Metroid Prime: Blast Ball Gets Surprise Release, for Free, on the 3DS eShop

Nice, I wanna give this a shot, downloading now!

Hope this comes to NA. This looks fun. Though with MH Generations out just this past week, this timely might not have been the best?

Nice gift from Nintendo

Great news! I will dl when it comes state side.

always nice to get something for free

At first my pessimistic self was like "They must have so little faith in the game if they're stealth-releasing Blast Ball for free" but then I got it together. This is actually a great way to invest people in Blast Ball!

I'm ready to download it NOW! Flick the switch and make it available in the states, Nintendo!

Wow, this is a surprise! I'll grab this as soon as I can.

@ThomasBW84

The demo seems to be the same except they'll stop supporting the demo servers at some point, I think. That's all I've gathered so far, uses don't seem to be otherwise limited.

No way! This is awesome! Grabs 3DS

Awesomeness.

Eh, I'll try it. Free stuff is always nice, but this pretty much screams ''we're out of ideas on how to sell this darn game''.

NOICE!

So when does this game fully release?

What a lovely surprise. I'm one of the few Metroid fans actually looking forward to Federation Force. I'll give it a go this evening.

The controls take a little getting used to, but they're pretty good all things considered!

I will give it a try. Not a main series Metroid, but a fun alternative.

Great news, the positivity of Blast Ball is separated from the negativity of Federation Force! (If you remember there wasn't negativity of Blast Ball at the NWC last year but Federation Force in the digital event was full of negativity).

EDIT: Oh, it's essentially a demo.

AH! Now this is a brilliant move, I certainly will give this a download! I still have some confidence in the full game, and giving Blast Ball it's own little publicity, in it's entirety is awesome.

Does the demo have limited plays?

Wii U owners Nintendo?

@Grumblevolcano You can't complain both about them giving out a demo after a game launches (SF) and before a game launches, you should at least be happy about 1 of the 2 options.

This and SF, good job by Nintendo getting their games out there today.

@SLIGEACH_EIRE Well we just got demos for SFZ and SFG, so Wii U actually got 1 more demo than 3DS.

As a huge lover of dystopian sports like "Speedball 2" and a bit of vehicular madness of "Rocket League", I think I will be spending quite some time on this. Hope the servers can handle the load.

Whaaaaat!?!? Hell yeah! Nice surprise!

Will definitely be downloading and trying it out tonight.

Whoop whoop! Keep the momentum going Nintendo.

Props to them. They saw the backlash and are offering at least a small taste for free in the hopes of changing people's opinion of the game, if only somewhat. As someone that's given them lots of crap for the game, I recognize this is a really cool idea of theirs. They should do something similar for color splash

Going to at least give this a try

So wait....in North America, if I download now (the supposed demo) and they switch the servers over in September, will I lose my save/progress?

If that's the case, I might hold out until the official Federation Force release in September then.

I would definitely appreciate if anyone knows an answer to this. Thanks!

@ap0001 What do you mean "at least"? You better try it and love it.

Very nice! I'm not super stoked for MPFF but I will definitely give this a shot!

After five online matches, my personal verdict is that the game is as dull to play as it was to watch.

Being a huge metroid fan, im going to give this a try and Prime FF. I can see why Nintendo has made the game and Im going to support them because Metroid as a series really need to evolve. Im surprised Nintendo didnt drop the franchise long time ago as most of the titles barely breaks the 1mil point outside the first game and the first Prime.

In the end Nintendo needs to make profits and if Metroid was handled by any other Publisher, the series wouldve been dead long time ago. This franchise needs to evolve much like Fire Emblem did but Nintendo has been doing it wrong, that's all. Instead of going with the chibi graphics, they shouldve atleast made it look more like Ironfall for the 3DS where the graphics are more realistic.

Although I would think Prime FF wouldve been better if they just tried to copy Monster Hunter's gameplay instead and play as Space Pirates to fight big monsters and use their hides and skins to make armor instead of the Kingdom Heart's 3/something days like system with limited resource

All right, I'm in, but I'm totally into 7th Dragon now.

