The Swap 2 might finish its first yr with a bang. However one large query mark nonetheless clouds my anticipation.
October 21, 2007: Wow, what a cool ending! Let’s see the way it continues!, I feel to myself on this (presumably wet) autumn day. Kimi Räikkönen has been topped the final Ferrari world champion in System 1 up to now. I’m 17 years younger, a brand-new trainee on the Wiesbaden metropolis administration, single, and have simply performed via Metroid Prime 3: Corruption on the Nintendo Wii.
November 6, 2025: Wow, what a cool sport! I don’t wish to cease!” I feel to myself on this (positively wet) autumn day. At 35 years outdated, schoolchildren now handle me formally on the bus. I’m a video games editor, blessed with a spouse and daughter, and I’ve simply lastly performed Metroid Prime 4: Past on the Nintendo Swap 2.
We followers needed to wait 18 years for a brand new Metroid Prime! The world has modified, I’ve modified, however Samus Aran has remained precisely the identical. Nintendo’s in-house bounty hunter has additionally had a troublesome time.First introduced at E3 2017, improvement was fully restarted in 2019, together with a change of builders.Nintendo invited me to Frankfurt so I might play Metroid Prime 4 at my leisure. The query that preoccupied me as a fan beforehand was: Will Samus make a profitable comeback?
Two hours of gameplay later, my coronary heart is cheering, “Sure!” however my head is screaming, “Be careful!”
A typical day for Samus Aran
The plot? Oh, simply on a regular basis life within the Metroid universe: aliens assault, plenty of bangs, bangs, explosions. Crash! Increase! Bang! One thing breaks someplace. Folks die, aliens too. Samus shoots, jumps, rolls, and opens doorways. She beats up the boss. A portal opens, and Samus is sucked in.
Our heroine awakens on the alien planet Viewros. She has miraculously misplaced all her talents—so all the pieces is as normal in Samus’s life.
Eighteen years of progress in storytelling and sport design have clearly left no mark on the essential formulation of Metroid Prime, and I’ve to confess: I find it irresistible! The story premise is so easy that it’s cool once more as an anachronism in immediately’s world.
Anybody accustomed to Metroid additionally is aware of that it’s usually the alien environments that inform the true story. As within the three earlier video games, you possibly can scan all the pieces that isn’t nailed down. Doorways, rocks, crops, enemies, animals…
Questions reminiscent of “What occurred right here?”, “The place do I must go?” or “Who lived right here?” are answered on this manner. Avid readers are rewarded with a deep background lore. Those that favor to shoot, nevertheless, will discover their manner round even with out extensively studying the ever-growing journey brochure.
Within the following gameplay compilation of my play session, you don’t should learn or shoot, simply watch. The fabric was recorded with HDR enabled and transformed to the SDR coloration area.
I’m 17 once more!
The gameplay of Metroid Prime 4 hits the mark for me. From the second I decide up the Swap 2’s Professional Controller, I’m that 17-year-old greenhorn once more. I’m amazed at how a lot I nonetheless get pleasure from old-school gameplay immediately.
I’m standing in a jungle. Dizzyingly tall bushes barely let the glistening daylight via. Throughout me, the inhabitants of this unusual surroundings are chirping and tweeting, and virtually all of them wish to kill me.
With my versatile arm cannon, I blast my manner via till I stand in entrance of historic ruins. Inside, I discover murderous aliens and tons of puzzles. Utilizing the brand new psy sensor in Samus’ helmet, I resolve little mind teasers to open doorways and activate switches.
Usually, all it takes is to activate a mechanism with psionic energy or hint a sample together with your finger. Is that this revolutionary sport design? No. However does it make the remainder of the gameplay devilishly enjoyable? Oh sure!
On my journey via the jungle and the temple advanced, I already come throughout many hidden gadgets that I can’t attain at first, as is typical for Metroidvania, as a result of I lack the mandatory abilities. I instantly really feel that excited tingling in my abdomen on the considered exploring each nook and cranny of this sport world in my pajamas on the sofa.
