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News Metroid Prime 4: Beyond new trailer, coming to Nintendo Switch in 2025

SpaceGodzilla said:
so TLDW, 100% running on the switch, 900P, 60fps with some small frame drops, some aliasing issues (jaggies)

so if it's cross-gen/ next-gen patch switch 1 owners won't get a notably inferior product (unless your a graphics freak)
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anybody with eyeballs could have seen that but it's good for John to clearly spell it out with also examples.
I don't think some people are actually ready for what actual Switch 2 games will look like if they think this trailer was a showcase of the hardware.
 
Bonejack said:
Steph, who made the trailer at Retro, was just as surprised as Frank was when asked to tweet about it, you have to understand that.

A lot of people at Retro "migrated" to other, more relevant jobs than the ones they were actually hired for. You need some time to get back into focus mode when you've not done something for a while!
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You're saying the trailer was made by someone who doesn't know how to make trailers and we should cut them some slack?
 
neil said:
You're saying the trailer was made by someone who doesn't know how to make trailers and we should cut them some slack?
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No, i was continuing the joke from earlier today with Frank, the BBQ event and social media manager, who "slipped" into another role at Retro because they didn't do much that would've needed a social media manager.

And in this joke scenario, Steph is totally a video editor, who slipped into another job like Frank, and just needs some time to get up to her usual skills after not having to use them in a while.

;]
 
I agree that the game looks pretty sick and I think did it's job which was pretty clearly to show Prime fans that this is a Prime game like they know it, but also goes forward (or beyond one could say).

As a trailer in general though I also agree that it's pretty bad. In the one combat encounter the Space Pirate shoots kind of next to Samus and she dodges but looks like she would not have been hit anyway? It also starts with a mood setting shot of the beginning only to cut like 4 seconds after.

Again I think they hit their main objectives: Show that the game is real, show that it is very Prime, tease that there's more and the story is progressing. I think it's reasonable to hope that the next trailer is much more capable to stand on its own.
 
Koren Lesthe said:
Liam Robertson did an analysis video !
He did note that at one point, in the room where the pirates explode the door and one human is seemingly escaping with an important object, there are numerous computers with an hologram, and one of them is the hologram of a black hole.

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Thanks for sharing my video. It's so fun to be speculating about this stuff with you all.
 
LiamRobertson said:
Thanks for sharing my video. It's so fun to be speculating about this stuff with you all.
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You're welcome ^^

I wonder how Retro will tackle character interactions. Even with all its dialogue, there's a lot I loved in Prime 3 that kept the "Show, don't tell" rule. Like how you can progressively see Samus' reaction when you defeat each of the corrupted hunters, where she don't even budge for Gandrayda's death but you can see squeezing her fist and you know, you KNOW that only make her want to defeat Dark Samus more than ever.

There's no useless narration when Samus looks over the Chozo ruins exploding in Prime 1, nor after she watched the Federation troops video, she just kneel in front of the dead soldier and close his eyes.

Not to say I'm against narration in Metroid ; Fusion is still one of my favorite 2D Metroid and I loved when Samus finally broke her silence because of the situation. Also loved that moment in Dread (actually jumped on my seat). It's just that it needs to be well paced and don't have to be clunky or... well destroying the "Show, don't tell" rule (oh hi Other M, take a seat - Yes, that's right. At one point in my life, I met with Koren Lesthe. He wanted to talk about the writing in my game - Hm, Samus ? - He called me by my first name, unlike Anthony, who called me Princess. I knew at this moment that Koren wanted a special approach with me).
 
One thing that would be a dream come true is for the world to be a planet: as in the world map actually looping back around itself, and you can travel to the core of the planet (which would be the equivalent to Magmoor Caverns) and to the opposite side of it.

Imagine something like this:

primemap.png


Like, when you pull up the 3D holograms, you see that it's all skewed, and some rooms are upside-down. But as you traverse, the world and world map rotate in real time. And then, when you ride the elevators, you literally come to the other side of the world.
 
I’ve got a theory that I’ll probably turn into a video, but let’s say the Switch 2 is still due out early in the year and they don’t wanna do a September General. What if we got a Metroid Prime 4 Direct sometime in the Fall? And alongside that, what if we got a Prime 2 + 3 reveal, and potentially even a shadowdrop? Nintendo’s had four first party releases in the holiday for a while, and only three are lined up right now, but this might explain that.
 
