Reasons why I don't like Hunters

[CapCom]

Well, I'm sure there were a few people who liked Hunters - even without the multiplayer mode (which I'm convinced is probably the only reason it was rated so high).

1. Insta-kill pits/smashers. Apparently, Samus can survive falling into a 2-mile deep canyon in one game (which I think we thoroughly explained a year ago so I won't go into detail on it here), but dies when she falls into outer-space in another? Whatever happened to the 'oops, you made a mistake, we'll respawn you at the entrance to the room' rule? That was about making a more enjoyable play experience, not a 'more realistic universe.'

2. Timed sequences were they give you WAY TOO LITTLE TIME. I'm talking specifically about the 'deactivate the failing engine core' sequence. And yes, I know some people cleared that in their first try, but would it have KILLED them to give you ten more seconds?

3. Those battles with hunters and security robots get way too annoying. In some cases, such as the escape sequences, they work pretty well to add to the pressure, but if you have to fight hunters and robots just by walking around the level, that gets REAL old and REAL annoying REAL quick.

4. The boss battles are completely lame. Yay, let's blow up a giant floating eyeball. Yay, let's also blow up a giant tower. It would have been ok possibly if you only had to do it once, or if the bosses were a bit cooler, but you have to do it FOUR FRIGGIN TIMES. Originality just goes out the door at that point and it smells to me like half-assed.

5. This one's pretty minor, but the scans are lame this time around. The writing sucks, mainly. Second, critical scans sucked back in Prime 1 and they still suck today in Hunters and will likely still suck in Prime 3. Whatever happened to the Castlevania system where you kill something and THEN learn something about it? Sure, you can scan stuff, but it's not like I have to worry about missing something that I'll never be able to get again - Metroid's always been about backtracking, and one-time items are something that totally defeats that purpose. They could AT LEAST make that stuff available in Boss Rush or something. I'm just glad you don't get anything interesting for getting all the scans.

6. Slow missiles sucked in Prime, but not AS much because they had seeking abilities. Slow missiles totally blow in Hunters because there's no locking system. Though missiles deal a lot of damage, they're not really worth it in Hunters because they are so slow.

7. This is something that only seems to bother some people, but the control schemes are awkward. The only one I felt I could really use was the two-handed version because the DS weighs so much that it cramps your hand. Of course, this control scheme also sucks b/c the aiming is too slow and inaccurate...that would really make stylus the best.

And there you have it, my top reasons for hating this game. In all honesty, if they took out the things that made me frustrated then you'd have a somewhat decent game, even without different bosses. So yeah, there were some parts that I enjoyed, but they just get totally obliterated whenever I remember the bad parts. So because of all these problems, I just can't rate this game very highly, even though you can still get at least something from it. And that's too bad b/c ($35 aside) I really wanted to like this game. But as it is, this is one of the few games I would have wanted to take back if return policies were better, I'm sorry to say.

[Infinity's End]

The game was just flat-out, *NOT METROID.* It was atrocious. It had Samus, and other Bounty Hunters, and her ship that looked extremely like the one from Super, and other things from the Metroid universe, but not one second did it feel or play like a Metroid game.

IMO, They tried so hard to make the game into a FPS that they forgot that they were using the Metroid franchise - NOT an FPS. Hunters had absolutely NO sense of adventure.

NST: are you reading this? BACKTRACKING /= ADVENTURE!
The only thing I liked about this game was that you could go back and watch all the CG cutscenes - something I hope to be added into MP3.

And I know it's been run into the ground a million times, but once more: BEAM AMMO SUCKS. Sucks sucks sucks. Did I mention that it sucks?

[chaosvolt]

gah, i hate the aiming on some of the control schemes.
and you're right, beam ammo is crap! at least playing
as other hunters in mutli allows for some interesting ways to get
around.....
at least they didn't stray away from the serie's roots as
far as metroid pinball did.

[CptTuke]

Ah, Hunters. Or should we call it Quake with Metroid skins. I definitely agree the only reason it has been rated so highly is because of the multi player. The single player is just...Not much of anything. I think it's a great presentation of that the DS can do with 3D graphics, but a pretty poor demonstration of what Metroid is in any sense.

Still though, it's fun to play with a friend while you're waiting for a movie to start, I'll have to give it that.

[Jeff Aran]

You would post an anti-Hunters post, Cap.

Yeah, it definitely was the most painful Metroid to play through. I'm still going to say I think I appreciated this installment more than anyone on the Board. Any takers?

I've got to defend it somewhat. It did break some Metroid firsts. Like first game you actually used the ship for transport. First multi-player with online. The smallest game medium - DS cart being size of a thumbnail. We got to go up against other Bounty Hunters.

And how about some of the upgrades like the movie theater that collected all the cut scenes you unlocked. I personally liked after you defeated the game with 100 scans you were able to save the game and keep all 100 scans!!

