Metroid Prime 3: Corruption

Metroid Prime 3: Corruption is an action-adventure game developed by Retro Studios and published by Nintendo for the Wii. It is the sequel to Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, is the fifth Metroid game chronologically and is the fourth game in the Metroid Prime series. It would later be re-released as part of Metroid Prime: Trilogy, alongside Metroid Prime and Metroid Prime 2: Echoes.

For ten years, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption was the final game in the Metroid Prime series, until the announcement of Metroid Prime 4 in 2017, which is currently stuck in mh:crappygames:Development hell.

Why You'll Want to Step Behind The Visor

 * 1) Incredible graphics for its time, and like the past entries, they still look great today. And with this being on a more powerful console than the Gamecube, they are currently the best the Metroid Prime series has had.
 * 2) Incredibly immersive gameplay which proved that the Wii was ready for the mainstream gamer.
 * 3) *While motion controls are usually hated by gamers, everyone can agree that the game has excellent motion-sensitive controls. After playing Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, you'll never want to play a shooter with dual analog controls again. It's that good.
 * 4) Great voice acting. This is the first game in the series to include full-on voice acting, and they did a surprisingly great job with it.
 * 5) Excellent music, such as Bryyo and Skytown's main themes, and especially Rundas' Boss Theme.
 * 6) Just like its two predecessors, the upgrades are still cool, and the game even has new mechanics.
 * 7) *After you're done with your mission on Norion, you get the PED Suit, immunity to Phazon, and the ability to use Hypermode, which makes you far more durable (under the risk of you being able to get corrupted if you don't use hyper weapons for long enough) and gives heavily buffed beam power, which is notable for killing the bosses and some enemies quicker.
 * 8) *The Grapple Lasso is a tool you get early on that allows you to rip armor off of enemies by aiming at them, thrusting your Wii Remote down, and thrusting it back. Not only is this an actually cool use of motion controls, it's helpful for killing certain enemies more quickly, and is even essential in a handful of bosses.
 * 9) *In addition to Hypermode's Hyper Beam, there are two normal beam upgrades (Plasma Beam and Nova Beam), but they're thankfully infinite in terms of ammunition just like Metroid Prime's beams. Also, for the first time in a Metroid Prime game, the beams actually stack up. The Plasma (or Nova if you already have the upgrade) Beam is also used to weld broken wires.
 * 10) This game is easily the most story heavy out of the entire trilogy, and the story is actually really beautiful and full of dread and mystery.
 * 11) Lots of callbacks to Metroid Prime & Metroid Prime 2: Echoes for the GameCube.
 * 12) Dark Samus is at her most dangerous and malicious here, as she's controlling an entire sentient planet, sends Leviathans down to corrupt different planets (and sending a Leviathan, which is like a meteor, to destroy Norion), and actually successfully corrupts Samus herself and her three allies.
 * 13) Incredibly fun and challenging boss fights.
 * 14) *The Berserker Lord makes a good first fight and part of the tutorial for aiming your arm cannon, as you have to shoot one of two weak spots and shoot purple balls at its face.
 * 15) *Meta Ridley is back in not one, but two encounters, and both are really great.
 * 16) **The first fight, after being built up by Meta Ridley flying around and occasionally interfering with you Morph Balling in some tunnels, really pays off as an epic fight. You're basically falling down an extremely long shaft to your death and still have to fight Meta Ridley, who still uses his signature attacks from Metroid Prime and is harmable by aiming at him and weak spots for when he grabs you. For a tutorial boss, this is a really great time, and is still a cool boss in general.
 * 17) **Omega Ridley is more like the Meta Ridley fight from Metroid Prime, but it is undoubtedly one of the best bosses in the game, expanding on how the already amazing latter fight went with new attacks, gaining Phazon Armor midway (you have to use the X-Ray Visor to spot its weak spots and shoot them to destroy it), and even flying through tunnels on occasion to throw you off.
 * 18) *Although Rundas has the fatal flaw of being really easy, his overall fight still has some good stuff like the music, the Grapple Lasso mechanic being present, the general attacks and movement from Rundas, and the arena being obscured by some ice pillars, increasing the challenge somewhat.
 * 19) *Ghor, like Meta Ridley, has good buildup (and its actually all around Skytown rather than in just one section, such as his recently-used mech suit laying around at one point, and him appearing at one point to obstruct your progress, which is followed up by him destroying and throwing your gunship towards you) and he has a really cool fight, which even utilizes certain items like the Ice Missile (which you can use to freeze a puddle of Fuel Gel in the middle of the arena to trip his mech suit), although this time, he's actually got enough health to last a while unlike Rundas, which makes him entering Hypermode much more noticeable and dangerous, and all alone a great boss. His only real flaw is that his music is kinda mediocre and unfitting.
 * 20) *Helios is a kinda odd fight with an equally odd fight to pair with it, but it is still a good enough boss and even follows the trend of you needing to kill it with a kinda overlooked upgrade, which is the Seeker Missile this time, just like Chykka from the game's predecessor.
 * 21) *Gandrayda, who you find in the Pirate Homeworld, is easily the toughest boss in the game, but thankfully not in an extremely tedious way like Mogenar. She is loaded with health and greatly utilizes her ability to shapeshift, and she takes the forms of certain bosses and enemies like Rundas, a Berserker Lord, and a Pirate Aerotrooper. Hell, when she's down to one third of her health, she even transforms into Samus to fire a massive beam around the floor, all the while firing projectiles and hopping onto you to decapitate you (which you need to shake your Wii Remote to cancel out).
 * 22) **All three of the hunters also have really horrid death scenes, with Rundas presumably committing suicide to avoid following more of Dark Samus' orders, Ghor getting his soul sucked out by Dark Samus (as a sort of spirit) as Samus tries to shoot her to no avail, and Gandrayda shifting from different forms while ending as Samus and giving a bone-chilling scream as Samus looks to her side, expressing sadness. Samus also clenches her fist after both Ghor and Gandrayda die, showing how eager she is to exterminate Dark Samus for all the torment and carnage she's caused.
