I strongly disagree with both these points. Even with 30 fps Samus feels lightning fast and super responsive, nothing remotely "tanky" feeling about it. The addition of free aim on top of that puts SR far above every other 2D Metroid, where most of the challenge of combat consists of awkwardly trying to position yourself such that you have the right angle on the enemy.
The teleporters aren't at all necessary while progressing through the game normally. They just make backtracking for 100% less tedious while maintaining Metroid 2's globally linear structure. I thought Fusion did a much worse job of making each stage interconnected. Super Metriod is obviously the king in this regard, but that's not really a fair comparison because SM's is has an overall nonlinear structure that involves criss-crossing rapidly between all areas of the map.
In terms of "micro" level design, I thought SR was strong but the navigational puzzles and challenges didn't feel quite as inventive as Fusion. Particularly the "challenge rooms" for certain powerups -- some of Fusion's were straight up
nuts, whereas SR's are pretty tame and don't push the mechanics particularly hard. Haven't played Super Metroid in too long to say, but my recollection is that the moment-to-moment navigation was less puzzle-y and more straightforward. The challenge was in figuring out where to go next, less how to do so.
Anyway, I haven't actually beat the game yet (just acquired *late game powerup sort-of-spoiler*
) but assuming the game sticks the landing I feel like this game is easily on par with Fusion. An impressive showing from an external team with a dubious pedigree!
