This game was pretty fun, but I really don't think it stood up up to the Metroid level of greatness.
The gameplay was fairly engaging and challenging without being frustrating. Most of the bosses weren't very impressive, but the atmosphere and artwork was very well done and engrossing. I particularly liked how, when you returned the energy to each sector, the environment changed noticibly - it stopped raining in torvus, agon and sanctuary brightened up a lot, etc.
A couple things kept this game from being really great, though. For one, the music wasn't very good. I liked the tune over the intro, but through the rest of the game it was "bleepy", unremarkable and repetative. The items you got weren't all that great, either. The dark and light beams weren't all that great and combined with the ammo requirement, I found myself only pulling them out to open doors. The charge combos for each ate up way too much ammo and frankly just weren't agile enough to be used on most bosses anyway. The annihilator beam wasn't bad, but I still wound up saving it for fear that I'd run out of ammo at the wrong time.
More than that the level design wasn't all that great. The obstacles felt like a system of artificial locks created to justify the keys you were given, rather than an incidental world(s) that existed for it's own sake, that you could navigate with the interesting powerups you had.
Also, what the hell is with the utter lack of voices? Is it beyond them to give Samus or the marines or the luminoth a few lines beyond the occasional "Oof!" or half-second blurb of unintelligible alien gibberish?
All in all, I feel the same way about the Prime series as I felt about the N64 Legend of Zelda - that it's just a game, and not thought provoking or intellectually stimulating in any way. The original was, the SNES version was.
I also feel that it wouldn't have taken too much to make the game about a thousand times better. Throw in some voices for the characters, maybe an FMV here or there, make each individual "room" three or four times bigger, add more, less powerful enemies and maybe even ambient creatures so everything doesn't feel so damn empty. A slightly less predictable plot wouldn't have hurt either.
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Maradon! attempted to be funny by writing:
All in all, I feel the same way about the Prime series as I felt about the N64 Legend of Zelda - that it's just a game, and not thought provoking or intellectually stimulating in any way. The original was, the SNES version was.
Oh you didn't
Ocarina of Time was the fucking shit 
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Kegwening:
Oh you didn'tOcarina of Time was the fucking shit
OoT was easily better than the Prime series, don't get me wrong, but it suffered from similar issues albeit to a lesser extent. It was mostly predictable, mediocre at times, and could have been a lot better imo.
One other problem I had was that Samus looked damn goofy at the end. Her hair was modeled bad (even taking helmet-hair into account) and she had a serious valley-girl look. She also wasn't wearing the two-piece she was in the SNES version Maradon! fucked around with this message on 09-26-2005 at 12:52 AM.
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Maradon! had this to say about Duck Tales:
OoT was easily better than the Prime series, don't get me wrong, but it suffered from similar issues albeit to a lesser extent. It was mostly predictable, mediocre at times, and could have been a lot better imo.
Yeah, well, playing it when I was maybe 12 probably had a lot to do with me holding it in such high regard. Were I to play it through when I was older, I probably would have blown through it in a day and never really thought about it again.
I guess that's similar to the annoying "nothing will ever be as good as the original mario bros because I played it when I was five years old!! THE PINNACLE OF GAMING! It's all down hill from the NES folks!" bullshit I see everywhere. All of you that read the previous sentence and are prepared to write an angry or elitist reply, don't bother. I don't care. Though I hope I don't become the same way with titles that were around when I was younger. YOU HOOLIGAN CHILDREN DON'T KNOW REAL VIDEO GAMES. 
Prime 1 was really fun, though not terribly memorable. I never got around to playing Echoes.
Prime didn't impress me. It had a lot to live up to, considering Super Metroid's badassery. Unfortunately it couldn't reach its potential. The controls are what did me in.
Prime Echos wasn't as good. Got tired of it, quit. It just didn't feel enough like a classic Metroid game. And putting ammo into the beam weapons was a bad idea.
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Maradon! impressed everyone with:
All in all, I feel the same way about the Prime series as I felt about the N64 Legend of Zelda - that it's just a game, and not thought provoking or intellectually stimulating in any way. The original was, the SNES version was.
I fail to recall what was so thought-provoking or intellectually stimulating about the NES and SNES versions of Metroid or Zelda. JooJooFlop fucked around with this message on 09-26-2005 at 01:06 AM.
I won't go into OoT.
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Suddar had this to say about John Romero:
I actually kind of agree with Maradon. OoT was fun but I've play LTTP through more times than I can count. It stays fresh for a long time, OoT doesn't have the same charm.
