Metroid Dread (ou simplement Dread) est un jeu vidéo d action-aventure à défilement latéral en deux dimensions de la série Metroid développé par Mercury Steam et édité par Nintendo, sorti le 8 octobre 2021 sur Nintendo Switch. Il est le cinquième épisode de la série principale Metroid et la suite directe de Fusion sorti sur Game Boy Advance en 2002.
Le jeu est initialement développé par Nintendo pour une sortie sur la console portable Nintendo DS. Il est découvert pour la première fois en 2005 sur une liste interne officielle de jeux, rédigée par Nintendo, et censée être révélé à l Electronic Entertainment Expo de 2005, voire en 2006. Il n est cependant jamais révélé lors de ces conventions, et est le seul titre de cette liste à ne jamais l avoir été. Le concepteur phare de la série Metroid, Yoshio Sakamoto, interrogé au sujet du projet Metroid Dread et de son scénario, confirme en 2010 qu il a bien existé à un certain moment. Il précise que si le développement de celui-ci devait être repris, il serait recommencé à partir de zéro.
Lors de l E3 2021, Nintendo dévoile finalement le renouveau du jeu pour une sortie sur Nintendo Switch. Le développement est confié à MercurySteam, qui avait impressionné Yoshio Sakamoto par leur travail sur le remake Metroid: Samus Returns sorti en 2017 sur Nintendo 3DS.

Only recently appeared with Metroid Dread the latest work of the Spanish developer studio Mercurysteam, which are known for their work on the Castlevania: Lords of Shadow series . Now the company faces serious allegations that the former employee collects.

Mercurysteam: ex-employee throw company punishment culture

This is apparent from a report of the Spanish website Anaitgames , in which a former team of the team share their experiences of the local working atmosphere. At the beginning of 2020, the company still worked a two projects and had been insured by the employees, everyone who wants to stay, could do so. Later, however, numerous people have been released and that, although their current project had a few months to work.

The development of that title ran under the code name Huntress Project , which was recently published as Metroid Dread in the trade. In general, MercurySteam should have adopted with the production of the game, which is why Nintendo let numerous aspects. In addition to the presumably improvement planning, however, above all the handling of the staff should have been bad.

In particular, the communication between the senior persons and the developers was pretty chaotic during this time, as an ex employee is told. The leadership flooring was very bad dealt with people, which led to the fact that the work had been done with a lot of sweat and tears . In addition, the corporate governance did not trust their employees, which is why a very tense mood has herred. Many employees have felt not valued .

Furthermore, employees were punished, the things do not make as the studio it wants . Spoken is from a permanent surveillance that penalties with errors. These sanctions acted from the isolation of the employee or the change of the group to the sudden release , which could have come from one day to the other.

Another ex employee says he had been put into another team and received a significantly lower increase in salary than a colleague who held the same position in the studio as he. Her supervisors would have given them to understand them, they were problematic for the company, as they had tried to negotiate their salary increase and exchanged themselves with some colleagues. The latter had been unacceptable, as he has brought into trouble confirming his partner who confirmed the incident.

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Regarding Metroid Dread , MercurySteam also confirmed (via gamespot ), not all employees who worked on the title would be mentioned in the credits. This merely reserved for those employees who had been at least 25% of the game. So these employees should be rewarded. Exceptions would only exist for those who had significant technical and / or creative contributions .

It is not the first time that the Spanish developer studio opposes harsh allegations. Already after the publication of Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2 , a former employee practiced hard criticism of his former employer. Compared to VG247 he prankened a lack of communication as well as a missing corporate culture, which is why several people would have worked as a result of blindly on the game.

What is your opinion on these allegations against Mercurysteam?

Further news about MercurySteam.