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The current title is from a guide or other published source.
Super Metroid Silver Space Pirate
Silver Space Pirates are the most resilient form of Zebesian Pirates encountered in Super Metroid. Sometimes dubbed "Ninja Pirates", they are first encountered in Ridley's Lair several rooms before Samus fights Ridley, essentially making them his guards.
They are always encountered in pairs, and are characterized by their dull silver-colored armor, which is invulnerable to all types of weaponry in its normal state, including the Screw Attack. However, when they make a diving kick at Samus, their armor briefly turns golden. This change of color, which makes them temporarily identical to the weaker Yellow Pirates seen earlier in Lower Norfair, is the only moment they are vulnerable to Samus' Missiles, Super Missiles, or Charge Beam shots.
They attack by throwing their claws at Samus, somersaulting and by using two kick variations, one of which is only used at close-range. In order for her to defeat them, she must jump over them, which triggers them to somersault into the air and is immediately followed with a jump kick, leading to the aforementioned color change. Their defeat opens up a Metal Door and Samus encounters Ridley several rooms afterward.
A second pair is encountered during the escape sequence after Mother Brain's defeat when Samus reaches the original Tourian's ruins (which has since been integrated into Crateria). At this point however, Samus is equipped with the powerful Hyper Beam capable of killing both Silver Pirates in a single shot, regardless of their Silver coloring. Interestingly, all of the Space Pirates featured in the reconstructed Tourian during the self-destruct sequence are silver-colored, but unlike the pairs seen in Lower Norfair and old Tourian, they behave identically to standard Zebesian pirates. Through hacking or retaining Missiles in the escape, these Pirates are shown to have more health than most other Pirates of their color.
Trivia
- The second pair of "true" Silver Pirates (who's behavior matches those of Lower Norfair's) were specifically located in a corridor with a low ceiling, effectively preventing them from somersaulting and dive-kicking. Consequently, this also prevented them from turning yellow; were it not for Samus' newly acquired Hyper Beam, this pair of Silver Pirates would have been virtually indestructible with any of her other weaponry.
- The fact that the Silver Space Pirates turn yellow when jump kicking, makes it plausible that they have some sort of temporary shield or force field around them, which will disengage for a short moment when making a difficult movement.
- The Gold Space Pirates of Metroid Fusion behave very similarly to Silver Space Pirates in Super Metroid, as two must be defeated before access to Neo-Ridley is granted. These can only be damaged by attacking their backs, though the Screw Attack easily defeats them.