Not really sure what possessed me to play Metroid Prime: Federation Force in 2022 other than morbid curiosity but wow, I really tried to go into this with an open mind and it is simply fucking dull. Without a doubt the worst Metroid game I've played. Other M was at least really interesting in the myriad ways it was bad and the twitchy action could be fun at times even taking into account the boneheaded decision to map everything to the sideways Wiimote.

This game takes the worst aspect of the original Metroid Prime games, the combat, and just sort of slaps it into a mission based, exploration-less, progression-less action shooter. I will say that I played this solo (as if any of my friends were buying a copy of Federation Force in 2022, lol), which I'm sure does take some enjoyment out of an experience that is clearly focused on co-op, but the way that the game is designed I don't feel like I missed much. Even Metroid Prime Hunters had the sense to give each character their own flair, in this game, you and anyone you might somehow manage to get to play with you get the basic beam/charge beam/missiles and a couple of other extremely throwaway elemental shot types to take on a grand total of around 5 basic enemy types and the occasional boss or miniboss. The level design doesn't even make for interesting shooting arenas, oftentimes enemies will be given all sorts of elevated terrain to leap around on that your stumpy jump can't reach, restricting you to a flat featureless plane on the ground to circle strafe in.

The blocky, chibi character designs obliterate any sense of atmosphere the game might try to build, though the bland, C-rate movie soundtrack was already doing a good enough job of that on its own. The final boss fight with Samus might be a bigger offense to her character even than Other M, where you get to see her brainwashed, hit with a growth ray that hilariously has been one of the main focuses of the bone dry, vapid plot up to this point, and then slowly, aimlessly roll around as a giant morph ball for 15 minutes as you try and take potshots at her with your dinky normal beam because anything else is not going to be accurate enough to hit her weak spot.

I kind of was hoping to come away with this having found a hidden gem, because I love Next Level Games. Every other game they've made has been at the very least "quite good" and Luigi's Mansion 3 is one of my favorite Switch games. Between Luigi, Punch-Out, and Mario Strikers, they seem to be genuinely passionate about the projects they choose to take on. I'm shocked so see how wrong it all went here and how soulless this entire project feels. Glad to see both Next Level and the Metroid series in a much better place now.

...If Stylux is really the main antagonist of Prime 4 hoo boy Retro is going to have to pull off a miracle to make me give a shit about what's going on with him

Wuhu Island + Miis is just way too sterile of a vibe for a game like this. SNES Pilotwings, mainly through its incredible soundtrack, managed to create a great atmosphere despite having other issues holding it back. 3D is a great feature for a game primarily centered around landing your aircraft just right, but the music consists mostly of uninspired, tepid remixes of prior Pilotwings tracks, and the mission design is far too basic and uninteresting. I think a great Pilotwings game could absolutely exist, but it doesn't seem like the sort of thing Nintendo would ever put the time and effort into getting right.

This game is tough as nails, and not necessarily in an interesting way. Having a guide is practically required in order not to pull your hair out navigating these maps, the encounter rate is absolutely ridiculous, and this is one of the first RPGs I've played in ages where I just had to do some honest to god grinding at times. While all that is perhaps rightfully considered outdated design by modern standards, I think enough distance has been put between me and this era of games that I can view it simultaneously as frustrating and charming. For a game that prioritizes being charming, that's a plus!

Though I will say that in comparison to its successor, Earthbound Beginnings doesn't quite reach that same level of charm and emotional impact for me. I think a lot of this is just due to the game being a bit more sparse dialogue wise in general than Earthbound, but even the NPCs that do have something to say don't manage to be quite as entertaining. Curious to know how much of that is due to translation work as well.

So yeah, it's very much Proto-Earthbound as many claim, but as a huge Earthbound fan, seeing where a lot of those ideas first gestated was a great experience for me. Also, the soundtrack is just wonderful, and this game's version of Eight Melodies is one of the few NES songs to give me goosebumps. Would recommend first playing Earthbound and seeing if you enjoy it before going back to this, and it's not for the impatient, but I walked away with a lot of respect for this project.

Trades in the more complex and varied copy abilities of the prior 2D entries for a huge step up in level design and a great amount of variety by other means. Introducing the hidden missions in every level was a pretty genius move and incentivizes exploration far more than prior entries. Helps that the reward, building up the town, is such a joy! Tons of passion and love was put into this project and it really shows. Also the postgame is fantastic and the music is superb. Didn't feel like doing a more deep dive/analytical review for this one even though you absolutely could because hey, it's Kirby! The perfect series to just have a fun chill time with.

