Sakamoto Speaks on Metroid Dread

[Guild McCommunist]

I had the opportunity to speak at length with Metroid producer Yoshio Sakamoto at this year's Game Developers Expo. The minute I sat down with the veteran game director and producer, whose titles include the original Metroid, Super Metroid, and Metroid: Zero Mission, the first question to come out of my mouth was simply this:

"Whatever happened to Metroid Dread?"

Now, I've seen documents – official Nintendo PR documents that listed the existence of Metroid Dread, to the point where it was expected at the 2005 Electronic Entertainment Expo. It's something that clearly was something Nintendo was working on and preparing for.

His response:

"It's always difficult when people bring up Metroid Dread. The only thing people have heard about the game are rumors. We never had an official announcement at E3 or anything like that. I think there was at one point where a little bit of information leaked, but now we don't know how to really talk about the project. All I can really say is that I wish I could put an end to the rumors!

"Oh, I'm not denying the existence of any documents that got out. What we're doing right now, we're waiting and watching and reading the comments to see what people are interested in before we make any comment on the project. So please be patient a little while longer."

Right now, we'll just have to make do with the upcoming and promising Wii adventure, Metroid: Other M.

But as soon as I'm finished Other M, Mr. Sakamoto, I'm going to poke you about Metroid Dread again. Be prepared.

Source

So, it can still be alive.

EDIT: Nvm, it's Sakamoto.

 

[Pliskron]

This is exactly what I've never been able to understand about Nintendo. You have ten or more really bad games coming out every month like my little ponies part seven and fantasy hair salon part three. Then you have one of Nintendo's most successful franchises with 16 million games sold and they can't put out a new game after how many years?

 

[Guild McCommunist]

This is exactly what I've never been able to understand about Nintendo. You have ten or more really bad games coming out every month like my little ponies part seven and fantasy hair salon part three. Then you have one of Nintendo's most successful franchises with 16 million games sold and they can't put out a new game after how many years?

Well, the crap games aren't Nintendo's and are made with low production values and are made in mass, aka shovelware. Nintendo games have much more polish and usually take years to develop. And they're already put out 2 (eventually 3) Metroid titles this generation: Metroid Prime 3, Metroid Prime: Hunters, and eventually Metroid: Other M. Last gen had 4 Metroid games: Metroid Prime, Metroid Prime 2, Metroid: Zero Mission and Metroid: Fusion. And Zero Mission was just a remake.

Anyway, Nintendo is getting annoying with the "Oh we're waiting for our fans to say 'yeah, go ahead'" and crap like that. They don't read what the fans say. They don't listen to the fans. If they did, they would've limited the amount of crappy games on their console. By "listening to the fans" they mean "We wait to see if this will appeal to a casual market". And Metroid will probably never appeal to a casual market. Ever. It's just got such a large fan following that odds are it'd sell well.

 

[Maikel Steneker]

This is exactly what I've never been able to understand about Nintendo. You have ten or more really bad games coming out every month like my little ponies part seven and fantasy hair salon part three. Then you have one of Nintendo's most successful franchises with 16 million games sold and they can't put out a new game after how many years?

Why do you think they even develop games this bad? If the costs to develop them were as high as the costs for, say, a new Mario, no one would develop a game with this much competition. The thing is, even if it doesn't sell that well it's still a good thing because development costs for bad games are really low.