Years have past since I last played Metroid Prime, despite it being one of my favourite games of all time. Years have past since last I read Fahrenheit 451 despite it being one of my favourite books of all time. So why on earth would I be silly enough to try and compare the two? Well, I don't really have an answer. But I'm going to try anyway!

Both Metroid Prime and Fahrenheit 451 start off with an alien and uncomfortable encounter. Samus' ship crashes and she is trapped on a hostile world, while Guy Montag meets a girl unlike any he's seen before and leaves him feeling lost and alone. From this point on both Metroid Prime and Fahrenheit 451 unravel at a fast pace.

Samus must escape the planet, while Guy must escape society-but come on, this is a rather flimsy similarity as far as plot goes. However it is still valid. What is important, though, is storytelling and pacing. As I said before both are fast paced, with Fahrenheit 451 lurching through the pages with thick language and poetic sentence structure where in some places the writing could virtually be split up into lines-wait, did I just say thick language? That can't be fast! And it's not, in fact the mood is one of a slow death on a hot humid day where everyone is dripping with sweat and without the energy to move. Yet somehow through this intrusive atmosphere it moves quickly, because it forces you to keep reading with totalitarian determination.

In Metroid Prime you feel the need to rocket through the levels, but the lush scenery and ancient architecture will slow you down just so you can take in, and then you'll move back and forth through it as you search ever nook and cranny for something you've missed. Hell, Samus' slow walking speed forces you to move slowly, so that you have no excuse but to take anything in, even if the urge to rush became too great.

The characters in Metroid Prime are dead. They're long gone and remembered only through ancient writings and the effect they've had on the environment, through their buildings, or the way they've survived the many predatory animals and even plants. Yet they all fit in this world safely; they're a part of it: they're aliens on an alien world. Yet Samus is just an intruder; another uninvited guest.

After the realisation Clarisse gives Montag (the previously mentioned girl) suddenly he too is an intruder and he moves about the suddenly alien world with caution and not just the intention to survive it; but to somehow find happiness there too, or perhaps, escape it.

And just as things are looking up for Samus she finds another group of intruders: the space pirates. They, like her, are uninvited guests, only they don't want to leave, they want to stay and pillage the world, and probably create a few metroids in the process! So suddenly she has a reason to stay.

But once again, we're getting a little bugged down in the narratives. This shouldn't be what this is about. Metroid Prime and Fahrenheit 451 are both told through their environment. In Fahrenheit 451 the harshest places of all are those that should be the safest; houses, with wall-sized televisions playing soap operas, and the constant paranoia of having hidden something in what should be a sanctuary pushes it even further away from being one-or perhaps makes it all the more important to hold on to.

Then he meets Faber who invites him into his house, which is safe, which is a sanctuary-but there's still fear. All the paintings and books and sculptures can't be hidden forever, and there's always a sense that no matter what, no matter how hard they fight, they cannot win.

In Metroid Prime the more you explore the lush natural world, the more you come across the relics of the long dead chozo world, and the deeper you venture into the space pirate's phazon mine, the more similarities you can draw between the two; both perhaps should never have been here in the first place; and both will never be here forever. And Shutting down a mine is one thing, but how could you ever win against the space pirates?

But still, there is no safety in the phazon mines, with every grey, depressing metal wall hiding behind it danger so that you don't even quite feel like an intruder; no you're a fugitive-it's you who should be here, not them! But they'll try and run you out of town anyway.

But in the ruins the opposite is true where you are an intruder that shouldn't be there, but you are not being ruthlessly hunted. But still there isn't quite safety like there should be amongst ancient carved stone. You're there because you have to be, and the sooner you're gone the better.

And both narratives end with destruction. In Fahrenheit 451 his fears are realised and everything is destroyed, in Metroid Prime the mining operation is shut down, and the Chozo are already dead. Yet both narratives end with hope. In Fahrenheit 451 it is for art and for humanity, but in Metroid prime, ironically, it is for the space pirates.