Gaming Metroid Prime 2: Echoes

[Engel]

The only thing that I find uncool about the Light Cannon and Dark cannon, is the said ammo. I heard somewhere that Samus only has those two cannons for an undetermined period in the game. I mean, I think the ammo should instead be an overheat, where it takes like ten seconds to rechage after firing fifteen shots. And, that creature with the red eye, is that supposed to be [spoiler]Dark Samus? I know that Metroid Prime took Samus' Phazon Suit and made itself Dark Samus. I've seen screeshots of the blob that Dark Samus becomes, so I'll see if I can get them up.[/spoiler] I like the Dark and Light side thing of Aether, it seems cool. I've also got th disc, so I'll find out some of this stuff soon enough.

[GuyYouMetOnline]

I'm surprised that nobody's made a thread about this game.

For those of you who've been living under a rock, Metroid Prime 2 is the sequel to the gamecube hit Metroid Prime. In Metroid Prime 2, Samus is hired to investigate the disappearance of Federation troops on the planet Aether. Aether is a planet that was split into two different worlds, the Light World and the Dark World, by the impact of a Phazon meteor. the Luminoth, a Chozo-like race that lives in the Light World, are on the brink of extinction at the hands of the Ing, who inhabit the Dark World. samus eventually agrees to help the Luminoth.

This game has a lot of new enemies, from the Ing to new types of Space Pirates. the bosses in particular look amazing. many upgrades are brotected by Guardians who use those abilities against Samus, and then there are things like the huge Quadraxis robot. Samus gets a lot of new gear, like the Dark and Light Suits, the Dark and Light Beams, and a missile upgrat I forget the name of that allows her to target up to five enemies at a time with Missiles.

I know that there are a lot of great games coming out this holiday season, but I think that Metroid Prime 2 will be better than every one of the others (I'm talking to you, [i]Halo 2[/i]), and I can't wait to get my hands on it.

[size=1][color=blue]Actually there [i]is[/i] an Echoes thread, so I merged yours with the existing thread. - Shinmaru[/color][/size]
[size=1][color=#0000ff][/color][/size]
EDIT: That thread was old enough that I'd forgotten about it. Sorry.

[Semjaza]

I've been playing mostly RPGs lately so this will be a nice change of pace. I absolutely cannot wait for this. Looks better than the first in basically every way, which is not a small feat.

Only about one more week.

[Iori Yagami]

I've also been playing mostly RPGs... I'm trying to decide whether to get this or Baten Kaitos. From what I've heard this game is pretty good. But the thing is that the Dark and Light beams requires ammo... and Dark Samus sounds cool and must be the thing at the end of Metroid Prime.

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]Well, I went out and reserved my copy of the game today, so the deal is sealed; I'll be picking it up next week when GameStop gets it in.

It's kind of strange, but I really hadn't been all that excited about the game for a while up until now. I was really interested when the first susbstantial information was released about the game, and around E3, but then my anticipation of it kind of lulled. I pretty much knew for sure that I was going to buy it, but I just never got around to pre-ordering it until now, only a week before its release. Whereas with the first Metroid Prime, I was hanging on every screen shot and bit of info released from the time it was first announced to its release, and had the game pre-ordered months in advance.

I think the thing I'm most looking forward to is the multiplayer, actually. Mainly because it intrigues me more than any of the other concepts that are new to the series. ... And also because I'll get to try it out come the 19th, soon after I get the game. I'm really interested in seeing what all sorts of things are implemented to balance out the lock-on targeting. That, and the idea of swinging across chasms with the Grapple Beam while simultaneously blasting away at opponents is too awesome for words to express.[/color]

[Semjaza]

[quote name='Desbreko][color=#4B0082']It's kind of strange, but I really hadn't been all that excited about the game for a while up until now. I was really interested when the first susbstantial information was released about the game, and around E3, but then my anticipation of it kind of lulled. I pretty much knew for sure that I was going to buy it, but I just never got around to pre-ordering it until now, only a week before its release. Whereas with the first Metroid Prime, I was hanging on every screen shot and bit of info released from the time it was first announced to its release, and had the game pre-ordered months in advance.[/color][/quote]

At the same time, Nintendo has barely said a single thing about the game since E3. They've obviously not divulged many story details and the most coverage I've seen on the game has been at IGN, which has mostly just been old stuff regurgitated. Nintendo doesn't seem to be as forceful with this title... although I don't think they did well promoting the original either.

