Developer : Nintendo
Release date : November 18, 2002
Synopsis :
Metroid Prime is an action-adventure game developed by Retro Studios and published by Nintendo for the GameCube. Metroid Prime is the fifth main installment in the Metroid franchise and the first game in the series to use 3D computer graphics and a first-person perspective. Since exploration takes precedence over combat, Nintendo classifies the game as a “first-person adventure” rather than a first-person shooter. It was released in North America in November 2002, and in Japan and Europe the following year. One day before its North American release, Nintendo released the Game Boy Advance game Metroid Fusion, marking the return of the Metroid series after an eight-year hiatus following Super Metroid (1994).
Metroid Prime is the first game in the Metroid Prime saga, which takes place between the original Metroid and Metroid II: Return of Samus. Like previous games in the series, Metroid Prime has a science fiction setting in which players control the bounty hunter and series protagonist, Samus Aran. The story follows Samus as she battles the Space Pirates and their biological experiments on the planet Tallon IV. The game was a collaboration between Retro’s staff in Austin, Texas, and Japanese Nintendo employees, including producers Shigeru Miyamoto and Kensuke Tanabe, the former of whom suggested the project after visiting Retro’s headquarters in 2000.
The game garnered universal praise and commercial success, selling over 2.8 million units worldwide. It won a number of Game of the Year awards, and is regarded by many critics and gamers to be one of the greatest video games ever made, remaining one of the highest-rated games on Metacritic. In 2009, an enhanced version was released for the Wii as a stand-alone game in Japan, and as part of the Metroid Prime: Trilogy compilation internationally.
Samus Aran intercepts a distress signal from the Space Pirate frigate Orpheon, whose crew have been slaughtered by the Pirates’ own genetically modified, experimental subjects. At the ship’s core, she battles with the Parasite Queen, a giant version of the tiny parasites aboard the ship. The Parasite Queen is defeated and falls into the ship’s reactor core, initiating the destruction of the ship. While Samus is escaping from the frigate, she encounters a cybernetic version of Ridley called Meta Ridley. During her escape, an explosion damages Samus’s suit, causing some of her abilities to malfunction. Samus escapes the frigate and chases Ridley in her gunship towards the nearby planet Tallon IV.
After landing in the Tallon Overworld, Samus explores nearby areas of Tallon IV and discovers the Chozo Ruins, the remains of the Chozo civilization. As she explores the ruins, she learns the Chozo on the planet had been killed by something referred to as “The Great Poison”, designated as Phazon by the Space Pirates, that originated from a meteor that impacted on the planet many years ago. After regaining her lost abilities in the ruins, Samus finds her way to the Magmoor Caverns, a series of magma-filled tunnels, which are used by the Space Pirates as a source of geothermal power. Following the tunnels, Samus travels to the Phendrana Drifts, a cold, mountainous location which is home to an ancient Chozo ruin and Space Pirate research labs used to study the Metroids. After obtaining new abilities, Samus explores the wreckage of the crashed Orpheon and then infiltrates the Phazon Mines, where she learns the outcome of the Phazon experimentation project, including the Metroid Prime, a creature that had come to Tallon IV with the meteor. Advancing deeper into the mines, Samus fights her way through the Phazon-enhanced Space Pirates and obtains the Phazon Suit after defeating the monstrous Omega Pirate.
Samus discovers the Artifact Temple that the Chozo built to contain the Metroid Prime and to stop the Phazon from spreading over the planet. To gain access to the meteor’s Impact Crater, Samus collects and unites the twelve Chozo artifacts. As Samus returns to the temple with the artifacts, Meta Ridley appears and attacks her. Samus defeats Ridley and enters the Impact Crater, where she finds the Metroid Prime. After she defeats it, the Metroid Prime absorbs Samus’s Phazon Suit and explodes. Samus escapes the collapsing crater and leaves Tallon IV in her ship. If the player completes the game with all of the items obtained, Metroid Prime is then shown reconstructing itself into a body resembling Samus.
Source : Wikipedia
