Topic: Metroid Other M

[Chozo Ghost]

lol forget double posting, quintuple posting is where it is at, yo.

I didn't double (or quintiple or whatever) post, because each post was different. I hadn't viewed this thread since March so now all at once I was responding to the posts that had built up since that time.

Yeah and you can do all that in one post.

Each response was to a different post/poster, unlike what you're doing which is a ton of posts just to me about one thing which was obviously done to be a troll.

[Sarail]

Just in case it was lost due to the nonsense here it is again.

http://www.gamesradar.com/wii/metroid-other-m/preview/metroid-other-m-mega-hands-on/a-2010072812244071096/g-20090602105555875007

That was an awesome preview! Metroid is being painted in such a good light, I don't see how people can not get excited for this.

Thank you.  The nonsensical posting was driving me crazy.  People need to read this impression of the game.  I've gone from not too terribly excited about this game to full-on GIVE ME METROID NOW.  I'm guessing Adam and crew are just near the beginning of the game helping out to get you used to the game's control scheme... lending a hand, ya know? Because that preview/impression makes Samus seem like she is, once again, isolated.  I cannot wait to play this game.  The lethal blow attacks are perfectly suited to what Samus is all about.  Looks killer!

[Sundoulos]

Here's another positive impression from Computer & Video Games: http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=257912

[AV]

FYI: CLub Nintendo now allows you to maker Metroid other m in INTEND TO BUY. I'm not sure how long that window is for intend to buy so I am just telling everyone now

[TJ Spyke]

The Club Nintendo site says you have until August 24 (the week before the game releases) to do the Intend to Buy survey.

[Caterkiller]

Here is a not so great preview from IGN. The demo was very short, and felt clunky sums it up. Not bad but not really good either.

http://wii.ign.com/articles/111/1110480p1.html

[vudu]

Here is a pretty great preview from NWR.  Actually, it's an impression, but whatever.  IGN sucks.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/impressions/23827

[Killer_Man_Jaro]

The Official Nintendo Magazine of the UK had a very in-depth feature on Metroid: Other M in the most recent issue (I think they played it in its entirety so it's basically a review, though no score was given). In short, the writer said...


The Good
The agility of the character and its contribution to the pacing: above everything else, this aspect of the game garnered the most praise. They say that Samus scales the environment smoothly at a blistering pace, with the basic controls being streamlined to make this movement easy.
The Metroid staples: apparently, despite the lack of coverage on this stuff, the staple elements of the franchise are still all there. The enormous areas to explore, the nook and cranny upgrade hunting, the exhilarating bosses - all present and all up to high standard.
The Team Ninja influence: aside from the faster pacing, which is likely one of their touches as well. The writer gave props to the melee combat and the dodge mechanic.
The narrative exposition: would you believe it, they actually enjoyed the story, especially the grand cinematic scenes that helped to tell it. Who would have thought, eh?


The Middle Ground
The soundtrack: not bad, but not great. It is supposedly a minimalistic soundtrack, driven more on ambience, and some extended sequences are silent.
The auto-targeting: mostly good, they say -- however, in cases of shooting into the screen or directly above the character, it was not completely reliable.
The voice acting: to put this bluntly, they called the voice acting decent, although the dialogue is 'sometimes a bit hammy'.


The Bad
The perspective transition: the writer mentioned that switching from 3rd to 1st person can be disorientating and takes a second or two to adjust, which may give time for the enemy to cause damage.
The new method of healing: unlike in previous games where you collect energy pellets to regain health, Other M asks to you to hold the Remote vertically and hold A to gradually regenerate. I'll leave it at that; you can probably guess why that would be a problem.


I really have to try this game for myself. As extensive as the article in the magazine was, it still didn't give closure for me. So yeah, got to find out for myself.

[Ian Sane]

The new method of healing: unlike in previous games where you collect energy pellets to regain health, Other M asks to you to hold the Remote vertically and hold A to gradually regenerate. I'll leave it at that; you can probably guess why that would be a problem.

So I guess in the heat of the action when you're fighting a bunch of enemies at once you better hope you had enough energy to start the fight with.  That seems like a rather dumb change.  There have been times in Metroid games where I had regained health during boss battles and I NEEDED to.  How do you do that if you can't stop and "reload" your health?

[Killer_Man_Jaro]

The new method of healing: unlike in previous games where you collect energy pellets to regain health, Other M asks to you to hold the Remote vertically and hold A to gradually regenerate. I'll leave it at that; you can probably guess why that would be a problem.