I'm the opposite. LTTP has gotten one, maybe two playthroughs from me. Maybe I'll play it again when I get another working SNES, though.
Suddar fucked around with this message on 09-26-2005 at 01:12 AM.
I'll still buy the revlution just for prime 3 though.
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Densetsuing:
Expecially having to press select to toggle EACH AND EVERY SPECIAL WEAPON.
You turned off weapons!?
Prime 3 may turn out to be better, but you're going to have to play it with a remote control. Maradon! fucked around with this message on 09-26-2005 at 01:13 AM.
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Suddar had this to say about Tron:
Super Metroid had awesome controls. You could do anything.
Except use another weapon while having the Grappling beam (which had really twitchy and crappy detection on it) selected. Or use missiles with the X-Ray Scope selected. Or use beam attacks with a Missile selected.
Super Metroid made NO USE of the shoulder buttons at all. It should be a crime to neglect controller buttons like that. Yeah, the shoulder buttons let you choose angles, but the GBA games have proven that only one shoulder button is necessary for that function. Not to mention that if you could use the Y button in conjunction with the normal Fire button to use missiles, the Y button's function would have been unnecessary.
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Maradon! said this about your mom:
You turned off weapons!?
No, because the combos that required you to turn off weapons weren't worth using at all. See above for my actual meaning.
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Densetsuing:
Except use another weapon while having the Grappling beam (which had really twitchy and crappy detection on it) selected. Or use missiles with the X-Ray Scope selected. Or use beam attacks with a Missile selected.Super Metroid made NO USE of the shoulder buttons at all. It should be a crime to neglect controller buttons like that. Yeah, the shoulder buttons let you choose angles, but the GBA games have proven that only one shoulder button is necessary for that function. Not to mention that if you could use the Y button in conjunction with the normal Fire button to use missiles, the Y button's function would have been unnecessary.
Wait a second...using the X-Ray scope paused everything else in the entire world, why the hell would you want to shoot anything with it on?
I really don't remember any of the problems you're complaining about.
Using a weapon while using the grappling beam...I don't think I've ever had to do that except maybe shooting down, which was easy. Suddar fucked around with this message on 09-26-2005 at 01:22 AM.
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Maradon! had this to say about Matthew Broderick:
Wait a second...using the X-Ray scope paused everything else in the entire world, why the hell would you want to shoot anything with it on?I really don't remember any of the problems you're complaining about.
I'm not saying the controls are the worst thing ever, just that they managed to actually make them better on a system with fewer buttons.
I can buy it for the missile weapons, but I loathed having to get ammo for my beams.
Though the boss fights were more technical than that of the first Prime, I actually found it more fulfilling to beat a boss in Echoes because of the skill required. The Chikka battle actually made me practice my grapple beam swings, which I thought were underused in the first game. The landscapes were very well made and intricate, and there were definite points in the dark world that the atmosphere was very creepy and unreal. Also, the addition of the Screw Attack in a 3D setting was done fairly well, though perfecting wall jumps was a major pain in the ass until I got it down. I thought the echo visor was an interesting concept, and the dark visor was not much more than a utility like the heat visor from the first one.
Gripes: Though ammo wasn't terribly a chore, it still prevented my using the different beams as much as I'd have liked. I hardly ever used the annihilator beam except to open doors and to use on beacons and crystals, and on the final boss. Maradon pegged the slowness of the beam combos dead on for the bosses, though if you dodged and aimed right, they could be used in some instances, like for against Chyklings with the Dark Burst and the Sun Burst against Quadraxis in its damaged state. Super missles were every bit as useful as always, but there were several enemies that made them frustrating to use against, like Pirate Commandos. Switching visors for some of the boss battles was a chore, especially when you didn't know which one would be required. And the whole Dark Samus thing was trite and awful. It was probably little more than an attempt to pit you against a boss with similar skills to Samus.
Other than that, I've liked playing both Prime games, and I'm seriously looking forwards to Prime 3, though the controller weirds me out.
And the only thing I hated in that game was those enemies that could infect your suit with a virus. Pain in the ass little doodads.
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x--Vinven D`SlyfoxO-('-'Q) :
You are responsible for this, aren't you?
No 
The ammo for the beams stoped me from using them other than on boss fights for silly combo shots if I felt like it. Even when ammo is sort of easy to get with the 4th weapon.
