New Metroid games are few and far between, so the launch of Metroid Prime 4: Beyond should have been a monumental event for the fanbase. Instead, eight years after its announcement, and 18 years after the previous game, Nintendo’s big December 2025 release landed with a loud thud. Already, this once highly anticipated title is poised to be one of the series’ most divisive games, earning a spot alongside Other M and Federation Force.
This isn’t for lack of polish, as Prime 4 is indeed visually stunning and perhaps the greatest first-party showcase of graphics on the Nintendo Switch and its successor. But while it has its share of enthusiasts, it’s difficult not to feel underwhelmed by the final product in comparison to prior Prime games and even other, similar entries in the Metroidvania space that has grown in Nintendo’s frequent absence.
The list of Metroidvania games from independent and third-party developers in the past decade alone is astonishing, with Ori and the Blind Forest, Axiom Verge, Hollow Knight, Dead Cells, Animal Well, and others throwing new concepts and innovations into the genre’s well of ideas. Hollow Knight and its follow-up, Silksong, have captivated players with their dense worldbuilding, roaming NPCs, and optional side objectives, all of which have come to define the critically acclaimed series. Nine Sols stood out with its intricate combat system, while more out-there games like pinball Metroidvania Yoku’s Island Express have proven anything can be a Metroidvania with the right amount of determination and creativity. Even Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown changed the game with something as simple as an in-game screenshot system to help with backtracking. The Metroidvania genre is rapidly iterating with a volume of unique takes.
Unfortunately, Metroid Prime 4 lacks the same ambition as its contemporaries and serves as proof that the series is now lagging behind the very games that it inspired. All Nintendo has had to show in the midst of this huge explosion of search-action games is Metroid Dread, which, as good a game as it is, is far from the most innovative or unique game of the bunch.
It’s disappointing to see Nintendo become an also-ran in a space it helped create. Not every game the company publishes has to be an earth-shattering release that completely shakes up the tenets of game development. But this is a company that has reinvented its other legacy properties multiple times. For Zelda, Ocarina of Time was a revolutionary transition to 3D, while Breath of the Wild once again reimagined the series with a new open-world format. The first Metroid Prime in 2002 was a similar accomplishment, unmatched by anything in the series since then.
Prime 4 could have taken a similar approach: using familiar gameplay concepts and structures while building something new, unexpected, or refreshing. Nintendo and Retro Studios could have challenged our notion of what a Metroid game could be. Instead, Prime 4 feels archaic–the same as usual, except further distilled and with the added prefix of “Psychic” before everything.
Under the hood, Prime 4 reuses game design ideas from the 1990s and 2000s, which wouldn’t be egregious if it had iterated on or refined any of them. The closest feature to an innovation that the game includes is the nonsensical paywalling of background music. The end result is a strange mix of concepts from the first three Prime games, as if Prime 4 was based on a vague memory of the original trilogy.
It retains the visual identity established in the original Metroid Prime, but it turns the complex rooms and environments into long, narrow corridors with the occasional split path. Prime 4’s world structure is somewhat like Prime 2’s, centering on an overworld that connects the different biomes. However, unlike in Prime 2, Prime 4’s map lacks any connection between the biomes themselves, and the Ocarina of Time-like overworld of Sol Valley is more of a chore to travel through than its own compelling area to explore. And controversially, Prime 4 has the voice acting and cutscene-filled cinematics of Prime 3, except that Prime 4 forgot to include either a story that makes sense or reasonable character motivations. All in all, Prime 4 is like a botched cover version of the preceding three games.
Prime 4’s loop is essentially this: Enter a dungeon, go through lengthy hallways, ride some elevators, turn on the power or complete some other objective, and then backtrack through the entire area while facing a new challenge. It’s extremely straightforward, and I was able to accept that loop as a tutorial section–but Prime 4 never felt like it got past the tutorial.
The borderline on-rails nature of Prime 4 is problematic for a series–and genre–based around exploration. Linearity and hand-holding aren’t new to the series–Fusion and Zero Mission were early examples of the game explicitly giving players a destination waypoint on the map. Prime 3 is also considered by fans to be a more linear affair, and Metroid Dread, with all of its Metroidvania-ness, imploys clever techniques to provide an invisible guiding hand to help players advance through its world. But while Dread was a modernization and streamlining of 2D Metroid, Prime 4 feels like a regression, with its version of streamlining actively dissolving much-needed tension and discouraging player agency.
This is further exemplified by the game’s characters, who continue to radio you even after they stop following you around. To hear a character “suggesting” where to go in an almost passive-aggressive tone feels patronizing to me as a player, and I found myself ignoring these suggestions, defiantly turning my Vi-O-La motorcycle in the opposite direction through the mostly empty desert. I felt the need to push back on Prime 4’s guiding hand to feel any sort of empowerment, but even then, there’s little to do outside of the game’s critical path.
Prime 4 stripping away that Metroidvania structure and feel is particularly disappointing given that the 3D Metroidvania space is largely untapped. There are hints of Metroid Prime in games like Batman: Arkham Asylum and Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. But with how groundbreaking Prime 1 was, it’s sad that it didn’t inspire imitators to the same degree as Breath of the Wild did after its release. Prime 4 could have been a watershed moment for 3D exploration-based games–instead, it wastes the opportunity, relapsing to antiquated ideas and questionable design decisions to form an overall underwhelming experience.
Nintendo should be leading the charge in the Metroidvania space, as it does with platformers, action-adventure games, and other genres. Unfortunately, Prime 4 feels more like an obligation for stakeholders and investors–something Nintendo couldn’t back away from after prematurely announcing it, rather than a passion project that showcases the company’s ingenuity. Naturally, this leads to questions about just how troubled Prime 4’s development was.
Ultimately, the Metroidvania genre doesn’t need Nintendo in order to thrive–other game creators have long proven this case. While developers may not find inspiration in modern Metroid, they can still look to the likes of Hollow Knight as a North Star. The democratization of the Metroidvania is objectively a good thing, as no one company should have a monopoly on a genre. But despite my misgivings with Prime 4 and my contentment with competing Metroidvanias, I still want Nintendo to make more Metroid games. It’s my favorite Nintendo series, and it deserves the same treatment as the company’s other key brands.
A comforting thought is that the reaction to Prime 4 might send Nintendo back to the drawing board for the Metroid series. Although it might have fumbled its Breath of the Wild moment, hopefully there will be something of a Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword effect, in which Prime 4’s shortcomings lead to Nintendo reevaluating the franchise and putting out a more ambitious title the next time around.
But if and when we get a Prime 5, my expectations will be even larger. Nintendo wants to be all about innovation, and I want the next Metroid to be a landmark achievement that other developers will follow. The Metroid franchise deserves nothing less. I just hope it won’t take another 18 years for Metroid Prime to get that chance.
