Metroid Prime (Gamecube) Review
Metroid Prime is the next in the Metroid series, but the first of the series which I have played. Its story is of intergalactic bounty hunter, Samus Aran, and her ploy to take out the evil Space Pirates once and for all. She has tracked a Space Pirate frigate to a low orbit around the mysterious planet, Tallon IV, upon boarding the frigate you quickly learn the controls, and by scanning absolutely everything possible, you get a bit of an understanding of whats going on.
The graphics of the game are quite simply put, AMAZING! Smooth incredibly detailed rendering and the weather effects are to die for, with snow, for and rain that sticks to and then drips down your visor. The maps of the game are enormous, and packed so tightly with detail its not funny. Lighting effects are also very well presented, with a part of the game I recently finished having only the light of stasis tanks, meaning that the Thermal Visor had to be used to find my way around. There is nothing I can think of that is bad about the graphics, they are just that damn good! They put the graphics of X-Boxs Halo to shame.
Like all games sound and music play a very big part, and are present so clearly in Metroid Prime that at some parts it has a survival horror feel to it. Although the music gets repetitive, it cant be helped due to the size of the Game Cube discs, but the music still r0x0r5. (Excuse the 133+). Being the man of music that I am, I can see where it could have been improved to be more atmospheric, and have that little bit more of an edge, but it was still very well done.
The most important aspect of any game, the game play; Metroid Prime sees some the most in depth and best edge of the seat game play, that I have seen in quite some time. Its not just your average run in and shoot everything, then shoot a boss as much as possible till it dies game AKA: FPS. As many magazines have said it like an adventure FPS, which is true.
I will use the first level to show this IF YOU DONT WANT THE FIRST 15 MINUTES OF THE GAME SPOILED SKIP THIS PARAGRAPH. You start of on the orbiting Space Pirate frigate, you go in, and find that its not what you were expecting, all the Space Pirates are dead or dying, instead there are creatures, most of which are in containers and cant hurt you, but you have to scan everything, and activate things to get to different parts of the ship. And look for small passages which contain secrets, which you can only get to via Morph Ball. After a lot of scanning, and some exploring you come across the first boss of the game, the Parasite Queen, but you dont just lock on and shoot her, you have to figure out how to hit her. Before the ship blows, and in the process partially destroys your power suit.
You start the game with the basics, your Combat Visor, and Scan Visor, your normal Power Suit with no extras, and your basic Power Beam (with no charging capabilities), due to this you spend some time exploring Tallon IV getting all the other bells and whistles back. You begin with one energy tank, and over length of the game get them all, each energy tank ups your health 100 units, there are also missile expansions to get, which up the total amount of missiles to be carried by 5 each time.
Because its not just another first person shooter, the game play of Metroid Prime really stands out, over the last week or so, all I have done is played this game, and am continually finding new things which impress me. There are many different foes to be killed, including Metroids themselves, the Space Pirates, balls of energy, and a myriad creatures native to Tallon IV. The Space Pirates dont just come in one variety either, there are several kinds of them, from flying, to invisible (Predator type invisible.) different creatures having different weaknesses, and are killed better by different weapons, some can only be killed by certain weapons and so on.
The bosses of the game are incredibly complex; the second boss took me a few times to get the timing and the tactics just right, and then the third boss was just insane and took about 10 minutes or so to kill. (I have read that some bosses take up to half an hour to take out, I dont think Ive had any of them yet)
Not having completed the game yet, I wouldnt know if it would have much replay value, although being the best game currently on the Game Cube (my opinion dont hurt me Zelda fans) I will definitely be playing it through again a few times. So far I am about half way through and it has taken me about 15 hours, so technically it should be around 30 hours for the entire game, which is pretty good by todays standards. There is no multiplayer.
Graphics 9.9
Gameplay 9.9
Sound 9.0
Tilt 9.0
Value 9.0
Rating: 4.5/5
