Team Ninja ruined Metroid, and Nintendo let them
The combat isn’t the most painful part of Other M, though; that award goes to the stilted dialogue in its many overlong cutscenes. Instead of the subtle, effective storytelling of Super Metroid (which Other M follows in the Metroid timeline), you’ll get cinematics that look beautiful but often run as long as 15 minutes, exhausting players with repetition of obvious plot points and overwrought dialogue as mature and interesting as a teenager’s diary.
Emphasis mine. Sad. Leads me to ask, is this going to go down as the worst Metroid title of all time?
“overwrought dialogue as mature and interesting as a teenager’s diary.”
I’ve been saying for a long time that Samus narrating herself is a lot like the girl in the Twilight movies, and is just as bad.
Hunters might retain that role. But it seems it has some good competition now.
I think you’re way too invested in this “Metroid has to be the worst thing ever” theme you’ve been running with for a very long time now, and you’re now about a hair’s breath away from leaping, head first, into Malstrom-style shark-jumping into irrelevancy.
So what I suggest is take a deep breath, step back from the kb and actually go and play the game, then come back and tell us it’s the worst Metroid ever…due to the, uh, cinematics…and not the actual gameplay.
(Or you could just keep acting borderline crazy about it and completely write it off, but you do your (already damaged) credibility little good in continuing down this path.)
(I also find it highly entertaining that GI is bashing a game for its overwrought cinematics when that’s a hallmark of a good 70% of the games they lavish praise upon.)
What happened to you, Jack?
Remember when all you did was rail against Hardcore Douche Bags? Now ou’re using GAME INFORMER–the douchiest of douche rags–Game Informer of all mags to reinforce your belief that this game is a failure. Never mind 1UP, whom you respect, saying that that they appreciate the game. Never mind Wired and Joystiq liking the game either.
You’re stuck in the Gears of Failure and it’s impossible for me to Take You Seriously.
But to answer your question:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/wii/metroid-other-m
If 12 out of 16 critics are to be believed: NO.
Other M is definitely worth picking up and totally worth the wait.
- Worth Playing
Most notably, the game design is innovative and daring, straddling a precarious line between 2-D and 3-D gameplay to make a game that feels contemporary while retaining the classic Metroid appeal.
- Wired
At first, I wasn’t sure that Metroid: Other M would be a proper Metroid game or even a fun one, but as its action intensified over the course of the adventure, it didn’t take me long to dismiss the second concern. As for whether or not it’s Metroid … I finished the game with a 45-percent completion rate, and I’m currently going back through the map looking for hidden Energy and Missile Tanks. You tell me.
- Joystiq
A huge step forward for Nintendo, a company that’s been reluctant to push story over gameplay…An excellent experience with great, intense action and an engaging story that turns one of Nintendo’s beloved characters into something more than a kick-ass bounty hunter.
- IGN
Other M is a strong departure from previous Metroid games, with fantastic combat and exciting bosses that make this another great entry in the series.
- Gamespot
C’mon, Jack, keep ignoring the comments of me everyone else pointing out what an arrogant, uninformed douche you’ve become of late. You’ve so convinced yourself that this game is terrible, that you don’t need to play it yourself nor did you need to read Game Informer’s review. If you can call a Metroid game with an 80% (and if the latest reviews I’ve read are any indication, soon to be climbing) score the worst Metroid game ever, you’ve already failed.
What are you going to do when suddenly you have no readers? There’s only so much of this bullshit I can take, as unintentionally funny as it is. THEN are you going to post that review that you promised us?
Give it a break, Poochy. If Other M was as great as you want it to be, you wouldn’t need to prove it to others. Enjoyment of the game isn’t riding on review scores, is it?
You either like the teen anime drama in Other M or you don’t. It’s opinion. Desperately trying to get people to agree with you just makes you look insecure. Plus, it’s futile.
What decides whether Other M is a success or failure is the test of time, not some paid “expert.”
To answer Jack: Yes. Other M is abandoning everything about Metroid that most people liked. Who cares about Samus’ personal issues? The protagonist is just a stand in for the player, that’s why they’re often mute. I just want to explore and shoot metroids. The series is called METROID for a reason.
I’m actually surprised that Jack could find “negative” reviews about Other M, since it is the kind of game that “core” audiences praise.
Since long ago, the “question in the debate” is not about about the subjective quality of the game. It might be the worst for Jack, it might be the best for Poochy, who knows. Many discussions about Other M here started because the Metroid series have been in decline, and some of the fans were sure that Other M would be the game that would revert that decline. Jack (and other people, including me) did not believe, for what they showed about Other M, that the game would be able to do that. Meanwhile, it seems the Metroid fan inside Jack took a bit out of him =)
Using VGChartz, I would say that if Other M sells around 1.5 million worldwide it will maintain the status quo, if it sells less something went wrong, if it sells more they are into something.
I’ve only started Metroid Other M, and I really did enter it with an open mind. Really. I was burned by Metroid Prime: here was this horrible rendition of Metroid put into first person mode… or that’s what I thought prior to its releaes. Then I played it. I was hooked within 5 minutes because the game was that outstanding. So due to this history where I was completely incorrect, began Other M with an open mind.
First off, I do like the cutscenes or at least the ones I’ve seen so far and I think Samus’ voice acting is fine.
But that’s where the positives end. I am so disappointed in this game! It eliminates so many classic elements of a Metroid game that it doesn’t even feel “Metroid” to me. Where are my floating missile and energy pellets? You mean I have to point up and hold “A” to “concentrate” and magically replenish myself? Are you serious? What the hell is an “Energy Part”? Really? It’s like Link’s heart piece? Why is it suddenly so difficult to shoot missiles? Why are there only about 3 enemy species in this game? Why did Team Ninja do this to Metroid?
I’ve just got to say it: this game looks worse than last gen. I’m so sick and tired of Wii games looking worse than the now 8 year old Gamecube title Metroid Prime. With this being a sequel it makes the bad graphics even more embarrassing. Could someone at Nintendo please ask the developers at Retro Studios how the hell they managed to make their games look so good, and then use that information in other games? Please?
The environment in the Prime games was vibrant and alive, in Other M it’s just flat and dead. It’s completely uninspiring. Stand in a waterfall, go into first person view, and then look up. You won’t get any water drops on your helmet. Sometimes the waterfall completely disappears.
Aside from the cutscenes, Other M’s gameplay portions seem cheaply created and come across somewhat buggy. You can easily tell that the edges of areas are bound off with invisible walls, and the inability to move your character into obviously open area gives a game a cheap feel (and, no, I’m not refering to the holodeck walls of certain rooms). There was a room with a tank in the center where you shatter the tank and it exposes a morph ball tunnel. Unfortunately, I had no idea it was a tunnel. I thought it was but I tried to bomb myself into the hole but those invisible clear walls deflected me so I figured it was just the base of the tank. After wasting an hour searching for my next goal, I checked the innerweb and learned that the base of that shattered tank really was a morph ball tunnel.
Worse game? I don’t think so, I think Metroid Prime Hunters will always hold that spot. I found that game to be torture and I only insisted on finishing it because I’m a huge Metroid fan. That game was just terrible.