Starcraft 2 Armory - Unofficial Starcraft 2 Fansite

I've written a lore related article for the armory to enjoy whilst we are in the absence of good information from Blizzard.

Has Blizzard Taken Inspiration From

Nintendo?

A comparison between Samus Aran and November Terra

November Annabella Terra, otherwise known to us eager Starcraft fans, as Nova, is a Terran Ghost currently affiliated to the Terran Dominion. We know and love her as an important character from a game which was never completed. Nevertheless she is one of our favourite heroes within the Starcraft universe.

However was she inspired by another of video gamings greatest heroines?

Are Samus Aran and Nova the same character at heart?

That I can't say for sure, but I definately would like to show you some of the similarities these two characters share.

To begin I will start with brief bio's of both Characters.

[Note: These are just short summaries, please don't quote me on small mistakes, or leaving out small parts (i.e. names), as I am shortening the story, to better explain my later points.]

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Samus Aran

Name: Samus Aran
Born: Earth
Raised: Zebes
Hair: Blonde
Eyes: Blue/Green mix

Back Story: Samus Aran is a Human bounty hunter. She was born on the planet Earth. Little is known about her parents, it is assumed they were not of high position. At the age of three, aliens by the name of Chozo1, came to planet Earth to mine important minerals. Space Pirates2 then came to planet Earth and wiped out the colony which Samus and her family inhabited. Ridley was the commander of the attack, and is Samus's arch rival.

She was left orphaned. The Chozo who had taken a liking to Samus took her under their wing, and she trained with them. At the age of 14 she was well past the physical capabilities of normal humans, because she had been infused with Chozo blood, and later given her famous Varia Suit, which is bio-mechanical and created entirely out of Chozo technology.

She had been noted to be extremely compassionate, something that they Chozo admired in her. She left Zebes and the Chozo to join the Galactic Federation3, as a member of the police force. Here she was given cybernetic implants which drove her physical capabilities to nigh superhuman levels.

She then vanished from the GF and did not resurface till a few years later. By that time, rumours of a male cyborg bounty hunter single handedly hunting down and killing countless SP's had surfaced. This was of course all the doing of Samus Aran.

Samus is now a bounty hunter for hire affiliated to the GF. She has partaken in wars, as well as assassination type missions.

Personality: In terms of personality, Samus has not been expanded on. She is a silent character, fitting the title of "Byronic Hero", brooding and out for revenge against Ridley and his Space Pirates. Of course that is largely just fan speculation.

Physical Appearance: Samus Aran is a Human. She is 6 feet 3 inches tall and weighs 198 pounds (when contained in her Power Suit). She has blue/green eyes. Blonde hair which she holds in a high ponytail.

Main Equipment: Chozo Varia Suit, and her Zero Suit. As well as a multitude of weapons and gadgets typical to a sci-fi hero.

1 The Chozo are an advanced race similar to the Xel'Naga in position within the lore. They are all dead by the time of the games.
2 Space Pirates are the antagonists of the series. They do not have any parallel imo to the Starcraft universe.
3 The Galactic Federation is the Human governing body within the milky way galaxy.

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Name: November Annabella (Nova) Terra, Aka Agent 12-862
Born: Tarsonis
Raised: Tarsonis
Hair: Blonde
Eyes: Green

Back Story: Nova was born into the Terra family, which was high ranking and one of the "old families" within the Terran Confederacy. Her family hid her latent psionic abilities from her and everyone else in order to avoid her being drafted into the Ghost Program.

Her parents sent her to Tyrador IX, away from Tarsonis because of the recent uprisings and violence against the old families. She did not want to leave them. As she was leaving, she felt her parents minds, as they were killed by anti-confederate rebels. At which point she disembarked and returned. She witnesed her parents murderers, still killing members of her family and staff, and at that point due to the huge mental and emotional stress, unleashed a powerful psionic attack, which killed all nearby and almost destroyed the Terra Skyscraper.

At which point wranglers were then ordered to capture Nova.

Before that however Nova fled to Tarsonis's underworld know as The Gutter. In which two men tried to rape her and she severly injured them with her psionic abilities. A crime lord by the name of ***in, eventually caught her, learned of her identity and used her as a loyalty detector/assassin against her will.

