Nintendo of Japan and Retro Studies held a roundtable last week to discussing the new game, Metroid Prime. From Nintendo of Japan were Shigeru Miyamoto, the game producer and Kensuke Tanabe, the game's co-producer. From Retro Studios was Steve Barcia, the executive producer, Mark Pacini, the game's lead designer, Karl Deckard, senior designer and Michael Mann, Metroid Prime's producer.

Tim O'Leary from Nintendo of America translated the roundtable for the press. Below you can find the full transcript. *Warning minor spoilers below, not too much though*

Miyamoto-san: As the producer of Metroid Prime, I'm very relieved and happy to have the game available in the United States before the end of the year. It's been a long road. Actually, we've been working for about three years on this game. This is the first time we've dealt with a foreign development team to this degree in building a game from scratch. The Retro team members have been working with us with the utmost cooperation. Even though, at the beginning, they did have plans to develop their own game, but we convinced them to build a Metroid title for us and they've been very cooperative for the entire process.

We have always recognized Retro's superb graphic talent from the great artists on their team. When we first got started on this project, there was a lot of thought about what kind of game we were going to get because they have a Western art style as opposed to a Japanese art style. It's obviously very good, but very different than what we're used to.

This team has been very cooperative and very hard-working. They had to get used to the hard development times and long hours that the Japanese are so used to. But because they did so, they developed a game that the Japanese media has accepted. They don't look at it as a foreign game, but as a game that meets the high standards held by Japanese gamers. This is going to be a game embraced by the Japanese people.

We really had a great time making this game. It was a lot of fun. There were obviously a lot of tough aspects as well, but you should probably go ahead and ask Retro themselves about what they thought was difficult! [laughs] Let's get started with the questions. We have had numerous three-way conferences, whether it was by telephone or video. So, we're used to this. [laughs]

Q: How was the labor split between Retro and NCL?

Steve: The overall design and direction was a cooperative effort between both sides. We communicated frequently to make sure that we were all on the same page. Everything was handled through communication between the two companies. As far as the actual implementation, the engineering and art was done here at Retro. A lot of choices about the game and the direction were a cooperative effort.

Tanabe-san: The only thing we handled completely on our end was the music, which was done by Research and Development Team 1 (R&D1). Kenji Yamamoto -- who did the music in the original Metroid and all of the Metroid games -- did the music on this game as well. Other than that, everything else was handled on Retro's end.

Q: Two part question: For Retro, could you expand a little bit on the timeline? When did Retro begin this other project before Metroid Prime started? For Nintendo, why after so many years of hearing the pleas of fans, did you finally decide to make another Metroid?

Steve: We had started it shortly after the company was formed. Then Mr. Miyamoto became involved and gave us some very good recommendations on how to change the game. However, I should note we hadn't actually developed this previous game for very long before we started on Metroid Prime.

Miyamoto-san: I had seen test builds of different projects from the Retro team as long as four years ago. At that time, I thought that in the future this team could probably do a Metroid game for us. That was my first impression.

I know that the American people have been eagerly anticipating a new Metroid game. I have been asked about it many times! Even through the entire Nintendo 64 period we were thinking of ways to produce a new Metroid title. We couldn't come up with any concrete ideas or vehicle at that time. When I met the Retro team and saw the work they were doing, I thought that this was the kind of team that could work on a Metroid game.

Q: When did work on the game begin?

Steve: We started to put people on it around June 1999.

Miyamoto-san: But, I remember thinking before that time they could do a Metroid title.

Q: It must have been difficult coordinating the efforts between Retro and NCL. What were your biggest challenges?

Steve: Communication was a big issue. Not only with the physical distance, but with the time difference as well. We bridged the gap with a lot of e-mails and some trips. Overall, maintaining communication was the biggest difficulty. Even that wasn't too hard after we created a good process for communicating.

Getting EAD involved in the project early really helped to make Metroid a quality game. Early on we realized that this game was going to have to be made for a global audience. We looked for a lot of direction from NCL and their experience in that department.

Miyamoto-san: We've had countless numbers of meetings and conferences. Right from the beginning, Steve at Retro had suggested numbering the e-mails so that we could know which e-mails we responded to and when. The number that is on the last batch of e-mails is a very, very large number. [laughs] We sent people from Japan to Texas to stay for fairly long periods of time, and that really helped with the communication process.

Q: What are the key gameplay elements that make a game a Metroid game?

