation of beautiful, easily discernible sprites. The remake's color spread, in particular, makes this feel like an entirely new game compared to the splotchy, dark-green look of the Game Boy original. Users have reported a few bugs here and there, particularly an issue with certain power-ups rendering Samus invisible on some systems—so, FYI, you're getting what you pay for here—but the creators insist that this is "not the definitive version, but the first," so we expect touch-ups and patches to come.

Now, if you'll excuse us, we have some more "reporting" to do from the planet of SR388.