So, I've been combing through Metroid Prime 3. I noticed that, while I can't decrypt the STRG files, they're legible to an extent. Very garbled, particularly as you go on in them, but you can tell what you're looking at. So, I've been looking at these, and this game has a shitload of unused scan data: For example: Etecoon (typoed as Endocoon) scan data... I have no idea how this would work; presumably the Ship Grapple was once used very differently. "Salamander" scan data. Presumably the lizard things in Prime 1's Impact Crater. "Phase Sprite" doesn't appear anywhere in the game. "Mantha" sounds like it might have been an early Warp Hound, perhaps? But, in sheer weirdness, none of these compare to these: (Weltraumpirat = Space Pirate) I can't get anything from this... Yes, it is in German. And it is unused. (Used scans actually have all the languages in the same file.) ...but this suggests that the Federation knew about Urtraghus from the start. ...and this is about an "Aurora Unit 068" that is nowhere to be found in the final. Something about AU 313... "Basis Up Bryyo"? I have no idea. The Federation knew about the Leviathan Battleship? "Urtraghus Lost", meaning that the Pirates were encoding lore AFTER the Homeworld is taken. Perhaps an active presence on Phaaze? Since it isn't much of a secret. GF data on a (presumably Pirate) ship that doesn't appear in the final. And a similar entry on the Stiletto skiff that DOES appear. Some kind of Federation data on Phazon mining? And on Samus. A bit of unintelligible Pirate data. I'd try to decrypt these, but I don't know where to begin...
