"Who saw Metroid Prime and thought it was the best? Well, it got better."

Story line 8/10

Samus goes to the planet Aether to see what happened to some lost Federation Troopers. While thier, she gets caught up in a war between two completely different races of being that live in different dimensions! Samus must transport from the two dimensions to bring all of the planets energy back to the non-evil group of beings. Except for the part about the different dimensions, not too creavitve.

Gameplay 10/10

Could I hear you say, "99% perfect"? I hope so, because that is just what this game is: perfect. Let me start by stating the one problem, then we can get on to the good part.

The absolute worst part has to be the fact that the only weapon you don't have to use cautously is weak.

Now, I am not against ammo, it's just that it kind of sucks when your fighting a boss and you are out of ammo. That means you have to use the insanely weak power beam. Some people are probably now saying that ammo sucks. It doesn't. Think about if your Samus, do you have an infinant amount of matter in your arm? No, thats's absolutely impossible. It's a good idea for two reasons: First of all, it really doesn't make that much of a difference after you get the first expansion. Then you have 100 ammo, and there is ammo everywhere. The second reason is so you don't destroy everything that is weak against that beam. Didn't it kinda suck in MP1 that you could easlily kill a Metroid with the Ice Beam or one of those dromes with a charged wave beam? This changes that and makes you more cautious.

Next is the enimies. They are creative, fun to fight, and cool looking. The Dark Pirate Commandoes did get kind of annoying, but it was still cool, since they had a weakness.

Bosses were cool, fun, and strategicly designed. You needed to scan stuff and be smart to kill bosses. They were very creative with they all-morph ball boss.

Another cool part was the two worlds. I mentioned earlier there were two dimensions, now lets go into some depth. There is a light world, hothing special. Then there is a dark world. This is a almost-exact-with-a-few-changes and much darker other dimensoin that you can enter with poratls. But here's the twist, you lose health for being there. There are light crystals, which can slowly give you health if you want to stand there all day. After you progress, you get new suits which protect you from the dark world, which helps a lot.

The map is awesome too. Just press the Z button and a 3-D map of your entire surroundings appears. Everywhere you are in shows up and if you got the Map Station, then even places you haven't been show up!

The first person view, like many other games, is cool, it makes you feel like your Samus.

Graphics 10/10

Two words: crystal clear. Amazing enviornments from a desert to a swamp to a machine-inhabited fortress. It makes you feel like your really there. You could cleary see all the enemies that weren't trying to hide. There were only about two places where the camera got a little messed up, which is unlike most games.

Sound/music 9/10

Great music that I found myself humming to in school. They fit the enviornments perfectly. The sound was cool too. But I think the enemies could have used a bit more howling when they died. The, "Ahhhhhh . . . ughhhh" when Samus died was so real sounding.

Another thing that got a little annoying was the sound of the power beam, it was so weak you had to shoot it 50 times (exagerating) to kill one enemy. The noise got a little on the annoying side.

Enimies and Bosses 10/10

Does anyone else get sick of those dumb M rated games where all you do is shoot people? I do. That is why I am so glad you shoot monsters in this game.Any little creature you can imagine from leeches to porcupines; there all here (in some wierd mutated way)!

Do you remember
"Help! This enemy has a metal shield! How do I kill it!"
From the games where the main character carries no technology? Well, not in the Metroid Prime games! Any enemy, boss, or even inanamite objects can be scanned to find thier weakness.

The bosses are cool, take strategy to beat, and are really fun. Especially the robot that was 50 times taller than Samus. The giant worm was cool too. They were all cool.

The one thing that has to do with enemies that is bad has the initials DPC. Although these appearing-in-every-freakin'-room-and-annoying-the-heck-out-of-you space pirates can be destroyed with a charged dark beam and a missile, most people don't know that (me on my first time through for example).

Control 10/10

Easy to control. All the shooting button were near each other, and the control stick really fit the game. The lock-on and manual aim worked well. A cool feature was how you change visors and beams. Just move the control stick or press the d-pad to switch the beam and visors. The Z button easily brought up the map.

Replay value: 9/10

I have played the game over 4 times. It is still fun, but not as fun as the first time. After beating this game, I really didn't play it again until after I played another game I hadn't beaten . I don't know why, it just does. It is still better than MP1's replay though. The only reason I replayed to get 100%.

Puzzles 9/10
There were many cool puzzles in this game. They could have been much more chalenging, though. There are spiderball puzzles, bomb slot puzzles, and puzzles that soley involve a certain visor or beam. I enjoyed them, but like said earlier, they were too short and easy.

Multiplayer 10/10

Haven't you always wanted to prove who's better at Metroid? Now you can! Most people will tell you the Multiplayer sucks, don't believe that. It is good. Unfortunatly, the Multiplayer is really only fun with 3 or 4 people, so that sucks if you were looking to kick your brother or single friend's butt.

You start with the power beam, combat visor, dark visor, a few missiles, grapple beam, and bombs. Some levels start you off with other special items though. You have to collect other beams though as you run around. The levels are cool. They all have something special. One has a turret, one has two islands connected by two Kinetic Orb Cannons, and to levels give you a spiderball or gravity boost.

Deathmatch mode 10/10
Run around to see who can get the most kill in a time limt. Or, if a player reaches a pre-determined number of kills, they win automaticly.

Bounty mode 5/10
You shoot people to get a few coins and if you kill them you get extra coins. Not a big deal, really. It is hard to keep on to the coins you get for a long time, you lose them right away! This part was really bad, I only played it 2 times.

Overall score- 10/10
Buy this game if you have the money. It is a great game, I loved it. Great gameplay, graphics, and an okay storyline. Perfect controls and awesome enimies/bosses.

In my opinion, this game should be promoted from "Best Gamecube Game" to "Best Game"

Let's give it up for another great Metroid game!

This Review has my copyright and can not be copied without my permission.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 02/10/05