IGN and other places have final copies though, so things are finally trickling out. Up until now its mostly been E3 videos and screens of things I could see in the demo for myself.

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]True, it seems like not nearly as much information has been released about Echoes as was released before the launch of the original Metroid Prime. And I never did get another registerable game to get the demo disc, so I missed out on that, too.

And at this point, I've decided to just not bother reading up on the game any more before playing it. Maybe it'll impress me more that way, going into it "fresh," or something. The first Prime really astounded me at various times, despite everything I'd seen and heard about the game before playing it for myself, so maybe it'll be like that, only moreso, with Echoes.[/color]

[Semjaza]

I picked up the game Tuesday night... Played a few hours since then (I'd guess 3 to 4, outside of deaths). I'm very happy with the game thus far and have no real problems with it. It looks great, plays great and is improved in many ways over the original.

Cinematically, the game is beyond the first. I was surprised by the cutscenes. While they really don't occur that often, they are far more story intensive in general. This is the only Metroid game outside of Fusion where you actual speak to another entity of some form, which adds another side to the series that it really just lacked in the past. It doesn't stop you from feeling alone and isolated (which is nice for this series), but it does give a bit more of a motivational factor, I think.

Graphically, there's obvious improvements. For someone who didn't really play lots of the original, these might be hard to spot. Overall, textures are quite a bit sharper. They still blur if you're right against them, but they look excellent in most gameplay views. Lighting is better, there's more dynamic shadows, more particle effects, etc. The worlds look great, far more organic than most titles I've played.

Samus' model is noticably improved (and includes a more transparent visor, you can see her face in all cutscenes), which you could tell from movies... However, in person, a lot of the detail is more obvious.

Gameplay is largely the same. For some people, this is a problem, for others it is not. I fall in the latter category. While at times I long for a dual analog set-up, mostly because I want to look around, I don't feel the current one hinders much. The way some of these new creatures move (particularly the bosses and sub-bosses), I don't even know how you could keep up with them manually as it is.

I know Charles was wondering about this, so yes: you do lose pretty much all of your equipment yet again. However, [spoiler]this time its due to a theft and you wind up having to defeat creatures that utilize your items. You keep your Varia Suit, Charge Beam and Morph Ball, however.[/spoiler] Surprisingly, you gain most of these items back fairly early on in the game. I'm really not missing anything that I didn't start with, aside from beams and visors that aren't in the game at all... and it's only been a few hours.

The game does lack the same feeling of "newness" that the original has, mostly because it doesn't really do anything to revolutionize the formula from the first. There are evolutions and additions and such, but few are amazingly different. Some music and sounds are reused (I also feel that some of the enemy designs, while very different in appearance, feature very similar core models -- something I've not noticed any review talk about and it probably bothers me the most). However, what the game does it does really damn well, so I can't really get too bothered by this.

The game is far more challenging as well, something I appreciate. While I don't know if its as difficult as say, Phazon Mines on Hard in the original, it's definitely up with Hard Mode in general. Some of the fights are quite difficult to win your first time through, although a second try usually makes it far easier.

The boss fights in general have been really great. Most of what I've gone against has just been sub-bosses, offering their own quirks. However, Amorbis (which everyone has seen by now, he is that three worm ball thing), was just an amazing fight in every respect. Probably the best boss fight I've had this year.

I've not tried multi yet, but I didn't get this game for that. Even if it sucks, it wouldn't affect my enjoyment of the single player game.

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]I picked this up on the 16th, but I actually haven't played it too much yet. Aside from school and other crap, I've been splitting my time between it and PlanetSide. But, I'll get a whole week off for Thanksgiving, so it won't be long before I delve farther into the game.

So far, I've pretty much just gotten through the game's introductory stage; getting into the Great Temple and meeting V-Mos, sort of like getting through the derelict space frigate in the first Metroid Prime. So now I'm in the Agon Waste, saved just after I ran into the first group of Space Pirates. They seemed weaker than the ones in the first MP, but maybe their toughness was scaled down since you only have access to the Power Beam at that point, whereas you have the Wave Beam in MP by the time you fight many pirates.

The first thing that struck me about MP2 when I started playing, though, was a sense of both newness and familiarity. Like Semjaza said, the gameplay is hardly different at all from the first MP, so I felt right at home with the controls and how things work. But the areas and a lot of the enemies are new, so it still feels like a new game. Which, I guess, is fitting; it's the same Samus, she's just on a different planet.

