ONM writes, "Metroid: Other M launched in the UK today and ONM readers seem to be loving it so far. Judging by the reaction of Nintendo fans on the Official Nintendo Magazine forum, those of you who have already bought the game are enjoying it as much as we did."
With Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty coming soon, it's time to look back at the developer's greatest triumphs...and one oddball favorite.
Former Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime reflects on Metroid: Other M and his initial high hopes for the game.
Yeah we all loved how you took a stoic badass and turned her into a whiny shrew. All those writers should be sacked.
VGChartz's Paul Broussard: "The early-mid 2000s saw something of a golden age for Metroid games. After an eight year hiatus, Metroid burst back onto the scene in dramatic fashion. Largely buoyed by the critical and financial success of Metroid Prime (at least, relative to other Metroid releases), Metroid saw a whopping six new titles between 2002 and 2007, as well as one rather bizarre pinball spin-off that wound up being much better than it had any right to be. Metroid had never been this popular before."
Never though the day would come where I say this but I’d be fine with having every 2D Metroid remade the way Dread plays.
The exploration is still integral to the game, but is somewhat more linear. The collecting aspect of the game is no more, so you basically run through the game as if it was a gauntlet, blasting anything in your path. You really just need to keep bashing the fire button whilst you run down corridors, and you will never be in harms way.
Gameplay along a 2d plane is fantastic, reminiscent of the old 2d games… this is a dream come true for those people who played the 2d games. Gameplay on a 3d plane feels tacky and just wrong… this is where it all goes wrong in my opinion.. It just doesn’t work. It was annoying how some paths you cant fall off, but others you can, so sometimes you will come a cropper just because the game suddenly decides that there will be no ‘invisible wall/clipping’ on a certain path.
The controls present no problem at first… but later in the game you will want to throw the controller at the wall when you face tougher enemies and greater things are demanded of you. Although the ’oldskool’ controls are meant to simplify things, it actually makes it more complicated, it feels like you are playing some silly party game when in the middle of a boss fight you are furiously rotating the control vertically and then back horizontally to perform the correct actions. Its frustrating and really unnecessary… they could have just used the nunchuck.
Cgi cut scenes- breathtaking, high quality. The way forward. Although the cut scenes from in-game graphics are not quite up to the same standard, they don’t have any real atmosphere or ‘cinematic’ feel. This isn’t helped by the robotic voice acting, as if made with a computer synthesiser rather than a human. Bad script lowers the tone even further. The in game graphics range from brilliant, to rubbish. But generally too dark, literally you will have to play with the lights out or turn the brightness/contrast right up on the tv because most areas are too dimly lit. The enemy character design was quite poor, I thought a lot of them were just silly and annoying.
Overall I think this is a unique game.. Its not like any other game I have played… it has a lot of frustrations but as an experience it does have its rewards. The pacing of the game is not the best, although the cut scenes are impressive, I think they are too lengthy for the amount of gameplay on offer. But there is not as many cut scenes as other reviews have made out. They are not pointless, they do actually enhance the gameplay, but I think it tips the balance slightly.
Was giving samus a voice a good idea? I think so.. Yes some parts are just unrealistic and you wonder how she ever became a great bounty hunter with such an immature attitude, but you also get a deeper understanding of both samus and the metroid universe. I liked the overall tone of the game.
8/10
:D
91% from ONM. :)