Metroid Database.com

Yoshio Sakamoto was recently interviewed by Famitsu about the progress of Other M. He states that development is running smoothly and that while there had been a few problems due to the size of the project, they have all been solved. Additionally, Sakamoto stresses that the gameplay will closely follow the style of the originals: "This Metroid is being developed with the aim of the ideal form of the old Metroid." This is certainly great news to hear! Additionally, he stresses the uniqueness of the Wii console's abilities to fully realize Other M. As for the depiction of Samus:

However different from the rest of the series, this time we're strongly depicting the human side of Samus through such things as movies. She's a strong woman, but she also has a fragile side. We want to make a game whose charms can be felt from the story areas and these human touches as well. It's an action game, but it's capable of having a clear emotional side.

This seems related to Sakamoto's response to Metroid's performance in Japan: these changes seem to have been made with the added benefit of increasing Japanese interest in the series. Sakamoto's interest in integrating character and narrative into an action game is definitely intriguing, and I hope he will be able to do so with as much impact as he was able to in Super Metroid.

Until next time...
Captain Commando