Seriously, what the heck is going on inside Samus’s Morph Ball?


Metroid Dread Morph Ball
Image: Nintendo / Nintendo Life

the Metroid The series is now in its 35th year, and during that long period of time, Nintendo has happily elaborated on everything from its star’s childhood to the nightmare that kills parents Ridley, Metroids, Chozo, and even the creepy evil clone created. by Phazon. In short, pretty much every avenue of lore you can think of has been explained, elaborated, overworked in a sequel, and then given a well-defined space in the extensive Metroid canon.

All but one. The exact workings of Samus’s Morph Ball ability, a series staple from the first few minutes of the first game, remains a mystery. Official information remains conspicuously absent on the finer details of this ubiquitous ability. “Collect this to give Samus the Morph Ball ability“,”Press this to roll it into a ballThey say the games regardless of the format, as if such simple instruction could ever quench our thirst for science fiction ball morphing knowledge.

How does it work? What happened to the poor souls who tested the prototypes? What bird-brained scientist looked at that iconic armor and thought “Do you know what skill this huge missile-carrying power suit needs? To curl up into a tiny ball so it can roll wherever it wants. “And who on Earth (or SR-388, or Zebes, or wherever) looked that person in the eye and said “Yes, it’s a great idea and you definitely don’t need to go and lie down for a bit.“?

What’s it like rolling inside a metallic orange ball on the surface of an alien planet or submerged in lava anyway? Nintendo isn’t saying anything, so we’ve had to come up with some theories on our own …

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Metroid Fusion
Image: Nintendo

# 1 The “Cronenbergian Body Horror” Theory

Channeling the spirit of the almighty Occam’s Razor, we can assume that the simplest theory is correct: Samus is able to roll into a ball because his body is effectively polished into a suitably spherical shape for the duration of his inhuman revolutions, transforming into a mass of fluids and bone fragments that are then restored to their original state once she finishes rolling thanks to Chozo technology, which is convenient to us often indistinguishable from magic.

Your eyes and brain will likely remain intact and gyroscopically stabilized for the duration of this activity, because how else are you going to see where you are going? It would emit a blood-curdling scream of unimaginable agony if it still had a mouth, but luckily for everyone involved it doesn’t.

This is the real reason Nintendo never tells us everything, because if they did, Metroid fans around the world would have nightmares for years. It’s enough to make you wonder why he can’t just crawl.

Mission Metroid Zero
Image: Nintendo

# 2 The “Electric Chozo Unit” theory

Fortunately, Metroid Prime offers a less gruesome alternative to the previous possibility of containing debris. Samus’ 3D outputs fill the gaps between the Morph Ball liner with some kind of eye-catching bright light … uh, stuff.

We can only conclude that Samus has become a form of pure energy, her mind and body reaching a singularly spherical state of sensitivity. We assume that this lack of anything that comes close to a traditional body prevents you from gagging as you spin and endlessly speed around the curved surfaces of the Tallon IV (and elsewhere) while the whole thing is in a ball, albeit somehow. way he managed to bring out his no-lunch. from his no-stomach through his no-mouth to his no-me, could anyone tell?

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Proponents of this theory point to an interesting philosophical state called Schroedinger’s Vom, where she is simultaneously covered in sick and not sick until she reverts to her standard human form.

Metroid Prime
Image: Nintendo

# 3 The “shrunken Samus” theory

Samus operates the Morph Ball by shrinking to an appropriate size at will, thanks once again to the suitably inexplicable and highly flexible powers of the magician Chozo, technology.

From here two great schools of thought emerge and then quickly branch out in wildly different directions. Some believe that he runs inside the ball like a hamster being let out for exercise, the suit’s often opaque armor is the only thing that preserves his dignity, while others suggest that a little Samus sits in a small swivel chair. the size of a Samus and uses a console controller. -appropriate way to navigate the world around you, all viewed through an equally small monitor.

Both theories adequately explain another mystery: how he’s capable of storing an infinite supply of those little wall-busting bombs that he somehow carries with him everywhere. If she can shrink, then presumably she can shrink them too, automatically re-widening them every time she needs to punch a hole in the ground or increase their height a bit.

This also raises the possibility that the entire Chozo race is really fine and living exactly where they used to, with abatement technology malfunctioning across the entire population reducing them to Picori proportions.

Super metroid
Image: Nintendo

# 4 The message “Hello, Samus-chu!” Theory

As we all know, Samus is the best as nobody ever was and she really has to catch them all, as long as “everyone” is Space Pirates and / or Metroids. So it makes sense that Morph Ball is based on the highly advanced Poké Ball technology.

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And as we all know, Poké Balls work … they work … they probably work a lot like Morph Balls.

Assuming that this theory is true allows us to reach two very important conclusions. One; Samus Timeline is a dark future where the famous Pokémon trainer Ash was killed at a crucial moment in history, allowing Ridleyanni and Team Space Pirate to go berserk. And two; the inside of a Morph Ball is incredibly comfortable.

Rumors that our space hunter heroine did not speak in previous games because she had not yet learned to vocalize anything but “SaMUS! Saaaaamus! Samussamus?“They are not currently tested.

Poke Morph Ball
Image: Nintendo / The Pokémon Company

# 5 The “It’s Just a Convenient Gaming Device” Theory

We will include this simply out of sympathy for your believers rather than because it has any real merit.

There are those who insist “It’s not that deep, nerdAnd that Samus adopts a ball shape because it is a small and mobile shape, it turns out to be a shape that is immediately recognizable at any resolution and requires little or no actual animation to roll convincingly across the screen.

We strongly urge these misguided folks to consider the above alternatives again, or at least point us to the logbook entry that they think supports such a far-fetched idea as this.


Which of these theories do you think is most likely to be true, or do you have a completely different idea from yours? Have you ever wanted Nintendo to explain it to you? Let us know by voting in the poll below and jump to the comment section to drop your own power bomb …

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