Got my copy today. Played a little into Area 1 and so far it's great.
Some obvious mechanics there to prevent sequence breaks / exploration and IBJ isn't too useful with the spiderball so early in the game. Gotta see how the game evolves in that regard. It's not a huge issue so far though
IBJ has been pretty easy in this game, but yeah the spiderball is gotten PRETTY early so its rendered a bit useless. There is about 4 bombs you put down before theres a delay though so you can't necessarily button mash and have it work every time.
I definitely did, but that could be because it was easier for me to get the counter prompt with zetas than with the gammas. Samus' counter for the zeta Metroid was hella badass, I loved it.
Once I figured out that you can totally shut down Gammas with charged Ice Beams, definitely not. Still find the Zeta's bouncy green balls awkward, the grapple takes so long that you have little control over whether you get hit
Ark you're missing out, the counters are the best part of ANY good Metroid fight. The ones for zeta and omega metroids are the shit. The only boss I legit couldn't get the counter for was the final boss, tho I think I know where it is and when it happens.
If anything I was just so impressed by the animations they did with Samus and the metroids in this game. So fluid and a lot of little details! And the cinematics weren't too long to too overbearing. Just right.
To be fair, Fusion was FINE as was Metroid Prime 3 when it came to dialogue, but I would argue Samus had mostly internal dialogue for Fusion and Prime 3 was mostly others talking bcSamus' actions speak louder than words. She ain't got time for that bullshit she has places to be and space pirates to kill.
I just started after work today. I'm up to Area 2, just got to the big atrium, still haven't seen any 'troids apart from Alphas but that'll change shortly if it follows the original. I'm really liking the gameplay so far, and the visuals are all solid.
I'd say the only real gripe I have as of yet is that there's been little or no effort put into the music/sound design: recycled tunes/riffs from Prime, the somewhat cringey rendition of the Tunnel Theme, and/or just plain no music at all in favor of "atmospheric" soundscapes. Hoping that changes.
i definitely wish there were some new music too, but i have to admit i like most of what's in there. prime is great and i kinda love all the references, even though it's lazy