Tiny Diggers – An iPad Construction Truck Game for Kids Age 2-5

It wasn’t long ago that people noticed a certain computer terminal in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption seemed to be trying to tell them something. Matt Cassamasina, head Nintendo guy over at IGN, pointed out to us that an in-game scan brought up the message,

Experiment status report update. Metroid project “Dread” is nearing the final stages of completion.

I know this got me pretty worked up. My assumption was one of two things: One, Retro is teasing us, or two, Retro knows about the almost mythic DS title and they’re saying it’s just about done. Metroid Dread was a game that was supposed to make its first appearance at E3 2005. At the time it was described as a 2D sidescrolling Metroid, like Metroid Fusion. When it never showed up, it was quietly ignored by Nintendo, and nobody’s had anything official to say about it. I just assumed it was being pushed off to keep some distance from the other Metroid games, so as not to dilute the brand, though some might say it’s too late to avoid that…

Retro Studios’ Mark Pacini, Corruption‘s director, stated in an interview with MTV that it was a reference to something in the Wii game, not some DS game. Sort of. Pay careful attention to the wording here. And when you’re done, click over and read the beginning of the interview at MTV News too. As a whole, it’s an excellent piece of work with tons of fascinating information about how Retro works, why Nintendo is such a hard sell on voice acting and some online stuff, and what it’s like to develop on a system like the Wii.

MTV: What’s the story behind the apparent reference in “Metroid Prime 3″ to “Metroid Dread,” the rumored but never-confirmed 2D game some fans hope is being made at Nintendo?

Pacini: “It’s not what you think it means… it as something that was overlooked and wasn’t in any way indicating anything about the handheld game. We know no information about the handheld games.

MTV: Are you suggesting that you got in trouble or something?

Pacini: Not at all. We actually had a fictional element of something else in the game that by a large coincidence could be read that we were giving a hint about “Metroid Dread” which was not the case. It’s a complete and utter coincidence.

MTV: OK.

Pacini: That’s all I can say on it.

MTV: That only makes me more confused. [laughing] I’ll see if I can parse what you just said to me.

Bryan Walker, Producer, Retro Studios: I think the bottom line there was [that there was] no innuendo in the reference that you’re mentioning.

Me: But you guys expected that some people would have a reaction to it. That it would be the stuff of news stories, yes?

Pacini: We didn’t think anything of it.

Walker: Purely innocuous, really.

MTV: Really? Honestly?

Walker: We’re not that clever. No conspiracy.

MTV: [pause, laughing] You’re not pulling my leg here. Definitely innocuous?

Walker: Yup.

“That’s all I can say on it?” Way to leave this inconclusive.

Source: 1up and MTV’s Multiplayer Blog.