Kinda Funny Gamescast: Video Game Podcast - We Played Metroid Prime 4 Beyond on Nintendo Switch 2!

Episode Date: April 3, 2025

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We played Metroid Prime 4 Beyond. Can you believe it, Blessing? I still can't believe it. It's kind of unreal. Yeah. After almost a decade, I'll never forget sitting at the old studio, space in the Nintendo Direct, and all of a sudden, the 4 starts coming in. And it's, or no, no, no, it was the Samis logo, the S, and it starts coming in.

And it was like, oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God, it's happening. And then the 4, and it was like, oh, my God, oh, my God, we're about to play Metroid Prime 4 on the Nintendo Switch. And then it caught really bad situations. Yeah, had a restart development. Yeah, long wait. Long wait. And I remember when the debut happened, like, I was popping off.

Like, oh, my God, it's Metroid. Oh, my God, it's Prime 4. Oh, my God, it's going to be retro. Oh, it's not retro? Huh. Hmm. Who's it going to be? That's kind of weird.

And then after all that... Did we ever learn who it was? I don't think so. I don't think so. But we know who it is now. It's retro, baby. Let's just go back to what works. Of course, I'm Tim Geddes.

This is Blessing at E. E.O.E.A. Jr. Hello, it's me. We've been playing Nintendo Switch 2 games all day. We're giving you all of our hardware impressions, software impressions, everything in between. If you want to hear us talk about Mario Kart World, you can do that. If you want us to talk about our very first time holding the system and all of that, you can do that. And of course, you can also check out Donkey Kong Bonanza.

There we go. I got it right. He put some respect on it. Finally. He put some respect on it. Roger, do it. Bandai Namco. Bandai Namco.

We're involved in that. Bad Amico, man. They're hands in everything. Yeah. They're doing a Super Smash Brothers all that too. Yeah. Padapon. Freedom Wars remastered.

Interesting stuff. Yeah. It's true. It's true. Yeah. Anyways, we got to play Metroid Prime 4 Beyond. And I want to hear all of your thoughts on this, Blas. Yeah.

Oh, this is a fascinating one. My, okay, first off, even though this demo was probably the same length as the other demos we got to do, somehow, not long enough of a demo for this game. I needed more time with this, right? Like, it felt real quick. We got to do a whole section, and then we ended with the boss fight. And once I finished it, I was like, oh, that's it.

That's all. And so, like, my impressions feel light, even though I'm sure as we talk about it, we're going to get deep. I think first thing to point out is that the setup that we played, we got to play with the joycon as a mouse. And the dope thing about it is it's very seamless of, you can play with the mouse functionality,

and if you pick it up, you can play with the two joycons, right? It is that seamless. It's not a button. that you press, it's not a setting. You pick it up and start controlling, and you then play with the two joy icons. I was going kind of back and forth with that. Playing this game with the mouse functionality, extremely smooth.

In that part of that is the 120 FPS. 120 frames per second in 1080P. It still looked great. We were playing on the TV. That was the only way we were allowed to play this. We couldn't play it in handheld. We couldn't play it in 4K. Yes.

And any of that stuff, even though you're saying, it's 4K-60. And, I mean, I was incredibly impressed. I was so impressed. I felt the 120 frames. What about you? Yeah. No, for sure. Like, this thing felt smooth as hell,

especially playing with the mouse mode, right? Like, that was the thing that blew me away. But honestly, even before getting to gameplay, the cutscenes that we saw blew me away as well, just in terms of the visual fidelity of it. I was looking at, I was like, wow, this is next Nintendo gen right here. Like, this is,

and the irony is it's not. Yeah. You know what I mean? We were playing on Switch 2. But yeah, it's funny. But visually, to me, it's very interesting because you compare this. I saw a lot of people after the direct last week comparing Metroid Prime 4 gameplay to Halo 4 gameplay. And Halo 4 just looks way better.

