Genre: Metroidvania, First Person Shooter
Year: 2007
Developed by: Retro Studios
Published by: Nintendo
Platforms: Wii
#57
Feeling Like: I have an arm cannon
There are two things I remember about Metroid Prime 3: Corruption without resorting to wiggling down a YouTube rabbit hole. Ok, three things if you include how much I enjoyed my time with it.
1 – Motion control aiming with the Wiimote
2 – It’s the most cinematic, populated Metroid game by a mile.
I dug both changes, enough to put it one spot ahead of Metroid Prime 2: Echoes.
It probably shouldn’t be. The drastic swings Retro took made the third Prime entry wildly different from the first two. Gone is the lonely feeling of isolation and dread; you won’t go hours without any kind of communication from a friendly. Here in Prime 3, you are in the presence of others constantly, whether it be via a voice in your helmet, or a Federation Soldier wishing you well, or even shooting the breeze with fellow Bounty Hunters.
UG. THE FELLOW BOUNTY HUNTERS. I want a whole game around them, they look weird and silly and fantastic. Like futuristic space X-Men or something. Naturally, sadly, you’ll have fight them as they succumb to the Phazon, but for a brief few moments I got to fight alongside them. I wasn’t alone in a Metroid game for the first time and I liked it, though admittedly I wouldn’t want this for every Metroid. Tradition, and all.
The levels, while detailed and interesting, aren’t as varied as the other Primes. Images of greys and browns tend to dominate my memory, though I don’t think we can entirely blame Retro Studios. Around 2007, seemingly every game was obsessed with sucking out as much color as possible. It was a strange time.
I’ll also admit the soundtrack doesn’t quite have the same punch, though I think the Title Theme is the strongest of the three. Especially that drop at 0:29, oof. Chills.
What really got me, and I mean REALLY got me, was the Wiimote motion controls. I got a taste of what it would be like in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess with the bow & arrow, but here it felt like the controller was a literal extension of Samus’ (and my) arm. Aiming was as natural as possible, even better than with a mouse. Retro cleverly added in some enemies that you couldn’t lock-onto, so you had to rely on precision aiming which, I mean, does it get more precise than point and shoot? Even door puzzles where I had to twist, push and pull felt like a fresh addition. It may be gimmicky and I don’t think developers will ever go back to this type of immersion, but it sure as hell worked on me.
The nunchuk reticle was used for the grapple hook and just like in Skyward Sword, it made me feel like I was part of the action instead of just pressing a button. Maybe I’m not over this, maybe I do want it to return. Or perhaps it’s just best left in the past as a shimmering example of how unique controls can enhance an experience. But man, swinging around like Indiana Jones, or tearing off an enemy’s shield before slamming a charge shot directly in their face brings me the kind of joy that video games were built for in the first place.
If the previous Primes were akin to Alien, Prime 3 is a summer blockbuster with non-stop explosions. There are cut-scenes everywhere and far more camera angles showing Samus in a third person view, for better and for worse. It’s slightly jarring to see a tonal shift in this manner, but I’ll always take a developer trying new things over doing the same thing over and over again to avoid a game feeling stale. Even if I SAY I want the same thing over and over again, I know deep down that’s simply not true. I want the FEELING of what I felt before, but when I see a sequel of a beloved game not be as fresh, it can be disappointing. And it’s not like I didn’t enjoy the story; I loved it far more than the previous two. The clash between the Federation, Space Pirates, Dark Samus and the Phazon corruption means a cavalcade of constant conflict. Ridley is back, more deadly than ever. Your spaceship finally plays a bigger role, and being in the cockpit harkens a feeling back to Super Metroid when you first land on the Planet Zebes.
I had a really difficult time circumnavigating the ratings for the Primes and the BioShock series. They’re both very different, but for whatever reason they’re linked for me in terms of enjoyment and the timeline in which I played them. I couldn’t get enough and even if Metroid felt more like a video game and less like a modern, immersive experience, the puzzles and shooting felt far more up my alley. Dobbo and I couldn’t really choose between the two, so at one point we just hooked them both up next to each other and traded off when we felt like it.
Even if they removed the ability to switch weapons and added in some wacky achievements through no-longer-accessible multiplayer, I simply didn’t care. The rat’s maze of morph ball puzzles were as satisfying as ever; seeing the background of SkyTown shift around as I zoomed through miniature corridors of all types was the cherry on top. Fighting new, strange bosses that required more strategy than just blasting away meant I was engaged the entire time. Samus is so goddamn badass too, adding a “Hyper mode” where she just fires blue blasts of death at the cost of her health is overkill, but I’ll take it. Risk/reward, and all that.
There’s a reason why everybody is so hyped for Metroid Prime 4, whenever that’s coming out and it doesn’t look like it’s going to anytime soon. While Metroid Dread satiated our appetites for a time, Metroid fans everywhere are clamoring for a true sequel to the Prime series. We want to get back into that helmet, we want to see what kind of stuff Retro can come up with in a first person view with full HD graphics and hardware like Samus has never seen before.
The 500 