Marcus Sellars is the gift who keeps on giving, if he is to be believed (trust no one). Sellars’ latest claim, which is completely separate from the Namco Bandai press event on the December 15, is that Metroid Prime 4 is being developed by Bandai Namco. In his Discord server, he further expounded on the rumor, stating that Bandai Namco is developing the Nintendo Switch title with “a lot of help from Nintendo“.
Trailer/gameplay at Nintendo direct. You will also see My Nintendo Rewards and online being outlined in detail.
— Marcus Sellars (@Marcus_Sellars) December 9, 2017
Now, there are a number of questions surrounding this rumor. First of all, Nintendo has already announced that they have an in-house producer who is heading the development team. Why would Bandai Namco then be developing the title, one of Nintendo’s biggest franchises? Sure, they did handle Smash Bros., but Metroid Prime 4 is a completely different kind of animal. Nintendo even issued a press release regarding the development of the game. This could simply be blown out of proportion too; didn’t Monolith Soft assist Nintendo on Breath of the Wild? Does that mean that they “developed” Breath of the Wild? No, it doesn’t.
“The project is being led by series producer Kensuke Tenabe and a talented new development team. Together they are hard at work bringing the action, isolation and exploration of the Metroid Prime Universe to life on Nintendo Switch.”
“Talented new development team” could be up to interpretation, but when Nintendo says they’ve put together a talented new team, it’s inferred that they’ve put together their own in-house development team. Handing the series to a third-party like Bandai Namco doesn’t seem plausible.
Regardless if the rumor is true or not, we are getting a Nintendo Direct in January according to a leaked EA e-mail. Only time will tell and Sellars will either become a superstar or he’ll become infamous.