Metroid Prime: Federation Force
Top Critic
Metroid's first outing in years strips away the series' isolation and exploration for a serviceable co-op experience.
Top Critic
Top Critic
A co-op Metroid seemed like a bad idea from the start, but while Federation Force has its moments they’re overshadowed by sloppy implementation and bland design.
Top Critic
Though riddled with frustrating sequences, the campaign is fun to play through solo or with friends, and Blast Ball is a fun distraction
Top Critic
Metroid Prime: Federation Force plays it safe and drops the ball.
Top Critic
With or without friends, Metroid Prime: Federation Force is a slog
Top Critic
It's actually very good! A smartly-designed and surprisingly-strategic shooter best played in co-op.
Top Critic
Aside from some cheapness with the occasional instant-kill attack, the varied scenarios they present create huge, exhilarating battles for players to contend with.
Top Critic
For the few things it does right, like some variation in the mission structure and a control scheme that makes sense (even in a hurty way), it's just not that good. For a series that has worked so hard to make a great solo experience, even—especially—in its first-person outings, it’s incredibly unbalanced with a difficulty spike I don’t think I’ve ever experienced before. And not in a challenging way, but in a “yup, I need multiple other people to cover me/back me up” way. Some of us enjoy playing FPS titles by ourselves sometimes, and I don’t want to feel relegated to a small handful of missions I might be able to work through on my own. Scaling the difficulty has been done since this genre began, so why it’s being bypassed now I have no clue.
Top Critic
I was holding out hope for Metroid Prime: Federation Force, but at this point, there are so many other dungeon crawlers that are worth your time. Just like Hunters on the original DS, the main questline of Federation will probably fade out of the limelight over time and become a whisper in hardcore Metroid crowds -- though I can see Blast Ball having longer legs.
