Metroid Prime 4: Beyond is very nearly here. It’s so close, in fact, that the reviews for the Switch 2 version of the game have now gone live, letting us all find out what we can expect from Samus’ long-awaited adventure on the latest hardware.
Here at Nintendo Life, we had a blast with Beyond, calling it “quite possibly the boldest, most well-realised Metroid game to date” in our 9/10 review. Here’s a snippet, followed by the full shebang, so you can check out our thoughts for yourself:
After 18 years of waiting, Metroid Prime 4: Beyond manages to replicate that magical sense of discovery from the GameCube original while pushing the series in some incredible new directions. Separating the main biomes with a vast open world sounds ridiculous on paper, but the slick traversal provided by Vi-O-La makes exploration more satisfying than ever
But we’re not the only review out there! Below, we’ve rounded up a handful of reviews from across the internet to give you a snapshot of the range of opinions on display. We predicted that this might be a rather divisive one in our review, and divisive it has been…
Kicking things off with a full beans 10/10 from Giant Bomb, where the outlet describes Prime 4 as “one of [Samus’] greatest adventures”:
Time will tell where I place Metroid Prime 4 in the ranking of the overall series, but fresh off my first playthrough, I feel comfortable putting it among the likes of Super Metroid and the original Metroid Prime
With a similar score to us, Game Informer awarded Prime 4 an 8.75 out of 10, praising just about everything the game has to offer, but feeling let down by the finale and save shenanigans:
Metroid Prime 4: Beyond maintains the high standard set by previous games in the series with incredible atmosphere and subtle touches that make the planet of Viewros look and sound real, but it is not without a handful of annoyances that hinder the immersion
TechRadar Gaming opted for a similar 4/5, and while the outlet seemed up on the story and “gorgeous” visuals, its big sticking point came in the open-field desert area:
If the desert was a touch smaller, and there were a few extra rooms to explore in each biome, it’d be on its way to sitting alongside the first two Prime games in quality
Things dropped ever so slightly for GamesRadar+, whose 3.5 review similarly struggled with the “padding” of the overworld, even amidst the excellent levels:
Within its actual levels, Metroid Prime 4 is triumphant, delivering immersive first-person exploration like nothing else in the genre, with some of the greatest levels in the series to date, dripping with potent atmosphere. But outside of those, Metroid Prime 4 is such a drag, and actively gets in the way of reaching those heights
VGC went for a 3/5, describing Prime 4 as “a game stuck between two worlds”, as it tries to keep the series’ backbone while trying something new:
When it’s emulating the series’ past, Beyond is an entertaining, if overly conservative, sequel. However, as the shadowy corridors make way for open-world fetch quests, and Halo-style expeditions with AI companions, it’s left feeling like a diluted experience that doesn’t fully deliver on the spirit of earlier entries
And finally, Eurogamer also went for a 3/5, feeling let down by the game’s ending and chatty companions, despite its high points:
No matter how much you enjoy the gameplay part, I don’t think there’s much more disappointing than finishing a game that’s relatively narratively-driven and thinking, “that’s it?” at the credits
A pretty large spread, no? At the time of writing, Metroid Prime 4: Beyond sits at a Metacritic score of 80, based on 63 reviews. We’ll have to wait a little while longer to see how things fare on Switch 1, but rest assured, we’ll have our impressions on the old hardware release with you before long.
Are you still excited for MP4 after reading the spread of critical opinions? Let us know in the comments.