When Nintendo unveiled the DS at E3 2004, one of the first games shown was ‎‎Metroid Prime: Hunters. It was astounding to see the Metroid Prime ‎world come off onto the handheld screens, especially as well as it did. The game was ‎downright beautiful. However the unique control scheme took a lot of heat from people ‎who played the E3 build. Nintendo heard complaints about comfort (people’s hands were ‎cramping up), and some people just flat out longed for a more traditional play-style. NST ‎is a company that usually listens to its fans and their concerns, so it’s no surprise to hear ‎they’re working hard at appeasing those who were unhappy.‎

NST is including five separate control schemes for players to mess around with. The new ‎default control setting has the players using the stylus like a mouse a la PC titles. You ‎look around the screen with the stylus, and press the L button to shoot. This means that ‎NST has done away with the lock-on targeting of its console brethren completely. ‎Players will move around by using either the D-pad, but left handed players can use the ‎face buttons if it’s more comfortable for them to do so. A player can jump by double ‎tapping the screen with the stylus, and change weapons, or into the morph ball by ‎pressing buttons on the touch screen. Comfort is still an issue, but not as much as it was ‎before. Unfortunately right now NST has no option to increase look sensitivity, or an ‎option to invert the Y-axis (move the stylus down to look up), but hopefully this will ‎change.‎

Make no mistake about it though; Metroid Prime: Hunters is a beautiful game. ‎Of course it runs at a lower frame rate than the GameCube version, and has less ‎lighting effects and hi-res textures, but it’s still a knock out. Everything moves fluidly. ‎The game is also able to show FMV (yes, FMV on a Nintendo handheld) on both ‎screens at the same time, creating a longer, vertical screen, which looks astounding. ‎There will be a single player mode in the game, but details on that are scarce. ‎ There are training missions in the demo version (Metroid Prime Hunters: First Hunt), so ‎hopefully more details are revealed then. Multiplayer is mostly where Nintendo has ‎focused lately, and it’s shaping up nicely. There’s the usual FPS deathmatch mode, in ‎which four players can battle it out via the wireless link. There’s a morph ball race mode, ‎where players have to race along a designated area. Obviously there are modes that have ‎yet to be announced.‎

All in all, when you buy your DS this November, you’ll get to experience what ‎‎Metroid Prime: Hunters will be like, since it comes with the First Hunt ‎demo packed in. Keep your eyes peeled for this one.‎