Metroid Prime 4 telekinesis is the headline addition to Samus this time, and it behaves nothing like the last famous game built on the same power. Retro Studios treats the ability as a key. Psi-Ops treated it as a toy.
Of course, both games hand you the power to move objects with your mind. What each one lets you move is where they part company.
What Metroid Prime 4 telekinesis can actually touch
Samus picks up psychic powers from the Lamornians early on, and they arrive as a pair. The Psychic Visor shows you what will respond. The Psychic Glove does the lifting.
However, that first half matters more than it sounds. Only marked objects answer you. Some gates make you drag a locking node along a set pattern before they open. Platforms appear where the game intends them to. You can also grab a Morph Ball bomb and throw it at a switch you cannot reach.
So the power carries level design rather than physics. GameSpot’s hands-on argued the abilities amount to more than a gimmick, and you can read that verdict in their preview.
Psi-Ops pointed the same power at a ragdoll engine
Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy arrived in 2004 and made almost everything liftable. Crates, explosive barrels and living enemies were all fair game.
So you could pull a guard off the floor, hold him there and shoot him, or simply throw him into his friends. Nothing carried a marker and nothing sat reserved for a puzzle, which is why one retrospective still credits it with setting the standard for psychic powers.
A lock needs a key, a sandbox needs a toy
Here is the trade. Because a marked object always works, Retro can build a room that only opens one way and trust you to find it. That is how a Metroid game has always worked, except the key used to be a beam.
Meanwhile Psi-Ops could never build that room. If the player can throw anything at anything, the designer cannot rely on a solution, so the levels became arenas instead of locks.
In short, neither choice is the better one. They simply buy different things. Metroid Prime 4 telekinesis buys a map that unfolds in an order, and Psi-Ops bought a fight that never played out the same way twice.
Notice what the visor really does, though. It quietly tells you which objects the designers thought about, so the game solves half of every puzzle by colouring it in.
For more on how this series handles its toolkit, read Halo Campaign Evolved vs Metroid Prime Remastered. Meanwhile Prey Typhon Neuromods vs Bloodlines Masquerade Violations covers another shooter that charges you for strange powers.
Frequently asked questions
Can Samus lift enemies? Not freely. The glove works on objects the game has marked for it.
What does the Psychic Visor do? It reveals hidden trails and shows which objects will respond.
Was Psi-Ops really that open? Yes. You could lift crates, barrels and living enemies, then throw or shoot them.
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