Metroid Prime Hunters does a good job of recreating a Metroid Prime-esque experience on the DS, but it's still probably the worst of the Metroid games that I've played. Does that mean it's a bad game? Hell no. Metroid Prime Hunters does so many things right that to shluff it off as derivative or not accomplished in any way would be doing the game a grave disservice. It's just that in the face of what I consider to be some of the greatest games of all time, Metroid Prime Hunters has to settle for being merely very good.
As always, the game puts you in the shoes of Samus Aran, oddly in a plot that is ripped right from Ocarina of Time. This game is a sort of side-story that takes place between Prime 1 and 2, and has Samus traveling to the Alimbic solar system, where the Galactic Federation has received a bizarre, telepathic distress call about the Alimbic system being the "source of ultimate power." Once you get there, though, you realize, first, that the Alimbians (a peaceful race not unlike the Chozo of the first Prime game) have been brutally slaughtered by some unknown force, and second, that you're not alone – other bounty hunters are after the same "source of ultimate power" for their own reasons.
Later on, you find out that the last act of the Alimbians was to seal away a space monster named Ganondorf… ermm… I mean, Gorea, and the only way to end his reign of terror is to bring back eight spirit stones… I mean, fuck! Octoliths! Yes, that's what they're called. Octoliths. And then you can fight the shit out of him.
Oddly, despite this set-up, the effectiveness of the Prime series' focus on fallen civilizations hasn't lost any of its lustre, and because the game actually makes you care about the Alimbians, I found myself feeling really bad a lot of the time. Unfortunately, what's less successful is the introduction of the Hunters. Basically, they've been introduced as a method for having characters besides Samus in multiplayer, but their role in the story of the game is limited to being mere bosses who just happen to be searching for the same thing Samus is. They don't have much of a personality, and their presence makes Hunters feel positively populated, rather than isolated like a Metroid game should feel. Prime 3, which I'll be talking about in a day or two, really works even though it also has the Hunters in it, because that game had the feeling of a grand space opera. Metroid Prime Hunters, however, feels a little bit like a corridor shooter.
There's no doubt that this is a case of the limitation of the DS hardware getting in the way, but it doesn't change the fact that the labrynthine designs of Prime 1 and 2 have been replaced by very narrow, very straight-ahead levels. Add in the fact that Samus has all of her powers right from the get-go (and only gets a few upgrades to her beam cannon) and it makes the exploration aspect of the game feel a little bit tacked on. It's not broken or anything, and there are occasions when you really do have to use your noggin, but it's nowhere near the level of cerebral intensity that a game like Super Metroid or Metroid Prime demanded. This is also exacerbated by the fact that the game is divided neatly into "levels" which are short and always seem to end with a countdown escape. It's exciting the first few times, but becomes repetitive after awhile.
Funnily enough, the closest companion to this game in the Metroid canon is Prime 3, yet that's one of my favourite of the Prime games. There's more of an emphasis on that classic Metroid design in that game, though, and I think that Hunters kind of goes off the rails by trying to introduce a totally new atmosphere to the Metroid games.
So the level design and gameplay isn't quite on par with the game's Gamecube counterparts. What far surpasses those games, though, is the sheer intense, almost visceral action that Nintendo Software Technology managed to squeeze out of the DS. The action is much more ramped up in this game, and you'll be shooting enemies all the time. Part of this has to do with the absolutely terrific control scheme that the team came up with. On the default setting, you walk and strafe with the d-pad, shoot with the left shoulder button, and do all of your turning, morphballing, and weapon changing with the touchpad. Although I have big hands that would occasionally get cramped using this configuration, it's super precise and are bar-none some of the best FPS controls on any system. If you had one of those big DSiXLs, I bet this game would play like a dream.
It would also look like a dream, thanks to some really great art design. Sure, this game is merely aping the look of the Prime games on a less-powerful handheld system, but what they accomplished here is nothing short of amazing. This game looks and feels exactly like it should – like it's a sidestory to the Prime games. Despite the propensity of right-angles in the architecture, there are still some amazing sights, and the enemy design is top-notch.
In theory, Metroid Prime Hunters shouldn't work, but it does. Mainly, it feels like a really excellent FPS game rather than a really excellent Metroid game. There's a robust multiplayer side to this game that hasn't really been seen in any other Metroid games (nor do I think they should, as Metroid's catch word is most definitely "isolation"), and for fans of that sort of thing, it's something you could do in place of the single-player game. And despite the single-player game's repetitiveness and less-inspired gameplay, it's still probably the best FPS on the DS, and plays unbelievably well. The exploration is muted, but the action is not. So it's not like most Metroid games, but it still has its own merits. That's nothing to scoff at.