Topic: Metroid Prime 4: The Long(er) Wait

Metroid Prime 1 can't be a perfect game if the shooting mechanics and enemy designs were improved upon in the sequels. It's definitely the most dated game, with the graphics looking noticeably less involved than even Echoes. I think the third one is the best entry point personally, but it'll totally spoil the first game for you since the lore and all the scan entries are basically all alluding to the same couple things.

Also, I don't know why Metroid Prime 4 has to be especially hard. All of the Prime games are hard, the lesson 4 should take from Echoes is to have a strong antagonist.

@KirbyTheVampire Just forget about the scanning. Aiming with the left stick was a weird decision, but you're able to adapt after a while. I'm currently working my way through Prime too. The last time I played Prime was probably 10 years ago, so I had to relearn the controls after playing any other FPS that came after Prime. Targeting enemies with L makes up for the lack of twin stick controls, kinda.

There's a reason why there's no C Stick control and it's because they have a ton of abilities to fit on the Gamecube controller. The C Stick is instead used to switch beams (which you can't really tell at this point because you don't get your second beam weapon until about halfway through the game). Camera controls really aren't bad, but they take some getting used to, you have to hold down R to aim and you can use L to lock on.

Alternatively, if you don't like that you can get the Trilogy versions on the Wii, where you use motion controls to aim instead of R. That actually works pretty well.

@Haru17 I played the Metroid Prime Trilogy on the Wii (the one with that rather sleek looking steelbook) and although I have no qualms in agreeing that the original Metroid Prime has aged the most, it is still my favourite one if only for being the first 3D Metroid similar to how we were all happy and giddy when we played Super Mario 64 for the first time, as well as the different locales and environments.

The music is arguably the best of all three games too. Stepping out into Phendrana Drifts for the first time and hearing that music still remains my favourite moment in the entire Metroid series.

I thoroughly enjoyed Echoes however, the repetition of the colours purple, purple and even more purple in the dark world just made everything look the same. And having to fetch light/dark ammo in the latter half of the game made the pace somewhat uneven in parts. Thankfully, the boss battles are some of the best in the Metroid Prime Trilogy, and I liked Dark Samus as the villain.

Corruption was okay. I liked the intro where you really felt a sense of dread and isolation, and having to actually use your ship to fly to different planets was something I missed (after the lack of ship-action in Echoes). I didn’t mind the Wii motion controls, but I felt that the pointer controls made the game too easy, just like it did when I replayed Resident Evil 4 on the Wii.

I only died due to my own mistakes or the one time that the Wii remote wanted to be recaliabrated itself in the middle of a boss fight. Talk about good timing!

I honestly believe that the reason why I didn’t have as much fondness for Corruption as the first two is simply because I personally didn’t feel like it did anything new, and that I was kind of worn out of playing three Metroid Prime games on the trot. The lack of newness and surprises dragged it down a little bit.

Still, despite me being burnt out by the time I eventually completed Corruption, I continue to regard the Metroid Prime Trilogy as the greatest series of games you can ever hope to play.

In saying that, I do hope that Metroid Prime 4 does something different, whatever that ‘different’ happens to be. I wouldn’t grumble too much if it follows the same formula as the first three games however, it has been fifteen years since the first Metroid Prime came out, and I would expect something (slightly) new.

On Switch the controls would probably be same as Prime 1/2 on GC except the right stick used for movement, L used for beams, R being the function of Z on GC and ZL/ZR being the function of L/R on GC.

@KirbyTheVampire If you're scanning only to get story information, then you can filter for the most important (logbook) parts with the red scans, as opposed to orange. Lore comes mainly from computers and writing on walls.

@Bolt_Strike Y'know, I always found it strange that only Japan got the separate New Play Control versions of 1 and 2, while the rest of the world had to wait for the Trilogy. Even though Metroid typically sells worse over there.

Fun fact: Everyone took to bashing Nintendo for supposedly not doing anything to celebrate Metroid's 30th... except the North American release of the original came exactly 1 year later! Does it not make more sense to celebrate the date where the game sold best?

@Grumblevolcano I hope you mean right stick for camera movement.

@BLP_Software Yes, just like virtually every other FPS.

I was about to say that. Right stick for walking would be almost impossible.

@Grumblevolcano Okay. You said right stick for movement and without specification that implies actual character movement.

Which would be wonky as hell. Can ya inagine that?

@meleebrawler Oh okay, good to know. Thanks.

