Metroid Prime 2: Echoes

"Insert "Echo" Pun here..."

I will say this, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes is a great game, and one of the best for the Game Cube, Retro Studios showed their talent with Echoes but it did not deliver in the way I expected it to. While Prime was amazing and had some of the best exploration and most incredible bosses I have ever fought, mixed with some gorgeous environments. Echoes seemed to be slightly more tedious and bland although it was still fun to play.

Story: 7

This is done better than it was in the first game, as you should know you are Samus and you were sent on a mission to investigate the disappearance of a Galactic Federation ship that was investigating Space Pirate presence over the Planet Aether.

Soon after you crash onto the planet from a storm in the atmosphere you discover that the troops were killed and the Ing, a race of parasitic black semi-liquid creatures that can possess most life forms, possessed several of them. She also discovers Dark Samus, who is Metroid Prime [from game 1] inhabiting her old Phazon Suit, and finally Samus discovers the Luminoth who are fighting a war against the Ing.

The Luminoth tell Samus that a meteor hit Aether and split it into two dimensions, the dark one created the evil Ing, and the Luminoth have almost been completely killed off by the Ing, and the Luminoth send Samus off to collect the "planetary energy" for their dimensions that is currently on the Dark half so the Luminoth can restore their world.

Like the last game the story is mainly told through Scanning things that you find, but now you are told a little bit more about what happens through the cut scenes. The story is well fleshed out and you should dig it.

Gameplay: 7

Like the last game, you are given a big world to explore while you look through every room to find the weapons and expansions and blow away the bosses that you get to fight. I am guessing that if you are reading this review you already know how Metroid works so I'll cover how everything felt to me in the game.

Like last time you get a great assortment of aliens and big bosses to blow to hell, but the problem with that is that some of them seem like model changes of the old ones from Prime [Sheegoth = Grenchler!], and some of them can get really frustrating because Retro made them to be the quintessential pain in the ass [Dark Pirate Commando's]. And the bosses, while some of them like Quadraxis were incredible... some of them were an ungodly pain to fight, and there are two who top this list; Boost Guardian, and Spider Guardian. The Boost Guardian would be able to kill you before you knew it because you were stuck in a small room where you health was constantly decreasing while it was zipping around the room and draining a huge chunk of power on each hit. And the Spider ******* Guardian [as Metroid Database called it] had you do an annoying as hell puzzle just so you could take a few points off of its health bar and you would have to keep replaying that boss so many times you want to slam your controller through the TV screen [as someone who has broken a few Keyboards and Game Pads that is something I really got close to doing].

You also get to go into the Dark world, and while it felt scary in the beginning because you were fighting in a bubble on a world where the air was poison against some shadow creatures, after a while it just got boring and turned into a purple retextured version of the "light World".

The weapons, were the exact same thing we had last time and they felt really rushed, it felt like Light Beam = Plasma Beam, Dark Beam = Ice Beam, and Annihilator Beam = Wave Beam [slightly] with an annoying ammo system, at first you only have 50 rounds which is nothing in the beginning, it does get frustrating to have to manage your ammo like this game does.

While Echoes does do the Metroid formula very well, even though I have no problem with what was kept the same as the last game, what was new felt poorly implemented in some places.

Challenge:8

As you all should know, Prime games give you a big world to explore and find all of the items, that alone is a difficult task but Echoes upped the ante with some things that I just need to cover.

I already mentioned some of the bosses who irked me a lot, but there are two more things that infuriated me. First was the tedious backtracking through the Light and Dark worlds you had to keep going around in there and it started to get really confusing. But there is something that was much worse that that...

The final Key Hunt, basically to get into the last part of the game, you had to find 9 keys to get inside, and that would not be so bad if they gave you a good hint or at least had a few in the open. In Prime, a lot of the Chozo Artifacts were given to you, and the others were relatively easy to find. In Corruption, you only needed 5 of the Energy Cells, and they were really easy to find, but in Echoes you had to find an invisible box floating in the air and blow it up to get the key. Now, if you knew how to read the hints it was easy enough, basically what you had to do was go to the Dark World version of a room where you found a dead Luminoth who was searching for the key, but if you did not know that you were basically running around the Dark World using the Echo Visor [one of the items you find] and shooting at anything that looks like the Cache it was in. This is just way too hard for the casual Metroid players.

Controls: 7

It works the same way as Prime, you move around with the control stick and you have to use the shoulder buttons to lock on and free aim. You can swap visors, beams and do everything easily although aiming is still tough to get used to.

Graphics: 9

Yet again Retro showed their talents at making beautiful looking games, this time even with how bland looking some of the environments are you can still see how much detail went into everything. Everything looks gorgeous, and as I said some levels look really bland [Dark World, Agon Wastes] but they still look beautiful in their own way, there is so much detail in most of the things you will find and incredible architecture in some of the levels you can see how much time went into into creating everything.

Onto the enemies, they are filled with polygons and they have some distinctive look to em that is very cool looking. Although some of them are reskins of old enemies there are a lot of beautiful looking ones out there, especially the Bosses like Quadraxis. That thing is so huge and it looks so metallic fitting in with the "Sanctuary" level you are in while you fight it. The artistry of some of the enemies is just amazing.

Kudos to Retro for having some of the best artists in the business.

Sound: 9

Again, the composing of new original tunes and some of the classics from the old games are done so well. I'll be simple with this, the music is incredible like always in Metroid games, everything sounds like it should, and the small amount of voice work does its job.

What you will really be noticing is the sounds of the weapons, and the roars of the creatures on Aether, and you should not be disappointed.

For me, the best part of the sound was hearing the Escape Song, which along with Ridley's Theme [although it was not in this game] is the best song in Metroid.

Atmosphere: 7

You do get drawn in and like the last game you feel like you are in a dying world. There are beautiful graphics and the sound really fits everything in here. Only problem is that the Dark World, which is supposed to scare you turns into a gimmick after a while and you get bored of going through the portals so, you can go into the Dark World.

Multiplayer: 7

I think of the Multiplayer as a little diversion, because that's all it really is. They give you a split screen where you can fight against other players and you can pick up all of the weapons that you use in the game. The Multiplayer is a fun little diversion, and that is all it deserves to be called.

Replayability: 7

Like last time, you can find the items and the scans so you can unlock all of the bonuses, and you can play the Multiplayer. But if the Spider ******* Guardian left a bad taste in your mouth you might not want to come back.

Pros:
Great graphics and sound, a large world to explore in traditional Metroid fashion, some awesome bosses, good sequel.

Cons:
Did not meet expectations, some levels were bland, Dark World got boring, The final Key Hunt, Spider ******* Guardian! I H-A-T-E the Spider Guardian!

Should you get it:
You should get Echoes; it is a great sequel to the original game and has a great story. It should be cheap now so get it for the Wii and use it to help get into Prime 3

Overall:

Although Prime was one of the best Game Cube games I have ever played, and Echoes was a great game on its own merit, it just felt like Retro did not do as good of a job as the fans wanted. There was a sour taste left in my mouth by some things in here, but that alone does not warrant not getting the game. You are still getting a great Metroid game, and the flaws that I listed were mostly minor things that would not get in the way too much.

8

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 10/12/07, Updated 08/25/08

Game Release: Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (US, 11/15/04)