The Return of Metroidvania?

I’ve been playing Metroids all the time!

Ok gaming students! A lot has been said recently about how the fantastic Shadow Complex is a return to the old school, a resurgence of the long forgotten Metroidvania type games. Yet as I play the excellent Batman: Arkham Asylum I find myself doing the same thing – collecting abilities to progress in areas I’ve already been to.

So then I think, hold on, I’ve been playing Metroids all the time, and mostly in my favourite games – it’s why I still take childish pleasure in the Daxters and Ratchets, and even the more childish Spyros and Bandicoots – it’s that satisfactory feeling of structured progression that comes with the measured doling out of abilities. Achievement. Novelty. Discovery. Isn’t it why we all started playing games in the first place?

Did Metroidvania really go away, or did it actually evolve into the open world sandbox game, albeit the ones with an RPG element (I’m looking at you Crackdown) ? Are there other recent games that use the Metroidvania mechanism ? And no, I’m not talking Metroid Prime Trilogy, funny buggers. Comment, discuss, contribute, call me a rambling idiot, whatever you like, but make your opinions known people!