But it doesn't because the art style. There's something about this style that like if it ain't broke, don't fix it. And I think that they kind of just really nailed what they had to with this visually. Yes. And so that's my thing is once we get into gameplay, it is 1,000% Metroid Prime. and that is, I think, the best thing, right? As somebody who played Metroid Prime remaster a couple years ago for the first time

and was blown away by it, this felt like getting back to form, right? You know, it was the... It's tough to talk about, like, the level experience that we had because it really was a, hey, here's how to play Metroid real quick. You know what I mean? Hey, shoot the door to open the door.

We essentially got to play what we've seen in the Metroid Prime trailers. Like, in specifically that... And it was kind of a tutorial section as well. Yes, exactly. And I don't think I learned much of like things that haven't been in other Metroids.

It was a mouse mode tutorial. You know what you mean? Honestly. It didn't feel kind of that way. I will say they give you the things that you want to have pretty quickly, right? Of like, all right, morph into the morph ball. All right, here's how you drop a bomb. All right, here's how you shoot a door.

Right. Here's how you scan and all that stuff. Right. So they give you that stuff pretty quickly to open to introduce it. And then you get into the boss fight and they do put you to the test. But in all of that, it just felt right. And that's both in mouse mode, which we can talk about in a second, but then also playing on joycons, right?

The control scheme is what you expected to be. and it just felt right. It felt like Metroid. Mouse mode was an interesting thing. One, because it did feel right, but also, we talked about this in the hardware impressions, broke my brain. Me too.

As far as, all right, so I'm pressing the buttons while I'm in mouse mode. I'm pressing A to jump on the right JoyCon, even though I have it being held sideways. You know what? In the hardware conversation, we were asking if the mouse stuff switched the controls. It did because it switches it so that jump is on your left trigger now.

You can use your left hand to jump You could also do other things But like it did add functionality to jump a different way Yeah Okay But even still right Like I had the thing every now and then of Even though I'm in mouse mode

I'm using the right in analog stick And the right in lock stick doesn't work in mouse mode Right and so it's a weird thing to get used to Though over the course of however long Like I'm sure it's gonna be a pretty quick process To get used to it I think that if you just commit to one of the control styles It's going to work and make sense

And I think the mouse mode is a very legitimate way to play. If you're looking at this and you want to play with mouse and I keep on to say mouse keyboard but mouse and left joycon, I think it's a very legitimate way to play. The dream, some would say. You know what I mean? For years,

I've been trying to pioneer this experience and now we finally have it. Not exactly how I want it. I was saying this is the hardware thing. I don't love how the joycon feels as a mouse just where the buttons are placed and at the end of the day, there was an analog stick just jutting out

in the way of your hand, right? And it's very hard to not hit that when you're just playing the game naturally. When you're holding a joycon. And there's something, too, is like, you put a mouse down and the mouse just stays where it is. You put the joycon down and it might fall over. You know what I mean?

You kind of need to, like, keep your hand locked there. And it's a little just different. Maybe people get used to it. I don't see myself playing this way. Having said that, playing this way, it's pretty awesome. Pretty cool. It feels amazing. The 120 frames per second with the mouse, you're moving around.

It is pinpoint accurate. And it was like, man, I don't know that I need this for a Metroid game, but having it kind of opens up a lot of opportunities. There's a lot of doors. we would get to that, you know, it's tutorial, you kind of go to the door, you scan it, and then like four different, like, color circles pop up and you need to, like, shoot each one to open the door. And I was like, I was like, and I was like, and it kind of was fun. I think it kind of added to the experience there.

Simple little thing, tutorial mode, but I was like, this feels good. My nitpick with Metroid Prime specifically, out of all the first midteriors, right, Metroid Prime 4 with mouse mode is Metroprime has that lock on function. And so you lock on and, bullets will automatically like fly to the enemies that you're fighting. But like, I don't know. There's something about it that feels weird with the mouse precision, but I almost,

I don't really need the mouse precision. Exactly. Because I'm locked on. So that's the one thing where I think that is really what broke my brain. It was the fact that I wanted to press the button. But then also like that lock on feels a little bit weird with the mouse. And again, that is the brain breaking situation.

But I also found, uh, once I like pushed through that, I found some opportunities to do some pretty interesting gameplay stuff with that. where I was like, I was kind of impressed with the amount of enemies that were in an area I once and how big the area would be. So I'd lock on to one enemy on the top left and I'm like, I do a call, like, charge a shot, shoot it, and then whip the mouse over because I knew there was another enemy on like the bottom right.