So I guess in the heat of the action when you're fighting a bunch of enemies at once you better hope you had enough energy to start the fight with.  That seems like a rather dumb change.  There have been times in Metroid games where I had regained health during boss battles and I NEEDED to.  How do you do that if you can't stop and "reload" your health?

That was exactly the problem cited in the preview. It would seem that the Dead Space approach may be necessary, by which I mean heal whenever possible so that you are as prepared as you can be for a potential firefight. I agree, it is a mistake and could be frustrating.

[SixthAngel]

So I guess in the heat of the action when you're fighting a bunch of enemies at once you better hope you had enough energy to start the fight with.  That seems like a rather dumb change.  There have been times in Metroid games where I had regained health during boss battles and I NEEDED to.  How do you do that if you can't stop and "reload" your health?

I think not being able to is the point.  If you run out of energy in a fight you die just like any other game.  It stops you from regaining health against tough bosses, you need to be good enough to beat them with what you have. 

If you really need more health because its so hard the bosses might have a small break in between a powerful attacks where you can gain a little health instead of having them shoot fire/rocks/energy at you that gives you health when you shoot it like before.

Lets be honest, if you searched for the energy packs in the previous gamesyou were pretty much invincible.  This could add a welcome degree of challenge.

[balzzzy]

The new method of healing: unlike in previous games where you collect energy pellets to regain health, Other M asks to you to hold the Remote vertically and hold A to gradually regenerate. I'll leave it at that; you can probably guess why that would be a problem.

So I guess in the heat of the action when you're fighting a bunch of enemies at once you better hope you had enough energy to start the fight with.  That seems like a rather dumb change.  There have been times in Metroid games where I had regained health during boss battles and I NEEDED to.  How do you do that if you can't stop and "reload" your health?

Allow me to try to clear a bit of the air on this one. When I played the demonstration I did this re-charge move and it actually healed a lot faster than I thought it would. The total time it took to re-charge 2 energy tanks and 12 missles was about 2 - 3 seconds, not bad but quite different than what we're used to nonetheless. My friend that attended with me re-charged at the mini-boss with the curled up tail and that thing constantly stalks you, dashes at you, even while cloaked. Since it took 3 missles to destroy an enemy generator you can see that we could only destroy 4 of them. However this is not the case, as you are aiming at the generator more of the enemy's pop out so you shoot them instead of shooting the generator. I found doing the recharge after I cleared each room worked best, as some rooms still lock you in until all enemies and generators are destroyed. Hope this helps in at least understanding a bit more about the feature. You don't necessarily have to agree with it. Remember they want fast paced action and they don't want you to sit there for a minute while you charge your stuff.

[Chozo Ghost]

The new method of healing: unlike in previous games where you collect energy pellets to regain health, Other M asks to you to hold the Remote vertically and hold A to gradually regenerate. I'll leave it at that; you can probably guess why that would be a problem.

So I guess in the heat of the action when you're fighting a bunch of enemies at once you better hope you had enough energy to start the fight with.  That seems like a rather dumb change.  There have been times in Metroid games where I had regained health during boss battles and I NEEDED to.  How do you do that if you can't stop and "reload" your health?

So if something makes the game more of a challenge "its dumb"? I really don't think its realistic or right to be able to regain health in the middle of something like a boss battle. If you can't fight the boss without dying then you deserve to die and should be forced to start over, imho. However, if you do defeat the boss then you now have plenty of time to regenerate your health in peace. That's how it should be. Regaining health in the middle of a fight is what is "dumb", imo.

[Sarail]

Maybe there will be something revealed in the story showing how Samus gains the ability to auto-heal.  Possibly something crazy happened after the events of Super Metroid to her Varia/Gravity Suit, and technicians/scientists added in the auto-heal ability to keep Samus stable.  This could also lead in to how her suit/body reacts to the X virus that imprints on her in Fusion -- which we already know is the next story in line after Other M anyway.

I dunno, I kinda like the idea of auto-healing.  It adds in another aspect of gameplay that will keep you on your toes -- especially in the midst of the grueling boss battle.

[balzzzy]

Here is a not so great preview from IGN. The demo was very short, and felt clunky sums it up. Not bad but not really good either.

http://wii.ign.com/articles/111/1110480p1.html

Well after saying that the author also wrote "...even with some weird quirks the game felt like it will be a really fun and engaging Metroid experience."