Gamer_G said:
I’ve got a theory that I’ll probably turn into a video, but let’s say the Switch 2 is still due out early in the year and they don’t wanna do a September General. What if we got a Metroid Prime 4 Direct sometime in the Fall? And alongside that, what if we got a Prime 2 + 3 reveal, and potentially even a shadowdrop? Nintendo’s had four first party releases in the holiday for a while, and only three are lined up right now, but this might explain that.
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How close to a game’s release do they usually do game centric Direct?
 
Gamer_G said:
I’ve got a theory that I’ll probably turn into a video, but let’s say the Switch 2 is still due out early in the year and they don’t wanna do a September General. What if we got a Metroid Prime 4 Direct sometime in the Fall? And alongside that, what if we got a Prime 2 + 3 reveal, and potentially even a shadowdrop? Nintendo’s had four first party releases in the holiday for a while, and only three are lined up right now, but this might explain that.
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If they don't wanna do a September Direct (be it General, Mini or Partner Showcase) then they need to have the Switch 2 reveal in September, and ideally this would also feature Prime 4 so they wouldn't even need a Prime Direct. ;D
 
Joe said:
I've always thought that, out of all the hunters, Sylux probably interested me the least, so yeah, I would also like to see more of the hunters and their lore explored. You could make a whole game about the Kriken empire, for example.

That said, I get why they are going all in on Sylux, because that character is essentially a blank slate. I'm sure by the end of Prime 4, I will be a Sylux fan.
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the fact that they snuck an invader zim reference in never stops being insane to me
 
ziggyrivers said:
How close to a game’s release do they usually do game centric Direct?
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The vast majority are around a month before a game's release. Super Smash Bros. is the most notable exception to this, as broken down in this video.


Sadly, they ended up predicting the Splatoon 3 Direct date wrong. They were a week off due to deciding in the end to just look at just the Splatoon series itself instead of Nintendo's overall pattern.
 
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ziggyrivers said:
How close to a game’s release do they usually do game centric Direct?
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Bonejack said:
If they don't wanna do a September Direct (be it General, Mini or Partner Showcase) then they need to have the Switch 2 reveal in September, and ideally this would also feature Prime 4 so they wouldn't even need a Prime Direct. ;D
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Usually directs air a few months at most before release, but I’m not expecting a full blowout, just another gameplay trailer with an explanation, as well as the 2+3 reveal.

I don’t expect the console to be revealed in September period, regardless of release timing. Nintendo revealed the Switch weeks after Colour Splash, its final major Wii U exclusive, and I believe we’ll see a repeat here if March is indeed the date, with a system reveal at least a week after M&L and a full Direct in the new year following Donkey Kong’s release.
 
I would be happy to have mostly new bosses... plus ridley. Ridley stan forever. I want to see a fresh new ridley design in these graphics. No need to make him the primary/final boss, just sneak a fight in there somewhere.
(Crocomire's a good little boy he can come too.)
 
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Amadeus said:






lots of cool fanarts lately
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These are great.

To go off on a tangent, I once again have to reiterate my frustration with the myth repeated all over the internet that Metroid has no Japanese fans, or worse, that Metroid is actively hated in Japan. It's demonstrably false. The way people were talking here a couple of weeks ago, with how "Nintendo would never end a Direct with Metroid Prime 4 because of the Japanese audience" made it sound like Japan is actually disgusted by the very mention of Metroid, which is hilarious to me. The worst falsehood I've seen on the subject was "Nintendo holds disdain for Metroid as a franchise because of how badly it sells in Japan" which is so very pulled out of the clear blue sky that I don't even know how people can say things like that and believe them.

Sure, you could say Metroid sells much better in North America than it does in Japan, but that's kind of a misleading statement because statistically, most games sell better in North America simply because the population of North America is much larger than the population of Japan.

Metroid is definitely not the most popular Nintendo franchise in Japan or anywhere, but to act like Metroid is a non-presence in Japan is false.

Also, this is anecdotal, but when I played Federation Force when it first came out, I played online with more Japanese players than Western players.
 
