Metroid Prime 4: Beyond

• Genre: First-Person Action Adventure
• Spoiler Free Review: Yes.
• Time Played: 19 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It's fine. Ran a little long on my end because I kept going back and forth to check areas over and over and there is no fast travel to do so, and I didn't activate the scouts that help you find missing items until my last pass through before finishing the game. I probably could have cut a solid few hours had I done that.
• Soundtrack: Soundtrack is fantastic. Mostly environmental mood setting type stuff, with a couple exceptions, but they still manage to be bangers.
• Why I played: I mean I play pretty much every Metroid game, but Samus on a motorcycle let's be real.
• Did I cry: Nah.
• Jank: It's a pretty polished game. There were like two times I encountered a glitch. One time where I was stuck/couldn't move and thought I was going to have to restart the game, and another where my scanning UI was popping on and off. They both worked themselves out though.
• Difficulty: It can be pretty difficult. It's not like grueling difficulty, but it can be a challenge and sometimes feel unfairly so when you're just trying to get from point A to point B. 
• Recommend to others: I'm not going to really go out of my way to recommend it, but anyone who likes Metroid/Metroid Prime, or has considered it, I definitely would. It's a really good game, but it's true to form for the series and I don't think is breaking any new ground.

I don't think I really have too much to say. After 18 years, this was I feel like a game that just played it safe. It did new stuff sure, I loved the motorcycle, and it played a little bit with each of the unique mechanics. There is some decent morphball puzzle/platforming and some motorcycle battles to mix it up, but they didn't go too hard, or lean too much into stuff outside the core game play. I think anyone with any fondness for Metroid Prime will be happy to play this one so long as they're reasonable, though some people are just looking to get mad at something.

I remember when Metroid Dread came out, a big complaint was it "uses too many buttons". I even know of someone who rage-quit the game entirely over it. I find it to be an odd complaint because modern controllers have so many buttons for a reason. Though I suppose if you mainly play certain genres - many buttons just become optional. Not to say controls couldn't be simplified or more intuitive, but Metroid Prime 4 definitely also uses all the buttons. I definitely felt it more for this one, and maybe because the more omni-direction nature of the game, but sometimes I would just be hitting stuff and doing the wrong thing. Plus the controls change depending on context too... there are the standard controls, the scan mode controls(not just for scanning!), the morphball controls, the motorcycle controls. There is a lot to do. But I'm not really complaining. In many cases, two buttons would perform the same function - I think this was to help with aiming during combat, and platforming, and stuff like that.

Arguably two things I wished were in the game would have required two more buttons. I wish Samus could dash - just run faster, and I wish she could punch. There are times in cutscenes where she just hits stuff, and the past couple Metroid games had the "melee counter". I really just wanted to smack stuff away that was right in my face. In sections where the bike was unavailable, I wish I could have just dashed or run to trek a bit faster. That would have made up for there being no fast-travel. Usually games like this would have a fast-travel, and this didn't, and I'm okay with that. It's not SO huge it's necessary, and sometimes fast-travel can take away from the experience. If there were tons of side missions and things I was actually required to go back and forth for, then maybe I'd need it, but it's not like it was a super long game anyway. I just wanted to run faster.