After ***ins death (which she caused as revenge) she then joined the Ghost Program willingly. Partly because she wanted a memory wipe to forget all her memories. Nova sped through her training, in 2.5 years (the normal was 4 years).

Towards the end of her training, Acturus Mensgk himself gave Nova a personal mission. She was to fly to Tyrador VII and kill, Cliff Nadaner a former anti-Confederate terrorist turned anti-Dominion terrorist. He was the man who sent men to kill Nova and her family. She was instructed to kill him with her mental powers alone. She succeeded in achieving her revenge.

Upon completion of her training she was given a memory wipe and given her Ghost code of Agent 12-862. At which point she joined the Nova Squadron.

Physical Appearance: Nova is a tall woman, Who had Green eyes, white skin, and has Blonde hair which she ties in a top not.

Personality: Before her nueral resocialisation, Nova was compassionate, with a high degree of empathy, largely unsees amongst the old families. She believed strongly in the concept of fair play as well. She will deal death, but only to those who she deems worthy of death.

After the nueral-resoc she has changed radically. No traces of her previous moral code remain, and she has become rather ****y, snide and arrogant.

Equipment: Ghost suit, with cloaking device, as well as other weapons typical to ghosts. It should be noted that her use of Psionics would fit in this category.

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So with that said lets look at two Images of Samus Aran and Nova.

Samus in her Zero Suit: (So that you can see what she looks like undernieth her suit.


And Nova


The Similarities are obvious. Visually they are identical, with slight differences in eye colour, and hair style. Overall however they are identical heroines. Even the difference in hair style is minute, as Samus has also appeared in other images even more similar hair styles to Nova.

Now here are another two images:

This here is Nova in her Ghost suit/armour.


And Samus in her Varia Suit less her helmet:


Here the similarities aren't as obvious. It should be noted however how much emphasis both SC and Metroid put on their heroines suits/armour.

Of course Samus's suit is of greater importance than Nova's nevertheless the iconic depictions of both of these heroines, is of them in their specially made suits. A notable similarity.

If that is not enough for you, consider the fact that despite near identical phyical appearances, they also play similar roles within their affiliated organisations. Whilst Nova is an obvious spy, she is sent on only the most difficult of missions which no other members could possibly complete.

Samus being an independent bounty hunter is still feircely loyal to the GF, and is also the one sent on the most difficult of missions. Of course her missions are of a wider variety, and often also personal in nature.

Another point of similarity is their personality. They both fit into the Byronic, lone wolf heroine. Both orphans who have shown venegeful qualities to their nature. Both prefering to work alone than as part of a group.

Nova and Samus are truly extremely similar characters within the video game industry. Both have huge followings, and are loved by their respective franchises. Both have similar personalities, appearances, roles and backstories.

I did not write this to present an issue as much as to show people, the obvious similarities which occured to me earlier today. Now what do you think?

-Discuss!

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Reference 1 - Samus
Reference 2 - Nova

I know that there are likley many many spelling and grammar mistakes. I will correct these each time I read this over.

interesting i never would have thought of this comparison, congrats on how much work you have put into it!

there are some areas where i do think there was a bit of influence thrown about most likely both ways.

and wasnt nova originally ginger? or is that me just getting her mixed up with kerrigan when she was a ghost?

generally in the gaming business there are alot of ideas reused but modified or used as inspiration. much like lost vikings and the WC3 dwarfs.

It's unlikley that the ideas were both ways. Nintendo had created the Metroid Franchise in 1986. Much of the lore was created before the release of SC. The only time in which they could have taken inspiration of Nova would have been The two last Metroid Prime games.

I still find it very unlikley however. Nova outside of the Sc community isn't very well known compared to Samus.

EDIT: Sorry about the size of the pictures, but honestly cbf minimizing and making them all fit.

true true, but didnt the zero suit get disigned quite recently? so that they could have possibly taken a bit of inspiration from the kerrigan or nova's art.

true but then again nova isnt one of the main characters of a game, and the one she was going to be in was cancled so that she was never really known by the non-SC community.

but alot of gamers know about kerrigan, since she is one if the most well known female villians in gaming.

UNBELIEVEABLE!!!!! (You know Kerrigan and Samus together, sort of reminds me of Corruption.)

Yeah the Zero suit came about when metroid fusion was released. I believe that was 2002. When Nova was being created/revealed to the public.