 * 23) *Dark Samus' fight is really great, utilizing all the old abilities seen in her fights from Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, and, you guessed it, having some exciting new attacks that expand on the old fights. This time, she summons holograms (which are called Echoes) to increase the amount of gunfire you'll be dealing with, and also for distractions when Dark Samus is regenerating health. She also has new attacks like sending ceiling spikes crashing down towards you. The Aurora Unit 313, while easier, does still feel exciting to fight, and is basically peak story buildup.
 * 24) The game is more streamlined when it comes to traveling around and saving. Though save stations are a little more far in-between (probably due to now being able to restore Samus' energy and missiles), you can now travel to different planets, while you only ventured around one planet in the last two games.
 * 25) Good, creative, and fair puzzles like always.
 * 26) The game is incredibly atmospheric, which is one of the things that the Metroid Prime series is known for.
 * 27) The endings (depending on your item collection) feel like some neat rewards.
 * 28) *The 75%-99% ending shows Samus at Skytown mourning the three hunters as flashbacks of them are shown, which is an emotional way to end things off.
 * 29) *The 100% ending has the bonus of showing (albeit not directly) Sylux in his ship following Samus' Gunship as it leaves Elysia, teasing his potential return in Metroid Prime 4. This is further built up by his appearance in a post-credits scene for Metroid Prime: Federation Force.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) This game really wants you to use Hyper Mode, as there are enemies that can also enter Hyper Mode, although it is possible to beat them with your regular beam weapons, it takes TONS of hits to beat them.
 * 2) *The worst part is that some bosses outright require Hypermode to beat, namely Mogenar.
 * 3) For some reason, doors can sometimes take forever to open. This can really get on your nerves when you're trying to get through areas quickly.
 * 4) While the story is much more focused on here, the three new bounty hunters, Rundas, Ghor, and Gandrayda don't get much in a way of character development, although they do help Samus during one of the missions, and while Rundas gets have a moment with Samus after saving her from Meta Ridley and a very long fall, Ghor and Gandrayda sadly don't have as much to offer. Not helping that after the three hunters get corrupted and are killed, they are not mentioned or seen again, unless the player achieves the 75%-99% ending.
 * 5) As mentioned earlier, unlike the previous installments, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption has desisted to go back to the Metroid Fusion route were you stack up beam weapons, and although it's not bad, it is a bit of a downer for fans who like Metroid Prime & M etroid Prime 2: Echoes' ability to switch beam weapons, also there are no secondary beam attacks like the previous installments.
 * 6) Some bosses are still bad and/or hit or miss.
 * 7) *Mogenar is universally hated for being tedious to beat, as you have to destroy his four weak points (one of which is on his back, and is really tricky to hit with the boss facing front most of the time) with Hyper Beams, which is hard since Hypermode takes a whole Energy Tank to use (ON TOP of it being able to give you a Game Over if you stall with it on), and the maximum amount of Energy Tanks you can have at this point is five. And even worse, Mogenar can regenerate any undestroyed weak points if you're not quick enough! All of these factors plus the huge disappointment (the boss is one of those War Golems you've seen all over Bryyo, which you'd likely be very excited to fight) easily make Mogenar the worst major boss in the entire Metroid Prime Trilogy.
 * 8) *The Steamlord is so fragile and underpowered, and its encounters are so quickly finished that you'll be wondering why it's even a boss at all.
 * 9) *The Metroid Hatcher is hilariously easy from the second encounter onward as you can use the X-Ray Visor and Nova Beam to one-shot it if you hit its hidden weak spot.
 * 10) *Rundas, while cool (pun not intended), has the fatal flaw of having very little health as mentioned earlier, which makes him too easy and kind of ruins the conflict of having to fight an actual character rather than some monster (and Rundas, as mentioned earlier, is the most well-fleshed out hunter). At least Ghor and Gandrayda are actually more challenging (especially the latter), so they can have more of an impact.
 * 11) *Aurora Unit 313, while also still good, is an underwhelming fight depending on your view, mostly due to how easy it is compared to everything else you've dealt with beforehand (and, of course, the two past final bosses).
 * 12) The Aurora Units are very annoying, as they constantly tell you to backtrack to other planets to do certain tasks, which is really infuriating if you're busy trying to search for something in a particular area, like an expansion.
 * 13) The beginning can be considered kinda long and drawn out, not helping that some of the dialogue is rather cheesy.

Reception
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption received critical acclaim. On Metacritic, the game has a critic score of 90/100.

Trivia

 * Metroid Dread (when the original project was in development before cancellation ) was referenced in the NTSC version of the game, as a scanning of a panel in the Metroid Processing room on the Pirate Homeworld says this:
 * "Experiment status report update. Metroid project "Dread" is nearing the final stages of completion."
 * The left panel interestingly says this: "Experiment results unsuccessful. All attempts at using Metroids as a weapon power source have failed."
 * People have speculated that this references to the development of Metroid Dread being cancelled, although Retro Studios has stated that the scans have no connection to the game while Nintendo said they were "not making the 2-D title point at this time." Mike Wikan, a senior designer for the game, later admitted the Dread reference was a joke.
 * The Japanese version of the game, however, drops the reference and refers to the scan as a "Dread-Class Turret".
 * Gandrayda's death scene could possibly be a reference to the death of the T-1000 in Terminator 2: Judgement Day.

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