Metroid: Other M Impressions.
The longest line in all of E3 this year is by far the 3DS, followed by The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, and then easily Metroid: Other M. I waited in line for a good two hours before I could get my turn to play the game. While standing in line a lady handed me a slip of paper advertising GameStop saying “See a game you can’t live without? Visit the GameStop table in the GameInformer booth and Pre-Order your copy TODAY! DON’T MISS OUT”. Shameless.
There were a couple different levels for Other M playable, including a level in a space ship and an organic forest level. The space ship level is supposed to be one of the first in the game, and acts as a tutorial. After watching people in front on me play it, and thinking I’m super awesome, I decided to hit up the harder organic level.
Right off the bat I noticed the controls felt a little unresponsive. This is due to the fact that the game is played with a lone Wiimote turned sideways — all movement is controlled via the D-pad. It took a little bit of running in circles to get the hang of it, but eventually I had no trouble moving Samus around. Other M isn’t completely 2D in that the camera will shift dynamically and players can move into the foreground and background. Shooting enemies is literally as simple as pressing the 1 button; auto aim is apparent and it’ll target the closest enemy. Battles are very fast paced without any hits on the solid framerate.
One area I was concerned with was switching to first person mode by pointing the Wiimote at the screen. All my doubts were thrown away, however, after getting into an intense battle with two enemies where switching into first person was required to destroy them. The viewpoint transfer is seamless and feels natural — the only problem I had was not being able to move around in first person, but that’s just the Metroid Prime in me speaking.
Overall, Metroid: Other M didn’t blow me away but it did successfully impress me. There are some qualms I have with the game, such as the voice acting and no ability to attach a Nunchuck, but hopefully Nintendo can fix up at least the former before its August release.
