Book Review - Metroid Prime 1-3: A Visual Retrospective
- The Artbook Collector
- 6 days ago
- 5 min read
October 31st 2025
Over 20 years ago, Metroid made the jump to 3D on the GameCube with Metroid Prime, giving players a new way to experience the popular game series. With two sequels and a remaster available to play, as well as Metroid Prime 4: Beyond releasing very shortly, now is a great time to look back at the series through the artwork that helped bring it to life.
An art showcase been made possible with the release of Metroid Prime 1-3: A Visual Retrospective from publisher Piggyback in partnership with Nintendo, having been released on October 28th. A copy of the book has joined the collection, so I can give my thoughts with some previews of this highly anticipated release.
Build Quality
The book comes as a 23.5cm x 31cm cloth hardcover with 210 pages, a good size that feels well made. I like the image of Samus on the front too, it’s etched in metallic which is a nice touch. Inside the paper is high quality and thick as expected and held in by strong binding. While solid, this binding is a little tight and prevents the paper from laying open and flat, particularly at the front and back of the book, but no more significantly than seen in many other artbook releases.
Content
The book is split into chapters for each of the 4 games covered; Metroid Prime, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, and Metroid Prime Remastered. These chapters follow the same formular to cover everything and I like the simple and easy to follow approach. They begin with an introduction to the game, followed by a focus on Samus herself that includes her suits, weapons and technology. This is then followed by bosses, enemies, and environments. There’s nothing unusual in this, but it works well and that will always be a positive.
The art itself is a nice mix of early paper sketches, full colour concepts, and some 3D models too, giving a full look at the work of the artists that create the games. I’m always happy when early sketches are included, as opposed to just the detailed final art, because it gives a peak at the earliest beginnings of the world and characters. A lot of the environment concepts are small sketches of assets that are implemented in each area, a nice inclusion among the designs of full areas. I also really like the use of early sketches placed in the backgrounds to fit more in, a great use of the space.
I’m a fan of the art style too, it captures the futuristic sci-fi look while feeling more grounded, as the only clean and shiny designs are for Samus, as opposed to the darker colours of the enemies and world she finds herself in. The exaggerated shapes and proportions give the games an interesting visual design, without the art here looking cartoonish or over the top. You can see images in the previews photos, so if you like what you see, you’ll no doubt enjoy the rest of the book too. Pages for the Space Pirates, the mix of creature concepts, and Luminoth are person highlights for me.
The only downside for the art itself is that are some darker images that come across a little murky, particularly in the Remaster chapter with its dark environments. In a few other instances the colour of the designs match closely with darker backgrounds, as seen with Emperor Ing, and this stands out as the rest of the book has a great print quality. Fortunately, it’s not a frequent issue and the vast majority looks fantastic.
There isn’t a lot of reading in the book, most of it is simple in-game details about the design you are seeing, but it’s the insights from Producer Kensuke Tanabe that I really like. He is the only person interviewed and gives his personal insights and memories into the making the games throughout. I really enjoyed what he shared as it is very honest and interesting. He speaks to the relationship of Nintendo and developer Retro and how the games came together, such as highlighting how using the Morph Ball in pipes was initially disliked, until it was made into a playable form and presented to Nintendo, who then changed their mind.
The most surprising notes from Tanabe are about what didn’t work, not something you often see in an artbook, which typically keep the details positive. He spoke about how Retro felt fatigue working on two Metroid Prime games in a row and wanted to move on, before ultimately making another. He also spoke about how some gameplay mechanics were not conveyed effectively and that weakpoints in Metroid Prime 3 should probably have been removed from bosses. This is good to read about, not only pointing out that game development is tough and not everything works out, but also showing that lessons are learned too. Tanabe’s notes make it a much more engaging read, as the generic details elsewhere didn’t add too much for me.
Credits
Sadly, there are no artist credits in the book, which is always disappointing. Ideally you want to see them on each page for the artwork, but at the very least in a list in the back or front with the names of the artists that helped make the games happen. It does cover over 20 years of artwork which could make some pieces hard to attribute to a specific person, but they do know who was working at the studio at the time, so a list should have been included.
Use of Space
Overall, I really like the page design of Metroid Prime 1-3: A Visual Retrospective, it mixes up the layouts throughout and the pages are filled. It uses loose and framed artwork to make sure there is no wasted space, with gaps between the art filled with the descriptions and notes from Tanabe.
The only negative is the image loss in the centre fold due to the tight binding mentioned earlier. It’s far from the worst for this, because it doesn’t affect too many images and doesn’t detract much from the book overall. It’s always worth mentioning this though, as there are publishers that have minimised or removed the issue, so it doesn’t have to be an ongoing problem in artbooks.
Value
The book has an RRP of $50/ £40, a standard price for a hardcover artbook of this size, so this is good news. The build quality and large amount of artwork won’t leave anyone feeling disappointed at this price point.
As always though, I use Amazon for price comparisons and the book is 7% off in the US, a small price drop shortly after release. This of course will fluctuate as is common for artbooks, so it’s worth keeping an eye out for reductions. Regardless of whether you find a deal or not, the full price is very competitive for artwork that fans will welcome onto their shelf.
Verdict
Metroid Prime 1-3: A Visual Retrospective delivers a wealth of concept art that players will no doubt enjoy poring over. It’s inclusion of a large number of sketches will be welcomed by many that like to see early concept art, with some of the development insights adding interesting details too. While it does have a few smaller issues, overall, it is a book I would be happy to recommend to fans of the series.
If you enjoyed my review and previews and would like to add this book to your own shelf, you can order the book here;
