OK I have been a Metroid fan since I have played Super Metroid the SNES (note I said Super Metroid I'll get to the original Metroid later.), the great graphics, the non linear game play, and great haunting music made this one of the best SNES games ever. It was a bit on the short and easy side but it's still one of the best games on it. Since then Metroid has been on an indefinite vacation with it's hero Samus only taking out her power suit out of the closet to kick some Pikachu and other Nintendo butt in the game Super Smash Bros. and it's sequel Super Smash Bros Melee. Well Nintendo has decided to bring the game back with 2 games that where released last Christmas season.

To tell the truth I didn’t rush out and buy either game because I was in the middle of Kingdom Hearts at the time and I didn’t have a game cube to begin with. Well when looking to buy the Nintendo lunch box I was crossed between getting a plantium one with Metroid prime or a purple one with Super Mario Sunshine, well since Metroid Prime was rated T and I didn’t want to tell my brother he couldn’t play it because it wasn’t a kids game, and Mario had a memory card and a few dollars cheaper I went with the purple lunch box with the Mario Sunshine in it.

Well since I wanted to at least try out Metroid prime I rented it and then went and bought it the day after. This is one of the best gamecube games out there, even surpassing that of Zelda the Wind Waker.

Story.
The chozo where a race of ancient bird creatures who decided to set up a colony on Tallon 4 completely void of any technology. Here void of any civilization trapping they enter a new era of spirituality and even learn to leave there body's behind. They left all there accounts of this in there lore carved in there ruins. All was peaceful on Tallon 4 unitl an unknown meator hit there planet and the chozo woke up from there dreams like ghosts. The meator spewed poison contaminating the atmosphere. The only thing keeping the Chozo going where visions of a young women showing up on the planet in one of there old power suits and kicking some evil booty.

Meanwhile Samus Aron has just successfully completed her mission of planet Zebes and eliminating both the metroids and the space pirates base from the planet (of course she was nice enough to leave the planet behind at least for now hehehe). She has tracked down the rest of the pirates who have metroids in there possession to Tallon 4 and is now on route to whipe them all out.

Graphics.
The game is done in first person and the graphics are stellar. The frame rate is always constant so there is no gritty ness or clipping on the graphics to screw you up, and there is no slow down what's so ever. Since Metroid Prime is a survival Sci fi horror game all the areas in the games match that. The rainy area from where you land to the Chozo ruins haunted by ghosts, to my favorite areas of Space pirate research where you don't know what's going to come after you. And there is of course the nefarious Samus reflection for when ever something like a missile blows up near you. These are all cool effects and make the graphics in this game top notch, best on gamecube next to the wind waker.

Sound.
The music in this game is quiet and muted which in some ways stinks when you consider the loud music in the original Metroid (that was thee best part in the original Metroid) but it's great when you consider it goes along with the atmosphere in the game, it's better to let the sound effects take over on this creepy rides. And there are a lot of good ones and I don't just mean the sound effects of Samus blaster either. You'll get from what I mean when ever you hear a Metroid or a space pirate scream that comes out of no where and you can't track it in till after you get hit.

Gameplay.
Ok now I have seen a lot of fan-boy cries on how this isn’t anything like the original Metroid because it's a first person shooter. Now most of these guys are basically old fogies that will complain about any old game franchise getting a new look they complained about the cell shading in Zelda, hell these people even complain about the ability of Link to jump in Zelda. These people who will cuss about any new game, these type of people I liked to beat the hell out of with a big stick if I could, it's not the 80's anymore and why I liked a lot of games that came out of the 80's it's now the new millennium time to move on.

Of course some of there complaints where justify Nintendo did license out to an unknown American 2nd party company called Retro Studios, and the original creator of Metroid died back in 1997 so would it be a good game. The answer is yes Retro did there home work and they created an awesome game for the game cube. Has far has it being an American company that also makes sense since in Japan where Metroid came from the games always seem to flop.

