Metroid Dread developer MercurySteam has been criticized by multiple former members of the company whose names were left out of the credits, the ex-staffers say.
Speaking to the Spanish outlet Vandal, several former employees who contributed to Dread‘s development—which was handled primarily by the Madrid-based studio with nominal oversight from Nintendo EPD in Japan—said they were not acknowledged for their efforts despite working on the game for months. The outlet also confirmed a company policy at MercurySteam that stipulates any employee must work on at least 25 percent of a project’s total development to be included in its credits.
“The policy of the studio requires that anyone must work on the project at least 25% of the time, of the total development of the game, to appear in the final credits,” a studio representative said in an email to Vandal (via our google translated-script). “Of course, exceptions are sometimes made when making exceptional contributions.” Sources in the story put the game’s total development time at between three to four years.