An absolutely astonishing failure of a game. The fact that this game is regarded fondly by anyone for any reason is a fact I will never wrap my head around. My run through the game, or rather my run through the 60% of the game I could stomach before tapping out, was a revolving cycle of boredom, frustration, and bewilderment. I think it's worth going through each of those in turn to get to the core of why Metroid Prime just does not work as a game.
Boredom. The game is most easily broken down into two distinct gameplay experiences: Exploration and combat. Both of them, for different reasons, refuse to offer any excitement to the player. The game progresses on a completely linear path, which at best simply blunts any sense of adventure and at worst actively discourages players from exploring. Why take the time to travel down new paths when the vast, vast majority of them are locked behind progression checks in the form of various items? The game presents itself as having an open world, however it's anything but, and the mismatch of expectations to the reality of the experience does not serve Metroid Prime well.
Combat is another way the game attempts to lull players to sleep. The over reliance on lock-on mechanics removes the need to exert any amount of effort in the enemy encounters, while the abundance of health makes strategy unnecessary. The resulting combat systems are brainless, with every encounter playing out identically.
And man are there a lot of encounters!
Perhaps sensing how unfulfilling it is to wander the world, the devs opted to put a plethora of respawning enemies just about everywhere, thereby ensuring the player will be engaged in endless combat. The mental exertion of switching tracks from one brainless endeavor to the other is just about the only aspect of Metroid Prime that stops a Drinking Bird Toy from clearing the game.
These respawning enemies really highlight the most frustrating aspects of the game: backtracking and all the baggage that comes with it. It's a difficult topic to discuss, as backtracking is not inherently problematic, yet "Oh you just didn't like the backtracking" is a relatively easy cop-out. Backtracking is no problem at all in older (and newer) Metroid titles, so why is Prime different?
Being a first-person game, the movement in Prime is much clunkier than in any of the other titles in the series. The result of this is that movement is slower and avoiding enemies is more difficult. Both of these drastically change the dynamic of backtracking. Whereas in other games one could quickly (and skillfully) dash past or jump over enemies they've fought before whilst backtracking to an old area, Prime sees the player clumsily fumble through the arena. Combat, being as boring as it is, simply is not an option, but taking some damage while slowly bunny hopping through an area barely registers as a better experience.
So at this point, we can see that the player clearly does not want to explore unnecessarily. This is where Prime has the brilliant idea of giving less than zero direction on what the current objective is. Thus, the player has to wander around to every area they've been to before acquiring their latest item. What's beautiful are the amount of item checks that have a second item check right behind them.
Acquire the spider ball? Cool, just wander back to that area from two hours ago that has the spider ball track you remember. You trek around, trip over some enemies, arrive, and spider ball up only to find that you also need the grapple beam to do anything here, and thus have wasted your time. Then you have to plan your next move, again uncertain if you'll even be making any progress.
This tableau plays itself out endlessly over the run time of Metroid Prime. It's a hollow, frustrating experience. There is a hint system that kicks in after a variable number of minutes exploring. This only serves to soften the blow somewhat, as the dominant strategy becomes waiting around for the hint to show up, which is about as fun as it sounds .
What bewilders me is the reputation this game carries. What do people like about it? The clunky, meaningless, punishing exploration? The brainlessly simple combat? It's always good to make lists of three while writing, but there's literally nothing else going on here.
Scanning???
I've never failed so completely to grasp a game before Metroid Prime. It's not an emperor's clothes situation; I believe people are completely genuine in their admiration for the game. But I don't get it, and at this point, I don't want to get it.
Boredom. The game is most easily broken down into two distinct gameplay experiences: Exploration and combat. Both of them, for different reasons, refuse to offer any excitement to the player. The game progresses on a completely linear path, which at best simply blunts any sense of adventure and at worst actively discourages players from exploring. Why take the time to travel down new paths when the vast, vast majority of them are locked behind progression checks in the form of various items? The game presents itself as having an open world, however it's anything but, and the mismatch of expectations to the reality of the experience does not serve Metroid Prime well.
Combat is another way the game attempts to lull players to sleep. The over reliance on lock-on mechanics removes the need to exert any amount of effort in the enemy encounters, while the abundance of health makes strategy unnecessary. The resulting combat systems are brainless, with every encounter playing out identically.
And man are there a lot of encounters!
Perhaps sensing how unfulfilling it is to wander the world, the devs opted to put a plethora of respawning enemies just about everywhere, thereby ensuring the player will be engaged in endless combat. The mental exertion of switching tracks from one brainless endeavor to the other is just about the only aspect of Metroid Prime that stops a Drinking Bird Toy from clearing the game.
These respawning enemies really highlight the most frustrating aspects of the game: backtracking and all the baggage that comes with it. It's a difficult topic to discuss, as backtracking is not inherently problematic, yet "Oh you just didn't like the backtracking" is a relatively easy cop-out. Backtracking is no problem at all in older (and newer) Metroid titles, so why is Prime different?
Being a first-person game, the movement in Prime is much clunkier than in any of the other titles in the series. The result of this is that movement is slower and avoiding enemies is more difficult. Both of these drastically change the dynamic of backtracking. Whereas in other games one could quickly (and skillfully) dash past or jump over enemies they've fought before whilst backtracking to an old area, Prime sees the player clumsily fumble through the arena. Combat, being as boring as it is, simply is not an option, but taking some damage while slowly bunny hopping through an area barely registers as a better experience.
So at this point, we can see that the player clearly does not want to explore unnecessarily. This is where Prime has the brilliant idea of giving less than zero direction on what the current objective is. Thus, the player has to wander around to every area they've been to before acquiring their latest item. What's beautiful are the amount of item checks that have a second item check right behind them.
Acquire the spider ball? Cool, just wander back to that area from two hours ago that has the spider ball track you remember. You trek around, trip over some enemies, arrive, and spider ball up only to find that you also need the grapple beam to do anything here, and thus have wasted your time. Then you have to plan your next move, again uncertain if you'll even be making any progress.
This tableau plays itself out endlessly over the run time of Metroid Prime. It's a hollow, frustrating experience. There is a hint system that kicks in after a variable number of minutes exploring. This only serves to soften the blow somewhat, as the dominant strategy becomes waiting around for the hint to show up, which is about as fun as it sounds .
What bewilders me is the reputation this game carries. What do people like about it? The clunky, meaningless, punishing exploration? The brainlessly simple combat? It's always good to make lists of three while writing, but there's literally nothing else going on here.
Scanning???
I've never failed so completely to grasp a game before Metroid Prime. It's not an emperor's clothes situation; I believe people are completely genuine in their admiration for the game. But I don't get it, and at this point, I don't want to get it.
Marjar
1 year ago