you can read the whole thing here. http://seanmalstrom.wordpress.com/2009/09/08/metroid-dread-will-be-released-in-november-2010/

the mainpoints:

*whenever a new risky metroid game came out, a classic one always came out for backup, incase the metroid fanbase hated the new direction, they would have a classic metroid to play to keep them happy.

*when metriod prime came out, fusion also came out as the classic alternative.

*when metroid prime 2 came out, it was the "classic alternative" game, while metroid prime hunters (which came out about the same time) was the experimental game.

*he suggests that nintendo was originally gonna release metroid dread alongside metroid prime 3 (this could explain the metroid dread reference that was in that game), but they desided against it because the prime sub-series had already proven itself as a game people liked.

take this for what you will.

I would say that Other M IS the classic game going by Sakimoto's statements.

Hope hes right.

He missed the fact that Metroid Prime Hunters came out in 2004 only as a demo, and didn't really premier until 2006.

actually, i mis-quoted him >.

Haha...."Malstorm Thinks" has about the same weighting to me as saying "A 5 year old child who lives in a cave thinks" I hate that guy

He also missed that Zero Mission came out in 2004. If any game was the traditional game that year, it was definitely MZM.