The second thing I really noticed was the scanning. The way the Scan Visor highlights and color codes objects to show you what can be scanned, how critical things are, and whether you've scanned them before, is really nice. Plus, things don't have a single scan point anymore; you can lock on and scan pretty much any part of an object. And also, the amount of detail in objects' descriptions seems to have been increased, even for little things that don't really matter. So far, I'm really happy with the improvements in this area of the game.

One thing I'm disliking, however, is the menu system. If you've seen it, you know what I mean, though it's kind of hard to describe. But my problem with it is that it moves a bit slow, which can be annoying when you know what you want to access but you have to spin the option around to the front, and that names get cluttered and overlap way too easily, making them unreadable until they're up front. This is especially annoying when trying to look through the Log Book, since the menu system makes it so there's a ton of subcategories beyond the main ones that you had in the first MP, to keep things from getting too cluttered. (Do you really need a list of categories as long as "Creatures > Aether > Fliers > Small Fliers > Sandbat"? With this menu system you do, and it's annoying to wade through them all.) The menus, to me, seem gimmicky and I think the system should've been confined to the main game menus; it's neat and looks cool, but it's not very practical for the Log Book and your Inventory list.

And I haven't played multiplayer yet, but I hope to this weekend, if my friend can still make it over. I'm hoping it'll be good, though I don't really have very high expectations, so we'll see. But MP2 is a primarily single player game, and that's what I bought it for, so I won't be terribly disappointed even if multiplayer sucks.[/color]

[Brasil]

This somewhat relates to the newness vs familiarity thing being discussed. I got into Dark Aether about an hour ago, and I must say, the Luminoth Light crystals are gameplay gold. You have the permanent crystals, but then you also have these dots that you have to shoot to activate the [i]temporary[/i] light barrier safe zones.

It really adds a whole new level to the game, because there's this pressing and imperative strategy to get through the levels. You have to plan out your route pretty much according to where you can find these light crystals/dots, and it's this sense of urgency that takes the game to a whole new level. I really can't wait till I get deeper into Dark Aether, just to see what Retro has done with this approach. If I'm impressed this much so early in the game, I can only imagine what's in store for me later, heh.

I think Echoes took on a new level of "Too cool" when I had to get back to Light Aether after going through the portal for the first time and opening the gate there, but the platforms had disappeared in Dark Aether. I must have spent 15 minutes trying to look for ledges along the walls, backtracking, etc, when I realized, "Wait a minute. Triple bomb jump." It's like, the old with the new. ^_^ Absolutely brilliant.

[Semjaza]

[quote name='Siren]This somewhat relates to the newness vs familiarity thing being discussed. I got into Dark Aether about an hour ago, and I must say, the Luminoth Light crystals are gameplay gold. You have the permanent crystals, but then you also have these dots that you have to shoot to activate the [i]temporary[/i'] light barrier safe zones.[/quote]

Sometimes I find these very aggravating, but at the same time, it really increases the threat of the area. Plus, it's fun to lure Ing into a darkened safe zone and light it up with them inside.

I really like going between Light and Dark, doing things that affect both of them. Many times I'm like "There's no where else to go in here..." and then I notice a portal and switch over. I've gotten stuck several times in this game, but I sit back and look at the map or think a bit and things become clear. That's a rarity in games lately, I think.

And Desbreko, I agree with the menus. Some of them get a bit ridiculous. Personally, I just use the C-Stick, which lets you go directly to the items without spinning.

[Tricool]

[color=red] I really enjoy this game a lot. The boss fights are extremely fun and some are really challenging. [spoiler] One boss fight that I thought was hard was the one against the boost ball gaurdian. Mainly because there are no safe areas to go during this battle and the fact that if the boss hits you while he's in the boost ball form he takes off almost a full energy tank.[/spoiler]

I am stuck at one part though and I was wondering if anyone could help me out. I have just beat the grapple boss and recovered the grapple beam. I also have two sanctuary keys but not the third. I think I know where the third key is but I need power bombs to access the area. Does anyone have any idea about how and where to get the power bombs?[/color]

[Semjaza]

You're past me, Tricool, heh. Did you try GameFAQs?

I played a bit more over the weekend and my enjoyment of the game just keeps going up. You really have to admit that the level designers at Retro are at the top of their field. The way everything ties in believably is rather impressive, through design and even story. At first glance, it makes little sense as to why there would be "morph ball canons" on a Luminoth planet, until you read that they were designed for kinetic orbs. It's a small thing, but I am glad it is addressed.

