Speaking of which; Qwerty needed some RNR, so instead we did another Metroid Prime! Qwerty guesting in the background as she does personal stuff, Robin and later Yza joining.

Zodi Streams: Metroid Prime Remastered [2] Funny Rock (Evil)

Video Length: 3:47:09

Content Warning: Extreme motion blur induced by Thermo-Viser, sudden very bright flashes of light during Thardus fight.

In this episode we... do a bit more wandering around trying to find out where to go as I'd like, but it's all in the spirit of Metroid exploration so it works and it all funnels out to us doing what we need to do anyway so its all good. The main bulk of this episode is carving our way through Phendrana Drifts, obtaining the Wave Beam from an ancient Chozo temple, then raiding the Space Pirate lab and forward operating base of all they've got. We also have our first introduction to Tallon Metroids, Metroids of raised on Tallon IV and mutated with this mysterious substance known as Phazon to make them no longer function exactly as we may be familiar with. It's all pretty neat stuff.

The pirate lab and FOB are some of my favorite areas in the game from a scanning stand point. They really grow the atmosphere of the world, making it feel like a real, lived in space. It even has hints towards future bosses, which aren't entirely necessary because scanning the boss itself will reveal those same things but also it feels "right" for this stuff to exist, and it is very cool as a result. We also get our first real big instance of Pirate Lore... though I'm thinking we miiight have missed some stuff on the Frigate in the opening? Because there's some stuff- not required lore- that I think we didn't see and where supposed to, but I may be thinking of a different area. We'll see, a lot of pirate zones kiiinda look the same even with the differences in colour tone and activity.

The Thermo-Viser and the surrounding Gameplay Event that happens is perhaps one of the more... controversial segments of the game. It is tense and quite a bit of a difficulty jump and involves using a non-standard method of sight and I would say that if they removed the realistic motion blur this would be probably a lot better, though still very nerve-wracking. You can probably tell I was having a bad time (positive) by the end of it, and while I do think it is ultimately a good segment of video game I think it can be a little too punishing given there is NO save point before OR after it.

As for the boss we face- it kinda suffers from the same potential problems the Thermo-Viser introduces, in addition with "sudden burst of light extremely in your face" when you bust up any of its rocks. Quite a rude bastard! It ultimately isn't that difficult a boss, the rollout move being the most threatening in any real capacity, but if you're not careful it can take awhile to chip down, especially if you run out of missiles like I did. Thankfully I ran out near the end...