Promising: The combo of shooter parts and brief puzzles is effectively balanced within the part I performed, in order that the motion by no means degenerates right into a monotonous capturing gallery or a soporific puzzle-solving ordeal.
Nostalgia bonus: When Samus picks up a brand new potential, the everyday Metroid melody performs. the one. Ahhhaahhahhahaaahhahhaa… okay, that doesn’t work. Then like this:
As you possibly can see, Metroid Prime 4 doesn’t reinvent the wheel—fairly the alternative, in truth. As an alternative of leaping on the fashionable gaming bandwagon, Nintendo and the event staff at Retro Studios ship simple shooter motion and linear stage design within the outdated fashion. Like Doom: The Darkish Ages in Could 2025, Metroid Prime 4 takes me again to the great outdated days™.
That is nice information for followers. After 18 years, it appears like coming residence. Nevertheless, these hoping for a narrative presentation that meets immediately’s triple-A requirements and up to date comfort options (the 3D map is simply as cumbersome because it was once, and I don’t know whether or not to sigh or rejoice) will most likely not be completely satisfied right here.
The massive query mark
The linear Metroidvania sections are, so far as I can inform from my check, completely top-notch. After my trial session, I’ve little question that we will anticipate a gaming deal with to crown the Swap 2’s sensible first yr.
B-u-t. BUT. B-u-t. Now right here comes the however: there’s nonetheless the open-world-like space of the sport world. That’s the a part of the alien planet that Samus travels on her brand-new sci-fi bike with the considerably embarrassing German title Vi-O-La.
Nintendo video games and the significant filling of open worlds – this mix usually leaves one thing to be desired. Mario Kart World is the most recent cautionary instance. Followers are due to this fact understandably asking themselves: is that this mandatory in a Metroid sport?
And now guess which a part of the sport I wasn’t allowed to check out? That’s proper. So I’ll be sincere: I don’t have a great feeling about this. However perhaps I’m incorrect. I actually hope so, as a result of all the pieces else I’ve performed in Metroid Prime 4 screams “hit.”
Image good, so long as you don’t look too intently
The graphics of the Swap 2 model, however, are solely successful to a restricted extent. The sport appears nice – however you possibly can’t stand nonetheless and look too intently. That sounds bizarre, I do know. Let me put it one other manner:
At first look, Metroid Prime 4 appears gorgeous. The lighting is tremendous stylish, the consequences are explosive, each location is brimming with small particulars, and all of this on the Swap 2 in 4K/60 FPS or 1080p with a fast 120 frames per second.
Nevertheless, it turns into clear that that is basically a sport for the Swap 1 as quickly as you pause and take a better have a look at the stone to your proper or the wall texture to your left. Or the considerably coarse pixelated shadows. However who does that when your eyes are always being handled to new panoramas and unique areas?
The audio backdrop, however, leaves nothing to be desired. The weapon sounds, the ambient noises, and the orchestral sci-fi soundtrack with many acquainted Metroid melodies make my fan coronary heart beat in time with the music.
Whether or not that’s wholesome or not is anybody’s guess. For now, I’m simply trying ahead to December 4, 2025, after I’ll lastly be seventeen once more.
Editor’s conclusion
Come on, Nintendo! Why are you making such a secret of the open-world sections? Both you realize you’ve acquired one thing sizzling in your palms, otherwise you already understand that the concept was a dud and also you wish to delay the inevitable.
Oh effectively, let’s neglect about it. In a couple of days, I’ll lastly be capable to check out the sport for myself. Till then, I’m optimistic, as a result of what I’ve performed of Metroid Prime 4 up to now has lived as much as my excessive expectations as a fan.
I’m significantly taken with the mysterious planet Viewros. The extent design of the primary areas is incredible, and if my temporary look on the different areas of the map is something to go by, there must be loads of visible selection.
Now all of it depends upon the open world and Vi-O-La (what a reputation…).In the perfect case state of affairs, we will anticipate top-of-the-line action-adventures in years and a spectacular comeback. Within the worst case state of affairs, followers can look ahead to a great, traditional old-school Metroid that stumbles over the one fashionable innovation.