Personally though, the worst was the controls - my hands cramped after 45 mintues. Why did they split movement onto two seperate controls?

I could go on, but why bore.

[Hiroshi Mishima]

Wow, I remember when Hunters came out, everyone on the board save like... Cap and Asaic loved the game, and yelled at me for complaining about it. Sure has changed though.

Anyways, I'm just gonna say I gotta agree with Cap on everything, much like I did the last time he brought this up while I was around a year or so ago.

To me... Hunters isn't even a Metroid game. It's like... Unreal Tourney or Quake with a Metroid skin/mod slapped onto it. My fiancee, who rocks hard on Prime, can't even finish this - or rather, doesn't have the desire to finish it, because it depressed her so much by not being what she was hoping it would be.

I admit I still haven't finished it either, but only because I got so incredibly bored with it. I was so hoping for something better...

[Ziggy Stardust]

I actually didn't have too much of a problem with Hunters. Actually, that may be because I don't like the Metroid Prime series very much (I don't like the way they blended platforming and FPS'. If it had been from a third-person perspective it would have been a much better game, IMO).

[Sasuke1986]

Yeah, it definitely was the most painful Metroid to play through. I'm still going to say I think I appreciated this installment more than anyone on the Board. Any takers? 8)

I enjoyed Hunters. To be honest, I never really had the option of using the Multi-player mode, and when I first started playing it I was disappointed that the controls were unchanged from the demo, but I eventually got used to it and began to enjoy playing it.

I'll agree with Cap on many of his dislikes, especially #1. The Metroid universe should have never ever ever EVER had anything that could kill you in one hit. I remember the pistons in Prime 1 backing off if they hit you. You would still take damage, of course, but it was that experience alone that made me walk right into instant death. I came close to giving up right then and there, but I eventually managed to get through that nightmare (thankfully, someone discovered a way to bypass the pistons, which is the method I now use to get that key). I suppose some people enjoy this level of difficulty, but to be honest, that whole room should NOT exist, especially since it's story required. If it wasn't needed, I would have ignored it like I ignored the 15% hard ending of Zero Mission.

As for the Hunter battles... I'll admit they got annoying, but it was nice on occasion to feel a little dominating, especially after getting the Imperialist. I sure did enjoy blasting those other hunters and robots in the head with that thing, ehheh. Kanden's weapon was fun, too.

The bosses rubbed me the wrong way a bit, too, but I didn't completely hate them. It definitely kept strategy formulating to a minimum, but seeing that typed down really makes it look like a bad thing. Regardless, I don't despise the tower and eyeball bosses, but some variety would've been good, too.

Like I said before, the controls took some getting used to, especially due to the lack of locking on, but if you think about it, the game would be REALLY easy if you could lock on. The way I see it now is that playing MPH might be to ready you for MP3, which seems to have a similar lock-lacking error, unless the videos I saw of people playing just didn't have them using the option too much, or maybe there are just some things that can't be locked on to.

My big likes for the series are more or less identical to Jeff Aran's, though. Finally being able to actually go to different planets via ship was awesome and definitely added to the feeling of size in the game, even if each planet was essentially as big as the zones present in other Metroid games, and ever since hearing mention of other Space Hunters in the Metroid 1 manual have I waited to see more of them. Having heard of them wasn't enough for me, and neither was seeing the corpse of that guy outside Kraid's room in Super Metroid. I needed some MOVING examples, and those new hunters were perfect.

And upon hearing the mention of beam ammo... I never saw what the big deal was behind this. I guess I never really used the ammo-requiring beams enough to use up all their ammo, at least not during my other play throughs of the game, and refueling was never too hard unless maybe you were in the middle of a boss fight.

I keep going back and forth here, too, but remembering the scans, a lot of the ones in MPH were dumb. No pictures, which is a pretty childish complaint, but they were also too simple at times, and some of the scans were stupid. I remember having to search through my entries because I didn't have them all and deduced that my missing entry had to do with something that was 'frozen' and as it turned out the scan I was missing was the one on the floor panel in the icy space station.

And then yak yak yak, blah blah, yappidy yak yak-

[Valherran]

No comment...

[MetroidHunter]

I was thinking about picking up Hunters just to see what it was like. Would my money be better spent on Metroid Prime Pinball?

[Conq]

Yes.

[MetroidHunter]

What sad times we live in, where a pinball game beats an adventure game.

[Conq]

That's because Hunters isn't an adventure game.

[Ffej]

The demo for Hunters that came with my DS was more fun than Hunters ended up being. Snipers in multiplayer for the lose.

[MetroidHunter]

I didn't like how nobody had an actual specialty move that only they could use. You got extra damage for your move, but it doesn't seem so great when someone else hits you with it.