[Killer_Man_Jaro]

Without knowing about the scenarios being thrown at you, it's difficult to say. You could argue that having the ability to heal at any time could be a permanent crutch to hold up the player. I was more thinking of typical late-game boss fights, where the patterns are relentless - the writer of the preview in ONM UK said that it annoyed him that there was no real opportunity to heal when the boss was on his back constantly.

I suppose it is a valid point that if you are damaged so much that you need to heal, it is your own fault and you should learn to deal with it. That said, I imagine if one of you got into a situation where you had to heal badly but the boss kept hitting you before you had the chance, it would be frustrating. Although it would show that the mechanic is balanced so it cannot be abused.

[Ian Sane]

So if something makes the game more of a challenge "its dumb"?

It's not dumb if it's intentional.  If they wanted to make the games more challenging and this was their way of doing so, that's fine.  But if the idea was just to streamline replenishing health by taking out energy pellets (no more standing near an enemy generator to heal yourself; a time consuming exercise that is unappealing to non-fans) and the game became harder as a result then it is dumb.
 
In other words if they just accidentally made the game harder by changing an established mechanic without putting the proper thought into it then it is dumb.
 
And I would argue that games where you heal on your own make no more sense then ones where you use some item to heal.  In real life if you get shot you're either dead or you're fucked.  Videogames use an artistic licence on this so that you don't have to do perfect runs every time.

[Chozo Ghost]

Well, its not like Samus goes through the game naked (we all wish that were true though, don't we?). She has a suit of armor and that makes it acceptable that she could take a hit or multiple hits without dying, right? It is like how our soldiers these days wear body armor and they are able to survive bullets and shrapnel that in previous wars like WW2 would have resulted in hundreds or thousands of casualties. You have to look at Samus' Chozo armor as like body armor, except thousands of times more advanced. That said, we don't know all that is involved in that armor technology so the possibility is open that there is something in there that realistically can allow her to heal up herself.... I'm thinking perhaps something like nano-robots or something that can repair damage to either the armor or to herself, but it takes time and that's why she needs to be out of harm's way for a few seconds.

[KDR_11k]

Since it seems the suit's protection is limited by energy, not armor I think it's some kind of shield system.

[Mop it up]

If done right, the heal system could make the game more challenging. The Metroid Prime games only get easier as you play through the game, gaining more energy tanks, plus lots of bosses had ways of acquiring energy pellets, and you could just concentrate on that if you get into trouble. Now you might actually have to dodge instead of plowing through like a tank.

Well, its not like Samus goes through the game naked (we all wish that were true though, don't we?).

I sincerely hope no one is truly so shallow.

[Dirk Temporo]

Well, its not like Samus goes through the game naked (we all wish that were true though, don't we?).

I sincerely hope no one is truly so shallow.

Do you REALLY have to get so butthurt all the time?

[Halbred]

If done right, the heal system could make the game more challenging. The Metroid Prime games only get easier as you play through the game, gaining more energy tanks, plus lots of bosses had ways of acquiring energy pellets, and you could just concentrate on that if you get into trouble. Now you might actually have to dodge instead of plowing through like a tank.

Well, its not like Samus goes through the game naked (we all wish that were true though, don't we?).

I sincerely hope no one is truly so shallow.

Hi, Zach Miller. Nice to meetcha.

[Chozo Ghost]

In my opinion, what always made the bosses in games like Metroid or Zelda easy was that they had certain weaknesses and once you know what those were you could exploit that, and it also became possible to learn how to avoid their attacks. So the bosses would be hard the first time you fought them and had no idea what you were doing, but after that they'd be insanely easy and you could almost beat them in your sleep.

[Chozo Ghost]

If done right, the heal system could make the game more challenging. The Metroid Prime games only get easier as you play through the game, gaining more energy tanks, plus lots of bosses had ways of acquiring energy pellets, and you could just concentrate on that if you get into trouble. Now you might actually have to dodge instead of plowing through like a tank.

Well, its not like Samus goes through the game naked (we all wish that were true though, don't we?).

I sincerely hope no one is truly so shallow.

Well, among teenage and 20-something males almost every single one is that shallow. I think that's actually the reason why Nintendo put Samus in a Zero Suit or in a Bikini (in the original Metroid there was a cheat code to make Samus be in a Bikini). They wouldn't have done that unless people were shallow. It was done specifically to appeal to that demographic.

[Mop it up]

You sound proud of that.