Regardless of whether this rumour is true or not, I do wonder whether Nintendo is going to re-evaluate their position on second party developers in the upcomming generation again ...

With each generation Nintendo has changed their strategy of dealing with external developers who are under exclusive contract to develop games for Nintendo systems. With the N64 Nintendo seemed to be focusing on having a single large developer who could compete directly with most large developers in the world (Rare), with the Gamecube they seemed to be focusing on having several smaller developers produce quality games in genres where Nintendo was traditionally weak, and it seems like Nintendo abandoned second party development with the Wii (at least publicly).

Personally, I think Nintendo had the right idea with the Gamecube but I'm not certain they (necessarily) had all the right developers working for them. While it can't change the direction of a generation, having enough developers to ensure that most key genres are represented makes you far less dependant on third party developers producing the content you need to make your platform successful.

maybe they could actually make the series good. I liked the mythology and mechanics of it, but the sound design and lack of atmosphere killed the game for me

Being a multimillion seller isn't a prerequisite for success and I reject the notion that Retro is only going to be put on second or third-tier Nintendo titles. It hasn't been the case since the beginning, unless you think Metroid was only a stepping stone. Retro will be put on whatever Nintendo puts them on, but I'm 1. not convinced that Demotruk was referring to sales with his comment, and 2. not convinced that they're going to be used for sure-fire megahits for the rest of time.

And probabilities can't be used to measure the likelihood of success, this isn't Star Wars where a magical computer can keep track of a perfectly observed system, compute the data, and spit out an exact probability expressed as a fraction. Even the phrasing of how you are putting this is dishonest.

I was referring to sales. I think they should be working on something more marketable, or at least creating a new IP with more potential than Eternal Darkness. It doesn't strike me as a game that would ever sell even the numbers Metroid could manage.

He always does that to me. Always tries to inject some big words and academic sounding arguments in there in order to force me to give up, because I can't decipher what he means even after reading it five times over.

The only reason I can see for Nintendo to give this IP to Retro would be if the members of the studio specifically asked for it for some reason.

I kind of liked the GC game myself but never finished it... and to be honest, in my opinion it just didn't feel polished enough, and I had the feeling that the studio behind it was several leagues behind Retro.

Yeah, personally I loved the Gamecube.  Loved it.  I know the sales of the system won't back my opinion but there were just so many great games on that system, first and third party:  Metroid Prime, RE4, RE remake, Wind Waker, Viewtiful Joe, Smash Bros Melee, and of course, Eternal Darkness.

On topic, I don't think Retro would be doing a new ED, but I'm sure it would be stellar if they did.