Yeah. And was able to just get to him fast, pinpoint it, and then lock on to him. And it just felt a lot faster and quicker than using an analog stick to do it. And then being able to like lock on so it kind of like pulled it to him, it felt really badass. You know what you mean? Which I think is pretty legit because that's another great thing about, especially early Metroid. It's that power fantasy of I'm super powered up. I have all the things.

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And you talk about that original reveal trailer where he got the famous logo and then you get like, oh man, this is Metro Prime. They're calling it for. Like, this is the fourth game. For me, coming in as somebody who's only played through Metro Prime, I was interested to see that, oh, this really is a follow-up. This is a sequel. There's a character that shows up where the demo's, the demo guy looks at me,

he's like, eh? And I'm like, I don't know who that is. And you boy is like, let's go, okay. Now here's the thing. Real talk, do you need to know? Probably not. And honestly, something that I'm really excited about, like, yes, this is prime. Yeah, there is story stuff.

Obviously, it makes it better to know. Play the other games. They're fantastic games. You should play them if Nintendo would put them out again. Who knows? but what I think is really cool about this is the amount of cutscenes and is the amount of like,

yes, it's a metric prime and that's what we wanted. It's a great thing. I know a lot of people, I want the most innovative game in the world and sure that'd be cool, but I think they're just getting another metric prime now. Fingers crossed,

if it's as good as I think this is going to be, will hopefully be the highest selling Metroid game and hopefully convince people and hopefully, you know, blah, blah, but I do think there's a level of polish of, hey, there's a story here, and the cut scenes and the camera, characters talking and just like you kind of have a squad with you in the beginning of this and the appearance of that. Did that get you hyped of like, oh, we're going to get a Metroid

Prime game that actually has a little bit of a story? I think for me it was the thing of good for you guys that like we're able to follow along with Metroid Prime, like have played all the Metroid Primes, right, and like know what's going on here. And I think I'm excited for, yeah, the idea of like, okay, where does this go? What's going on here and all that stuff? But I don't know. Like now I'm like, okay, I might watch a quick recap or something. Yeah, see, maybe maybe that's, it's interesting because like to me, it's, and having played them, I don't really think that this is like, oh man, like you need to know everything to keep going. It just to me is like, oh, they're trying to tell a story here. Yeah. You know? And I think that for me, they'll tell you everything you need to know. And that, my, my thing is having only played Prime 1. Yeah. That is very story light. Yeah. It's very story light. And like, to the point where we start off this one, I'm like, oh, other people. Like, oh, there's an army. Like, shit's going on here. I, but I look at it more so it's like, oh, they're feeding the fans. Like, they're giving people. Like, it's been so long since a. Metro Prime, right? That like, I can see the idea of people being like, oh, they're probably going to reboot. Oh, they're probably going to like forget about all this shit, right? No, hey,

here's returning character that I don't know, but I'm sure Tim Getty's gets hyped about. For me, that's exciting just for the fact of, oh, they're staying true to what this is. And yeah, like, I'm hoping that it hits for me, but I didn't necessarily get from this that I'm like, I'm not invested in the store yet, is what I'll say. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm all over the place with this. I'm excited like for the feed the fans and all of that. I'm more excited that I think that they're, what I'm from when I experienced this, I think they're going to make this game

a little bit more digestible for more people. Like I think just having, like, it's still atmospheric as hell. It's still, it's still Metroid, right?

But having just that little bit of story bit, like, I think the comparisons to Halo aren't just like, oh, the visuals and stuff. It's like the fact that it seems to be like, we're getting like a Halo campaign, like an old school Halo campaign style single player here

mixed with all of the Metroid prime trappings. I think that that could like really make a lot of people happy, whether they've played a Metroid Prime before or not. And from playing this demo, that my suspicions seem to be confirmed. Yeah. We got to talk about that boss fight.

