Way back in 2021, documents shared as part of Epic’s court battle with Apple confirmed what Nintendo fans had long suspected: that Samus was planned to appear in Fortnite’s bounty hunter season but, for reasons unknown at the time, never made the cut. But those reasons have now been revealed, with former Fortnite boss Donald Mustard explaining Nintendo “got really hung up” about its characters appearing on other platforms when approached.
Fortnite’s bounty hunter season ran from December 2020 to March 2021, and included appearances from two major console mascots: Xbox’s Master Chief and PlayStation’s Kratos. Inevitably, there was plenty of speculation Metroid protagonist Samus Aran would be next to represent Nintendo, but the character never arrived.
When court documents shared later that year confirmed Samus had at one point been planned for Fortnite’s bounty hunter season, speculation only increased. Fans have long wondered if Nintendo’s sticking point was that it didn’t want its characters stepping outside the bounds of its own consoles – and it turns out, as per a new interview with Epic’s former chief creative officer Donald Mustard, those theories were exactly right.