I was going to download this....until you said Democrats for NA. That turned me off to the whole thing.

@HeroOfTime32

I am also wondering this. Only one way to find out until others post info. Downloading now.

Gretna demo. Tight controls with a bit of a learning curve.

The demo has amiibo compatibility! So far only Samus, Mario and Luigi, Peach, Bowser, have given me anything unique. Strangely the Zelda ones (have em all so far) only gave a skull, no Triforce or anything neat. Splatoon, Star Fox, and Yoshi strangey yeilded no results.

This game no matter how good it is will be a huge waste of Nintendo's money. Horrible PR job and terrible foresight in the reaction to tacking on the Metroid name to this.

Awesome I've been saying this should have been a free too play or cheap standalone game on the 3DS and also on the Wii U.

@SLIGEACH_EIRE What about them? This isn't a Wii U game

I'm downloading it now with a skeptical attitude.

@HeroOfTime32 Why would you lose your progress? The servers don't save your progress on any other online game.

Well, then. Guess I have to try it out now. Will this cure my pessimism towards Federation Force? Who knows?

When Reggie said "just give the game a chance", I commented "sure, give us an eShop demo". I mustn't have been the only one in saying that, because it seems like our voices were heard!
Gave it a try, and the premise of a portable, mech-based Rocket League (key word being portable) doesn't seem that bad at all.
As long as you ignore the word "Metroid" in the title, this game is an awful lot of fun, really neat.

So EU has the better deal? Even when the game comes out we can still play this online? Btw Nintendo of America said it's for a limited time.

@Lzeon I guess what I'm asking is...for North America, is this a demo or the real thing? And how does that affect things when Federation Force actually drops in September? Bc I'm assuming blast ball will be in the Federation Force release, and I'm wondering if I shouldn't even waste my time with today's release if any progress I make is all for naught.

It's free, so I'll give it a shot later, even though it's probably not my sort of game.

I have tried the demo and while I'm not interested in the Blast Ball mode, it allowed me to see that the controls are quite good for the 3DS. It felt like an actual Prime game, and I'm sure it will be quite fun customizing the mech and playing the actual missions wich are the ones I really want to play.

@rjejr @Lzeon Sorry I misread the stories headline.

It does appear that Europe get the entire game for free, without any time limits, as seen here:

https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Games/Nintendo-3DS-download-software/Metroid-Prime-Blast-Ball-1125616.html

Demos don't usually get their own game page, nor does this page actually reference any time limit of any sort, meaning, yes, Europe has got the entire game for free.

Sweet deal. Totally downloading this ASAP.

This is a very interesting way to promote the game, kind of similar to Splatoon's Global Testfire. They should do this for future online games too!

One glaring problem I'm seeing is the lack of an option to play online with friends. I hope the full game will fix this.

Ah NoA, being poopy compared to NoE is what you do best.
Still if it's at least a limitless demo I'll give it a demo. Probably won't play it more than once though so the death of the online servers isn't too big a deal, especially since if I want to play a futuristic sports game I already have the far superior Rocket League.

Has anyone checked if the demos are region locked? Can US and EU players play together, or is it restricted like in Triforce Heroes?

Edit: There doesn't seem to be any way to play online with friends at all.

@HeroOfTime32 Just an fyi, Federation Force launches on August 19th, not in September.

Olliolli is free too

@IceClimbers nice, even sweeter. I'll probably just hold out till the official release then. Thanks for the tidbit.

hmmmm. I've been playing it. It definitely has some fun moments, but it feels a little tedious at times.

I played, not terrible, but the mario & sonic olympics demo is, surprisingly, more interesting.

