Series producer Kensuke Tanabe has hinted that the upcoming Metroid Prime 4 won’t ignore casual players, despite being a title that could be perceived as an experience for ‘core gamers’.
Tanabe, who is responsible for franchises such as Metroid Prime, Donkey Kong and Paper Mario, has discussed Nintendo’s “philosophy on game creation” in an interview with Nintendo Life network partner, VGC. The chat actually centres around this week’s Paper Mario: The Origami King and is well worth a read.
His comments come as a response to a question about Nintendo’s hardcore audience, and particularly about finding a balance in its game development that pleases all fans – hardcore and casual alike. Tanabe notes that the philosophy behind Paper Mario’s creation is also true for the Metroid Prime series, no doubt including the upcoming fourth entry which was has been completely overhauled to meet Nintendo’s own high standards.
Kensuke Tanabe: First, Nintendo’s philosophy on game creation is that we don’t ignore casual players in creating our games. This is also true for games such as those in the Metroid Prime series; games that at first glance look like they are only aimed at core gamers.
With that in mind, what we’ve done in the Paper Mario series is to put a lot of work particularly into the puzzle solving elements of the games, so that they can also be enjoyed by core users.
Of course, since Metroid Prime 4’s development restart, Nintendo subsidiary Retro Studios has been placed in charge of proceedings. The studio has been hiring extensively over the past few months, acquiring a number of industry veterans who have worked on a number of high profile releases.
Are you still feeling excited for Metroid Prime 4? Still patiently waiting for that next slice of news from Nintendo? Share your thoughts with us in the usual place.
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