The Metroid producer is said to be retiring from Nintendo

Spoilers for Metroid Prime 4: Beyond ahead.

Kensuke Tanabe, for a long time Nintendo producer known for his work on Metroid franchise, has reportedly announced his retirement. A producer at Nintendo for nearly 40 years, Tanabe's first work with Nintendo came as a director for the 1987 Yume Kojo: Doki Doki Panic!a title that would later be transformed into Super Mario Bros. 2 for American audiences. From there, Tanabe became a screenwriter on back-to-back entries in The Legend of Zelda franchise, they are The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening.

In 2003, Tanabe moved to Nintendo Software Planning and Development, where he took over as head of Production Group No. 3. Since then, he has produced a number of games for Nintendo and is best known as a long-time producer on Metroid Prime series together with Retro Studios. He most recently oversaw the franchise's latest entry, Metroid Prime 4: Beyondwhich was released in December 2025, over eight years after the official announcement.

Nintendo shares Metroid Prime 4: Beyond's position in the franchise timeline

Family

Nintendo officially comments on Where Metroid Prime 4: Beyond Fits in the Franchise Timeline

Nintendo shares the official position of the newly released Metroid Prime 4: Beyond in the overall timeline of the sci-fi series.

Nintendo producer Kensuke Tanabe is reportedly announcing his retirement after 40 years

In a possible interview with Nintendo Dream uploaded to Weibo, Kensuke Tanabe revealed that Metroid Prime 4: Beyond would be his last game with Nintendo, and that producer Risa Tabata will likely succeed him if another Metroid Prime title enters development. During the interview, Tanabe reports that he consistently thought about making a game where series protagonist Samus Aran would take on the villainous Sylux as far back as 2007 Metroid Prime 3: Corruption. He hinted at the character facing Samus in that game, along with 2016's Metroid Prime: Federation Force.

Eventually, the 62-year-old Tanabe felt that at his age, Metroid Prime 4: Beyond would likely be his last chance to have a face-to-face confrontation between the two. But instead of giving the two a definitive battle, he chose to make the title the first in a saga of entries where Samus would see Sylux's true power and realize she needed to defeat him. This explains why the inevitable meeting between the two i Beyond ends unfinished, and Tanabe also laments that the game's protracted development cycle complicated the creation of Samus and Sylux's story.

If this interview is legit, Kensuke Tanabe's retirement represents the end of one of Nintendo's most enduring legacies. Tanabe, 62, was one of many notable creatives at Nintendo who had been there since the NES and Super NES eras, including Shigeru Miyamoto, Takashi Tezuka, Eiji Aonuma and others Metroid alum Yoshio Sakamoto. Tanabe has been credited for over 150 games with the studio and has had a hand in some of its most beloved games to date.

In addition to his work at Metroid Prime Tanabe also oversaw several titles across several externally developed Nintendo projects, with much of his recent work within Paper Mario, Donkey Kongand WarioWare franchise agreement. He was also the creative director of Super Nintendo World, Nintendo's theme park area seen across Universal Studios parks worldwide. Tanabe leaves Nintendo with a legacy as one of its most active producers, and a creative whose impact can be felt across a multitude of franchises and genres.