<P> The Metroid e-manga covers Samus' origins . She was born and raised on the Earth mining colony K - 2L, and when she was a child, the planet was raided by Space Pirates led by Ridley in an attack that killed her parents and destroyed the colony . The orphaned Samus was then found by a bird - like alien race known as the Chozo, who brought her to their home planet, Zebes . To preserve her life and ensure that her status as the "Protector of the Galaxy" would come to pass, the Chozo infused their DNA within Samus, which granted her superhuman athleticism and a strong resistance to foreign environments . In addition, they trained her in combat by equipping her with one of their artifacts, the Power Suit . Upon completing her training and being granted the Power Suit by the Chozo, Samus then enlisted in the Galactic Federation at an unknown point after leaving the Chozo, but left over disagreements with her commanding officer, Adam Malkovich . Samus then started working as a freelance bounty hunter, and has since been called on by the Galactic Federation to execute missions "because of her superior skills and sense of justice ." Most of her missions revolve around the galaxy whilst getting rid of unsavory elements, most notably the enigmatic organisms known as the Metroids, which can drain life energy and are frequently sought after as biological weapons due to their extreme durability . </P> <P> The style for the original Metroid game was designed to be a cross between the side - scrolling gameplay of the Super Mario series, the exploration and puzzle - solving aspects of The Legend of Zelda series, and inspiration from science fiction, particularly Ridley Scott's film Alien . The game's characters were conceived by Makoto Kano, while Hiroji Kiyotake designed the main protagonist Samus Aran . Samus' signature ability to collapse into a ball to travel through tight areas was initially called the Maru Mari (meaning "round ball" in Japanese) in before it was later rechristened as the Morph Ball in Super Metroid . The Morph Ball was conceived by the developers because it required less effort to animate than "a cyborg crawling on all fours", and the producer for Metroid, Gunpei Yokoi, took advantage of this shortcut . </P> <P> The series' co-creator Yoshio Sakamoto recalled, "We were partway through the development process when one of the staff members said' Hey, wouldn't that be kind of cool if it turned out that this person inside the suit was a woman?"' The developers voted on the concept, and it passed . The game's instruction manual refers to Samus as if she were male to obscure her real sex until the end of the game . Sakamoto noted that during the course of the Metroid series, developers constantly try to express Samus' femininity without sexually objectifying her . Samus' image was based on actress Sigourney Weaver in her role as Ellen Ripley from Aliens, and actress Kim Basinger from 91⁄2 Weeks and My Stepmother Is an Alien . Sakamoto and Kiyotake said that the character's last name "Aran" was taken from Edson Arantes do Nascimento, the birth name of the famous soccer player Pelé . </P> <Table> <Tr> <Th> Metroid story chronology </Th> </Tr> <Tr> <Td> <Ul> <Li> Metroid (Zero Mission) </Li> <Li> Metroid Prime </Li> <Li> Hunters </Li> <Li> Echoes </Li> <Li> Corruption </Li> <Li> Federation Force </Li> <Li> Return of Samus (Samus Returns) </Li> <Li> Super Metroid </Li> <Li> Other M </Li> <Li> Fusion </Li> </Ul> </Td> </Tr> <Tr> <Td> <Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> </Td> </Tr> </Table>

When did we find out samus was a girl