Steve: A lot of it is mood. It's got to feel creepy and eerie. Samus has to be a very cool character. She's this bounty hunter and she's very powerful. The player should get a sense while playing through the game that he or she is Samus. A lot of the game elements then support that. For example, the visor gives you the feeling of being in Samus's suit. We have very cool weapons and cool adversaries.

As far as the actual gameplay and structure, we took quite a bit from the original game. Traversing through a specific area more than once is an important aspect of the game. Then there's the pacing and the pick-ups. A lot of the traversal itself -- being a platformer mixed with some level of combat. We think these qualities are at the heart of what a Metroid game is.

Above everything else, it's the mood. The experience has to be really eerie and isolated.

Mark: As Metroid fans, each one of us brought something different to the table when we sat around and talked about what the game needed to be. We picked what stood out for us in the previous Metroids. What was cool? How do we associate Samus with the game to make it feel like Metroid, and what can we bring to the new game?

The atmosphere of the game is extremely important. Exploration and platforming were key elements that we tried to instill in every part of the game to make it interesting, and to make it a Metroid game.

Miyamoto-san: For me, I just want to be able to say, "I produced a cool game!" Our first goal was let's make this look good -- let's make a really cool game. We met some opposition at first because a lot of people thought that Metroid at its heart was a 2D platformer and didn't belong in the first person.

People thought that a jumping game like Metroid couldn't be done this way. But then we changed it. We decided not to call it a jumping game. We called it an exploration game That's the moniker we stuck on this game. Pretty early on in the development process, we experimented with putting the game into the third- person as well. That's when we came up with the Morph Ball mode. We decided that if it didn't work, we wouldn't have any third-person action at all.

We were able to overcome a lot of different obstacles, and I think it turned out really well. We were able to have both elements in the game: the first-person action and the third-person parts as well.

Q: Did you ever consider making Metroid Prime a 2D game?

Miyamoto-san: We just started out by thinking, "Boy, can we make a 3D Metroid? Let's try to do that."

Steve: There were very short discussions about what we could do, but we realized that it had to be a 3D game.

Karl: You've seen good games in every genre. We had to ask, "What was the gameplay like in the original Metroid games?" Whether it's third-person, first- person, 2D or 3D, we had to capture the feeling that was in the earlier games. Like Mark said before, exploration is very important. We had to figure out what that was. What is exploration? What kind of feelings does the player have when they go through the world?

One thing that is very important is being able to see something that you can't have and that you desire. If you see a power-up or you see an exit to a room that you can't get to, you'll want to explore to find it. Those are the kinds of things that we were interested in, regardless of what format the game was in. We're glad that it actually turned out very well.

Q: How was the story developed?

Mark: It's kind of funny because in the other versions of Metroid, you got a story at the beginning and a story at the end, and in the middle you played the game. The game made its own story by what you did. Our main goal was to make a game that was fun and that gave you the feeling that you were creating the game experience as you played.

What we needed to do was to create a story that was understandable in chunks, so you didn't need much explanation about what was going on. Players can figure out for themselves what's happening. The player can scan things with the Scan Visor and read messages to propel the story. Simplicity was the main directive from our end.

Q: This game is a lot different than most first- person games. Are you worried about the reaction of people who purchase this game expecting a typical first-person experience?

Steve: We set out to make a game that stood on its own. Above everything else, the first-person element was considered to be one aspect of the game, but not the focus. Exploration, we decided early on, was going to be one of the main goals. I wouldn't say that we were trying to fit exactly into that genre. Instead, we were trying to make a really cool game and to take what inspiration we could from the original Metroid.

Karl: There are two different things. You have the gameplay itself and then you have the way to present that gameplay. The gameplay is the most important thing. You can represent the gameplay in many different ways, but the actual gameplay is what we focused on. I think it's sometimes good when people have a certain expectation, and then they're surprised. They're doing something that they haven't done before and in general people like that. Originality and innovation are more important than fitting yourself into a certain genre just because people like it. I want people to play this game and be surprised and just have fun.

Steve: We also wanted this game to be very accessible to a large audience. We set up the control so it's easy to get into. It's definitely not a conventional first-person game as far as the controls are concerned. Our real goal was to try to make this easy for anyone to pick up, and to give them an enjoyable experience in a short period of time. I think we achieved that. It wasn't our goal to try to be just like any of the other first-person games. It was just the opposite. We wanted to use the first-person view as a vehicle, but we didn't want to focus on it as our only goal.

Miyamoto-san: That's right. Even the people working on this game often fell into thinking, "This is the way it has to be in a first-person game." We really had to break down those stereotypes. We had to toss that out the window and make something which was good for this game. We had to think about what was good for Metroid as opposed to what would work for a stereotypical first- person game.

