VC Tuesday: Metroid's Japanese boxart is really great

The Japanese version of Metroid differs from the American version in four major ways:

1. It comes on a disk instead of a cartridge

2. Thanks to the Famicom Disk System hardware, that music has instruments that don't show up in the cartridge version

3. It uses a Zelda-style save screen instead of passwords

4. The boxart is amazingly awesome

The Virtual Console version doesn't come on any media, has no box, and, of course, uses the decent Wii savestate system, so that just leaves us with the music. Is better music a fair trade for getting the game seven months after we did?

As for Star Luster, the Japanese version differs from its U.S. counterpart in just one way:

1. It exists
   

• Metroid (Famicom Disk System, 1 player, 500 Wii Points)

• Star Luster (Famicom, 1-2 players, 500 Wii Points)