How to unstick yourself in Metroid Prime 4: Beyond, a beginner's guide

I've been waiting for Metroid Prime 4: Beyond so long that, when it was announced, I had not even met my wife, who I now have house and 3 year-old child with. So that's a pretty long time, and that's after I'd already waited 10 years since Metroid Prime 3.

Anyway, the point here is that Metroid Prime isn't exactly muscle memory for most of us these days. And in a series infamous for allowing you to get stuck all on your own, unsure of what to do, that can be a wee bit tough.

So here we are with a few beginner tips to get your started on your journey.

And if you're looking for a walkthrough for the first part of the game, hey, we can help with that too.

When in doubt, scan it

There is a lot of stuff to scan in Metroid Prime 4: Beyond, and it's a great (and, honestly, the primary way) to get some background story for – stop me if you've heard this one before – a long-dead race of aliens.

But it's also your primary way of turning things on and interacting with technology. If you've found your way into a room and don't know why the room exists, chances are there's something important to scan in here to turn on a switch or open a door.

Scanning is also a great way to remind you of what to do next or how to beat a boss. Boss scan descriptions will usually give you some weakpoint analysis to help you solve the combat puzzle.

Your dodge doesn't get taken away when you lose Space Jump

Samus loses most of her sick upgrades about 15 minutes into the game, as she is wont to do. One of those lost abilities is the double jump, or "Space Jump" as it's called in-universe.

In the time between losing the Space Jump and getting it back – which is relatively early compared to other Metroid games – you'll retain the ability to strafe dodge, which you can do by locking on and double tapping the jump button while moving in a direction.

Dodging is a big part of combat in Metroid Prime 4: Beyond, so make sure that you don't forget to use this maneuver just because Samus is a lot slower than she was 30 minutes ago.

There's almost always a way to get health and ammo back in boss fights

Metroid games aren't exactly Souls-likes when it comes to difficulty, but they're quite a bit more challenging than the traditional Nintendo game, as they're aimed more for the teen/adult audience. Basically, the game isn't afraid to drain a lot of Energy from you very quickly if you stand in something bad or get hit with a big boss attack.

Thankfully, almost all bosses have something you can use to get your health and your ammo (missiles, etc.) back mid-fight. Look for things like Sylax's weird, big missile summons or other orb-like attacks that bosses spawn. If you take your focus off of the boss to destroy these objects, they'll usually contain items inside of them. Even better, these items seem to drop at higher rates when you really need them, like when you're at critically low Energy.

Charge beam sucks items toward you

This is an old Metroid trick that Prime veterans will be familiar with, but I don't recall seeing a mention of it in Beyond's tutorial section (Jeff note: It's in there, but the tips are really easy to miss or ignore in this game): if you hold your charge beam – as-in hold the fire button down and don't shoot – your arm cannon will act like a magnet until you let go of the trigger.

This will only pull in consumable items like missile ammo and health orbs, but it's an extremely useful trick if you're in a really bad way or just can't get to where an enemy dropped some items.

Your puzzle abilities are much better in combat than you think

Prime 4's main schtick is that Samus is psychic now. So everything is psychic. Even the scan visor is psychic. Video games! But, all of that psychic shit is good for more than just solving puzzles.

Some boss fights will force you to use your psychic charge beam – which you can guide using the the thumb stick mid-air – to force them to transition into a killable state. But did you know that you can also use this tool to damage them once they're vulnerable? This isn't always worthwhile, as it's pretty slow and doesn't deal massive damage or anything.

But, for example, you can use it against a boss that's really good at hiding its crit spot because it has an outer shell that rotates. If you just wait to see the weakspot naturally, you might be waiting a long time. But by guiding your beam, you can hit their back at anytime, and combat slows to a crawl while you're controlling it, so you aren't in much danger.

There are also some boss attacks that can only be interrupted with a Morph Ball Bomb. That can be tricky on its own. But if you use the Psychic Morph Ball Bomb, pick it up, and throw it, it does the same effect.

Just keep in mind that these are versatile tools.

There's actually a lot to do in the desert ... but not at first

When you first take your cool motorcycle into the desert – about two or three hours into the game – you'll immediately notice how large a space it is. Then you'll probably notice that it doesn't seem like there's much to do there. This is actually false, as there are shrines to complete, outposts to explore, and crystals to gobble up.

The problem is, outside of the crystals, almost all of these activities require some later game upgrades – especially the Grapple Beam, for some reason (sorry, I mean the Psychic Grapple Beam, silly me). So while you might want to just get on your bike and ride, it's better to get some upgrades first and come back to the desert later.

You can (and should) mark your map when you find an inaccessible item

Metroid Prime 4 mostly avoids the "oh shit, Breath of the Wild was very successful, how can we make more stuff like Breath of the Wild" thing Nintendo has been doing for a while now. But it doesn't totally avoid it. Apart from Beyond having the aforementioned shrines, it also has a map-marking function.

You can now save yourself a lot of time later in the game by marking rooms with stuff like missile icons or energy icons, which will tell you later that there was an inaccessible secret in this room the last time you were there. (Jeff note: Oh goddammit, I haven't been doing this.)

You can (mostly) ignore Myles, your talkative friend

There was a lot of hullabaloo about Myles, the talkative space marine, in the Metroid Prime 4 previews. The reviews then suggested that he's not that big of a deal and won't be ruining every session with his incessant yapping. Well we can confirm that is the case.

If you're nervous about Myles killing your Metroid buzz or just being too annoying once you find him, rest assured that you ditch him back at camp pretty quickly and he's completely out of radio contact for a lot of the exploration sessions. Just be prepared that he will, occasionally, nudge you in the correct direction while on your bike. But this is pretty easy to ignore, as it's infrequent. It is also, however, helpful if you get lost or zone out during an exposition cutscene.

Is this even really a tip? Well. Hmm. OH, you can always hit the radio button on the map to get a hint if you need one.

Nailed it.