I dunno, back then it was "holy shit, imagine what the guys who made Metroid Prime could do with next gen hardware!"

Now it's more "meh, Retro used to be great".

Eh, and 80 and a 75. They didn't set the critical world on fire, but they certainly aren't terrible scores.

I certainly haven't met any of the "meh, Retro used to be great" crowd, so perhaps I'm a little biased there, but say Nintendo announces that Retro is working on an entirely new IP for NX (with no other details). I would bet money that there'd be roughly equivalent excitement to what there was back in 2011. The disappointment came from Tropical Freeze not being as ambitious as something like Metroid Prime. I don't think that anyone sincerely doubts Retro's ability to push the limits of the hardware (at least, I sincerely hope not), they just haven't chosen/been assigned a project to do so in a while.

That's what I mean though; people are now worried that they'll be disappointed yet again. Retro are not longer considered a studio that can do no wrong.

I'm not sure that being assigned a project that wasn't as ambitious makes people feel worse about Retro; if anything, it seemed to direct hatred towards Nintendo for overhyping a game that probably didn't deserve it. Releasing one less than amibitous game doesn't qualify as a major stain on a company, though; if it did, Monoloth would have been abandoned long ago. Rare as well, if you'll recall the collective "meh" response to DKC3 (ignoring what happened to them post Microsoft acquisition).

I wouldn't call it so much of a stain on their record, more that it has diminished people's excitement for their future projects because there's no longer the assurance that whatever they do will push boundaries.

They are high chances Nintendo will revile Retros project this year.

The question is though, what is retro working on now? Also Retro themselves wanted to make a new DKC games and so TF was born, one of the finest examples of its genre to date. So no i don't think monolith has surpassed them. They are both talented Dev teams

Well, let's be fair, then. If this is your line of thinking, Retro's reputation hasn't been "damaged considerably." All that's happened is they garner less excitement due to the assignments presented to them by Nintendo.

Again, though, I'd argue this is wrong. There simply isn't much excitement at the moment because we hardly know anything about the next project. If Nintendo were to say that Retro was working on "something" for NX, with no further details, I'd bet money people would still be extremely excited.

With that said, this is a debate with extremely little substance; there's no real way to prove any of this other than wait and see, I suppose.

There is a giant, "Metroid Prime"-shaped hole in my heart this gen.

If Nintendo is set against MP4, they should at least commission someone for a FPA (first-person adventure). There haven't been any first-person games with a darker/psuedo-realistic style on the Wii U since way back at launch. 

As an adult gamer, I don't crave for every game to be an FPS, but I do enjoy the genre when it's done creatively. "Splatoon" is creative, yes, and very fun. It really really doesn't seem like it was created with my age group in mind (I'm 29).