Nintendo: Metroid Prime 4 Will Likely Be A 2018 Release

Last week during the Electronic Entertainment Expo, Nintendo threw a few surprises our way during its Direct presentation – including the news that Metroid Prime 4 was in the works. But the real question now is when we can expect it to arrive. Well, according to the company, not too long now.

Speaking with GamesBeat, senior director of corporate communications for Nintendo of America, Charlie Scibetta, revealed that Metroid Prime 4 is being slotted with some kind of 2018 release. While it doesn't have an official date yet – it's still in development – that's currently the game plan.

"We've announced a nice lineup through this year, and next year we have some big games coming with Metroid Prime 4. 2018 will be around Metroid, Kirby, Yoshi, new Pokemon game has been announced. We feel god about the lineup for this year and beyond."

The game will return to the first-person shooting roots as we've come to expect from the series over the past few years, though it won't be developed by the usual team at Retro Studios, who worked on previous games. Instead, Kensuki Tanabe, the original producer of the series, is working alongside a new studio to bring Metroid Prime 4 to life. So it sounds like it's in capable hands, even if it's not entirely in familiar ones.

For the time being, fans that are looking to get their Metroid fix won't have to wait too much longer, as the MercurySteam-developed Metroid: Samus Returns will be making its debut on the Nintendo 3DS on September 2015. That should certainly hold us over until the new Metroid Prime arrives – by that time, we should have a little more information in terms of what to expect from that title.

It'll be interesting to see how Nintendo markets the title, since Metroid: Other M didn't exactly go over well with fans of the series, despite a somewhat simple return to its 2D style gameplay roots. Fortunately, Metroid Prime 4's announcement has went over real well, so the job may have already been done for them. We'll see how it fares next year, if development currently sticks to plan.