So I finally got my own Wii, and I beat the game in 10 hours or so. I had bought the game itself when it came out (just to support Team Ninja and Hayashi, because I lurv me some new Team Ninja), and after playing for about 5 hours of Other M on a borrowed Wii, I sort of lost interest.
(Spoilers ahead)
But yet, when I started my new playthrough with my new Wii, I had no trouble with the game at all. In a lot of ways, I think it was because I took a break, yet retained muscle memory and knowledge of how the game works.
But I don't think that was what was most significant about my second, full playthrough.
Before Other M came out, I borrowed my friend's Wii, and I saw that he had purchased Super Metroid. I'd always meant to eventually play Super Metroid, but never could get around to it, as the emulators I've used always proved to be pretty wonky with how frameskip ruined Samus's energy ammo sprites. And Super Metroid is also the worst game to play on a keyboard.
I played that for about 5 hours, slowly burning through the game at a nice pace every day, and it made me realize just how much of a polished and well constructed game Super Metroid really is. The nuanced design, controls, and what have you were just shocking to me.
It was so good that I went ahead and started playing Metroid: Zero Mission on an emulator w/ a game pad, and makes me hope that the 3DS will offer Advance games on its VC.
By 5 hours, I had just got my speed booster, and had youtubed Shinespark and wall jumping to better understand the game. An increasing sense of respect for Super Metroid bubbled in me.
When Metroid: Other M arrived, I decided to put Super Metroid aside, as I was anxious to play my shiny new game.
Wow, my first two hours were just nothing but me reflecting on how un-Metroid Metroid: Other M was, and realizing in retrospect just how loyal and true Metroid Prime was to Super Metroid. It was just so different as a game from what made a Metroid game. The fact alone that the little item acquirement jingle doesn't play whenever you get a power up of some kind drives me nuts, and still bothers me. I think that if they just included that jingle in the game, that there would be more fans and less raging. Sure, throughout the game you're mostly just getting health containers and missile upgrades, but you still do get at least two power upgrades outside of Adam "authorizing" them.
But as I said before, I played for about 5 hours, and then lost interest. My friend eventually took his Wii back, and it sort of collected dust on my shelves for a few months until just recently.
Starting the game up as the afternoon/evening dusk fell, with the lights off and what not, I found myself realizing a few things: I wasn't getting hung up on how un-Metroid it was, and was instead enjoying the Metroid-y things it did have to offer. I was enjoying the realization that no, I do not need to kill every living thing in a room every time I enter it, as I do not get health items and missiles. Knowing how to properly reflex dodge and knowing the need to run up to/jump on enemies to finish them off made what was happening on screen much more exciting than my original first two hours of play. Retracing my steps and knowing visual cues immensely helped boost my enjoyment, as it made me realize Metroid: Other M's true strength: Speed.
I was also no longer hung up on the fact that the maps were much more lateral than vertical, nor that the discovery element was ruined by the mini-map showing every item location once cleared. Its failures as a sequel to Super Metroid in gameplay didn't bother me.
While I still hate the fact that the D-pad limits how you move Samus, starting the game a second time also made me realize how much more truer Metroid: Other M was to Team Ninja's style of play. The quick finishing moves quickly punctuating what would have otherwise been a long and dragging combat instance made me realize: Yeah, this REALLY isn't your father's Metroid.
As an avid Metal Gear Solid fan, I'm a complete and total whore for overdone narrative and cutscenes. As such, I actually really enjoyed Other M in that respect. I don't really understand the people who bitch about the story. I thought it was an interesting chapter of Samus's life to see, and as a matter of fact, I'm absolutely glad that the game exists for that. The excuse is that the game is, in my opinion, a whole genre shift. The platforming and exploration element found in past games is practically nonexistant, and therefore, I find myself lead to the conclusion that this is, despite its appearance, a much more mainstream action/adventure entry in the Metroid franchise, rather than the series's traditional exploration/action.
But yes, the "baby" thing was bad in the beginning, and how MB goes out at the end was a little disappointing (not to mention, the stuck-in-first-person part confused the hell out of me; I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong, and after several continues and doing the same thing I was doing before, I guess I triggered something for it to move on). But that didn't stop me from not playing the game.
It was really obvious that the mocap actors were Japanese, which bothered me every time there was a female character other than Samus on-screen. Everyone but Samus suffers from what I like to call Naomi Hunter-itis. The whole overtly Japanese body language thing that annoys me to no end, whether its the clamped hands, or excessive nodding while talking. You don't notice weird stuff like that with the male characters except at the beginning with the quarantine officer making that weird gesture and the poor line delivery when he tells you to move to the weapons test chamber.
Capcom got it right in working with Reuben Langdon's mocap company and using English speaking actors.
As far as the story goes, though, like I said before, I liked it for what it was. Watching the (semi) final cutscene with MB and her mother, and just realizing that the fight against the Queen Metroid was going to be the "final" boss fight, it gave me moment to sympathize with the situation. Samus's final soliloquy, with her thoughts on the final events that occurred on the bottle ship, tied up a few loose thoughts of my own, and then gave me some food for thought in that classic sci-fi cyborg/AI ethics Bladerunner-esque way, which is always a pleasant note to leave on.
The final "mission" was interesting, and in a lot of ways, it made up for the complete omission of the classic item-acquirement jingle. What makes a Metroid game, if not A) losing all abilities, and B) a self-destruct escape sequence. Seeing Zero-suit Samus as a controllable made me want to go play Zero Mission and Smash Bros Brawl, lol.
Anyways, those are more or less all of my thoughts. I just bought a used copy of Metroid Prime 3, so I'll probably be going through that sometime this week (though I do contemplate whether or not I should go and finish Echoes...).
Edit: On a side note, watching the two guys who do those Wii Ultimate Challenge videos play Other M for the first time is really entertaining. You can really tell that they just came off of finishing Super Metroid, and thanks to video/audio editing, I bet they weren't terribly happy with the design decisions made in difference to Super Metroid but decided not to include those segments of the video. You can really tell they were expecting Metroid Prime in 3rd person or something, but instead got Other M's lateral and linear gameplay. Their whole shtick is to be super gung-ho about everything they do, but man do they look annoyed at some points :lol
