Nintendo Throws Out Metroid Prime 4 Work, Restarts With Retro Studios (arstechnica.com) 77
Nintendo is essentially restarting development on the highly anticipated Metroid Prime 4, saying the game as it currently exists "has not reached the standards we seek in a sequel to the Metroid Prime series." Ars Technica reports: The surprise announcement comes from Nintendo General Manager for Development Shinya Takahashi. He said in a YouTube video posted this morning that current Metroid Prime 4 producer Kensuke Tanabe will begin "collaborating" on the game with Retro Studios, the studio responsible for the original Metroid Prime trilogy. Tanabe has previously worked as producer on multiple Retro-developed Metroid Prime titles.
"The current development status of the game is very challenged and we have made a very difficult decision as a development team," Takahashi said in the subtitled video. "We have decided to reexamine the development structure and change it." "This change will essentially mean restarting development from the beginning, so the completion of the game will be delayed from our initial internal plan," Takahashi continued. "It will be a long road until the next time we will be able to update you on the development progress, and development time will be extensive."
"The current development status of the game is very challenged and we have made a very difficult decision as a development team," Takahashi said in the subtitled video. "We have decided to reexamine the development structure and change it." "This change will essentially mean restarting development from the beginning, so the completion of the game will be delayed from our initial internal plan," Takahashi continued. "It will be a long road until the next time we will be able to update you on the development progress, and development time will be extensive."
Re: I never heard of Metroid (Score:2, Informative)
What rock have you been living under? Or are you just that young?
Metroid Prime was the killer app of the Gamecube/X-Box/Playstation 2 generation. Metroid had much better single player gameplay than Halo, while Halo's gameplay lent itself better to multiplayer and actually had multiplayer. By the next console generation (Wii/360/PS3), it was all about the (online) multiplayer, and Samus all but vanished outside of Smash Bros.
Metroid stars Samus Aran, who is part Lara Croft, part Boba Fett/Master Chief. Metro
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"Metroid Prime was the killer app of the Gamecube/X-Box/Playstation 2 generation."
What? False by any measure. Halo outsold it, if it were so great then they would have sold a lot more GameCubes, the graphics looked antiquated from day one because the cube was slow, etc. And having played both, play control was vastly better in Halo. It didn't hurt Halo that GC controllers were garbage, either.
"Metroid Prime is part Tomb Raider, part Halo."
Metroid prime was part Duke nukem forever, part marathon 2, in that t
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Different AC but jesus christ lmao, you have to be trolling.
I owned both consoles, and both games... I both win and lose :/
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The graphics were good enough to do the job, and to my eye they still look perfectly decent. The GC may have been slower than contemporary consoles, but graphics are just one (IMO pretty minor) part in what makes a game good (e.g. Thief graphics are terrible by today's standards, and yet it's still a better game to play than a lot of modern AAA titles).
And what do you mean "GC controllers were garbage"? It was one of the most comfortable and pleasant controllers ever released for a console, and I was pretty
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"And what do you mean "GC controllers were garbage"? It was one of the most comfortable and pleasant controllers ever released for a console"
It was too small and the angle at which you had to hold it was too narrow, and it had too few buttons and the buttons were both oddly shaped and weirdly placed. I have adult-sized hands though, so perhaps that's why I'm so emphatic about it. It seems like it was okay for children. Sadly, only Microsoft has ever made a controller for adults, and they discontinued it bec
Re: I never heard of Metroid (Score:2)
I don't have large hands, but they're not tiny (23 cm handspan). I rate the GC controller as my favourite ever console controller (the wireless Wavebird is the best), and I'm genuinely surprised that they aren't highly rated.
That said, a quick check of a few websites ranking console controllers shows that it's pretty subjective, and the GC doesn't seem to appear on any of the worst controller lists.
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That's a really good question. Who DOES care whether or not you've heard of Metroid?
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Two was about as good as One was, and is absolutely worth playing. I'd personally suggest playing the trilogy collection on Wii since the Wiimote controls were a big improvement over the Gamecube control scheme. You didn't have to lock on to strafe, and aiming felt perfect. It's a shame no other first person games on Wii quite got the controls as perfect as the Metroid Prime Trilogy did.