Q: What was the hardest part of the game to get right?

Steve: Probably the first-person jumping. From the beginning, we realized that we were going to have to pay a lot of attention there since we were creating a platformer.
We recognized very early on that it was going to be a challenge to be able to jump through the environment like we wanted to. There aren't many games where first-person jumping is any fun at all. We continually spent a lot of effort to get it right.

Mark: That was one of the most difficult parts, but I also think that the control scheme was tough. With Miyamoto-san's experience with play control, we knew that it was extremely important to perfect the way that the player interfaces with the game. Play control can really be the pivotal thing that determines whether or not a player enjoys the game. Getting the controls correct and living up to our expectations took a great deal of work, and we're really proud of what we've done.

Q: Which of the previous Metroid titles influenced you the most?

Karl: I'd say that Super Metroid was the most important because that's the one that we grew up with and that we still love to play.

Q: What was the most difficult aspect of converting a 2D game series into 3D?

Mark: Pretty much the whole thing! [laughs]

Miyamoto-san: The fun aspects of 2D exploration were converted into 3D very well. In the 2D game, you can see whether or not you can easily jump to certain areas or shoot certain things. Those are things that, generally speaking, get lost when you go into 3D because your view is different. The team was able to find a lot of new ways to make 3D exploration fun. They discovered a lot of new things that now make 3D exploration just as great.

Mark: Miyamoto-san asked us, "What is the most natural thing to do when you're trying to look around and explore in any kind of game?" It's looking in the first-person view. It's very natural for an exploration game to be based heavily on looking through the first-person. That was a very important question that was presented to us, and it made many of our design decisions easier to make.

Q: On a scale of one to ten, rate the accomplishments you've made in bringing Metroid from 2D to 3D.

Miyamoto-san: Twelve. [laughs]

Karl: I like his assessment!

Q: Do you think that you handled it as well as you did when bringing the Legend of Zelda from 2D to 3D?

Miyamoto-san: Well, the next Zelda is pretty different and you'll have to see that for yourselves. Really 3D games are fairly difficult for first-time gamers. It's hard to control, hard to see what you're doing, hard to look at the map -- all of these things contribute to the difficulty for first-time gamers. But, with this game I think we've done a great job making it accessible for first-time gamers, and it's not too difficult. And, because Metroid takes place in this closed environment, a lot of it is trying to find your way through mazes and such, and for a 3D game it's not too difficult.

Q: What did you include in the game to enhance replay value?

Steve: Once you actually finish the game, you can replay the game at a harder difficulty level. The creatures are a lot more powerful and the game itself is more difficult. That provides a new challenge to the players who have become pretty good at it. We also have an art gallery that you unlock based on how well you perform throughout the course of the game. Things are unlocked depending on whether or not you scan everything, and whether or not you actually get all of the pick-ups. We know that there are going to be a lot of people who want to find everything, which most players won't accomplish the first time through.

Q: Will we have to wait another eight years for the next Metroid game?

[Both parties hesitate and request that the other answer the question.]

[Everyone laughs.]

Miyamoto-san: We've been discussing future projects while working on this game, so I think it will be a little quicker than in the past. We'll be working around the clock again! [laughs]

Q: Are you pleased with the GBA Connectivity features in the game?

Tanabe-san: I'm very satisfied with what we did, because we did what we could within the timeframe we had to work with.

Miyamoto-san: As a company policy, we want to push the connectivity between the Game Boy Advance and the Nintendo GameCube to the point that if you have a Game Boy Advance, you're going to get a different style of game play and special bonuses in the games we're publishing. That's the case with the new Zelda game. In Metroid, we were looking for a way to connect Metroid Fusion and Metroid Prime because they were coming out at the same time, so we did do some fun things for players who have both games. They'll be able to connect and get some special stuff.

Q: Who is your favorite enemy?

Mark: My personal favorite is the Chozo Ghost. I think it's a very simple enemy that's effective. Since you have to use one of your visors to battle it, I think it sums up a lot of the game's fun aspects in one enemy.

Karl: I guess I like the Triclops the best. He kind of makes me angry because at first you don't know how to beat him and he always wins. And then you feel cool when you figure out how to beat him, but you can't always do it even though you know how. I like that in game play. It constantly pushes me to try and be better.

Michael: I like the Baby Sheegoths. They're like the bulldog of the game. They attack you, grunt and freeze you.

Steve: My favorite is Ridley. I think it's an extremely cool battle and a character from the past that everyone can really appreciate. I don't think there have been many battles like that in any other first-person games. I think it sets Metroid Prime apart.

