Metroid Site Teases the Phazon Out of Me

A post on NeoGaf unearthed myriads of speculation on the Metroid series last week, when the Japanese Metroid site introduced a teaser banner with a Space Pirate on it.

The banner, though simple, clearly indicates a new direction in the beloved namesake. In plain English, it reads "Another Side Story -Coming Soon-," with a null-play button on the side identical to those in the other Metroid Prime game sections. As if this isn't enough to indicate a nearby announcement or teaser trailer from Nintendo, the Japanese text was also translated (courtesy of Cubed3) to say "Follow Metroid Prime's history from the perspective of the Space Pirates." This indicates a very real possibility of gamers being able to enjoy taking on the role of the Space Pirates instead of the series' heroine, Samus Aran.

According to 1Up, however, gamers shouldn't get too excited at the idea of a new Metroid game yet. What we are looking at here could potentially be a teaser for "a new online manga entry, similar to Metroid 'e-manga' that have been released in the past."

The fun in dissecting these words can be had, however. "Another Side Story," for instance, evokes a few ideas. First, the side story at hand clearly indicates that this game or manga will tell the Metroid Prime trilogy story from another angle. The translation of the lower text, in addition to the image of the Space Pirate, tells us to expect to see things from the side of the Space Pirates. Plus, it mentions the history of "Metroid Prime." This narrows our timeline and subject matter, to an extent.

However, the most important word I take out of this is "another." While this seems to indicate that this teaser is for "another " e-manga, there are a few other possibilities. For instance, the Prime sub-series is, more or less, a "side story" from the other Metroid games. And within this sub-series is Metroid Prime Hunters, the Nintendo DS game that features online multiplayer, and Metroid Prime Pinball, a spin-off game that features... well, pinball.

Will we see another spin-off like pinball? As fun as that may sound to some (myself included) we have one last thing to keep in mind, the issue of a protagonist. In playing a game, it is difficult (except in the case of an RTS of sorts) to lead multiple heroes through an adventure. How could Nintendo manage to tell the story of the Space Pirates in this saga, while keeping to the Metroid formula?

Perhaps players will have a chance to be an untold rebel Space Pirate in the new game, or possibly Dark Samus herself, the sort of "evil leader" of Metroid Prime 3. Regardless, I'm sure many gamers will agree with me that we hope for a game as opposed to manga. And we absolutely want multiplayer, especially online multiplayer. Did you get all that, Nintendo?