Metroid Prime Hunters



Metroid Prime Hunters is a first-person adventure game built for the Nintendo DS. It was developed by Nintendo Software Technology Corporation, a Redmond, Washington-based first-party developer for Nintendo. A demo, Metroid Prime Hunters: First Hunt, was first released on November 21, 2004, and the full version was first released on March 20, 2006. Metroid Prime Hunters supports the Nintendo DS Rumble Pak, which was bundled with Metroid Prime Pinball.

Story
Beyond the bounds of the Galactic Federation's controlled universe lies the Tetra Galaxy, where the now-extinct Alimbics once ruled. The region under the Alimbics' reign was and is still known as the Alimbic Cluster. The Alimbics ruled with much force, but were also efficacious in their decisions. One day, however, all of the Alimbics suddenly disappeared without any warning or explanation, leaving behind many relics and ancient, valuable objects, some of which are quite powerful.

Now something in the Alimbic Cluster is eerily communing with powerful bounty hunters and other intelligent animals, telepathically uploading a message. "The secret to ultimate power resides in the Alimbic Cluster" is the sentence that played back mysteriously in the minds of hunters Sylux, Spire, Noxus, and some others. The message is in various dialects, languages, and even slangs, but it always boils down to the above sentence. This simple message tempted many to make their way to the Alimbic Cluster, frantically and violently, to reach their own goal of obtaining an unknown source of ultimate power. Some want power for their own doings, others seek it for a more noble cause like saving their people. But it seems that all of them are willing to take each other out to gain this mysterious power. The Galactic Federation sends Samus Aran a Mission File, asking her to discover more about this mysterious message. Her Mission: "Discover the truth about this mysterious message, to protect against a potential threat, and to keep the Alimbics' ultimate power from falling into the wrong hands."

Samus arrives at the Celestial Archives, a space station that holds a wealth of information regarding the Alimbics, most of it lost due to age and lack of upkeep. Samus first encounters Kanden here and fights him for one of the artifacts that will allow her to reach one of the guardian chambers.

After collecting the first three artifacts, she encounters her first Boss in the game, a bio-weapon named Cretaphid which resembles a totem pole with multiple cannons running down the shaft. After defeating it, she receives her first Octolith, a key to the "Ultimate Power." A timer kicks on and Samus is forced to backtrack through the entire station to her ship.

After escaping, her ship scans the Alimbic Cluster and allows her to explore three more worlds: Alinos, the homeworld of the Alimbics, Vesper Defense Outpost, a remote defense and weaponry station, and Arcterra, a frozen world. On each world there are two Octoliths and at least one "Affinity Weapon." Samus must find these weapons in order to open some special doors, which will allow her to find more Artifacts. For every Octolith, there are three keys to be found.

During her journey, she finds more information regarding the long lost Alimbics and their history, recorded mostly through things called datashades, which are visible only through the Scan Visor.

Once she has collected all of the Octoliths, she must return to Alinos to activate the Alimbic Cannon, which allows access to the Oubliette. This structure holds the long-dormant and extremely dangerous Gorea. When she gets to the Oubliette, she sees all of the Hunters firing upon Gorea, only to be defeated and have their abilities absorbed by the creature. Gorea then attacks Samus. Once defeated, it will enter a second form if Samus has shot the colored nodes on the walls in the proper order with the correct weapons. If not, the station blows up before any of the Hunters, Samus included, have a chance to escape.

If she does activate the nodes, then a second battle with Gorea takes place in the Oubliette's main room, where Samus finds the only weapon capable of harming Gorea, the Omega Cannon. Upon defeating Gorea, the Oubliette begins to fall apart in a series of explosions. Samus and the other hunters are believed to have escaped the destruction of the Oubliette. Right at the final explosion, Samus, in her Zero Suit, is seen floating in a vision that could have been sent by the Alimbics or Gorea. When this vision is over, Samus is returned to her Gunship with what may be a restored Varia Suit. The game concludes with Samus's Gunship flying off into space.

The events of Metroid Prime 2 follow.

Characters

 * Samus Aran - The player controls Samus, the Galactic Federation's most valued bounty hunter, who has proved herself in various missions.
 * Noxus - A Vhozon bounty hunter on the hunt for this mysterious power so that he may use it in his fight against wrong-doers and crime. He has walked a very virtuous path.
 * Spire - The one remaining Diamont, who hunts the ultimate power so that he may discover more information about the fate or location of the rest of the Diamont people.
 * Kanden - An experiment for the most powerful super-soldier gone wrong. He wants this power solely so that he can continue hunting and become more powerful.
 * Sylux - A deadly and powerful bounty hunter who hates, and constantly attacks, the Galactic Federation, and is also a sworn enemy of Samus by association and has been tracking her for some time.
 * Trace - A swift, relentless bounty hunter from the Kriken race, Trace is currently on a rite of passage and is searching the galaxy for new planets for his people to invade and conquer.
 * Weavel - The Space Pirate bounty hunter was badly damaged by Samus, and his shattered body is now supported by a cybernetic life support suit.

