Metroid Prime 4: Beyond, out now on Switch and Switch 2, is a game that, as I continue to play it, is winning me over more. But one part of Prime 4 annoyed me so much that I had to finally go into the settings, dig through some menus, and bypass a warning screen to fix it. I’m talking about the default jump button for the Morph Ball which is, inexplicably, different from the regular jump button.
Look, I understand that this isn’t new to Prime 4. It was like this in Metroid Prime Remastered, too, and the Wii version of Prime 2. So for some folks, this might be second nature and not weird at all. But I haven’t played much Metroid Prime beyond the remaster of the first game, so when I discovered that jumping in Morph Ball mode used the X button instead of B, which is how you jump when controlling Samus on foot, I was perturbed.
How to change the jump controls in Metroid Prime 4
I tried to play using the default controls for a bit, hoping I’d get used to it, but no luck. Thankfully, Nintendo and Retro Studios let you customize Prime 4‘s controls. The problem is that to do so, you have to dig through a few menus and alarm bells. It’s odd. But here’s how to change the Morph Ball jump button in Metroid Prime 4: Beyond:
Pause the game and open up the settings menu.
Scroll down to the control scheme subsection and hit A.
Now hit ZR to bring up the Morph Ball controls.
Select “Spring Ball” and hit A.
Now highlight the B button slot and confirm the swap.
If your B button slot contains question marks (???) you need to do another step
The game will ask you if you want to go into advanced mode. Hit Ok.
Now you can swap the ??? (which is later revealed to be the Spin Ball ability) and fix this silly control choice.
This should work the same on Switch or Switch 2. Since making this change, I’ve had a lot more fun jumping around as the Morph Ball. I’m not sure why Nintendo buried this option in some menus and behind a warning, but I’m thankful they included the ability to remap controls at all. Not every developer does that, and it can be very annoying. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go hop around as a ball in Metroid Prime 4.
