Ironic that you now say that it is normal for a video game to lose customers even though you were previously arguing that Other M was to expand Metroid and make it more mainstream. Metroid does need to expand it's audience, but Other M was the opposite of how to do it.

The player decides who he his playing (which is usually a version of themself). If they choose to play along with the character as created then good, but most people will not and find characterization of the player's avatar tiring or annoying. The game is supposed to satisfy customers, not piss them off. And there is worse a player can do for a game than not buy it, they can buy it, sell it back to the store and spread the word of how bad it is, and end up with others not buying it.

The game world having doors that slow the minimum time you can complete a game in somehow removing the fact that the player is the player character is a really weak argument, as your personality is not determined by what you can achieve but the choices you make.

I wouldn't mind Retro making the next Metroid. It could be another FPS or a 2.5D side-scroller. I think Team Ninja could deserve a second chance as well. Many of the bad, or atleast mad, design choices weren't made by them.

I don't care why she is owned and told what to by another person.  The thing I didn't like is Sakamoto took her lone wolf personality away. And in the process did some damage to the series IMHO

The only two options are going back to Sakamoto or Retro (or doing both again)

Nintendo might see the writing on the wall for the franchise after Other M, in that Metroid is a franchise with American appeal first and foremost, so they should keep focusing their efforts in maximizing sales here, which would mean a return to Retro.

I'd rather like to see what they did with Other M, but replace Team Ninja with Retro, in terms of Sakamoto still having a certain amount of creative control

First part: I meant that it loses some gamers and gains others in their place. If the franchise goes well - a lot of sequels don't. Mario is a good example. People outgrow him, when new players come in. And untill now the balance has been in the growth area for Mario.  

Negative advertising from peers could be rather bad, but it isn't worse then not buying. Not buying means no sale. Having unstatisfied players is still beter then none at all.

You were really pissed off from Other M? It's just a game.

Last part: You brought up moving through the levels quickly or slowly as an 'character' thing. I mearly pointed out that there is a base time to it. The weak argument is yours.

And i wasn't saying that the player doesn't see himself as Samus. In fact that was the whole problem with Other M: Players had a different Samus in mind. Sakamot wanted to take back Samus, and.... he did it in a big, somewhat upsetting way. 

What choices are you talking about? Metroid isn't an open world. The non-essential secrets don't change the game or character much, if at all. Chosing to find them is a personal choice - mostly for completists.    

Thing is, Samus *is* deep. Shallow Samus would have destroyed the Baby Metroid on sight, and Samus' portrayal throughout Prime was a character who was very reflective.

Or at least that was my interpretation, which is (i suppose) why i found Other M far less objectionable than many, because i previously saw Samus as an introspective character who could appreciate the gravity of a situation, and had some sense of tragedy about her, while still being able to do the job and do it well.

That really is not smart for a company to gain more sales.  Alienate customers so your Sakamoto god can stomp  his feet and tell people he is right and you are wrong.

And that Barbie argument fails on so many levels.  How is a strong samus who is a warrior and who happens to be female a threat.  

Other

Konami. They perfected metroid with Castlevania: Symphony of the Night.

Okay, I tried to quote something and it came out as gobbleydegook. Anyway, short version: Sakamoto was going to tick people off regardless of how well he pulled off the writing (though admittedly he was a bit flawed with the plot). The Barbie analogy I used earlier was also a way of me saying that people can no longer treat Samus like a doll. Because that's all she used to be: a doll for people to play pretend with. Even in Fusion her personality was archetypal at best. It's times like this where I'm half-tempted to tell Nintendo to give up completely on the "hardcore" as a lot of the time we display ourselves as nothing more than disrespectful, arrogant, selfish brats.

There is no point in gaining new customers if you are losing more than you gain, a series goal should generally be to grow not decline. In practice, I doubt Other M gained many new customers at all and simply lost a lot.

Bad word of mouth (and trade ins, which you conveniently ignore) are why Metroid Other M had a somewhat comparable first week but is now selling less than half what Corruption did after the same amount of weeks.

It may be "just a game", but it's also €50. That's not an amount of money most people thoughtlessly throw away, you do expect to get something decent in return. If you do not, you are entirely justified in being pissed off. I am not talking simply from a personal perspective, I did not buy or play the game (though I did have a laugh as a friend agonized through it).

Your character is not reflected in the resultant events, but the attitude you choose to play the game with. It thus does not matter if there is a limit on the minimum time with which you can complete the game. That's a total red herring.

"And i wasn't saying that the player doesn't see himself as Samus. In fact that was the whole problem with Other M: Players had a different Samus in mind. Sakamot wanted to take back Samus, and.... he did it in a big, somewhat upsetting way. "

This is precisely the problem. Sakamoto thinks his ideas of Samus supercede the customers. He is wrong. And there is no "real" Samus, no authority who decides the "actual" Samus personality. A character and even an IP exists in the minds of the customers, and if you're going to maintain the value of said character/IP, you need to respect that.

I have already described the choices I was talking about "If you play a character running from objective to objective quickly, you are playing with a different personality than someone who messes about with the NPC's or someone who approaches situations slowly and cautiously". Further than that, there are plenty more choices in a Metroid game, from how or whether or not you fight the regular enemies , how and where you choose to explore and even whether you read the logs or not, etc. This is the player playing himself, or playing "a character", which helps to determine how he sees Samus.