I'm glad this is just an optional mode in the full release. Played for about an hour and it's just another classic chance-based experience rather than skill-based, just like Mario Kart. There's a cheating item that allows the opposite team to randomly disable the entire adversary mechs, leading to instant goals usually. Unpredictable results, no matter how good you do at first minutes... anyway, it's perfect for playing casually with friends, definitely not recommended for people obsessed with winning streaks since it's so unbalanced.

You also need luck on online to find players that don't keep disconnecting or lagging.

Controls are awesome though.

so is it the full blast ball mode? or just a demo of the blast ball mode?

Doesn't look like high priority buy for me since I saving up for the FE Awakening Sale bonus and Blast-ball isn't for me to be playing for a long while, granted it's a small mode but what I've played is pretty sweet! The controls being Prime like and attention to detail on the graphics is astonishing. The death animations on the enemies could be better tho.

@rushiosan Yea they need to fix those servers. Online battling was pretty bad, but I do like the fail safe of having bot join your game if one or all of the other people drop.

Played it for 15 min and think it's pretty dumb so far

I gotta try this soon.

Tried it. It's terrible. Moving on.

Sorry Nintendo, but it'll take more than that to tear me away from 7th Dragon.

Nintendo North America just cannot seem to get it. Offer the Blast Ball for free and you get a huge number of online players playing that mode and you might entice them to get the full game eventually.

Balls.

After playing it, it's nice they gave it free, but EUGH. Those who are somehow actually interested in this game and the full versions, do yourself a favor and get a CPP or a New 3DS. The default gyro controls are beyond awful. If you're a 2DS owner like me, you're screwed unless you enjoy using awful controls.

It's listed as a demo on the NA eShop, but nowhere else. Pretty sure it's the exact same thing as in Europe, just that we know the servers will go down in September.

Well i was always skeptial about this game but this demo may have changed it

@crimsontadpoles online play is not region locked

Kinda tired of being that guy but hey, why not?
Who, in the next month is going to find enough enjoyment with this cheap, plastic Metroid knockoff that they'd actually be willing to pay for it or even play it in 6 weeks?
You know it's bad when the Other M haters stop complaining about that steaming pile.
It's like the new Zelda. For me it looks awesome cause I hated Skyward Sword. Not as much as 'grappling' with the camera in the Wind Waker, or the slight delay when scrolling in Zelda 2, but pretty close.
Unfortunately for Nintendo, this is somehow worse than Other M, and even free, isn't worth freeing up space to download.
Sorry about the fact it took rebooting a 20 year old franchise to make you relevant again Nintendo, but you've lost touch with the only audience that still gives two clumps of kitty litter.

How do they keep screwing up the simple things?

Free in one region, locked/demo in another. Just have a single plan for the rollout!

Sweet, will get today!

I'm loving it so far! Blast Ball is seriously a LOT more fun than it originally looked. The controls are great and the customization is a nice bonus!

Let's hope it's not as awful as the starfox demos

If you play enough, you get a trial/demo of the real FF. It's alright, it's no more 'a better' version of Prime Hunters.

Honestly this is like a bad version of Rocket League, I gave it a fair shot but its just so dull and not that fun. Nintendo should just get Rocket League on Wii U or something.

Its essentially Rocket League but with mechs, but its surprisingly okay

Just saying you people should stop hateing on this game it's metroid and how often do we get another one plus blast ball is somehow fun it's kinnda like rocket league but diffrent

ive just played it and i really like it this has potential

@Grumblevolcano No it is not a Demo. They have released the FULL version of one of the mini games in the full game.

There are NO restrictions on this game. Solo play, local multi-player and full online multi-player.

Will download, but I am not hyped!

@akaDv8R It is a demo because the online doesn't function when Federation Force comes out.

Yes I'm soooo excited! All aboard the Hype-Paddleboat!!

@Marce2240 cool!

This game needs 3 things. Faster mechs. Larger arenas. Lighter ball.

I found this game boring and felt that the controls were a little too clunky. I hope the main game in Federation Force isn't as dull as this was.

Meh... give us a real Metroid game or gtfo