This is the usual arrogant answer. You can make a game challenging and deep without going to the cheap developer trick of making you replay the same sections over and over.

It has nothing to do with skill. It is an issue of putting 10 hours into a game and feeling like you accomplished something. Not playing for 10 hours, but only really playing for 5 since you replayed the same boring shit over and over. I'm not expecting to beat the bosses on the first try, but when I die I don't want to have to backtrack for 15 minutes before I get to try them again.

it was a joke. apparently you didn't get that...

but seriously, how do you expect to improve?

It is still easy to forget with a 'save anywhere' function. I played through 40 minutes of Bioshock the other night, died and didn't realize I didn't save until I went to reload my game.

Between this and the Strikers difficulty talk, it makes happy to see that Nintendo is still challenging gamers to some degree. So much talk lately has been about how easy their games are getting - "dumbing down for the masses" - "kiddie (not just graphically, whatever that means)".

I love it.

Metroid has always had periodic save points. But even the similar Castlevania games have save points very near every boss. It's sort of a catch-22. You either overload the save points or you move them closer to the bosses.

You either spend your time GETTING TO the save point or GETTING FROM the save point. The same distance has to be covered.

By the way, does anyone have any evidence that the save points in MP3 aren't near the bosses or is this all just speculation?

Again, explain how dying in a boss battle and then backtracking for 15 minutes to fight them again makes me a better player? Refighting the sections I die in makes me better not wasting 10-15 minutes to return to them.

Strikers is actually ridiculous in the difficulty department. so much so that it gets extremely unrealistic

Try not sucking

If that's the case, then I could understand the argument, but this is a hypothetical statement. The other metroids never suffered from this

what cup have you gotten to?

Many games (Metroid, for example) don't have difficulty settings. Additionally, many of us don't have the kind of time to put into improving our skills to a certain point in a game like we used to. So, while I'm not asking for a "win button", it'd be nice to eliminate the pointless back-tracking in between save-points and deaths.

He doesn't have one. That's the problem.

"it was a joke. apparently you didn't get that..."

I'm not claiming it is easy or hard. I've played it exactly twice since I bought it.

Just using your argument. Not everyone wants the same thing out of a game.

Some people like leisurely strolls. Some people like Ninja Gaiden romps.

Some people like deep stories. Some people like to skip that and get to the game.

To each his own, but don't sit there and pretend that there's only one way to enjoy a game.

Apart from Zero's helpful post, this is all discussion based around the earlier games. I don't know how the save points are distributed in MP3, I just hope they're better arranged than in previous games.

I'd like to hear more about this, we'll have to talk about it sometime over a game of puzzle fighter when its out. Cool? Im not trying to flame you or anything but I am interested in what you have to say.

I don't think I'll be getting Puzzle Fighter (maybe if the girlfriend wants it), but I can give you the gist of it here. I actually like Maximo May Cry, I mean Army of Zin. I can't help but like it because it's a hack and slash.. but the first one was so much more. You actually had to think out your battles, there was strategy to fighting even small monsters. You couldn't run into an area and blindly flail your sword around because every health point you had was crucial, it was more important to not get hit then to hit them. In Army of Zin you just keeping pounding away at the X button until you've beat a group of fifty skeletons (the "win button" theory in grand practice). It felt like they ignored any and all positive reception to the first game and built the second solely to appease Jimmy Jo Bob who couldn't get past the second level (and therefore was never going to buy the sequel). What a surprise that the third game was aborted a few months into production..

..and don't get me started on what they did to Final Fight Streetwise.

Final Fight? oh man I'm sure you know about this then right?


I had no idea that they canned the third game that really sucks. Thanks for the input.

Four more days.

Capcom Digital Studios originally wanted to make Final Fight Streetwise a very fun, cell-shaded beat 'em up. Capcom of Japan stepped in and had them develop the game as it turned out to market it to Americans.. as if there wasn't enough fucking gritty, street thug games on the market already. Or so the story goes, anyway. Typical corporate, publisher horse shit. And then they disbanded Clover. Oh, Capcom.

Here's some art that was to be for Maximo 3 and some of the (original?) Streetwise designs:
http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=75300

My heart is officially broken.

So this comes out in just a few days, and (Nintendo Power aside) there's still not a single review of it out there? What the dilly-o?

Embargos.

The IGN site says their review will be up at 12:01 AM on Monday. They also have an article on the history of Metroid which is a pretty good read:

http://games.ign.com/articles/815/815011p1.html

However, be warned that on page 3 they reveal a pretty big spoiler for Metroid Prime 3.

I thought that was only for bad games? I didn't even know video game review had embargos now.

i think it is pretty common for Nintendo games lately as well.

http://wii.ign.com/articles/815/815424p1.html

9.5 from IGN! I can't wait for tomorrow.