#retro studios

It's the same old story. People who don't know how games are made make weird assumptions based on information that doesn't matter.

If there's one area where media literacy is at its worst, its how few people actually understand how games are made, how ideas are implemented, how things are tested, how bugs are dealt with, etc.

It's both. There's something called "institutional knowledge." When you work with the same people for long enough, with the same tools, in the same environment, it creates this shared web of information between everyone and everything that allows them to work more efficiently and better with each other.

You start removing people from that web and the institutional knowledge begins to break down. That well-oiled machine isn't so well-oiled anymore. The team composition gets worse. It's more than just losing raw muscle. It's losing the ability to effectively use the muscle you still have.

Now who do you blame for that? You could say a CEO. But did the CEO act alone? Or did they get a recommendation from a hiring manager? Or someone in finance?

It's never so cut and dry. Plus, sometimes, hard decisions have to be made and people have to be cut loose.

And that also includes people just naturally leaving the company, too. They don't even have to be fired. Yes, there are plenty of people still left who are doing their best and they are undoubtedly very talented, but the institutional knowledge has been damaged.

TDLR: when they started development and BOTW was still new-ish and exciting, they believed there was a fan demand for an open-world Metroid and decided to add the hub. However, as years went by and opinions changed, they realized fans had soured on the concept, but were unable to scrap it because it was far too late in its already troubled development to restart.