Dark Samus

Discovered by Prime Hunter

By hitting Dark Samus with a Hyper Missile at the following times, she can be stunned for several seconds. Even if you mistime the shot, she will put up the barrier that protects her, which usually cancels whatever she's doing at the time:

• Right after she stops moving
• Right before she starts moving
• As she's about to lower her missile barrier
• During certain ground attacks

Later, when she starts cloning herself, you can turn on the X-Ray visor to see which DS is the real one. The real one is the one that doesn't blend into the background.

When she has a single clone and the two of them start spinning around with the lasers, you can easily avoid them by morphing. You can also attempt to Hyper Ball the two of them by staying inbetween them for some quick damage.

Once she starts spinning around with the two clones and attempts to collide with you, you can avoid this attack by Screw Attacking across the battlefield. As as added bonus, they usually end up spinning right through your Screw Attack and damage themselves in the process several times per crossing. (This can sometimes kill one or both of the clones depending on the timing.)

Alternate Method: Discovered by Prime Hunter

During the battle on Normal difficulty, it may be faster to continuously fire the uncharged Hyper Beam at Dark Samus in order to do damage. If you are fast enough, you can drain Dark Samus down to about 1/2 health and skip the cutscene where she first splits in two. By continuing this method of attack, Dark Samus can end up in a constant loop: She splits into three, rushes into the sky to recharge, and as soon as she drops down again, she will head to the center to collect the three and begin the process again. There is a few seconds between her landing and collecting the three versions of herself where you can get in plenty of fire and do significant amounts of damage to her, making it so the that loop has to only occur a few times before the fight is over.

This method of attack appears to work well on Veteran difficulty as well, but at a slower pace and without skipping the cutscene where she splits into two. However, there is also a greater chance that Dark Samus will be able to move into a different attack due to this slower pace, so use the strategies above to deal with them if that happens.