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E3 Update: Evidence on the floor seems the initial guess I made
about the control scheme was off. See what happens when you cannot
play the game by yourself? It turns out that the control scheme is
closer to GoldenEye than Turok, as I originally suspected. The
control stick moves Samus; forward, back, left and right. The
C-stick is used to select weapon modes now, meaning a quick flick is
all that is needed. The L button is used to grapple, initiate
"scan" mode (after selecting the visor by tapping the
D-pad), and lock onto enemies ala Zelda (A feature early videos of
Metroid Prime showed, but newer ones have not). The R-button allows
a "free-look" mode, akin to GoldenEye's R-button
functions. A is used as the primary button now, with tapping being a
normal shot, and holding down charging your beam. B is now the
strafe button, and although I would complain about this, many
GameCube games have proven to me that one is quite capable of
hitting A, B, and Y all at the same time. X now moves you into and
out of morph ball, leaving the Z button functionless (As it should
be). The Y key, finally, fires missiles. This allows for quick
switching between normal fire and missile use; which, if the speed
of the Metroid larvae is any indication, is very important.
On November 18, 2002, Nintendo is on the verge to give Nintendo fans
two long-awaited signs of love, in the form of the hardest
ass-kicking female in the history of video gaming. That is the date
Nintendo is planning to release Metroid Prime on the Nintendo GameCube
(by Retro Studios), and Metroid Fusion on the Game Boy Advance (by
Nintendo itself). Both games feature a strong sense of the 'feel' of the last game in the series, Super Metroid on
the SNES, but approach the series from two completely different
perspectives. Metroid Prime is taking up a first person perspective,
whereas Metroid Fusion looks like it could easily be taking place
inside Super Metroid with its traditional third-person,
side-scrolling perspective.
Metroid Prime is a game that has seen many trials, tribulations, and
rumors, but in the end it comes out as a rewarding experience. The
story takes place after Super Metroid, as far as anyone can tell. In
that fateful game's final sequence (Recreated quite well in Super
Smash Brothers: Melee for those who were not around during the time
of the 1994 opus that was Super Metroid), the Mother Brain, upon
being defeated by the combined might of Samus and the larval Metroid
that she "rescued" from the Metroid home planet (Another
long story, recapped at the beginning of Super Metroid and played
out in the 1991 Metroid 2: Return of Samus on the Game Boy)
detonated the core of Planet Zebes, sending the planet's crust out
into the galaxy, never to be heard of again... Or so we thought.
Turns out a part of this crust has crash-landed on the surface of
Tallon IV, and a dormant Metroid was found. Our resident bug-killer,
Samus Aran, has been sent in to clean out the infestation, but it
seems from the footage that we have seen, that others have gotten
there first.
I need to stress that as of this writing, I have not played Metroid
Prime. I am going off of the pre-E3 press footage, which can be
found at Nintendo's official website. Hands-on reports from Rick and
other GameCubicle members will probably start rolling in quickly,
explaining such things as how the game handles, the mood, in-game
music, and other such fare that is best left out of this article.
The core of the gameplay will occur in a first person,
"exploration" mode, with obvious gun slinging elements
interspersed. The feel of Metroid has always been one of
exploration, and this will be conveyed to the player through vast
landscapes and a unique, "behind the visor" point of view.
That is, your field of vision literally starts at Samus's eyes, and
goes through her visor, where all information pertinent to the game
is displayed. The visor has multiple modes, but most of the time you
will be seeing the game through the Combat visor. Starting in the
upper left and going clockwise, the combat visor features: A
2-dimensional radar of enemy positions, a life bar (with energy
capsule indicator and visor mode indicator), a 3-dimensional map
that keeps Samus static in the center and rotates and moves about
her, a missile supply indicator, a weapon selection indicator, a
visor selection indicator, and an unknown bar (as no screenshots yet
have indicated its use). The interface is slick, and transparent
when it needs to be. The weapon selector and visor selectors, for
instance, are laid out in "crosses", and selecting one of
the options will slide the option from the outside of the cross to
the center, to indicate that it is in use. This allows for quick
selection of modes and weaponry, and hearkens to the Turok 2
"wheel" of weapons, which makes sense considering Retro
Studio's past. Logic would indicate that the D-pad would select
visor modes, and the "d-buttons" (A, B, X, and Y) would
select the weapon modes. The visor modes include standard (combat),
X-ray, "scan" mode (where you can get data on the enemy),
and thermal views. The weapons shown so far (which are indicated in
a clever use of hand signals probably indicates how her hand is
inside the weapon) include the charge beam, wave beam, freeze beam,
and what almost appeared to be the plasma beam, although I haven't
confirmed that yet. Missiles have also been demonstrated in the
past, as has the grappling beam. This humble Metroid purist would
believe that there will be a secondary menu that can select what the
four slots will actually contain, and therefore the weaponry can go
up into the dozens. This leaves the R button for shooting, charging,
and what not, and probably the L button to choose between missile
mode or not, although this will again come out with the hands-on
impressions.
I have been careful to proclaim that this is "mostly" a
first person game for a reason. The final button on the NGC (with
the C-stick and analog stick used for movement) comes in the form of
the Z button, which will be used to switch Samus into ball mode.
When this happens, the camera pans back to a third person mode with
a camera reminiscent of Zelda's, which leads a cinematic feel to the
whole process. Samus's bombs are still intact, although it appears
that there will be a system to keep a player from bombing themselves
upwards into eternity, like in previous games. The game will also
reportedly scroll back into third person view when jumping, although
again this is not a feature illustrated in the media I have seen.
