November 09, 2004 - Packaged within every Nintendo DS box will be a copy of Metroid Prime Hunters: First Hunt, a taste test of things to come when Metroid Prime Hunters is released sometime in 2005.

First Hunt is the first of its kind, really: an official "demo" cartridge of a Nintendo game for a handheld, given away for free as a sample of a future product. Though demo software is pretty common on the consoles,publishers don't generally do this since with cartridge games since the media is much more expensive than discs. First Hunt might be a testament to just how cheaply Nintendo can make cartridges available to third-party developers. Or, perhaps Nintendo's simply eating the cost in order to bring gamers something they haven't experienced on a Nintendo handheld since Tetris: a pack-in game.

The First Hunt doesn't last long in single player mode. There's only one real level that takes players through a variety of challenges, including open room combat, a spiraling decent towards a jump pad, a sliding platform challenge, a spiraling ascent up with gaps to put Samus' jump abilities to use, a Morph Ball maze, and finally, a battle with a dark Samus character that's meant to give solo players a taste of combat that's possible in wireless multiplayer.

Controls are handled in a variety of ways. The default is indeed the best option: a Stylus-mode for either handed individuals that manipulates Samus' "looking" direction via the touch-screen. By moving across the touch screen left, right, up and down, players "look" around much like using a mouse in a PC first person shooter. Forward, backward, and side-to-side movement is handled via either the Dpad cross on the left, or the A, B, X, and Y buttons on the right. Handily, the button configuration on the right is in D-pad arrangement, so it's not difficult to adjust to this control scheme.

The other ways to control Samus involve a lefty or righty D-pad/action button configuration, or the tap-aim that was created for the E3 demo. The last option is easily the worst of the bunch, but it's there if anyone really wants to see what people were controlling more than six months ago.

Back at the Nintendo Gamers Summit in early October, I railed on Metroid Prime Hunters: First Hunt because, to be honest, the control via the stylus was incredibly cramped and uncomfortable. To play this way, you have to literally hold the entire system in the one hand that you're controlling Samus' forward/backward/side-side movements, and this fatigues that hand something fierce.

But now I've played the game using the Wrist/Thumb Strap that comes included with the Nintendo DS system. Basically the strap has a little plastic "shoe" that latches onto the underside of your thumb. This "shoe" makes it possible to glide your thumb over the D-pad with very little friction, essentially turning your digit into a tiny PC mouse. And believe it when I say that this Wrist/Thumb Strap makes all the difference in the world. The system is far more comfortable to hold controlling Samus with the touch screen, and controls much more intuitively.