Miyamoto-san: I like the Alpha Beetle because that's the first one that we saw up and running. We said, "Wow! This is an enemy! We can build off this!" I thought it was a really good start.

Tanabe-san: I like the Turrets.

Q: The game has a very cinematic feel. Where did you look for inspiration outside of the video game realm?

Steve: Nowhere in particular. We just wanted to make a quality game all around. We have some very talented artists and they brought the game to life with their artistic talent.

Miyamoto-san: Since you don't get to see Samus very often in a first-person game, we wanted Retro to introduce a lot of cinema scenes. There are also places where you'll catch glimpses of Samus as she's reflected in the environment. Those are the things we wanted to add in order to give the player a chance to see the great models we've developed.

Q: Are there any specific technological feats that you're most proud of?

Steve: I'd say the overall game engine, because we were able to get a lot of performance out of the GameCube. It allowed us to have these really gorgeous environments that were very rich in detail. That's due to the engineering team's efforts.

Michael: Also, to run at 60 frames per second and achieve all of that is pretty amazing.

Miyamoto-san: As Michael was saying, we were able to put all these particles on screen in addition to other effects and have it maintain 60 frames per second.

Q: Did you pay much attention to the skeptics who weren't sure that a first-person Metroid would work?

Miyamoto-san: Well, maybe we should have listened! [laughs] We made it the way we wanted to make it, and we weren't really concerned with what other people were thinking at that time.

Steve: At that time, we were starting to see the game come together. Parts of it were turning out to be really fun, so we knew that we were going in the right direction. Even though there had been some opinion that it wasn't a good direction to go, we could see for ourselves that it was going to be fun so we knew it was the right direction.

Q: In the credits, Retro thanks their families for their understanding. You must have put in a lot of long nights. Do you feel like you're going to reap the rewards when everyone loves this game?

Karl: We're reapin' some sleep right now! We're all really happy with how it came out. I think gamers will be happy too. You guys have all played it and said you liked it. We're just happy that all the hard work paid off.

Mark: I completely agree. I think everyone worked so hard because we all saw the potential of the game. We knew that we were part of something special. It was very hard work and we put a tremendous amount of effort into it. We're really proud of what's out there and we hope everybody likes it. It was fun.

Tanabe-san: One thing that I will always remember about working on this game is that in the middle of one of our conferences, my wife had her second baby But, I didn't name her Samus! [laughs]

Q: Did you feel any pressure from being trusted with such a beloved Nintendo property?

Steve: There was a lot of pressure. Metroid is a very, very popular series. We knew that there were a lot of fans out there that we needed to please. So the pressure was high, but at the same time we could see how special the game was going to be. So we worked really hard.

Mark: It was a great opportunity. I'm a really big fan of the series. When we learned about the possibility of being involved with the Metroid franchise and NCL, we immediately saw all of the difficulty that would lie ahead. We just decided to do it and to do the best job we could. It was difficult, but it was a really great opportunity to take that chance.

Q: Could we get a little more background on Retro Studios. We know you were a pretty big studio at one point, and have downsized since then. How many employees are there now? Are all the original artists still there? The artistry is stunning.

Steve: Really we'd prefer not to talk about company details. We did change the size of the company, we're now one team. And I think we all work really well together.

Q: Do you have any plans for the game engine? Are you going to use it for anything else?

Steve: We're very happy with the engine we have and going forward in the future we'll try and leverage it any way we can.

Q: What's next for Retro Studios? We know you had some projects you put on hold, any chance of reviving them?

Steve: Yea, currently we're still developing the Japanese and European versions. So that's consuming all our work time.

Q: How much attention was paid to sound design and how important is it to the Metroid experience?

Steve: We think sound and music are both a huge part of the game. It really puts you into the environment. We paid a lot of attention overall to music and sound. We tried to squeeze in as much as we possibly could.

Michael: Our audio designer here spent a lot of time working with Japan on this to make it as immersive as we could.

Miyamoto: We put a lot of time and energy into creating a lot of good atmospheric sounds and background noises. A lot of time was spent trying to create an immersive environment.

Steve: There were many passes, one after another where we evaluated it. We were
constantly asking, "Where can we put more sounds?" and "How can we make this a cooler experience?" Throughout the whole process we were adding as much as we could possibly fit in.

Q: Since Retro Studios did such a wonderful job on Metroid Prime, would you consider giving them Kid Icarus?

[Everyone laughs.]

Miyamoto-san: Ahh... I'll think that over.

Thanks for your time Retro Studios and Nintendo. [Round of applause issued.]