I got to play two players the other day with my little brother. He, admittedly, wasn't very good at it, but he wasn't awful either. I actually had quite a bit of fun with it. Sure, you can lock on to the other guy, but the idea of it being nothing more than locking on and mashing A is really not how it worked... even against someone who wasn't too hot at it. There are a lot of ways to get away from shots (boosting, morph balls, side jumps, etc) and the pickups make the game pretty random.

So, overall, while it's not the best multiplayer thing you'll ever play and its totally outside the story of Metroid (four Samuses?), it actually is pretty solid. I wish there were more maps, though.

[Tricool]

[color=red]Thanks for the help, but uh...I kinda found the the solution right after I posted. Heh. It turns out that I just didn't see a ledge that I was supposed to jump on. It was very aggrivating since I spent hours searching the entire world. Well, at least I got a bunch of upgrades out of it.

Anyway, I've already beaten two main bosses now and I'm on the Sanctuary Fortress. [spoiler]The enemy robots here are pretty fun to fight. Though it doesn't take as much fire power to take them down as some enemies, some of these robots are pretty annoying. One robot can upload a virus to your suit making the game move slowy and jump, so to counter the virus you have to reboot your system by pressing L, R, and B. [/spoiler] I thought that was a pretty cool feature.[/color]

[Brasil]

I'm a few rooms away from getting whatever the Luminoth weapon is, and I just thought I'd mention how hilarious some of the Log entries are. There were some pretty funny bits in Prime 1 (the Pirates' Morph Ball Experiment Logs, for example), but I'm laughing my -ss off right now from a few of the Log entries I just scanned in Echoes.

One of them read, "Unit 686 released a Metroid for target practice today; the Metroid then assaulted 686. He should be regaining brain functions in a cycle."

This is terrific black comedy. You wouldn't expect such a dark sense of humor in Metroid games, but Prime and Echoes are rife with it. Like Tony, my enjoyment of this game keeps rising. The entire game so far is fantastic. In the broader, bigger picture sense, it's incredible, but when you get down to minute things like the various Logs and such, the attention to detail is mind-boggling. Retro Studios is awesome.

[Desbreko]

[quote name='Siren']One of them read, "Unit 686 released a Metroid for target practice today; the Metroid then assaulted 686. He should be regaining brain functions in a cycle."[/quote]
[color=#4B0082]A friend was watching when I scanned that one, and we both had a good laugh at it. And what also makes it funny is that, earlier, you come across a scan that gives handling guidelines for Metroids, which includes something along the lines of "Metroids are not to be used for target practice." So then you see that other scan, and you think "Well, now I guess I know why that had to be posted. Some Space Pirates must not be too bright."

It seems like a lot of the Federation trooper and Space Pirate logs are pretty good, with some of them being really funny, and it's something I've been noticing more and more in MP2. In the first MP, there were a few scans that weren't pure information with little personality (like that Morph Ball experiments one), but there seems to be quite a few in MP2. And being scan-crazy like I am, scanning anything and everything that I can, I'm really enjoying it. The logs in MP2 sound less like strict, formal log entries and more like they were actually written by a person.

But myself, I just got the Dark Beam and am about to make my second excursion into Dark Aether. So I'm still not that far, but I plan on playing more tomorrow.

I did, however, get to play a couple of multiplayer matches with my friend. Personally, I didn't find it incredibly fun with only us two playing, but I do think it could be pretty fun with three or four people. It really isn't just button mashing. ... Unless you get the Annihilator Beam, anyway. Whenever one of us got that, the other died very shortly thereafter. Hitting with the Dark Beam, and also somewhat the Light Beam, seemed really hard, though, and almost not worth it, since you can get in a lot more hits with the rapid fire Power Beam. Missiles were doing most of the damage in our matches, since they home in somewhat, which makes them harder to dodge.[/color]

[Meggido]

I loved the first game and I bet I'll love the second when it is released here. The Australian release date is 2nd of december and I would pick it up on that day if I hadn't already preordered Jak 3. Well I guess I'll have to pick it up a few weeks after the release like I did with the first.

[Gavin]

[size=1]Interesting, most interesting.

I've been interested in Metroid Prime II: Echoes since I first read about it in Nintendo Official Magazine UK a while back, I have to admit I've still not played the first Metroid Prime, or any Metroid game for that matter but this really does seem to have piqued my interest. NOM-UK actually gave away a DVD with this month's issue with clips of all the big Nintendo games due out this Christmas, and as a special bonus they had a big section on Echoes.

