The identity of the developer has also surfaced in the rumors, but this is not a surprise.
We haven’t heard much from Samus Aran lately. Well, MercurySteam’s Metroid Dread was released (as a Nintendo Switch exclusive of course), which was fine, but in the meantime, Big N has been announcing for many years that the Metroid Prime series will continue, so a fourth part of it is also being made for Switch, But this development has not been straightforward since its announcement at E3 2017: initially Bandai Namco Studios was mentioned as a developer, then the IP was returned to Retro Studios, who developed the first three installments.
Yes, but Metroid Prime 4 will be a 3D game on principle. Let’s not forget that Metroid started out as a 2D game on the Famicom disc system (i.e. Nintendo designed it as a floppy game and not a cassette one; the 1986 FDS version was followed in 1987 by the American and then the European NES version in 1988), so this genre is home to Samus . Nintendo knows this well, as MercurySteam’s Metroid Dread also introduced a 2D experience, and such a success that, according to rumors, Big N ordered a new game from the Spanish studio.
Back in April 2021, a Spanish leaker named Nash Weddell tweeted that “2D = YES, MS [MercurySteam] = Yes, 2021[-es megjelenés] = yeah”, and now this Claims, that MercurySteam is working again on a 2D Metroid, but not released in 2023 or 2024, but only in 2025. If Samus is indeed coming back in two years, we have to ask, will it be going to the Nintendo Switch or the new N platform? After all, the Switch will be 6 years old in March, and the console generation usually lasts 7 years…
We’ll see what happens, but Nintendo certainly saw the demand for Metroid. Hopefully, we won’t have to wait long for Metroid Prime 4, which according to the job advertisement looks more emotional and cinematic.
Source: WCCFTech