Gameplay
Metroid Prime Hunters plays similarly to the past Metroid Prime games in that it also focuses on exploration and upgrading abilities, but also has a stronger focus on shooting. The major upgrades Samus can get in single player are all weaponry, most already wielded by the other Hunters. In multiplayer, these weapons serve some traditional purposes similar to the weapon selections of other FPS titles; in single player, they are more often used to solve puzzles as find the weakness of various beasts that the player has to eliminate.

Metroid Prime Hunters is the first game in the Metroid Series to feature in-game uses of Samus's gunship besides saving and restoration purposes, which is later expanded on in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption. The game was also the first to have Samus explore multiple territories across the reaches of space, and it introduced sub-weapons to the Metroid series.

Metroid Prime Hunters is the second game in the Metroid series to have multiplayer and the first to ever have online multiplayer. In multiplayer, the player can choose between all of the Hunters seen in single player, though most are locked until you defeat that particular Hunter in a multiplayer match or defeat them in single player for the first time.

Metroid Prime Hunters is also somewhat more simplistic and linear than the main Prime games. Samus only has two visors, the Scan Visor and the Combat Visor, and there are no suit upgrades other than Energy Tanks, Missile Expansions, Universal Ammunition Expansions, and the weapons of the other Hunters. As the gameplay requires using the touchscreen to aim and the L or R-trigger to shoot, the controls are more akin to a PC FPS rather than the old Metroid Prime control scheme.

Multiplayer
In a multiplayer game, there are twenty-six maps that can be played, most of them based on areas of the single player game. There are several game types, including the typical death-match mode, dubbed "Battle", a Capture the Flag style game aptly named "Capture", two King of the Hill type modes called "Nodes" and "Defender", and a mode with limited lives available called "Survival". There is also "Bounty", where all the players are hunting after a single Octolith, and "Prime Hunter". Multiplayer is limited to two to four players. Two teams of two can fight each other in most game types, or there can be a two on one handicap game. Not all maps are available for every game type and some become slightly altered depending on which mode is played.

All of the Hunters seen in single player are playable in multiplayer, and each gains special attributes for their Affinity Weapon -- for example: Samus's Missiles have a homing ability while the other Hunters' do not; Sylux's Shock Coil restores the user's health, etc.