I personally find that watching actual clips of the game gives me a far better impression of what the game is like compared to a load of pictures which could merely be high-res. concept art. The game looks very fluid and the action seems to come thick and fast, all of which combine to make a great First Person Shooter. The whole Light and Dark idea on Aether brings a kind of Soul Reaver element to it which sounds very interesting, I must admit actually sitting here and typing about it makes me want to go out and buy it.[/size]

[Tricool]

[color=red]Well I just managed to beat the game on normal mode. I'm not gonna ruin the last moments of the game for anyone but let me say that I thought that they did really good on the last boss fight in the game. And also on the ending cutscene. This game was very well done and now...I'm gonna go beat it on hard mode. :) [/color]

[Erika]

[size=1][color=royalblue]Well, I'm concerned about the Morph Ball deal in mutliplayer mode. I thought you couldn't lock on to a Balled player, but my cousin, who has the game, said you can lock on, you'll just lose the lock when the player Balls up.

Grr. Everyone seem to have the game but me. :( Oh, well. I'll get it eventually. ^o^ I haven't played a good shooter in a long time--I really need to get started on the MGS series.[/color][/size]

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]Well, yes, you can lock onto a player that's in Morph Ball mode. ... But good luck hitting them. The thing is, you're not only much, much faster when in ball form (and players can't lead their shots with the lock-on targeting, to aim ahead to where you're going to be), but you also have access to the Boost Ball, which makes you even faster. So unless you can catch someone with a really well timed missile, which home in a bit with a lock, you're not going to be able to do much damage to someone that's in Morph Ball mode -- not if they know what they're doing, anyway. Plus, if someone does give chase when you're in the Morph Ball, you can drop bombs for them to run into.[/color]

[Erika]

[size=1][color=royalblue]GrrRRrr...This'll be the first game I'll get when I can! *shakes fist*

I kinda like the light/dark worlds--it kinda reminds me of A Link to the Past! I guess with that concept in mind, I'll have a somewhat easier time solving the puzzles, albeit I'm sure there'll be points in time where I'll wanna tear my hair out, lol.

By the way, does anyone know what you can unlock in this game? :3[/color][/size]

[Krycifer]

Metroid Prime 2:Echoes looks promising.It looks better than the first one.The enemies look tougher.There's some new beaam weapons and suits.The first one was too easy at the end although Meta Ridley started getting on my nerves a bit despite that the first one was easy.I hope the second one is harder than the first one.And I'm looking forward to playing it in multiplayer mode.That should be fun!Now I can whoop my friends arses whenever they come over to play.

[GuyYouMetOnline]

Unlockables include several soundtracks for multiplayer mode, and two arenas. There are also three endings in the game, and as in Metroid Prime 1, the ending you get is determined by your completion percentage.


As far as the game itslef goes, I unfortunatly don't own it yet.Christmas presents have already been ordered in my house, so there's no buying anything for myself. I expect to get the game for Christmas, however. Of course, I do know enough about the game to form a few oppinions.

First of all, I think the 'two worlds' concept is interesting, but I don't like the fact that the Dark World damages you. Continuous damage is not something I like having to deal with. Also, I definatly do not like the fact that the three beam weapons you find throughout the game require ammo. Beams aren't supposed to need ammo. I do like the looks of the new Seeker Missile Launcher, and the new Echo Visor could be fun. I'm also glad that you don't have to run from Dark Samus like you did with the SA-X in Metroid Fusion. The other bosses look great, too. I can't wait to fight Quadraxis.

As for multiplayer, well, I don't mind the small number of arenas (six, including the two unlockable ones), because I always end up only playing in a couple different arenas in other games. The fact that there's only two modes also hurts, but again, I probably won't mind, because I normally stick to Deathmatch. I do like the fact that you're invincible for a couple seconds after respawning, as that means that spawn-point camping doesn't work too well. And neither does camping by the good weapons, because those have random locations (at least, they do if my guide is correct, and I'm assuming it is).


Well, th my two cents' worth.

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]In multiplayer, the weapons have set spawn points, same as missiles and energy, but which weapon you'll get out of the box that spawns is random, and there are several points where the boxes appear. So yeah, no weapon camping. Also, the various special abilities that you can get for a limited time (such as unlimited missile ammo, the Death Ball ability, and the Hacker Mode ability) from stepping onto certain pads are randomized -- and there doesn't seem to be a limit on how many people can grab abilities from the pads in a certain period of time -- so you never know what you'll get.[/color]