I am not even good enough to get consistent wins on Standard difficulty, but I can't help but be blown away by how good this is. A genuinely challenging racer with great track design and possibly the most legit sense of moving at blistering fast speed I've ever felt in a video game. The slightest touch of the control stick will send your racer careening off in that direction, so micro movements and mastery of the drift is key. This very touchy control at such a high speed combined with the difficulty makes each race white knuckle. The boost being tied to your health is such an astoundingly simple yet well thought out risk/reward mechanic that I'm shocked every arcade racer didn't start copying it. Total masterclass of a game.

Oh yeah and the soundtrack freaking rules

Certainly not "another showcase of Valve's world class game design" or anything, you literally just sit and watch real time cutscenes for half an hour interspersed with occasional extremely barebones shooting mechanics that are obviously meant to acclimate you to the Steam Deck controller. For that reason it's not great, but I also don't hate it because it's not trying to really be anything more than that. The humor was also less consistently solid than the prior Portal games (which themselves did not have a perfect track record).

But as a way to kill half an hour? Sure, might as well. Mostly just reminded me that gyro controls rule and should be standard on all games that require you to aim with any amount of precision.

The prose and production value are such huge steps up from the first game, but the boost in quality sacrifices none of the outsider art sensibility and charm that its predecessor has. While much like the first game it seems a bit scattershot, this works to the game's strength in a way, giving it the feel of a journal of disconnected thoughts from an author who is hesitant to dig into any one thing too long lest it excavate feelings and memories they'd rather keep buried. At only around an hour, please check this out.

It's super rough around the edges, it's not as fleshed out as it could be, and the production value still leaves a lot to be desired (the fact that they still just fade the screen to black every time a cutscene would require something more than the default set of animations they've made is laughable). Yet... it's the most I've enjoyed a Pokemon game since the series went 3D with X & Y. Not a game I thought Game Freak was even capable of making, and I hope a lot of the shakeups to the formula they've done here carry over to Gen 9.

Game Freak, please hire some 3D dungeon designers every cave or temple just being like 3 hallways is getting embarrassing

Oh wow people weren't just overrating this due to nostalgia it's actually good what the heck

What aged well:

- The music. Grant Kirkhope is imo not nearly on the level of David Wise, but I do think this is some of his best work. Charming and catchy.

-The movement. Look, the movement options in Banjo are moreso a set of discrete states that you can switch between, rather than something fluid, dynamic, and momentum focused like Mario 64. That said each of those states does feel good on its own and the rate at which you unlock them is perfectly paced.

- The level design: It's by far the best part of the game and it's frankly astonishing that it's this good. As one of the first "collectathons" Banjo gets everything that makes that sort of game engaging. A wide variety of objectives, worlds that are big enough to explore but small enough to not feel like a slog, and secrets around every corner. For being Rare's very first 3D platformer they set a standard here that would not be matched for several years, from what I hear of DK64 and Tooie, especially not from their own games...

-The credits. Folks, games need to bring back credits sequences where they treat every enemy and boss as a "cast member" and have a big roll call where we get to see all their names and they do a little fun animation. What are we even doing out here in the modern era of the medium that we've forgotten this great joy of the video game platformer.

What didn't age well:

- The last two worlds: Ok I said the level design was great and on the whole it absolutely is but I think Rare's idea of ramping up the challenge for the end was "make one world have tons of opportunities for cheap deaths that make you collect every note in the level over again" and "make a world so huge that it's impossible to figure out where you missed something" and that's certainly not how I'd like to see it done.

-The final boss: Between this and the last two worlds Banjo's biggest problem is sticking the landing. This is just not a well designed fight and relies exclusively on your mastery of the two jankiest moves in the game.

-The camera: I can give a pass on this considering the time it came out but yeah of course the camera is bad lol

-The humor: Kazooie can be funny at times but man this just comes off as mean spirited (and straight up offensive to overweight people pretty much constantly). A bit of it's time as well in that respect unfortunately.

As someone who grew up just after this era and has never really known how much of the mythologizing of Rare (especially N64 Rare) was warranted, this game is the proof that Rare really did have something special going on that translated into 3D. Was nice to experience it for the first time and find it lived up to the hype.