Metroid Prime 3: Corruption

In Round 3 of our Vs. Mode exchange on Bioshock and Metroid Prime 3: Corruption with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo, which is also being posted on Totilo's blog MTV News: Multiplayer, Totilo sang the praises of Metroid Prime 3's new risk-and-reward Hyper Mode ability, and gave BioShock mixed marks for its handling of boss battles (thumbs up on the Big Daddies, thumbs down on the game's final boss.) We offered up some suggestions on how BioShock's excellent "moral choice" mechanic could been woven more fully into the fabric of the game. But towards the end of our reply, we decided to set up us the bomb, as the kids say, with our assertion that "The mechanics that are at the heart of Metroid, most notably backtracking and scouring the environment for hidden passages, don't translate well to first-person gaming." Surely that would get a rise out of the normally even-tempered Totilo.

Alas, Totilo is not only a scholar, but also a gentleman, and far too gracious to take our crude bait. In today's Final Round, he uses our statement as a jumping-off point ro reflect on what's been lost and what's been gained in the transition from 2-D gaming to 3-D gaming. But rest assured, Metroid Prime 3 lovers, he also takes the time to forcefully defend the game from our scurrilous charges--and get in a few digs at the end. We extend our thoughts on what's problematic about Metroid Prime as a 3-D first-person adventure; reveal our favorite boss battle of all time; and explain why BioShock's decision to handle the Rescuing and Harvesting of the Little Sisters in a menu screen rather through the game's more interactive mechanics was not only the wiser choice, but also the more artistic decision. Some excerpts:

Stephen Totilo: The backtracking [in Metroid Prime 3] has been fine. I just finished the game at 100% completion. I backtracked plenty. In fact, I chose to backtrack near the end when I didn't have to and am now made that I overwrote my save file and can't go back and re-visit parts of the game some more. To help me backtrack and find hidden passages I used the plentiful cues programmed into the game, including: strong art design that made most rooms uniquely memorable, a 3-D map that worked well enough for me to never get lost the way I did in Halo two weekends ago, a scan visor that marked all but one of the vulnerable areas I ever needed to bomb to find hidden stuff, a humming sound effect that played in any room where a power-up still lingered, and--BIG SPOILER WARNING!--a satellite station I activated late in the game that clearly marked any remaining items on my map as well as an x-ray visor that let me see through the architecture of any given room in order to spot power-ups and enemy weak points.

N'Gai Croal: The other challenge the Metroid Prime titles face is that first-person shooters have largely defined the first-person gaming experience, and they've done so in a way that's detrimental to the gameplay that Retro was translating from 2-D to 3-D. In a first-person shooter, much of the action takes place on the same plane as the player character, so my attention is primarily focused straight ahead. Enemies are rarely below me, unless I've taken the high ground; if I haven't, the high ground is where I'll find enemies armed with snipers rifles, rocket launchers and other ranged weapons. So in an FPS, whenever I'm looking up and off in the distance, I'm usually looking for enemy armed with one of those pieces of lethal hardware. In Metroid Prime, secret passageways and power-ups could be hidden anywhere. I might have to look high, low or in a corner. I might have to go to a room, realize I don't have something I need, complete a fetch quest, then go back to that room, aided only by a map that is as much foe as it is friend.

To read this Final Round in its entirety, click on the link below.