I cannot do justice to the game's graphics. This is probably the
first case in my entire life when I cannot describe them properly,
for they defy convention. The world itself is dark, gritty, and
"lived in". Heck, you could probably go as far as to say a
war has happened in this environment! However, regardless of this
feeling, Nintendo and Retro studios has pulled off something that
most other post-apocalyptic worlds cannot: the world is not all
brown, it has a sense of vibrancy to it. From the varying
environments of Tallon IV to the space station that it appears the
game begins on, from Samus' own suit which reflects the terrain to
the space pirates and metroids and nastier things that she
encounters, the world has a visual flair that is purely the feel of
the GameCube itself. This game is pushing polygons and textures
harder than even Rogue Leader by the looks of it, and yet it is
silky smooth in everything it does. Samus' movements of targeting
enemies and putting her hand on her gun for balance look like a real
person is behind the visor, and rolling along at a breakneck speed
in the ball looks almost as if it could be a multiplayer blast...
but that is an issue we will touch later on. When she uses her other
visors, you -know- it, for each of them has their own style. The
X-ray visor moves four semi-circle pieces into the field of vision,
locking them down and beaming out the X-rays, and the scanning visor
zooms in the item she is looking at in real-time, which the video
demonstrated by her getting attacked in the middle of a scan. Water
drips down from her visor, as does blood which splatters onto it as
she defeats enemies, and other visual effects are everywhere. When
people are talking about this as a Halo-killer, do not take their
world lightly. This gets even more exciting when you think about
what they are not showing - namely, the scan of the single Metroid
larvae in the video declared it as an "alpha" Metroid...
Something that is -only- referenced if the other genetic mutations
of metroids are going to appear. Although it hasn't been confirmed
yet, my belief is that a Metroid nest has evolved on Tallon IV, and
a Queen is lying in wait somewhere in the game. If players remember
how the enemies of Metroid got enhanced for Super Metroid, evidenced
most notably in Kraid growing to be nearly 2 screens tall from his
barely bigger than Samus appearance in the original game (and even
further enlarged in SSB Melee), they can start to imagine how the
absolutely massive Queen Metroid from Metroid 2 will be enhanced.
This humble writer's only real hope for Metroid Prime right now is
that Tallon IV is inhabited, so we will get not only some urban
combat, but glimpses about how the universe unfolds.. and perhaps
people to save from roving metroids and space pirates.
Call it a blessing if you are a Metroid purist, call it a stupid
mistake if you are a big fan of Halo, but Metroid prime has -no-
multiplayer modes at all. For a game that seems perfectly suited to
it, not to mention from a company that is pushing communication and
gameplay between people, and an online plan that will be unveiled
around the time that this game comes out, Metroid just chose to be a
pure single player game. Make of it what you will; some theorize
that Retro or Nintendo wanted to keep the purity of the franchise,
others feel the single player is just going to be that good that it
doesn't need it. The ultimate answer won't be known for a few more
months, to be sure. I do, however, want to point out one final thing
to those who are angry about this.
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Regardless, this game is being heralded as a front runner for game
of show, although this is such an excellent E3 all around that such
a contention needs to be played before it can be made. Stay tuned to
GameCubicle for further reports on Metroid Prime.
Side Story: Metroid Fusion
But wait! We aren't done yet! Boasting a graphical style that could
be considered a per-pixel perfect translation of Super Metroid, as
well as being developed by the same people who made that legendary
game, the long-awaited Metroid 4 (as it was known on the GBC) looks
to be a stunning addition to the Metroid family --- not to mention
one of the most important when it comes to the story. According to
-this-, When the Metroid Larvae injected the power of the metroids
into Samus to defeat the Mother Brain (see above), Samus became
fused with her suit, to effects both ill and good. Not much more of
the story has been revealed beyond that, save for the fact that some
strange virus has escaped, and Samus cannot seem to defeat any
enemies that she faces until she gets an anti-virus. The game
itself, which again can be seen in Nintendo's coverage of E3, leaves
this Metroid purist with a very familiar, fuzzy feeling, but at the
same time strikes some haunting discords. Primarily, Samus's suit is
now a sickly looking purple and green, and her suit's helmet is
quite oversized. She wanders about with a severe hunched-over pose,
even when she runs. The star of this game so far seems to be the
enemies, though. All of them have a similar purplish look to them,
and when she shoots at them, the GBA's technical prowess kicks in to
show the enemies "morphing" into gel-like blobs. When
these blobs come in contact with other enemies, the enemies morph
and change into bigger, badder forms of themselves, which, when
defeated, revert back into the blobs and fly about some more. It's
scary, watching the footage, to think they cannot be defeated.
Early reports on the game said that it would take place entirely in
a derelict space ship, however the game footage seems to contradict
this. Yes, the game features a heavy dose of this space ship, which
bears an architectural similarity to the Wrecked ship in Super
Metroid, but there are also outdoor areas and cave complexes. More
of the game will be uncovered on the show floor, although I believe
that the story will mostly remain hidden. Shigeru Miyamoto has, in
the past, said that he wants to have Metroid Prime and Metroid
Fusion combine using the GBA/NGC Interconnectivity features, but he
also said that would not be a primary focus of the game, and for now
it appears as if the games are separate. How they each fit into the
timeline is a prime question, as the fusion between the Metroid's
energy and Samus doesn't appear to have gone away after she left
Zebes, yet she can get out of her suit at the end of the game (much
to the pleasure of many teenage and older men and boys).
One final note: I won't give it away here, but I will recommend
watching the official footage of Metroid Fusion to the very end for
a very revealing surprise on how the story of Metroid Fusion might
be interpreted. My own analysis aside, I think it puts Metroid
fusion into a much brighter light, and more than anything else, it
has made this particular writer giddy, for November 18th cannot come
around soon enough. |
