Fixing Samus

[Edelgard von Hresvelg]

Samus is one of the few remaining characters in Smash Bros. that doesn't strike me at all as being particularly true to her series' roots or having an accurate representation. Obviously it's because of tradition, carrying over the under-baked moveset she was given in Smash 64, but this is how I would fix her (which unfortunately can't happen until a next Smash game releases, if that happens at all). Also I'm just going to assume most if not all of you will disagree with me, but I'm going to give my thoughts anyway, being the super Metroid fan that I am.

Appearance
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Instead of recolors of the unpopular Other M suit, she would have these unique suits. She deserves the extra love and attention and these are all really cool looking suits. The main suit is based on her Varia Suit from Samus Returns.
Standard Look (Varia Suit) - Power Suit - Gravity Suit - Fusion Suit - Phazon Suit - Dark Suit - Light Suit - PED Suit

Also her running animation would finally not look dorky because it would be the same as it is from Samus Returns.

Moveset
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Melee Counter - I can't decide if this should be mapped to forward smash or up smash, but either way this NEEDS to be one of her new smash attacks. Leaning towards up smash. Maybe it would work a lot like Min Min's up smash and reflect too (I know it didn't reflect in SR but might be a good substitute for stunning)

Space Jump - Samus gets one extra midair jump. If Banjo gets two midair jumps when he only had one in his original game, then Samus gets two, end of discussion. Seriously, go play Samus with a spirit that grants an extra midair jump (like Ho-oh) and see how it feels. It feels very natural and wouldn't make her broken at all.

Dodge Roll - Samus no longer rolls into her Morph Ball when dodge rolling, she just dashes sideways like she does in Metroid Prime, or what was done in Project M.

Morph Ball - This is Samus's new Down B. For one, it is larger like it is in pretty much every game except for Super Metroid which depicted it oddly small. In Prime, you can clearly see Samus would fit inside of the Morph Ball if she were crouching. Anyway, this is a toggle move similar to Wario's bike except you don't automatically move forward. You can roll in either direction, jump once, and place bombs with the A button. Rolling into other fighters (after gaining a little momentum) has the same effect as the Impact Run ability granted by various spirits. Pressing the B button at any time exits Morph Ball. You can still use this to bomb jump, and otherwise when it's beneficial to be more evasive. You also take slightly less damage while in Morph Ball form, so it's a good defensive option, and you can roll under some projectiles while still closing in on your opponent.

Screw Attack - Up B. Mostly the same, except it can be angled similar to the Screw Rush custom move from Smash 4, which is more accurate to how the move behaves in Metroid games. There was talk of making this a multi-use move, and that could also be considered.

Arm Cannon - Side B. This functions similar to Min Min's side B, so Samus can fire shots while walking forward or even jumping if you continue holding the stick in either direction. She'll stand still if you only tap the stick. What does she shoot? Missiles? Well you'll see because

Weapon Swap - With a quick press of Neutral B (which can be done on ground or air), Samus will cycle through Power Beam (quick but weak shots most similar to Falco's laser but looking more like Mega Man's lemons--good for when you want to aggro or be annoying), Wave Beam (projectile that waves through the air with larger hitbox and fires slightly more slowly, but also passes through fighters and does not cause them to flinch--good for racking up some damage like Fox's laser, and on multiple targets), Ice Beam (slowest firing, but deals more damage and has a chance to freeze at higher percentages), and Missiles (homing missiles like you are familiar with).
When you smash the stick left or right (which can also be done in the air), it causes Samus to fire a slightly charged shot of each beam type. It has about the same timing as the Super Missile, which is also what happens when you smash the stick while Missiles are equipped (so Missiles in general function the same).
Also, instead of cycling through, it's possible it functions similar to Shulk where you can input a direction after pressing B to select which weapon to use.

Aeion Burst - This is a visually reworked Final Smash. It functions nearly identically to the current Zero Laser, but instead of being based on nothing, it is based on three of the Aeion abilities from Samus Returns: Lightning Armor, Beam Burst, and Phase Drift. Samus gains Lightning Armor becoming invincible, and simultaneously slows down time with Phase Drift. She then fires a Beam Burst across the stage that can be angled. If you think using Phase Drift is too OP, then fine, it's just Lightning Armor and Beam Burst.

Conclusion
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I'm sure some of her standard attacks could be tweaked as well, but they're not as important in this case. Otherwise, if I were to imagine how to translate Samus from her games into Smash, the above is how I would do it. Removing the camp-friendly Charge Shot and encouraging Samus to approach enemies while firing seems more true to her character, not to mention the ability she would have to fire various kinds of beams and missiles. Actually giving her the Morph Ball ability would be a fun mechanic, and she would have a much better recovery with the additional jump and improved Screw Attack. She would lose the more powerful Charge Shot, but this time her main KO move would be her Melee Counter, tied to Up or Forward Smash. This means that she strategically uses various projectiles as the situation requires to rack up damage, then goes in for the KO with Melee Counter or some other hard hitting smash attack. Anyway that's my vision for Samus and I do give credit to the wonderful people behind Project M for fueling my creativity in this regard. I would take either one, but as it is I'm not very satisfied or impressed with her current representation in Smash.
Thank you.

 

[MarioDDR755]

I like it! The current Samus is more just representing herself in 64 and Melee rather than the character as a whole. Ultimate didn't do anything to make older characters more true to themselves as the DLC fighters are, which hopefully they do in the next game (and I expect it).

I haven't played a whole lot of Metroid games except Super Metroid, the NES one and some of Prime, but your version of her in Smash sounds a lot more like if she was given the same attention as new fighters get in terms of trying to make them as true to the their original series as possible. Being able to shoot missiles while walking would go a long way to that, and having a toggle button to go between different things to shoot would fit perfectly with how she plays in most of her games, and the concept is common in modern Smash with Min Min's ARMS and Shulk's Arts and such things.

It just makes me really hope they do some overhauls in Smash 6, because truer representations of existing characters would be really fun to see.

 

[Edelgard von Hresvelg]

Another idea I had was to make Neutral B and Side B the same thing so you can more easily control whether Samus is standing while firing or walking forward, and then swapping weapons could be mapped to something else like Shield+B, or side Taund like Project M did. Only downside to that is you can't swap weapons in midair, but it may still be a good option.

 

[SvartWolf]

I always though that if we are having another metroid rep. i rather get a reworked samus and de-echoed darksamus.

I wouldnt change too much.. though...

Dark samus forwards b now have an overhauled homing misiles (no smash misile) but these are like phazon orbs instead, and a new down smash (similar to her phazon outburst in her assist trophy) also a more phazon looking charge beam.

Samus on the other hand, would lose homing missiles and but she would gain directional super misiles (Up, diagonal up, front, diagonal down, and down.) And her forward smash attack getting replaced by mii gunner's forward smash attack. she keeps her down smash (And dark samus keeps teh old forward smash)

While your idea of down B morphball feels neat i dunno how useful it could be. maybe make her gettin smaller hurtbox at the expense of not being able to immediatly block? still i don't think samus's current down B is bad.

Ilike teh ide of a new upsmash in melee counter. while darksamus keeping teh old one (extra easy decloning).

I like the idea of the icebeam somewhere... but changing weapons feel a little overcomplicating stuff. dunno if i want that to be samus gimmick. (instead of no gimmick)

Imo the biggest change samus need to feel like in metroid is directional firing somewhere.