Critically Analyzing Other M: Two Perspectives (Gameplay)

Oh, and one more disclaimer. Obviously there are going to be spoilers in these posts. However, I urge you to not worry that much, as a) you really shouldn't play this game anyways, it's awful (and if you do want to play it, play it from a friend or get it used/rent it, but PLEASE do not buy it new), and b) if you're playing through it, you've probably gotten far enough you know what's going to happen anyways.

So, first off, the gameplay. It's easiest to comment on without becoming subjective, although it's hardly a subject one can speak on without injecting one's own opinions. But where to begin? There are all sorts of things I have problems with...

As you can see from the picture above, the controls, other modes notwithstanding, are quite simple. Almost elegant, and if they were all that the game used, I would have to praise it for its simplicity and use of design to mimic the 2D platformers. However, that's not the case. If you haven't noticed, you have to go into first-person mode to fire missiles. Incidentally, you can't move while firing missiles. Also, the transition from third to first person isn't exactly smooth. Frequently I find myself transitioning only to have the camera flailing about on me because...well, because I just swung it around in my hand to aim in first person mode. So I get to add a few moments to my frantic trying not to die movements to aim at something that is hopefully not moving fast or killing me and...well, you get the idea. It's not the best design in the world.

You can sensemove while in first person mode, which essentially acts as a "dodge everything and take no damage" move, but shaking the wiimote while aiming is one of the most unnatural things I've tried to do. But I'll say more about that in a moment.

So there are basically two issues with the current control scheme as we've discussed. One: You can move in third person mode, but cannot fire missile. Two: You cannot move in first person mode, but you can fire missiles. Resolving either of these would make the gameplay a little more smooth and natural, at least in my opinion. Well, you could make it so you fire missiles while say, holding down the B trigger or something (Actually, let me go see how that feels...well, I can't definitively say so either way, but it's not bad.), but then you just negate all usefulness of the first-person mode, leaving only the awful, awful pixel hunting sections to deal with (which we'll also get to later). Well, then you could add movement to the first person mode, but then you'd have to add the nunchuk. Which brings me to my next point:

WHY THE HELL IS IT SUCH A BAD IDEA TO USE THE NUNCHUK? Granted, the wiimote D-pad isn't BAD, and that's certainly low on my list of complaints for this game, but seriously, we could have had two control methods for this game. One using the first-person view, with more accurate shooting and dodging, and one using the third-person view, with more fast-paced action and finishing moves and lots of jumping.  But -- IN FAVOR OF SIMPLICITY, MIND YOU -- they chose this ridiculous scheme that forces you to switch to first-person due to arbitrary game decisions (enemies resistant to beams, pixel hunts) which feel forced and restrictive (oh yeah, we're getting real objective here!).

I'm not real sure why they wanted to force BOTH control schemes in, but even wanting to they could have done it better. Let's give movement and missiles to both schemes. And to add variety to both, we can re-add the scan visor to the first-person mode (I desperately missed this mode) and maybe other fun visors if you're feeling creative, and then do wall-jumping and edge-grabbing in the third person mode. Platforming is a lot easier in third person mode, as well as some of the combat sections (smaller baddies and whatnot) so it wouldn't go unused. And then, suddenly, you have a control scheme for people who like the more strategic first-person and for those that like the faster pace of third-person, as well as natural, unforced reasons to swap between the two, without the need to switch between them WHILE YOU'RE BEING EATEN BY A METROID ARRRRGH.

Hell, we could even regulate the morph-ball to just third person as well, if you REALLY wanted to.

But I think the main problem with all of this stuff is the implementation of that ugly mechanic, the Sensemove...