@Haru17: I agree with most of your post, particularly about Echoes being a good candidate for a remake. I personally found myself wanting to know more about the Ing and the Luminoth. I spent part of a drive recently trying to imagine what that Luminoth city must be like; that's an area that's just begging to be explored.

@DarthNocturnal: Ah, I'll try the Light Beam by itself next time. Thanks! I defaulted to the Annihilator Beam due to the auto lock-on since I was having a heck of a time targeting the tentacles.

I did notice something a little odd with the Phazon attack I had to absorb, but I put that down to me being a bad shot. XD I wonder if some of it wasn't the game trolling me at that point.

@meleebrawler: I had a feeling that she (still) wasn't gone. I'm assuming that she plays a role in Corruption, though I won't pry much past that. You present an interesting way of comparing her motives to that of Samus.

Also, you forgot that she learns the move Insane Laughter around that level. XD

@KirbyTheVampire: The first game takes a little while to get going, but ultimately I'm glad that I stuck with it past the beginning. Most of the exploration and lore in the game really open up after the linear obligatory ship section. Personally, there's an upgrade over halfway through the game that I particularly enjoy using for puzzle and exploration purposes.

I do agree with you about the Save Stations, particularly if you're like me and your playtime is limited. That was a concept that they kept from the 2D games. I don't mind them too much, just that I wish there were more of them.

Edit: Missed the last page.

That was my favorite moment in Prime 1. While I think that a remake of the first game should offer some needed graphical updates, I still found this area quite impressive. Further proof, IMO, that graphics aren't everything.

I still daresay that Sanctuary Fortress is my favorite area out of the first two games, period.

I'm not sure I have a favorite part of Metroid Prime tbh. I like it so much that I can't choose one area, and in fact, my first playthrough frustrations and early game parts aside, I would probably just say "the whole game". Even the backtracking never bothered me much.

Though for the second and third games, it is the much easier answer of "the area that's technology and sky focused".

I guess Frigate Orpheon would be my favorite part of Prime 1 because of the music and because water levels are supremely atmospheric. Phendrana had some nice secrets in some of the later areas, but I was never impressed by it since I played the Prime games 3 -> 1 -> 2. In that instance the graphics actually did matter to me because the ruins in Phendrana seemed generic and didn't convey enough about the Chozo to make me want to know more. Like Luminoth ruins always felt ancient and made of brown metal with many blades arcing out, while Chozo ruins circa Prime 1 just make me think 'tan.' I have a very distinct answer as to what I think of for the cultures of all of the Prime 3 planets, but I won't spoil them just quite yet. Also there was that random Ridley cutscene that just felt unfinished.

Prime 2 is more difficult. I like the rooftop area in the Sanctuary Fortress where you can look down and see the city, but I think the hydrodynamo (?) beneath Torvus is my favorite area. That little area felt like a dense microcosm of metroidvania puzzles, and it contains two really tense boss battles. It's unfortunate that they never seemed to explain the purpose of all of these pumps and pools right beneath the Luminoth's arena. That's something in-bounds and something that really ought to have been explained, unless I just missed the scan.

No, they never really explained what the purpose of the Hydrodynamo was, it's just sort of there. The key question there is whether or not it was built before or after Torvus flooded. The easiest explanation would probably be that it powers the temple, but the problem with that is that the temple was built before the flood, so why would they power it with water when it was just a regular forest? Was there some kind of pocket of water underground there that welled up when the meteor hit? And if it was built after the flood, why would they have suddenly needed one after the fact? The temple was already up and running, why does it need more power? Or is it for something else, maybe something related to the war with the Ing? There's no clear answer to this question.

EDIT: Actually now that I think about it, it couldn't have been built before the meteor because it has an equivalent area on Dark Aether (the Undertemple). So that does narrow it down.

Dear Nintendo,

Please don't bring back the Elite Pirates.

Thank you.

@Octane I mean I thought the Elite Pirates were fine. Easy to kill, if a bit loose in the hitbox department. The Berserker Lords were basically just an improved version of them, so imagine that plus 10 years if Nintendo knows what it's doing for Metroid Prime 4.

Elite Pirates can only be trouble if you didn't find enough missile expansions, the super missile is extremely effective.

@Haru17 Elite Pirates are fine, but don't throw some other pirates at me after the fight, whilst not having seen a save station for a good hour or so. I forgot the Phazon Mines was this annoying at times.

Anyway, I survived.

Just no color-coding the enemies this time. That's not a 2007 thing, let alone a 2019-2020 one.