You're right however, Nova is not a main character or primary character the same way that Samus is. I think that is largely the reason no one has picked up on the similarities. Because it's sort of irrelevant I guess.

As for Kerrigan, yeah Kerrigan is rather well known, but she is far better known for her status of Infested Kerrigan, Queen ***** of the Universe. Than as her ghost counterpart.

Sarah was expanded upon in the the books which followed more so than the games. Interesting.

interesting, the zero suit could have possibly been influenced by the ghost suit but who knows.

you can never really tell with these things nowadays.
i like how they expanded the knowledge of kerrigan in the books, gives more depth to the character and im sure alot of people wanted to know the past of the queen of the blades.

Quote by Genten

UNBELIEVEABLE!!!!! (You know Kerrigan and Samus together, sort of reminds me of Corruption.)

I can see that. It's fairly similar concept if you somehow had SK fighting against IK.

Huh i see the similarities. I didnt know that metroid was a girl.

And geez i wonder why people would try to rape Nova.(sarcasm)

Wow, nice pictures found, AzraelBlack.

Quote by AzraelBlack

The Similarities are obvious. Visually they are identical, with slight differences in eye colour, and hair style. Overall however they are identical heroines. Even the difference in hair style is minute, as Samus has also appeared in other images even more similar hair styles to Nova.

Well, for me I think that Nova and Samus are "far from being identical" and actually I have got my own preference already because I like Nova more and she is way prettier, haha )

On the subject of Samus personality we have caught glimpses of her more feminine side when she spared the baby metroid(best move for her in the entire game series).
Samus also isn't blindly loyal to the GF since in Metroid fusion you destroy their Metroid breeding stations,the Sa-X and a Federation Space station all for good reason's but it still count's as a betrayal of sort.
Lets not forget Metroid other M will expand on Samus's personality and story.
Edit:That first Samus pic is awesome!

lol @ the concept Nintendo took any inspiration from a game they likely gave little to no ****s about
I highly doubt the Zero Suit was even remotely inspired by SC: Ghost's version of the HEV. Yeah, Zero
Mission released 2002, and it was in production for far longer than that, as in before Ghost was even announced. StarCraft isn't (sadly) that huge a name outside of the RTS/PC landscape, and why would Nintendo care about some Western title developed on a platform they didn't even work on?

Sure, you can argue 'but StarCraft was ported to N64' but that doesn't mean Nintendo actually cared all that much.
Anyways, that's my two cents on the Zero Suit. As for the similarities between Nova and Samus? Well, it's far simpler to say that Samus established an archetype for female characters that many others now follow, rather than many people simply inspired by it. Remember that Samus was the original break-out role for female protagonists in gaming, so it's easy to see why many others would follow in her footsteps. Whether or not this was a conscious design choice by Blizzard, I'm not sure.

I dont think so. Samus looks nothing like a girl untill she takes her armor off unlike Zero.

First off, I'd like to congratulate you (AzraelBlack) for obviously spending much time and thought on this topic. This puts it above roughly 90% of the topics made lol I'm glad somebody found a way to get Metroid onto this site, it is truly an epic series. There certainly are parallels one could draw between Samus and Nova. As Sunlight stated, Samus may have more or less set the bar for female protagonists in general.

Quote by Destroyer

On the subject of Samus personality we have caught glimpses of her more feminine side when she spared the baby metroid(best move for her in the entire game series).
Samus also isn't blindly loyal to the GF since in Metroid fusion you destroy their Metroid breeding stations,the Sa-X and a Federation Space station all for good reason's but it still count's as a betrayal of sort.
Lets not forget Metroid other M will expand on Samus's personality and story.
Edit:That first Samus pic is awesome!

*face palm* Gah how could I have forgotten. It has been years since I have played those games, decades almost. Eagerly awaiting Other M.

@Dorkmaster

Thank you! It's definately interesting to look at. Inspiration came to me while I was playing Corruption earlier that day. Just remembering both of their stories and visuals really clicked.

On the topic of the zero suit and Samus looking nothing like a female. Technically the Zero suit has been around since the first game. Upon 100% completion, Samus takes of her armour, in which you see her in a bikini. That was the first iteration of the Zero Suit. However her gender was known.

It wasn't until metroid fusion in which her Zero Suit was given the look it has now.

@ gwoodkid

Nuh-uh, Samus is way cooler! >.>