Metroid Prime Impressions

I\'ve put in 3 hours of Metroid Prime gameplay, and so far the high acclaim from journalists is well-deserved IMO.

Graphics: Some of the textures aren\'t groundbreaking, but in general this is arguably the prettiest game ever. Very organic, lots of effects, tons of stuff on-screen, 60fps 99.9% of the time.. it is astounding at times. Everything makes so much sense. Your visor/blaster/etc interacts with the environment; if it\'s raining, look straight up and you\'ll see raindrops on your visor.. look down a bit and the gun\'ll get wet.. look straight down and your back is getting wet. I love it. Everything is ultra-varied as far as textures and polygons go. Sure, there\'s no bump-mapping or detail textures (as seen in TS2, Halo, and Unreal) but there is so much stuff in every environment that you\'ll be floored anyway. The draw distance is great too. No, you can\'t see a mile away like in Super Mario Sunshine, but there are big outdoor areas being drawn with tons of enemies on-screen at a constant 60fps.. with the pre-mentioned high levels of detail. Those level designers put in over-time I tell ya, because nothing is obvious. A lot of the platforms and stuff you see appear to have been constructed out of rubble.. there are few solid bridges here folks.

Sound: I love it, I love it a lot. It fits extremely well.. exactly how Metroid should sound in 3D.

Music: I love it, I love it, I loveitiloveitiloveit! *kicks his feet up in the air* Especially that main menu theme! Yeah, there are new songs and remixes of old Metroid favorites. (this will become evident once you reach Tallon IV)

Gameplay: Okay, this game makes two things very obvious. A: It\'s a Nintendo game, B: It\'s a Metroid game. Perhaps the best 2D-to-3D transition I\'ve seen. It\'s not evident at first, but get far enough into the game and WHAM! it\'ll hit you like a sack of bricks: Metroid Prime is Super Metroid in 3D. Polished like you wouldn\'t believe.

To get into gameplay specifics.. well, I\'ll say it again: Super Metroid in 3D. The physics are better this time around though. The Morph Ball is awesome, the jumping is surprisingly good.. the visor system works well.

Now.. the biggest concern for many players is control. Let me tell ya.. it\'ll be a wee bit difficult to get used to.. but once you\'ve sat down for an hour it\'ll be second nature. The lock-on targetting (reminisent of Zelda 64) is spot-on, and the controls are very intuitive. One thing you might want to do is drop your "FPS" mentality because this game doesn\'t control like a Halo-style console FPS; it\'s more like GoldenEye but even a little different than that!

Finally, longevity.. is Metroid Prime long enough?

I saved it at 3:05 into the game, explored lots of areas.. and it says 8%.

If you have a GCN, drop what you\'re doing and buy this. If you don\'t have a GCN, drop what you\'re doing and buy one with Metroid Prime. And if you have something against Metroid.. just give in. Otherwise you\'ll be missing out on one of the best games of this generation.

I played it for 3-4 hours over at my friends house today.

TO make it short I personally think this is one the GC best games so far, as I have not been impressed with previous GC games, other than the boring RE

I am going to have to get this one I suppose. Thanks for the impression Blade.

Amazing, brilliant, gorgeous, beautiful, superb, kick ass...quite possibly the best thing to come out of this generation, IMO. And I\'ve only put an hour on it!

To anyone who was worried about it not retaining the look and feel of old Metroid...worry not. Retro did their homework and put so much effort into this game. The environments are amazing, the music is excellent, and the action is so reminiscent of past Metroid games.

To all the naysayers, I\'m very pleased to say you were 100% wrong. They have pulled off the morph ball in a way that can\'t be described...the grapling hook is equally a pleasure to pull off. (Although I\'ve only used it 2 times so far).

Fighting enemies...it\'s fast, frantic, and a blast. Locking on is easy, strafing, and side dashing is a breeze.

The experience thus far earns a 10. Everything is here and you\'d be fooling yourself to think this is not Metroid or a great game.

Copied and pasted from another thread...I\'m now at 3 hours and 12%..it keeps getting better:)

[Living-In-Clip]

Bah. I\'m playing it now and I\'m not impressed...

