Let's get the pink elephant out of the room first: Yes, the story is bad, and sadly, not in a cheesy way. It's not terrible, as in, it could've been a lot worse and it's full of dumb stuff, there's the Samus character-breaking moment with Ridley, a whole "Traitor" subplot that doesn't get "officially" resolved, and some of the actions characters take are baffling. There's scenes that defy all logic, like the Deleter getting out of a certain cockpit, when there was no possible way he could've gotten out without Samus seeing him, and with only one way to run... and right after that, they show him at another place, doing stuff... Yeah, the story is all over the place, but rest assured, it could've been worse, I think.
Gameplay-wise, the game doesn't know what it wants to be. Most of the combat has a very arcade-like feel, which I love, with Samus auto-targeting, and you only have to mash the 1 button in order to shoot. Dodging is accomplished by tapping any direction right before being hit, and Samus will dash away, press 1 during the dodge, and Samus will insta-charge her beam, for a quick counter attack. Samus also has a "Finishing move", done by running towards the enemy while charging your beam. So it seems the game rewards quick reflexes, with a fast combat designed on offence, right? Well, you'd be wrong. The game does away with enemy drops(Meaning that combat is completely pointless, unless the doors get locked, the only thing you can get out of the combat is the possibility of getting damaged), instead, in order to recharge your missiles, you have to stay put in place, point up with the Wii-mote and hold the A button for a couple of seconds. And to recharge your health? After your HP falls below a certain threshold, you are allowed heal back a fixed amount by following the same procedure to recharge your missiles. Staying put in a fast-paced game? Kinda breaks the flow of the game, don't it? It doesn't end there, shooting missiles, the most aggravating gimmick of the game, you have to point at the screen with the wiimote, at which point the game switches to first person, in the direction Samus was looking at(So, if you just dodged and need to counterattack, you need to reposition yourself. With the digital pad. That lacks any precision. FUN), hover over your desired target, and hold the B button for a second, only then will Samus ready the missiles allowing you to shoot them with A. Oh, and you can't move while in first-person. Shooting missiles never manages to feel right, it will probably make you hate the controls for the first part of the game. Luckily, once you get the Plasma Beam, you are no longer forced to use missiles, since bosses are suceptible to the Plasma Beam, and the game becomes fun. But until you get said upgrade, the controls will get in your way. The game is not hard at all, even though the enemies deal a lot of damage, but it's easy to dodge... until you need to aim with the cursed missiles.
The game suffers from this arcady action focus though... Metroid games are associated with exploration and discovery, so they tried to have that in the game, by placing power-ups scattered around, some only accesible with the right tools... and then you go through a door and the game locks it behind you. Once again, it doesn't know what it is: Is it an arcade-action game? or is it an slower paced action game? It doesn't know. It places power ups all over the ship, but it locks doors, so that you are always moving forwards, the game keeps contradicting itself in this regard all the way through, until the end-game, when you are allowed free access to the whole ship.
The Devs also placed some really annoying and flow-breaking moments in the game: Pixel hunts. Every now and then, after a cut-scene, the game will have you "find" something while in first person. It breaks the flow of the game, it's a dumb mechanic, it's often obtuse, since you might be pointing at the right place, but the game won't register it unless it's the exact pixel it wants you to look at. Sometimes you'll also get mini-boss battles in first-person only, which consist in aiming at the right target and shooting missiles. Heck, the last boss is one of this dissapointing first-person... events. A really lame way to end a game.(Luckily the post-game has the most epic battle in the whole game, so it's worth playing just for that one fight).
Graphically, the game looks gorgeous, I dare say it's the best looking Wii-game I've ever played. Characters look very detailed, and while the animations are not the best, rarely do they look awkward. The music is... all borrowed from past games, so if you like Metroid's soundtrack, you won't have any problems with it. Finally, voice-acting is... great, actually. Specially Samus, while I was initially put off by Samus' cold, monotonous voice, eventually it sank on me: This. This is how a battle-hardened bounty hunter is supposed to sound like, which is what makes Samus' voice-work so excellent. The rest of the cast pull off a convincing job too, but Samus is a standout among them.
All in all, the game is not all that bad, it has some very fun mechanics, but they are hampered by a really bad story and the game's identity crisis.
It's a 5/10.
No comments:
Post a Comment