For how chaotic the video game industry can feel at times, it's not often that fans get a peek behind the curtain of game development. While recent years have seen the rise in reports surrounding toxic work culture at game studios and tumultuous development cycles, these stories are often reserved for when games are finally out. One rare instance of this was in 2019, when Nintendo announced that Metroid Prime 4 would be restarting development after almost two years of work had been done.
Only a handful of major canceled projects were officially announced and showcased within the last decade, including Kojima Productions' Silent Hills and Platinum Games' Scalebound, but rebooting a project is arguably more difficult as it means scrapping years of work and often involved handing creative control to another studio. Such was the case when Nintendo announced on January 25th 2019, almost two years after its announcement on in June 2017, that Metroid Prime 4 would no longer be developed by Bandai Namco's Japan and Singapore studios, with development shifting to original series developer Retro Studios.
Since this announcement three years ago, barely a world has been said about Metroid Prime 4 from any party. The only response fans have gathered from any of the companies involved is the major hiring spree Retro Studios went on between early 2019 to 2021, as it's been assumed that the team majorly down scaled in size after the development of Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze in 2014.
With almost eight years since the release of its last title, five as of the announcement of Prime 4's reboot, fans still have no idea what Retro Studios might have been planning to come after Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze. Many speculated that the studio was developing a Star Fox kart racer titled Star Fox Grand Prix, however it was later discovered that this was a trap for Nintendo to identify internal leakers. Instead, it's assumed that Retro was working on a new action IP that's speculated to have been canceled as a result of the team being put on Prime 4's development.
With the release of Metroid Dread in 2021, fans of the series have thankfully been kept busy as the wait for Prime 4 surpasses a quarter of a decade, and now the series has seen a huge boom in worldwide popularity putting Prime 4 in an excellent position when it does release. Many are hoping that 2022 marks the first year that Nintendo and Retro could be finally willing to reveal the title. Expecting the release of Metroid Prime 4 in 2022 however seems like a long-shot, as a 3-year development cycle for a game as complex and high budget as Prime 4 seems very unlikely. Either way, without any public update from Nintendo or Retro, all fans can do is hope for the best with Metroid Prime 4 as it enters its third year of rebooted development.
Metroid Prime 4 is in development exclusively for Nintendo Switch.