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Ok, I completed the first Metroid Prime game earlier today. Been a while since I played that game and it been almost 7 years since the game was released yet I kept finding myself playing it. That demonstrate how tightly designed and polished this little gem is.

Oh yeah, this verison of Metroid Prime is part of Metroid Prime Trilogy set, so it gotten major control interface overhaul and few additions and changes. Does it lived up to my expectations?



GRAPHIC

Gritty and realistic. One of the kind art direction that really take atmosphere and immersion to the next level. Enemies behave realistically and machines roared to life with creative animations. Environments teeming with life of outerworldly creatures and plants and architecture. Level design brilliantly established the tone of entire game with focus on exploration and backtracking that didn't interfer with art direction and natural setting. Oh yeah, they added some of bloom effects and it look prettier than ever 3nodding

Back in 2002, graphic and arts were considered incredible and one of best around. Now, they seems slightly dated, but they aged nicely because gritty realism and atmosphere and setting are still breathtaking to look at. This game setted the benchmark for many other games to follow.

9.5/10



SOUND

For Metroid Prime soundtracks... think Super Metroid soundtracks on steroid with full musical and choir tunes.

For sounds, they heavily remind me of tightly polished movies with all of those bell and whistle in term of sound effects. The developers thought of everything with sounds for machines, enemies, weapons, and environment ambients.

Amazing.

10/10



PLOT

The plot is both simple and complex, depending on how the player blaze through the game. If the player wish the plot to be simple, they can avoid scanning everything and follow the flow of the game that can tell pretty good story without any of texts. If the player wish to scan just about everything there is, he/she would be rewarded with incredibly deep plot about Metroid universe, Space Pirates' motive, Chozo's tales of their last days, and appearance of Phazon on Tallon IV, which sparked the major central plot in entire trilogy.

However, the plot in scans went through some of revision in Pirate Logs and Chozo Lores to fix some of plot inconsistancies from the GCN version of Metroid Prime and the results is quite mixed. Pirate Logs got the better deal at the end with recent revisions to remove any mention of meeting Metroid Prime creature which should be impossible because of the Temple's shielding. The revision of Chozo Lores didn't seems to be improved because the graceful tone of sheer poetry and metaphors from GCN version were totally transformed into something that's bit easier to read. In my opinion, this revision forced out the charms and mystique of Chozo, which made me quite sad because they fixed something that was never really broken in first place.

All other scans and rest of plot developments are pretty much intact for the best, the simplicity and complexity of story is what make this game incredible to read and play through.

9.8/10



GAMEPLAY

So... this game got overhauled in term of gameplay with Wiimote function and controls. YAY!

But no Grapple Lasso and niffy interface function from MP3. AAWWW...

Yet the Metroid Prime was never meant to have those kind of gesture-based interface in first place and the gameplay remain largely intact. YAY!

Yeah, I don't really miss Grapple Lasso and other interface such as pressing button, turning cranks, pumping, and lifting levers. Metroid Prime have its own experience that really make up for the missing gestures from MP3. Big derelict spacecraft, naturally entangling paths, huge world with lot of variety in areas, enemies hiding in nook and cranny, sneaking into Pirate bases, tumble around in Morph Ball, sinking into lava or water, reclaiming your weapons and abilities, and more.

Not to mention that pointer function really heighten the experience because looking around while moving is really europhic and natural. You would be able to suck in the atmosphere, immersion, and isolation when you look upon Chozo Ruins, Magmoor Cavern, and Phendrana Drifts for the first time. Traversing through lands and caves while blasting away enemies are now hassle free because of fluid motion the Wiimote can offers. Even boss battles performed slightly better with more intensity because of pointer functions (Thardus stole the show for this game in my opinion.) Now Metroid Prime really feels like Super Metroid in 3D.

However, it is not without flaws.

Even though pointer function suppose to improve the experience and make targeting enemies easier, very few of enemies are quite difficult to point and/or target (if you have Free Aim option on) and blast them away. Sometime, larger enemies move too fast for your beams to hit. I think this is attribute to the hit detection areas that each enemy have, which might be largely unchanged. If the hit detection areas were to be little bit larger, then the experience would be smoother.

Also, I am surprised that Meta Ridley had few additional set of moves which, in my opinion, made him slightly deadlier to battle against. Metroid Prime changed the way it use Lasso function, but it didn't detract from experience. I still wonder why Core Essence of Metroid Prime didn't have any extra set of moves? It would make this final FINAL boss battle epic and more interesting. Totally missed opportunity.

Beside that, the core Metroid Prime experience are largely improved thanks to the Wiimote, even though there's very few new flaws.

9.5/10



FINAL THOUGHT

Back in 2002 when this game was released to public, many fans, gamers, and critics hailed Metroid Prime as one of greatest games ever made and possibly the BEST game of its generation. To me, this notion still holds true even to this day. Beside the few flaws this game possesses, it is the brilliant level design and settings, atmosphere, art direction, memorable plots, epic battles, and unparalleled experiences that propelled this game to all-time classics that still must be played by just about everyone.



Final Score
9.7/10



next stop... Metroid Prime 2. This is gonna be sooooo awesome 3nodding