Re: I never heard of Metroid (Score:1)
Don't you guys have Nintendos?
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You're starting to reek of desperation.
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Do you even remember who you're trying to troll?
Re: Troll? We're going to HANG you fucking traito (Score:1)
I agree we the story just not who's who.
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Oh, I'm a genius alright, but nothing even approaching stable. You'd best BTFO.
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Yea, maybe you're right. Or, maybe I'm just bored and lonely, and by feeding me more attention you're playing right into my nefarious plot. But then, you wouldn't mind being my pawn. You like being a pawn of just any random person who comes walking by, don't you? So in this way we are actually helping each other out, comrade.
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It's called a baitjob anon, learn what that means.
Worked for Capcom (Score:2)
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Also Blizzard and Overwatch. It started out as an MMORPG called 'Titan' but the assets got reused for a completely different type of game. Blizzard and Nintendo have similar reputations for all of their games being extremely polished and high-quality. I'm sure Nintendo doesn't want another 'Other M', and would rather start over than run the franchise into the ground. It's already pretty coolly received in Japan, and noone at Nintendo wants to touch it since its creator Gunpei Yokoi died. Mercury Steam did a
Cool. (Score:4, Insightful)
As long as it's less like 'Other M', and more like any of the Prime games eventually - then great.
It's somewhat odd - but when the original creator went back to the series, taking over after the prime series, he really made a mess out of the character and her motivations.
It's nice to see that they seem to be learning that lesson, and putting it more in the hands of ILM, and less in the hands of 'Lucas' himself in this case.
The whole point of Samus was she showed how little gender in a trained warrior should matter, kicking butt in power armor says all you need. Flashbacks to childhood and freezing before a critter you already killed like 5 times is NOT adding to that character, and not anywhere worth taking away gameplay control. And that's just like 1% of the things wrong that debacle.
Ryan Fenton
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The characterization in Other M was entirely in line with how the character was portrayed in the manga, which is canon.
Samus has had pretty much no other characterization outside of that.
In the first 3 games you don't get squat for characterization.
You finally start to get something with Fusion.
Metroid Prime is not canonical. Aggressively so, in fact. It was considered to not be a "real" Metroid series. Until it sold well, then they walked that line back a bit. It's now a "real" Metroid series in a diff
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Whether it's misogyny or not, there's plenty of elements about Other M that don't add up. From how short she is [thetanooki.com] to how she so quickly turned to working with the military unit when she dislikes following orders. In fact, just about everything about Adam Malkovich [metroidwiki.org] in Other M comes across as whiny and the way he acts really doesn't jive with the person presented: "The real Adam would have said the same thing a
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I remember how he whipped her in the beginning of the SNES game, so it fits.
He tortured, murdered, and ate her parents in front of her when she was like six years old. While mocking her.
On the other hand, she already killed him several times.
Honestly, though, Ridley's entire species was wiped out by the GF because they were "too dangerous". He can regenerate from cells. I'm not surprised he's a vindictive sadist.
Man Nintendo... (Score:4, Interesting)
Man Nintendo, I love you. Rather than release a pile of crap on us you've chosen to lose in the short term to keep the franchise strong in the long term. Not only is it proper business sense (if you can afford to just scrap a half way done game of course) but it's showing proper respect for your fan base. Sure, it'd been better if the Metroid they've been developing was actually good and we had a more timely release but at least they have the integrity to not feed us garbage.
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Rather than release a pile of crap on us you've chosen to lose in the short term to keep the franchise strong in the long term.
Keep in mind they released fucking Metroid Prime: Federation Farce. They can't care too much.
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But do they still have the team that developed the original Metroid Prime trilogy? Game developers are highly mobile, and the studio may have lost the talent that made the Prime trilogy what it was.
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Quite a bit of the original talent has indeed moved on since the Wii days when the third installment was released.
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Not only is it proper business sense (if you can afford to just scrap a half way done game of course) but it's showing proper respect for your fan base.
I don't understand. Why not just say it's the greatest game ever and publish it.
- Todd Howard.
Hey EA! (Score:2)
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Not true. Beelzebub gives you something you want when you sell him your soul.