Metroid Prime’s Return to the Stage Felt Weird, Right?

We saw shockingly little for a game out (apparently) next year

Putting together showcases is hard work, I’m sure. Like a concert set list, you need to start strong, regather the crowd’s interest in the middle, and finish with a crowd pleaser. Mostly, Nintendo understands this cadence better than its peers.

At today’s Nintendo Direct, we got an exciting opener in Mario & Luigi Brothership, a new adventure in the rock solid dual-controlled role playing franchise I think most of us are pretty excited about. In the middle, Nintendo rocked us with a haymaker: a new Legend of Zelda title with the tilt shift graphics of the Link’s Awakening remake with the revelation that we will be controlling the titular princess in this particular adventure.

The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom not only will have players in Zelda’s shoes for a change, but the gameplay loop features what I can only imagine are linearity-smashing conjurations of physical objects to aid in traversal and combat alike.

It’s a truly stunning announcement that certainly got our co-stream chat excited for the future of a franchise that has been so firmly planted in either remakes or massive, sweeping open world games for the better part of a decade.

Our chat also began to swell with excitement — if a new Zelda game slides into the middle of a presentation, the big finale must be massive! Well, we got a new look at Metroid Prime 4, now known as Metroid Prime 4: Beyond, for the first time in years.

We get a ship landing, we get Samus emerging from the top, we get a gun check, we get the big camera swoop to first person, we get some space pirate killing and scanning…we’re checking boxes and I think it’s supposed to feel good. So why did it feel so strange?

I think, in fairness to Nintendo, the rest of the Direct felt strong enough (let’s not forget Dragon Quest I, II, and III all coming within 18 months) that whatever came last was going to have to be a world-rocking banger for us to care. And again, there’s a lot of earned enthusiasm for Prime, whose HD Remaster on Switch is one of the best games to come out last year. But for a game announced in 2017 (!!!) and later rebooted under the original studio’s care, I’m kind of shocked that we saw such a cliched trailer now in lieu of something that might be more exciting later this year or early next.

This isn’t to say I expect the game itself to be bad — there’s no reason to doubt Retro Studios’ track record in this regard — but I found it unnecessary to update us if the update was so lifeless.

The good news is that Metroid Prime 4: Beyond‘s reintroduction into the world was counterbalanced by ample evidence that Nintendo Switch’s swansong is looking incredibly strong.