Multiplayer Tips/Hints
Multiplayer in Metroid Prime: Hunters has been called "one of the greatest multiplayers a handheld has ever seen." by numerous sources. This stays true do tot he fact that come several years after the games release, it still takes less than a minute of wait time to connect with a full group of 4 players (1 (you) + 3 others) over Nintendo Wi-Fi. The problem is, however, that the majority of people playing multiplayer now have been for a while and are quite good. With a current average player rank of 3.8/5 stars (average gathered over 100 Wi-Fi matches set to "worldwide" and "any rank" parameters.), any greenhorn player will find themselves outclassed in many cases by atleast 1 player in a full session. There are, however, numerous startegies that one can use to ensure they are able to get those 750 player points and soar to Legendary Hunter rank in no-time! --Multiplayer Hints/Tips brought to you by Clavat99 (AKA: Archangel, Master Hunter with 701 game winstreak and counting)
 * Train consistently against bots in multi-card battle mode. Have it set to the defeault of 7 points to win and 7 minute time limit, and fight against rank 1 bots untill they get really easy. Then switch the bot rank to 2 stars and repeat with that and 3 stars. Also make sure you play on a variety of maps and with a variety of weapons so you can be ready to take any opportunity that might come your way.
 * Get proficient with the Imperialist (the games Sniper-Rifle weapon). It has been observed and proven that the easiest way to win a match is by cranking out a few imperialist headshots.
 * Move constantly, as many of the games weapons are most effective against slow/stationary targets.
 * Use your Alt-Form alot. ESPESCIALLY when there is a sniper of noticeable skill in your game, as headshots cannot be pulled off on a player in Alt-Form.
 * Exploit glitches whenever you can. It may seem "cowardly" or "unmanly" to some, but as the game suggests, you are a cutthroat bounty hunter who is (or atleast should be) willing to do anything to win. There are numerous wall glitches (the most prominent of these in the arena "Combat Hall") which can enable you to see and fire upon your opponents without any worry of return-fire.
 * Protect your multiplayer points at all cost. ARDS (Action Replay DS) users are a nuisance, as they show up with permanent double damage, cloak, and bipedal Death-Alt. With of course infinite health. Should a player like this show up, use this simple and very useful glitch. Shut your DS off, turn it back on, then go STRAIGHT to Multicard mode, win any game against any number of bots with any settings and let it save. You will gain the 1 wireless win for your Hunter Liscence, and you wont lose the 30 points or have your Connection percentage go down. While this works for anytime you would lose in a Wi-Fi match, it is most commonly used in the hacker scenario.
 * Dont be afraid to lose! If you are tied with or second to a player with 2 or mroe stars than you, you will actually gain points! Another scenario is when you are in 3rd place but someone higher than you lost, you will still gain the points. If you are obsessed with win percentage (where even 1 loss puts a permanent negative to that stat) then ignore this and utilize the glitch listed in the above section.
 * Find a position to hold your DS that is both practical and comfortable. The most commonly observed way of holding the DS while playing MP:H is the "Tea-Time" and "Southpaw Tea-Time" methods. This means that you hold the DS with your left hand controlling movement with your thumb, and fire with your pointer finger. and your Right hand holding the stylus with the thumb, pointer and middle finger, the ring finger under the DS to keep it steady and your pinky sticking out (looks like your holding a teacup) on the R-Shoulder button to control zoom. The "Southpaw Tea-Time" is that but with lefthanded settings on. This style of holding the DS is extremely useful in multiplayer situations.
 * USE YOUR DAMN RADAR! Radar is there but is heavily under-appreciated by many players of MP:H. It hay not server alot of use in Adventure mode, but it is by far one of the most invaluable tools in your arsenal in multiplayer mode. It is not like Halos Motion Tracker, that meaning that remainign still will not make a player disappear from your enhcanced reality. Being able to keep tabs on when your enemies are near you is extremely useful as it lets you hunt down a near-dead player around corners and such, as many player when low on health will disengage and attempt to flee and get an energy pickup then reengage. There are many other uses for it and many of them unique to the creativness of a player.
 * Use power beam frequently. The Power Beam (the default weapon) deals little damage, but it is verry accurate, hard to dodge, and has the fastest rate of fire of all the weapons in the game. Many a match has been won due to 20+ headshots with the powerbeam delivered in under 5 seconds.

Areas



 * Celestial Archives
 * Alinos
 * Vesper Defense Outpost
 * Arcterra
 * Oubliette

Bosses

 * Cretaphid
 * Slench
 * Fire Spawn
 * Arctic Spawn
 * Gorea

Creatures
The creatures in Metroid Prime Hunters are a mix of traditional Metroid and Metroid Prime enemies, like the Zoomers and a more challenging variety of new enemies like the Guardians. Strangly, there are no Metroids in the game; instead there is the Quadtroid, which has an attack style similar to the Metroid. On closer inspection, one will notice that there are only a select few types of creatures, and most of the creatures that appear in different environments are variants of others. There is an obvious reoccurring theme of interstellar creatures such as Blastcaps and Ithraks who are able to migrate from planet-to-planet and even inhabit artificial space stations. Most creatures in the Alimbic Cluster, both biological and artificial, are not native to their current environments; they are mainly migratory entities who stowed away on space vessels which later visited these places.


