Cheap Metroid Prime (Video Games) (GameCube) Price

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Customer Reviews of Metroid Prime

Dear Retro Studios: I love you
I haven't beaten this game for myself, I can already say it's been an awesome experience.
For those not in the know, Metroid games have always combined EXTREMELY satisfying, power-up driven gameplay with atmospheric, expansive environments to explore: at the beginning you always start with minimal weapons and life reserves, but as you navigate the various areas (not levels, as some people call them: they're too streamlined to be called that) you collect powerups that increase your defensive and offensive power. The most satisfying facet of this type of gameplay, though, is that you need certain powerups to help you unlock previously inaccessible areas. (In Metroid Prime, some examples of this are having to find missiles to open doors with missile locks and having to aquire the Grapple Beam to reach a room placed much higher than you can jump.)
There are four beam weapons, lots of auxillary tools and armor upgrades to collect. Finding these items (and usually solving a long puzzle or beating a tough boss to aquire them) really makes you feel like you've accomplished something.
The actual gameplay experience, though, is less perfected. Metroid is a series over 15 years old, but Metroid Prime is the first 3D venture. The first person perspective is really cool and immersive, but obviously it means you can't see behind or below you. Many times when wandering around the planet of Tallon IV I would miscalculate a jump and end up in acid water or magma. (You also can't see your character's feet. Unnerving.)When fighting the various enemies, you often have to strafe in a circle around them. This is fine until you have to fight multiple enemies that strafe around YOU: you'll be dispatching one, only to get a nasty surprise when its sibling rams you from behind. During a lot of the game, I definitely needed a way to do an about-face turn: your field of vision's too narrow and you can't turn or dodge fast enough. Some of the weapons also have horrible firing rates: especially the missiles.
The controls have their flaws (as noted above) but most of the time they'll serve you well and many times are notably intuitive.
Battles are enjoyable, as is exploration. Environmental effects, animation and texture maps are all top notch (some areas are a bit dark, however). The enemies, from the tiny nusiances to the enormous bosses, are wonderfully designed and sometimes it's even a shame to kill them.
Some people have gripes about the minor enemies respawning: at times this is irritating, but it gives you a chance to improve your skills and replenish your health when you need to.
The boss battles ARE HARD (why does the strafing speed slow down, anyway?), but once you find the boss' weak spot and figure out your plan of attack, your success is pretty much guaranteed.
This game does a great job of keeping you busy, and that overpowers any of its flaws tenfold. Gameplay constantly varies from FPS shooting to platform-y morphball antics (and jumping, once you get a good feel for how far you can jump) to reading detailed log book information to running around in circles acting stupid to shake off the adrenalin you get from, well, everything in this game.
The music is stylish and adds a note of atmosphere to the game. Many tracks are remixes of old Super Metroid tunes, while others are brand new. The soundtrack varies from haunting synth chords to PIANO to hyperfast techno/rave during certain boss fights, all set behind startlingly real sound effects and beautiful graphics.
Final word: this game will suck you in and you'll never want to leave. This game is definitely worth every cent you pay for it (and now it's only thirty dollars!!!!! :D)... in fact, back when it still cost $49.99, it would have been worth buying a Gamecube just for this game. That would have been about two hundred dollars, right? *;>

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Metroid Prime: Game of '02
This game, quite simply, will blow you away. The graphics, sound, gameplay, and atmosphere add together to make the finest game on the Gamecube. Several people were skepticle when they found out that the game was to be first-person, in addition to the fact that the American Retro Studios would be handling the game. Don't you worry, they handled it just fine.

The graphics in this game are astounding. The first time you see this game in action your jax will drop. Samus Aran, her enemies, and the environments are all rendered with amazing detail. You won't be dissapointed. The worlds are not just a collection of textured polygons: rather a living and breathing place. Games just aren't supposed to look this good.

Gameplay, however, is really what makes this game shine. The intuitive controls feel natural and responsive. The classic Metroid gameplay is here in spades. After the short space station "training" level, you are thrust onto TallonIV with little more than a pea shooter. As you gain more power-ups, more areas of the game become accessable. There are a couple of visors that you can get in this game. The coolest one is the scan visor. With this visor equiped, you can scan almost anything in the game; enemies, parts of the level etc. I may be using the word "level" to freely; this game has no "levels" but rather a very open ended design.

Speaking of design, this game has an intriguing storyline. Whether you have followed the previous Metroid games or not you will appreciate the detailed and interesting story.

Finally, the sound. This game has an outstanding audio collection. The music is eerie and complements the game atosphere well. If you have got good speakers you will want to crank them to enjoy this game to the fullest.

This game alone would be worth the price of a Gamecube. With the special promotion Nintendo has right now, you can get Metroid FREE with the purchase of a Gamecube. I have several other next-gen systems and I bought a Gamecube with this game. The cost is justified already and I only have one game!

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Nintendo Raises The Bar Yet Again
I really enjoyed this game and would say it is one of the very best i have ever played. Nintendo really has been doing a great job on the Metroid series, but this was unexpected. This game takes all other platform shooters and blows them out of the water. What really annoys me is the large number of trashy games that obviously took no work. This is more of an intelligent game. There's still plenty of alien-blasting for all, but it's the characters and story that get me almost as much.<
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> Samus is supposed to be a bounty hunter, but instead of just hunting down space pirates, she usually ends up tangled into a huge alien-breeding operation and decides to play the hero. That's exactly what happens here. Samus infiltrates a space pirate frigate, destroys a monster alien bug, and pretty soon the whole place is in meltdown mode. The thing she's after, a big robot dragon named Ridley, escapes the explosion and flies off to the planet Tallon IV. Samus follows, and discovers that there's more going on here than what it seems. Throughout your adventure, the entire story unfolds through little journal entries left behind by an ancient alien race before they were killed by... The Great Poison. You later learn exactly what's going on and why.<
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> Another thing is the unique playing style. If you've ever played other Metroid games, you know the formula. At the beginning, you're physically pretty weak. But as the game progresses, you pick up weapon and armor upgrades like the Plasma Beam and the Thermal Visor. Not only does the player get better at the game, but he/she gets satisfying new weaponry and such. And the controls are much different than you would expect, but at the same time, feel totally natural after about 10 minutes.<
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> The music and graphic design are great as well. The music perfectly fits what's going on around, and it feels natural. The graphics are something to be reckoned with. Everything looks as good as it should. All the designs of the animals and worlds and equipment, everything looks great.<
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> This is a dazzling game, and was worth the money even back before the price was lowered. It's intelligent and fun. Happy alien-shooting!