Goal : Escape from Eribu
Back in 2017 hacker Metaquarius showcased a proof of concept hack in a video (now unlisted) with a bunch of tilesets and rooms from Axiom Verge in Super Metroid. It looked very neat, but ultimately never went anywhere.
Apparently this past month he decided to dust off his old project files and assemble them together for a short mini-hack experience that expertly recreates the entirety of AV's opening area, Eribu.1 Even if you've already played the source material there are still some nice surprises with how things were remixed and adapted. There are a couple rough spots here and there, in terms of gameplay polish, but nothing was dealbreaking to me.
The author labels the difficulty as "Veteran (ie. not for casual players)", but I have trouble believing it.2
[ Difficulty Digression ]
The most difficult parts of the game are:- The segment from the very beginning to the first boss, because you're underpowered.
- Late in the game when you're forced to figure out Axiom Verge's most unintuitive mechanic (but this is not a Super Metroid techskill thing).
The middle of the game is perfectly reasonable, as there are ample health upgrades and it doesn't ask much of you in terms of tech skill (I don't know whether walljumps are required, but I think not). Also, this is based on the latest version of Project Base, so mid-air morphing into tunnels is almost free.
There was one part where I thought that I got myself stuck in a pit underequipped, but if I had remembered that this hack has rocket jumping (because it's a Project Base hack), I would have gotten myself out of there really easily. In practice though, said pit is more of an expert trap than a noob trap, and I already told you solution anyhow.
[ End of Digression ]
The actual hardest part of the hack is figuring out what any of the items do, because they all (intentionally) look the same and their names are given to you in gibberish Sudran characters. If that kind of nonsense sounds up your alley, give it a spin. It should only take you somewhere between an hour or an hour-thirty.
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No. I do not believe the author has plans to demake any more areas of this. This is just a neat one-off novelty project.
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If you ended up playing this and felt like I misled you, leave an angry message in the comments to correct me.