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Kool Savis said:
Actually, 343 hired some people from Retro, back when Halo 4 was developed and you can clearly see the inspiration. I liked the artistic direction in the new Halos.
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Halo 4 is a great game. Definitely smaller in scope than 3, but it looks amazing and I think it has the best character moments in the series. I teared up a bit at the end with cortana
 
Thinking about the possible time-travel in the game, since the Space Pirates and Sylux attack a Galactic Federation Research Facility, i have to wonder what plan the Federation has by pursuing time-travel.

Are they trying to find a way to gather Phazon even without the Metroid Prime alive? Trying to get more Metroid samples?

You know, there's one good thing with the Space Pirates, you know they're evil assholes and they make no effort to present themselves in any other way.
The Federation is a backstabbing worm acting like they're the good guys.

GPKs3 said:
These are great. I love how game announcements get the creative juices flowing in artists. I've been enjoying all the fan art for Zelda: EoW as well.
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To be honest, the amount of artists drawing Smol-Zelda as some "hidden psycho" enjoying the violence she unleashes with the Tri-Rod is a bit ... concerning. ;D

But funny.
 
Joe said:
These are great.

To go off on a tangent, I once again have to reiterate my frustration with the myth repeated all over the internet that Metroid has no Japanese fans, or worse, that Metroid is actively hated in Japan. It's demonstrably false. The way people were talking here a couple of weeks ago, with how "Nintendo would never end a Direct with Metroid Prime 4 because of the Japanese audience" made it sound like Japan is actually disgusted by the very mention of Metroid, which is hilarious to me. The worst falsehood I've seen on the subject was "Nintendo holds disdain for Metroid as a franchise because of how badly it sells in Japan" which is so very pulled out of the clear blue sky that I don't even know how people can say things like that and believe them.

Sure, you could say Metroid sells much better in North America than it does in Japan, but that's kind of a misleading statement because statistically, most games sell better in North America simply because the population of North America is many, many times larger than the population of Japan. Even Dragon Quest sells better in North America by sheer numbers alone.

Metroid is definitely not the most popular Nintendo franchise in Japan or anywhere, but to act like Metroid is a non-presence in Japan is false.

Also, this is anecdotal, but when I played Federation Force when it first came out, I played online with more Japanese players than Western players.
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In fairness it's still definitely one of the more overseas-proportioned series in their stable, but in the case of the Prime games it isn't really surprising given the comparative weakness of FPS games in Japan. The Prime Trilogy also predated COD and other FPS games gaining some steam during the PS3 era there.

But I do agree that the "there aren't more metroid games because Japan" was a weird take. Having some degree of "special treatment" towards your home country isn't unusual, but to suggest that because they are a Japanese company they by default really only care about domestic sales feels like a rather ignorant take to me. If that was the case they would never have greenlighted Prime to begin with, or the various FPS games that released during the N64 era.

As an aside, I also found a lot more Japanese FF players than I expected. Almost every 66 I ran into also was from Japan.
 
IronTed said:
In fairness it's still definitely one of the more overseas-proportioned series in their stable, but in the case of the Prime games it isn't really surprising given the comparative weakness of FPS games in Japan. The Prime Trilogy also predated COD and other FPS games gaining some steam during the PS3 era there.

But I do agree that the "there aren't more metroid games because Japan" was a weird take. Having some degree of "special treatment" towards your home country isn't unusual, but to suggest that because they are a Japanese company they by default really only care about domestic sales feels like a rather ignorant take to me. If that was the case they would never have greenlighted Prime to begin with, or the various FPS games that released during the N64 era.

As an aside, I also found a lot more Japanese FF players than I expected. Almost every 66 I ran into also was from Japan.
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I've mentioned this before (maybe even recently, forgive me if so, I have a bad memory), but I had to stop watching a certain prominent video game news YouTuber for saying "there aren't many Metroid games because the series doesn't sell well" as if it were fact when it was blatantly false and easy to prove wrong. There are documented, publicly visible reasons for Metroid releases to be sporadic: with 2D Metroid it was both because there was no dedicated team to make it as well as the hardware not being enough to match Sakamoto's vision (both with the N64 and the DS); with Metroid Prime it was because Retro finished their trilogy and was ready to move on. Sales have very little to do with the production of Metroid games and the way people overstate their importance in regards to Metroid really drives me up the wall.
 
