Y Can’t Metroid Launch?
[Art byJorge M Velez]
Not a lot is known about the now-scrapped game that was once calledMetroid Prime 4.Some rumors say it was being worked on by multiple teams across the globe, with Nintendo directing them towards a unified vision as best they could. Others claim that Nintendo was in direct partnership with Bandai Namco on the title, and that in the end, the development process just wasn’t working. We will probably get the real story eventually, but for now, the details on why the current work on the game was tossed and rebooted, now with Retro Studios in the mix, remain unknown.
One thing we do know for sure is that this is not the first time aMetroidgame was shown off in one form or another before it disappeared. Here’s a short list of a few other known games in the series that were ghosted, scrapped, or drastically altered.
Metroid II: The Return of Samus DX
If Helen of Troy was the face that launched a thousand ships, then this screenshot ofMetroid II DXare the scans that launched a thousand fan games. After seeing the color remake of the Gameboy original announced in Club Nintendo all those years ago, millions of kids dreamed of what it would be like to play the game themselves. That day never came, but it did inspired the creators ofAM2Rto create what is arguably the best fan game of all time. Buzz around that project may or may not have influenced Nintendo to produce their own modern take onMetroid IIin the form ofSamus Returns.
Metroid IV
From the looks of it,Metroid IVwas developed for the Gameboy Color but was shown off at E3 2001 as a Gameboy Advance title. Those visuals weren’t going to pass muster compared to the likes ofCastlevania: Circle of the MoonandMega Man Zero, so it’s likely that this build was ditched and remade into the game we now know asMetroid Fusion. From the looks of it, they kept the “Samus and a Metroid join bodies” concept, but it’s not clear how much of the rest was lost in transition.
It’s weird that they never came back to that gravity flip move though. This was well beforeVVVVVVmade a whole generation of kids fall in love with upside-down Metroidvania exploration. Who knows if the game would have had the same impact if an officialMetroidgame had implemented the mechanic back in the day.
Metroid: Zero Mission Beta
Metroid: Zero Missionis another one that looked very different when it was first announced. The reboot/remake of the first game in the series was eventually released on the GBA in a style that took from the best ofSuper MetroidandFusion, but that wasn’t always the plan. This footage, originally shown at E3, reveals that the game originally kept the big head, rubbery body look of the NES original. We can only guess about the other ways it stayed truer to the source material.
Chances are high that Justin Bailey was in this one. If she had stayed, then maybe Zero Suit Samus would have never happened.
Metroid Dread
The only things we know for sure aboutMetroid Dreadis that it was planned to launch on the DS, and that Nintendo has officially confirmed that its existence more than once.Metroid Prime 3: Corruptionreferences the game in a bit of text, which led many to think that when it was released, it would connect to the Wii title, like how linkingMetroid PrimetoFusionunlocks content in both titles.
The screenshot above is from a Game Informer April Fool’s joke. Please do not send hate mail to Game Informer for giving a nonexistent game a 5 out of 10. If you do, they will almost definitely print it in their upcoming April issue, and trust me, life is hard when the world sees that you’ve beenduped by an obvious April Fool’s joke.
Next Level Games’ Mysterious Metroid Pitch
After putting outPunch-Outfor Wii, the team at Next Level Games reportedly put together aplayable mock-up for a newMetroidgame and pitched it to Nintendo. From all accounts, it was a lot of fun, and it came close to getting the green light, but then the team was put onLuigi’s Mansion: Dark Mooninstead.
They later worked onMetroid Prime: Federation Force, so we can guess that some of their ideas from that old DS prototype may have made it into that much maligned 3DS title. One thing is for sure, the art direction didn’t make the jump. The Bruce Timm-style depiction of Samus above is a far cry from the chibi-look we got in Next Level’s officially releasedMetroidtitle.
MercurySteam’s even more mysterious Metroid FPS Pitch
There are a few stories out there claiming that MecurySteam pitched a FPSMetroidgame to Nintendo back in 2015. By all accounts, they were turned down, but were later put onSamus Returns, which thankfully fared far better thanFederation Force.
Still, I’m curious about what that FPS was like. I there any chance it could have been as good or better than thePrimeseries? It’s hard to imagine, but until anything from their pitch surfaces, we won’t have enough to speculate on. Some think they dumped all their work on the prototype intoSpacelords, their free-to-play 3rd Person Shooter, but that’s just guesswork.
Metroid Wii U
Well technically, there is aMetroidgame on Wii U.Nintendo Landfeatures a relatively lengthy multi-playerMetroidcampaign calledMetroid Blastthat comes complete with morphball transformations, battles against Kraid and Ridley, and the ability to fly Samus’s ship. That’s more thanFederation Forceoffered, and that was a full priced game.
Sorry to pick on you so much,Federation Force. You deserved better than what you got. If you had been calledHello Halo Space SurpriseI think you would have been received a lot more fairly. Don’t blame yourself for what happened.
As for a full fledgedMetroidgame on Wii U,Miyamoto was once quite enthusiastic about the idea, naming it alongsideStar Foxas a perfect fit for the system. He got hisStar Foxgame, but theMetroidtitle never panned out. Rumor has it that there were plans to take mechanics ofMetroid Blastand use them in a bigger, more fancy looking title, but as the console’s fortunes continued to wane, efforts to support it with new content waned with them.
So could a high qualityMetroidgame have helped save the Wii U? WellMetroid Prime 1and2certainly didn’t save the Gamecube, but they were both successful enough, despite the system’s relatively small install base. The Wii U gets a lot of crap, but plenty of games sold good-to-great on the thing, likeSplatoon,Mario Kart 8, andSmash Bros. 4to name a few. The fact that a game likeTokyo Mirage Sessions #FEgot the green light on Wii U overMetroidis pretty wild. I love the game, but it never had a chance in hell of being a success, whereas everyMetroidgame starring Samus has at least broken even.
Nintendo clearly suffers from bouts of confusion about what they want to do withMetroid. I’m not sure that anyone at the company feels 100% sure about what fans love about the series. This latest development withMetroid Prime 4is just another sign of that. Regardless, I personally like every game in the series to some degree or another (c’mon guys, you have to admit, the Ridley resurrection science inOther Mis pretty fun), so my only real complaint towards Nintendo’s treatment of the franchise is that they don’t do enough with it. Side projects likeFederation Forceor remakes likeSamus Returnsare fine, but what I really want is a new game that sticks to theMetroidbasics while moving the series forward.
Throw a million bucks at Matt Thorson’s team and ask him to make a 12 hour longMini-Metroidadventure using theCelesteengine and toss it on the eShop.Celestemade more than a million in no time flat, and it’s still climbing to this day, so I can only imagine how much money Matt and his friends could make with Samus’s star power in their corner. Nintendo could also get theHollow Knightguys on the case, or Tom Happ, or theAM2Rteam, any of the other highly successful indie devs who have carried theMetroidmantle in everything but name for all these years. Their options are almost too many to count.
We’ve been waiting since 2002 to see what would happens to Samus afterFusion, and I for one hope that she’s doing more than justsitting around in space jail.