We got to talk about the boss fight. They cook. They cook being cooked. That was a fun one. It was fun, man. I really enjoyed, that was when I decided I'm going to go full mouse mode. Yeah,

just to see if I can get used to it and like what my impressions were. And I'm happy I did because that's when I realized like, oh, there's something cool here. And the boss fight, it was like this big old dude with like kind of these like energy shields on both of his arms. So, like, blocking a lot. You have to wait for the right weak spots to pop up and, like, shoot them. And, you know, then a big weak spot opens, like, classic video game boss stuff, right?

But what was cool about it is he would shoot this, like, energy beam at you. Kind of like Star Wars Episode 1, Darth Ball and Obi-Wan, you know what I mean? That type of thing. But it shoots it at you, and you need to, like, jump over it, right? And at first, it's just like, oh, the ground. So you jump the ground. But then eventually it's a lot bigger. It's like a fence coming out.

You have to jump over it. But then eventually they start coming out. you and you have to turn it into a morph ball. Yeah, and go underneath. And I'm like, oh, man, that's what I'm talking about. This is Metroid, baby. This early in the game, too, I'm like, oh, man. Like, I liked the different phases.

I liked how, yeah, like, they have you doing different things, right? Like, you're shooting the different, you start off shooting these different orbs that he has on him. And once he get the orbs down, right, like, his big weak spot opens up and you shoot that. But, like, he might, he had the energy shields that he has on his arm will, like, block certain orbs and stuff. And I'm like, this is classic right here.

Yeah. This is some classic game design right here. But then, yeah, you get into the thing where he's throwing the big energy shield at you. And yeah, you're hopping over it. You're going to the morph ball. You're dodging all around. And then also, like, I like that this early on, assuming that it's early on, right? Like, it feels early on in the game.

I don't think they actually said that this is the beginning or not. No. It kind of seems like, I can see like a cut scene to set it up and then boom, you're into this. Yeah. And then title screen and then maybe it slows down again. They didn't set up where we're at in the game, but it feels early, right? So like, but being at this part of the game and it already being the thing of, all right, missiles, blast, charge up this blast, boom charge up my blast to collect the collectibles that are on the ground real quick and then point in

I'm functioning on that level in a way where I'm like this is good like they they nailed this first boss way scan this thing go up now you're in the vents you're in the morph ball it just feels like home but it yeah you keep saying classic and oh man it feels classic and and I mean you know metro prime is now an old game 25 years old something like that 24 maybe like that that is incredibly dating me But we're talking about one of the best games of all time. And like, yeah, sure, old game is old, but I think old game can be new. I think that Metroid Prime 4Beyon right now has the potential to be that.

I don't think it's going to change the minds of people that are going into this of like, first person shooters aren't this. I've been fighting this fight for 25 years. The Nintendo fans, Metroid fans, people like, oh, why would you play this? There's Halo right there. It's like, it's not a first person shooter. It's a first person adventure. There's puzzle, there's combat, there's so many different elements to it.

It's a Metroidvania, but in 3D first person. Yeah. And we haven't got to touch the psychic abilities. We haven't got to. Yeah, we didn't get that. We don't know. So you said it earlier, it's like there's not much to break down here because like the devil wasn't that long. But everything we got, I was like, it gave me faith.

I already had faith before, but I guess this reassured that faith. Playing through this, I'm like, okay, this is what exactly what. This is exactly what you want it to be. It's exactly what we think it's going to be. And that couldn't excite me more, right? Like, you know, you make the reference to old game is old, but also, old game is good. Somebody who played that old game two years ago,

old game is still good. Old game is fire, actually. And I mean, you know, after almost 10 years since they announced this, it's so nice that we know when it's coming. It's so nice that we have a release date for this game, and I know when I'm going to be playing it. He lied. We don't have a release date for this game.

Why don't we know? And I get, we can't have all the answers at once. But like, I will also say on that, I'm very happy it's not at launch because I really, really, really didn't want Nintendo to put this game out to die, especially after this long. And I think putting it out with Mario Kart as well as the biggest suite of third party titles ever. First time CD Project Red's ever been at a console launch period. Like, stay out of the way. Stay out of the way.

Let Metroid Prime 4 beyond so far deserves its moment. 1,000%. Until next time, love you all. Goodbye. Bonanza.