Honestly, I kind of understand where the "authorization" thing comes from, since unlike most other Metroids there's no real justification for upgrades to her suit, which is based on ancient technology, to be lying around a space station. All the other games had her go to Chozo ruins except for Prime 2, where half her upgrades come from some other ancient civilization that we can presume is for some reason compatible with Chozo tech and the other half comes from the vilians who stole said upgrades at the start of the game, and Fusion, which had her gain powers through absorbing the X-virus thingies.
The problem is just that as much as upgrades to her suit lying around the space station relies on a lot of suspension of disbelief, the staright-up fucking stupidity of the authorization thing requires even more suspension of disbelief, and more importantly, said suspension of disbelief is much more conscious. Literally fucking everyone who plays the game is going to question why she needs Adam's permission to use any of her abilities. Only a small percentage of the people who played would have questioned why Samus starts without any of the shit she gained in previous games and why shit that powers up her suit is lying around the space station.
Even knowing the actual reason doesnt make it any better. Its a complete head on collision between story meaning and gameplay meaning.
Lets lay out whats actually going on:
To be precise, Samus needs 'authorization' because it was part of the clause she accepted as a verbal contract to be hired onto the mission.... And she follows it with near inhuman proffessionalism for a mercenary (Shes not a bounty hunter, like most fictional bounty hunters, shes a mercenary, bounty hunter just sounds way cooler). From a story standpoint, this is very reasonable. Mundanely reasonable. WHy put something this mundane in a video game about alien planets and arm cannons and shit?
From a gameplay standpoint, this is bullshit. Metroid is based on learning through observation and doing. The player does whatever the hell they can possibly think of, observes the outcome, and learns, the world design is arranged in a way where the player naturally discovers, through learning, 'the path', the resulting sense of satisfaction that results from this is damn near fricking cathartic. Instead this game constantly smacks the players hand everytime they try to do something, and 'the path' is shoved down their throat.
The reason Adam authorizes certain things is because he is strictly following doctrine called Rules of engagement and escalation of force. Apparantly the greatest military mind in the future of space and tight body suits bases his entire existence on two basic methods of military fires discipline, with all the finesse of about a half hour google session. From a story standpoint this is ham fisted military representation... Its about as botched here as everywhere else in media.
From a gameplay perspective Its more bullshit. You do not put Samus 'Hey guys look, my arm is a freaking 155mm cannon' Aran under rules of engagement, or escalation of force. What a load of boring crap.
The mission, is not a search and destroy mission.
Again, I repeat because this is important, the mission, is NOT a search and destroy mission like every single other metroid in existence.
It is a vip extraction mission. Its a search and rescue.
Search and destroy, you go wherever you want, do whatevr you want. kill every damn thing between you and your objective with extreme prejudice, and all the power you can muster.
Search and rescue, you tediously and carefully try to find a civilian on the battle field, making sure you dont cause any collateral damage, in the way most efficient and time sensitive to ensure the highest rate of extracting the target alive.
Which one of these sounds like it would make for a more entertaining experience?
Because its a search and rescue, Adam actually states he doesnt want samus' ridiculously powerful weaponry (A single one of her normal missiles destroyed a bulk head lock their ship laser would take hours to burn through) accidentally blowing the civilians to be rescued, so he he sets up rules of engagement including escalation of force, he will observe the escalation of force, and authorize the bare minimum force he believes Samus would need to acheive victory with minimal collateral damage.
He defers his authority to Anthony to increase his level of force via his own judgement. :/
So thats that for the weapon systems. But what about things like the grappling hook?
Well, rescue mission. We stop chasing lizard ridley and go back the other way instead of using grapple beams, because Adam wanted to return to searching for the civilian, which his info showed was the other way.
I shouldnt need to get into what I think of this from a gameplay standpoint
And what about the Suits? Why didnt adam authorize the suits?
Adam never authorized the suits. He never said 'Im authorizing the varia suit samus'.
Samus just... never equipped the suit, and he popped in and said 'Samus, equip your varia suit'.
I dont know why Samus didnt equip her varia suit. She just didnt. Adam went 'Hey, equip the damn suit its hot', not 'I authorize you to equip your heat protection suit'.
Why the hell didnt she turn on the gravity suit the second we were in a super crushing or upside down gravity area? Why didnt she turn it on in a fight against a creature that manipulates gravity, why didnt she turn it on until the last second when she was being sucked out int the vacuum of space?
I dont know. It doesnt make any sense, but its what actually happened. Authorization of the suit, is not a thing that actually happened.
Lets look at this from a gameplay perspective.
WHY THE HELL AM I NOT FINDING MY OWN GOD DAMN SUITS AND POWERUPS HIDDEN WITHIN A LABYRINTH OF BRILLIANT AND SINISTER DESIGN IN A METROID GAME!!!!!???? If there is nothing to actually find, then what the hell am I going through this pale parody of an imitation of exploration for?