So what's the game like.
Well now you may have heard how great Samus is because she isn’t the usual dumb blond video game woman, nor does she have boobs that are big enough to suggest that nipple gouge is one of her special attack. But the Metroid series is still a game mainly for men it still has shooting, maiming and blowing things up ghar har har har.

Not to throw people into a complete mess from the get go the game has a training area in which Samus explores a space station that just sent out a distress signal. Samus starts out with more then the basic gear, a charge beam, a varia suit, a morph ball, and a grappling hook. But after the straight forward area she looses all of them and only has the ability to jump and fire. Then it's on to Tallon 4 to gain them all back and a few new ability's has well.

Now like the previous games Metroid Prime lets Samus roam free where ever she wants the only thing stopping you is either some barrier that won't open without a right weapon or some obstacle that can't be passed in till an item is found that let's you get through it. This of course means you can get lost easily and not figure out where to go. Luckily they added a map feature that not only tells you what your surroundings look like but where to go to. So when you at least have a general idea of where to go getting lost is just another way of saying goofing off.

Once you get to the area and get the weapon the map will buzz another area now accessible to do getting that weapon and item and you have to go there, this means of course there will be back tracking like classic metroids you will be having to go back to get through area's you couldn’t have before. Which is one of Metroid's prime biggest problems. The world is huge and while that's good for exploring it's bad whenever you need to get back to some place it can take 15-30 minutes to get back to some of the places you need. Maybe I have been spoiled by the Castlevania games and there warp points that are scatter through out the game to help sort problems like this out. There are done in Metroid so you have to backtrack on foot all the way.

Of course the long backtracks aren't Metroid Primes only flaw the first person view does contain another flaw in jumping. No I am not talking that Samus can no longer roll up into a ball and throw lighting bolts out her a$$ like in previous games. But jumping from platform to platform like you have to do in first person sometimes means missing one or misjudging the distance and falling down. This can be frustrating when having to scale tall cliffs and constantly falling down.

blood and gore.
While Metroid is a survival horror game and does spoof a few sci fi movies (aliens motley but I did note a few gags from movies like MIB and Ghost Busters) the blood and gore is virtually none. The most enemies in this game are usually giant insects of some kind, and Samus is the Orkon man (or woman). The only thing remotely looking like a human are space pirates but even they look more like giant insects. The most disgusting scenes you'll ever see is the space pirates space station at the beginning and a few of there corpses lying around. So does it still deserve a T rating. Yes it's still a first person shooter and it's still very realistic. And I won't talk about how many times something came down at me and nearly jump out of my seat.

Challenge.
Ok while Super Metroid was a bit on the easy side, Metroid Prime is not. There are huge bosses that all will probably take a couple of turns, and possible backtracks to find powerup's. Also the amount of enemies and distance between safe points can be enough to die just traveling around. Any way's expect the life support critical line appear atop your screen many times. It's still however easier and less frustrating then Mario Sunshine.

Unlockables (and Samus shows some skins)
The game does have some un-lockables like gallery's for finding stuff in the game, there are also different endings but the most you'll see of Samus is her face. but the biggies are the un lockables that use the GBA link cable with Metroid Fusion. If you beat Prime and link with Fusion the Fusion suit will then be un lockable in Prime. Beat fusion before linking you can unlock the original Metroid. The original Metroid is her and all it's 8 bit over hyped rose glasses glory. The only differences in the overall game is the screen is clear and the controls now match that of prime with B to jump and A to fire, guaranteed to confuse a few old timers who played the original Metroid. Of course I should mention is the ability to save passwords so all you youngins can now just save your password on the memory and not have to worry about writing down the wrong password. Everything else is still here from the original NES game, including the sub par graphics, the slow down, the flicker, and just for the heck of it color platelets changing. Of course if you beat it you get to see Samus in a bikini but then it's an 8 bit women nothing for even hormonial pump up teenagers to get excited about. You know I know a code to start off with Samus without her suit with a lot of game items to, but I am going to be mean and like the contra code keep my mouth shut, all right just one clue the code has to do with some guy named Justin.

Final Recommendation.
Metroid Prime is the best gamecube that I have played and is definitely worth a pick up.


Recommended: Yes