1.5 party? Is Itagaki working on this game?

Second party means when they don't own atleast 51% of the company. Retro studios is 100% owned by Nintendo and is there for first party and not second party.

All that matters is that it's a party! Woooooo!!

*gets drunk, takes off clothes, and passes out on sofa*

I am going to say second party

The deciding factor of first/third party is the relationship between the game developer and the console developer.

Game Developer == Console Developer : First Party
Game Developer != Console Developer : Third Party

Unless someone would like to claim that Nintendo owns Team Ninja then Metroid: The Other M is clearly a third party game.  

The fact that it is using a Nintendo IP is irrelevant.

The fact that EAD group 1 is the most important developer of this game isn't irrelevant there for it's first party game.

Oh, and the fact that the co-creator of Metroid is producing this game only proves my point even more.

My understanding was that Team Ninja is lead developer with Nintendo consulting on use of the IP.  

I would be interested in a source showing otherwise.

Read the interview on IGN and 1up. The team behind this metrtoid made the 2d metroids, so they have little experience for 3d. That's why they asked Team Ninja for help. You can clearly see the influence of Team Ninja in this Metroid, but I see more influence of Nintendo and wanna take a bet that this game will be the highest rated Team Ninja game on Metacritic? I wonder why... Oh, because Nintendo hasn't made a 3d metroid so far that goes below 90% on it. Without Nintendo pulling the strings on this game, it will fail.

I just read them.

This tells me a lot about who's going to be creating the engine that drives the game's combat and interaction.  Still, there's a lot more involvement that I had known about.  Learning that there were 3 companies working on the project is even more interesting.

Thanks for pointing me in the direction of those interviews.

This is why the term "second party" exists.

A game that is developed and published by the first party is obviously first party. A game that is developed and published by a third party is obviously third party. The term second party exists to describe a relationship where a third party develops and a first party publishes.

Team Ninja is contractually obligated to make THIS GAME only for Wii, so as far as this game is concerned, they are a second party developer. Second party is an informal catch-all term for when a first party and a third party collaborate.