Bonejack said:
To be honest, the amount of artists drawing Smol-Zelda as some "hidden psycho" enjoying the violence she unleashes with the Tri-Rod is a bit ... concerning. ;D

But funny.
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given the torture devices and weapons-surely-banned-by-the-geneva-convention people have made in TotK, this was inevitable


seeing people do so much fan art of Sylux feels vindicating in a way. because people have dunked on Sylux and Tanabe's vision for years now despite us barely even seeing what that vision even was. people were calling Sylux a plant long before Aloy was being (wrongly) accused of it. and now, we can finally see that vision and all of a sudden people are ok with it.

y9wqzhjapq1d1.gif
 
Bonejack said:
Thinking about the possible time-travel in the game, since the Space Pirates and Sylux attack a Galactic Federation Research Facility, i have to wonder what plan the Federation has by pursuing time-travel.

Are they trying to find a way to gather Phazon even without the Metroid Prime alive? Trying to get more Metroid samples?

You know, there's one good thing with the Space Pirates, you know they're evil assholes and they make no effort to present themselves in any other way.
The Federation is a backstabbing worm acting like they're the good guys.



To be honest, the amount of artists drawing Smol-Zelda as some "hidden psycho" enjoying the violence she unleashes with the Tri-Rod is a bit ... concerning. ;D

But funny.
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They may not actually know that weird artifact they are studying actually have time travel property, and just studying it for the space travel possibility. I imagine being able to travel anywhere pretty much instantly would be really useful for them.

Wild theory time: They may not know what the artifact can do, but Sylux know because he actually come from the future where the GF abused the abused the shit of the artifact power and that why he is a hater
 
Sin & Punishment said:
So will this be the final Metroid Prime game?

I get the feeling Nintendo wants to release this and then move on.
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I hope this is the final Metroid Prime game, but not the final first-person Metroid game, if that makes sense.
Irene said:
One thing that would be a dream come true is for the world to be a planet: as in the world map actually looping back around itself, and you can travel to the core of the planet (which would be the equivalent to Magmoor Caverns) and to the opposite side of it.

Imagine something like this:

primemap.png


Like, when you pull up the 3D holograms, you see that it's all skewed, and some rooms are upside-down. But as you traverse, the world and world map rotate in real time. And then, when you ride the elevators, you literally come to the other side of the world.
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Love this. Massive Outer Wilds energy.

I hope the game's core idea is as interesting as this.
 
R.D.Blax said:
They may not actually know that weird artifact they are studying actually have time travel property, and just studying it for the space travel possibility. I imagine being able to travel anywhere pretty much instantly would be really useful for them.

Wild theory time: They may not know what the artifact can do, but Sylux know because he actually come from the future where the GF abused the abused the shit of the artifact power and that why he is a hater
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Slyux is Samus from the future. The feds kept cloning the dickhead who killed her parents and she finally had enough.
 
Reposting this art from another thread:



I've been predicting Sylux to be a woman for over 15 years now. It would just make too much sense as a villainous mirror to the Samus reveal in the NES Metroid game. The fact that the games go out of their way to avoid specific pronouns for Sylux as well as keeping their backstory deliberately vague is what tipped me off to this direction. I have a strong feeling that's where they're going and that they've been planning it ever since Hunters.
 
Joe said:
I've mentioned this before (maybe even recently, forgive me if so, I have a bad memory), but I had to stop watching a certain prominent video game news YouTuber for saying "there aren't many Metroid games because the series doesn't sell well" as if it were fact when it was blatantly false and easy to prove wrong. There are documented, publicly visible reasons for Metroid releases to be sporadic: with 2D Metroid it was both because there was no dedicated team to make it as well as the hardware not being enough to match Sakamoto's vision (both with the N64 and the DS); with Metroid Prime it was because Retro finished their trilogy and was ready to move on. Sales have very little to do with the production of Metroid games and the way people overstate their importance in regards to Metroid really drives me up the wall.
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It's funny how (mainly during the 2010's for obvious reasons) you have the, to be quite blunt, embarrassing "why does Nintendo hate metroid" persecution complex takes. As though Nintendo is specifically making these games to piss people off or something.

Then you have the "every Metroid game except the original was a flop" crowd that seem to think Nintendo loves Metroid so much that each game underperforms and yet they keep getting made. Of course most don't even realize this is a conclusion of their argument.

I'm past being hung up on these toxic intra/cross-fandom arguments. The Switch era has put to rest the need to justify the franchise's existence and that's enough for me.
 
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