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An unnamed company, assumed to be Nintendo, has put a stop to development of a fan-made Metroid Prime game and requested its demo be pulled.
Fan-made homages to popular games and series are becoming more and more common. However, the studios behind the original games aren't always too enamored with their IP being used without permission, especially if it is making someone else a profit. Many projects manage to fly under the radar, but others are taken down when they gain momentum or if a company has a similar official project in the works.
The latest fan-made game to bite the dust is Prime 2D. As the name implies, it's a two-dimensional version of the GameCube classic, Metroid Prime. The creators of the demake, known as Team SCU, revealed on Reddit that “a certain games-related company” has ordered them to stop working on the project. Its demo has also been removed.
“We have removed the demo download and soundtrack MP3 download, and we are currently in dialogue with that company to determine how best to proceed for both parties,” the statement reads. Nintendo infamously doesn't take kindly to its IP being used in others games without its permission, so if it is the company behind all of this, then it's unlikely the project will return any time soon.
As touched upon above, a studio suddenly deciding it isn't okay with an unofficial project can be an indicator that it has something in the works itself. Take-Two, for example, has been busy issuing takedowns over mods for some of GTA's older games, such as San Andreas and Vice City. That appears to have been building to the remastered trilogy of those two games and GTA 3. Rockstar is yet to announced the remasters but reports suggest they will be here in 2022, or possibly before the end of 2021.
It's no secret that Nintendo is still hard at work on Metroid Prime 4, and has been for a while. It will attempt to stave off Samus fans via the release of Metroid Dread later this year. Perhaps a remastered trilogy of the first three Prime games is also in the works, as has been rumored in the past. Another way to buy some time ahead of Metroid Prime 4 while hyping it at the same time.