ugachaka :: Jacob was here

N’Gai of Newsweek and Stephen Totilo of MTV had another intelligent discussion recently about the confusion that is caused when a game switches from 2-D to 3-D. Suddenly, instead of constantly moving forward, you have to try to keep track of where you have been by the appearance of walls. You can’t just constantly move right on the screen.

It’s interesting the points they make. I prefer 3-D games, but especially in the Metroid series, I have gotten really lost before.

I neglected to mention awhile back that the Metroid Retrospective had been concluded over at GameTrailers.com with the Part 5 video. This one sets the timeline. If you watched the Zelda videos, then you know finding a timeline for a game series can sometimes be a hard thing to do. This one is a little less debatable, but they seem to have just as large a task in creating the timeline with what little you can piece from each game.

Joystiq reported that the Metroid Prime 3 controls are looking good when they played throught it in PAX 2007. I can’t wait to see this game in action.

In my opinion, the Wiimote controls haven’t been utilized nearly enough yet with the games that have come out. Most just use a handful of simple gestures for a few controls. The full possibility of this control scheme is definitely going to allow deeper gameplay.

Guess now I have to go back and finish Echoes…

The rest of the Metroid retrospective that Joystiq has covered and that GameTrailers produced is completed. I talked about it after the first edition. It is cool to see the series laid out this way, and I hope they do something similar for other saga-like games. Check out all four parts below.

This stuff is what I always hoped that G4TV’s Icons series would lead into in the world of gaming media. One can only hope. Icons got canceled last I heard.

Looking forward to the rest of the installments from GameTrailers.