 * List of Creatures in Metroid Prime Hunters

Trivia

 * Metroid Prime Hunters is the first Metroid game to use pre-rendered CG cutscenes.
 * The Trocra was originally intended to be a Power Bomb, as evidenced by its file name "PowerBomb_Model", although this idea was scrapped for unknown reasons.
 * Metroid Prime Hunters has the most amount of Countdowns out of any Metroid game.
 * Metroid Prime Hunters is the only Metroid game where Samus constantly remains in her Varia Suit and never finds any additional suits.
 * Metroid Prime Hunters and Super Metroid are the only games in the entire Metroid series where a special ending is unlocked by doing something other than completing the game within a set time-limit or by getting 100%. In this case, it is unlocked by shooting a series of panels in the final level to fight Gorea's true form, fulfilling the Alimbic Prophecy.
 * Hunters is the first Metroid game to allow the player to control characters other than Samus (albeit only in multiplayer mode).
 * Metroid Prime Hunters is the only game in the Prime series that allows the player to scan objects or creatures in another room or area without entering it first.
 * Unlike other Metroid Prime games, the sub-weapons in Hunters do not change the shape of the Arm Cannon when they are active, though the coloring changes for each. Also, the new weapons do not have the word "beam" in their names, and they cannot fire any Charge Combos.
 * The music in Metroid Prime Hunters appears to be based on existing themes from Metroid Prime: the theme of Alinos is a remix of the Chozo Ruins theme, the Arcterra depths theme is based on the Phendrana Drifts theme, and the theme of Gorea's second form is a remix of Metroid Prime Battle. It is worth mentioning that Kenji Yamamoto had no participation in the music creation department, which was led by Lawrence Schwedler and James Phillipsen from NSTC.
 * Hunters has the most interchangeable weapons of any other game in the series.
 * Despite not needing to activate any Spinners or travel up Half-pipes, Samus is still able to use the Boost Ball upgrade in this game.
 * Metroid Prime Hunters is the first Metroid game that does not let Samus upgrade her suit aside from Universal Ammunition Expansions, Missile Expansions, Energy Tanks, and all of the sub-weapons.
 * Hunters is one of the three Metroid games that does not have Ridley in it, along with Metroid II: Return of Samus and Metroid Prime 2: Echoes. Apart from two Pirate Troopers in the introduction and Weavel, this game also has no Space Pirates.
 * Hunters is also the only Metroid game to have a (non-canon) ending where Samus actually dies.
 * Metroid Prime Hunters is the first Metroid game to have a menu that displays a player's records, including: Gorea Phase 1 Time, Gorea Phase 2 Time and Total Game Time. It is also the first to keep track of how many enemies a player has killed during the single player game, which is seen again in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption as a ship feature.
 * Hunters is one of two Metroid games to allow players to access any cutscene from the single player mode without having to replay the game. Metroid: Other M has this feature once again, under the name "Theater Mode".
 * Metroid Prime Hunters is the only Prime series game that has no direct indication of Phazon's presence.
 * Hunters is one of the only Metroid game released after the original Metroid that features an entirely new set of weapon upgrades obtained in the game.
 * Metroid Prime Hunters and Metroid Prime Hunters: First Hunt are the only Metroid games to have lobbing weapons: the Magmaul/Battlehammer and the Electro Lob.
 * Hunters is also the only Metroid game that features weapons Samus can fire that are capable of bouncing off walls, the Judicator and the Magmaul, and features the only sniper weapon: the Imperialist.


 * Metroid Prime Hunters is the only game in the Prime series that does not feature a hint system.
 * Metroid Prime Hunters is the only game in the series to not have Metroids in it nor mentioning them in any way at all (aside from the game title).
 * Tetra is the Greek word for the number 4. The Tetra Cluster has 4 locations (not counting the Oubliette).
 * Metroid Prime Hunters may have originally been intended to take place after Metroid Prime 2: Echoes as evidenced by scanning a War Wasp, the scan reads "The royal jelly of the War Wasp queen is so highly valued that hives continue to be harvested on Aether in spite of a shocking death toll." which is chronologically inconsistent with the official timeline. However this could mean that Aether is a dangerous planet as seeing that the Alimbic have been hinted to trade with the Luminoth.
 * To market the game, Jones Soda sold a bottle with the label featuring Samus as she appears in Hunters.
 * The game was playable in 2005 during the Nintendo Fusion Tour.
 * Metroid Prime Hunters has the least to do with the Metroid series' main plots of any of the games, especially the Prime series - it has no Metroids, few familiar enemies, and features very little continuity between the Prime series. This makes it questionable as to why Hunters is even in the Prime series, as the only similar thing is seeing through Samus's eyes and minor elements of the plot including the implied mentions of the Chozo and Luminoth and the direct mentions of Tallon IV and Aether. -- ***Reponse to this by Clavat99: "Over 80 percent of enemies that appear in MP:H were in other metroids before Hunters. There ARE metroids, just a different species of them (found in Arcterra in the fault-line cavern..) Metroid Prime series is a series its own as it is played in First-Person. Were Hunters not in FPS format it would have been just Metroid: Hunters. And it was created to add an out-of-the way and non-dangerous element to the series time-line so that it could be made into a Handheld game featuring online multiplayer and other playable charectors."***
 * The best ending in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption features Samus' ship flying off into space then shows another ship drift on screen and pursue her. When cut from screen-shots and compared, this "Mystery Ship" is practically a Hi-Res duplicate of Sylux's Delano-7. Including color scheme and all. Making MP3 the only metroid game to have a (albeit small and very inside) link to Hunters.
 * The Multiplayer Modes were designed to appeal to Halo Fans. Battle (MPH)=Slayer (halo); Survival (MPH)=Elimination Slayer (halo); Prime Hunter (MPH)=Juggernaut (halo); Defender (MPH)=King of the Hill (halo); Nodes (mph)=Multinode KOTH (halo); Capture (MPH)=CTF (halo); The only mode not directly attributed to halo is Bounty, but the game still resembles Halo's Oddball mode. This strategy worked and got alot of long-time Halo fans to try out MP:H.