Metroid Prime 4: Beyond fik semi-høje anmeldelser, men der var mange der var skuffede over spillets åbne verden, som kommer til udtrykt igennem en ørken i midten af spillet. Det viser sig faktisk at udvikleren bag, Retro Studios, godt vidste at denne del af spillet nok ikke ville falde i god jord.
I et interview med Famitsu siger de at de havde svært ved at balancere Nintendos behov for at eksperimentere med open world-formularen, og seriens primære kendetegn:
"At the start of the project, perhaps due to the influence of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, we saw a lot of comments on the internet saying 'we want to play an open-world Metroid. However, Metroid's core element of 'increasing the amount of explorable areas by unlocking powers' is not very compatible with the 'freedom to go anywhere from the beginning' of open worlds. Thus we thought to design a limited area that could be freely explored, and have that be a hub that could connect to other areas. Then we thought that if one could move around on the bike in a satisfying way in that area, it could be a segment that mitigates the tension from exploration, and paces the whole game."
Det skal dog siges at de ikke identificerer præcis hvem det er der udtaler sig i interviewet - der står det er "Nintendo", men vi går ud fra at dette er repræsentanter fra det egentlige udviklingshold.