New Metroid Prime 4: Beyond trailer showcases Samus' psychic powers
Today's Nintendo Direct featured a new trailer for Metroid Prime 4: Beyond. Samus finds herself transported to a new planet with mysterious psychic abilities.
One of the biggest games featured during today’s Nintendo Direct was a game that was originally announced at E3 2017: Metroid Prime 4: Beyond. After eight years of troubled development, the fourth entry in the Metroid Prime series continues to get closer to actually releasing. Today’s trailer shared more information about the game and what to expect, including the setting and some strange psychic powers. Unfortunately, we still don’t have a release date for this highly anticipated game.
More details revealed about Metroid Prime 4: Beyond, including psychic powers
Metroid Prime 4: Beyond finds the series’ bounty hunter protagonist, Samus, “unexpectedly transported” to an unknown tropical planet: Viewros. This strange world is filled with aggressive alien life, but Samus is more than ready to defend herself. To escape, Samus will have to scan objects and relics to learn more about her surroundings, solve puzzles, and of course shoot some aliens.
The trailer reveals that Samus will unlock an array of psychic abilities. These can be as simple as manipulating an object with her mind or controlling the trajectory of her beam to strike multiple enemies at once. It appears that a major mystery of the game will be why Samus has these powers, and what brought her to this planet. In the trailer, she speaks with another alien, perhaps former residents of Viewros, who tells her she is the chosen one.
We still only have a 2025 release window for Metroid Prime 4, though it is possible that we will learn more next week during the Nintendo Switch 2 Direct. This is one of the few major Nintendo titles that we know of for this year, other than the potential for a new Mario Kart teased during the Switch 2 reveal. It would make sense for Metroid Prime 4 to serve as a cross-generation title, available on the Switch 1 but also serving as a launch title for the Switch 2. Perhaps this is the title that will pioneer the use of the rumored Joy-Con mouse feature. Maybe that functionality, along with a visual upgrade, will serve as encouragement to buy the Switch 2 version.
Ultimately, after eight years, it’s exciting to be on the precipice of a modern, original Metroid Prime game. Hopefully that troubled development period didn’t have a negative impact on the quality of the game. At least for the last few years, everything seems to be going smoothly. Now we can all look ahead to next week’s highly anticipated presentation.