-keeps goin\', just in case I\'m missing something-

Well, it\'s offical. I hate this game. It\'s yet another FPS with a shiny new coat. I don\'t see how any of you can say it represents the Metriod franchise in a good manner. It\'s a disgrace. Samus should be 2D and it\'s that simple. Oh, lookie, I can use a scan visor. Blah, blah.

-goes back to Metriod fusion and puts Prime away for the rest of time, until a desperate moment at least-

[Jumpman]

It\'s yet another FPS with a shiny new coat.

Your negative opinion, or everyone else\'s beyond positive opinions...tough call.

LiC: Your opinion seems so negative that I\'m not sure if you\'re joking or serious..

Yeah, the first area (space station) left me feeling.. bleh too. I mean, it\'s a decent introduction (with the superb escape and all) but I thought that the opening to Super Metroid was better. Once I got deep into the main game though, I felt a lot of the same stuff that I felt in Super Metroid and the other Metroid titles..

Except that it was first-person. Retro did a great job, but it\'s obvious that Nintendo had a big hand in development because a lot of this game reeks of R&D1 (original Metroid team) and Shigeru Miyamoto.

I see hints of Mario and Zelda in MP.. and only Nintendo themselves could do such a thing.

Retro Studios is great, though.. I can\'t wait to see what they\'re working on next. I don\'t care if it\'s a franchise game or not, if it has the polish that MP has.. I\'ll be pre-ordering way ahead of time!

Hopefully it won\'t take as long though.. (preliminary work on MP was started in early 1999)

LIC...that was predictable.

You\'ve been protesting the game since it was announced.  

I have to disagree with your "it\'s just another FPS".  It\'s clearly in a league of its\' own and you obviously haven\'t played it enough to get that impression.

There is so much to explore...I just got the morph ball boost and space jump...I\'m going back to previous levels and finding more stuff.

Seriously, let the wall down for a minute and give it another go.

[Jumpman]

LIC...that was predictable.

You\'ve been protesting the game since it was announced.

I can back this up, in fact, I was the one who was always trying to tell him that Metroid wasn\'t going to be another FPS and said it was still possible to have the same classic Metroid feeling in a first-person perspective. I hate to say it, but LIC is just being ignorant here.

I don\'t think this game is AMAZING, incredible, speelbounding etc...

I do think it\'s a great GC game, and deserves a hand or 2. Personally I liked HALO WAY WAY better, none the less this is a game in it\'s own class.

In its own class and "liked HALO WAY WAY BETTER" are very contradictory terms.  If it\'s in a class all its own, you can\'t compare it to Halo.  

After playing MP, my opinion dropped on Halo, big-time.

It\'s got good physics and solid combat, but MP is more immersive.. more hands-on. MP > Halo, easy.

I haven\'t even finished Halo yet. It got too repetitive, and no level in the game could match the quality and fun factor of "Halo" and "The Silent Cartographer". MP on the other hand has no levels, and the gameplay goes beyond the simplistic FPS stylings of Halo. Halo is still a good game on its own merits, but IMO MP is better.

Hits Blade over the head with my xbox...

don\'t compare them!!!  They are totally different games...both happen to be top class.

In its own class and "liked HALO WAY WAY BETTER" are very contradictory terms. If it\'s in a class all its own, you can\'t compare it to Halo

Not really, but you do have a point. Let me better explain myself.
Not the same game, but still in the same ball field way out in the back. Both are FPS(say what you will) etc... to make this short they share cetain simularites, but in the end metriod is a different game. Out of the 2 I find HALO to be far more emersive to me, it\'s grabs my attention much stronger than metriod does.

Like you said RYU it\'s almost like comparing apples and oranges.
People here in this thread are finding this game to be GODY which is very much there right, I on the other hand disagree, I think it\'s an excellent GC game but nothing more and can see why some are not drawn to this game.

Fun game to play, but seriouly I have had enough of MP after playing another 2 hours today.

Here i\'ll give you a FPS that beats MP and HALO....are you ready


Unreal Tournament BABY!!!!!!!!!!!! Best game I have ever played in my life all due to it\'s online factor

Ginko: I\'m fully aware of their differences. I\'ve been playing FPS\'s since 1994.. they\'re my most-played genre. Halo is not comparable to MP in most cases, but I feel that MP\'s first-person single-player gameplay is superior to Halo\'s. Halo is a great game, but is overrated IMO. After playing games like MP, I look back at Halo and it seems bland.