Nintendo has published a notification revealing that it intends to acquire Luigi’s Mansion and Metroid Prime: Federation Force developer Next Level Games (NLG). The development isn’t much of a surprise for anyone who’s been following the company, as it has worked closely with Nintendo for over a decade, going so far as to pledge exclusivity to the Japanese gaming giant in recent years (“We’re a AAA Nintendo Developer,” a blurb on the Canadian developer’s official website reads).
“NLG is a video game development company based in Vancouver, Canada which has nearly two decades of experience creating video games for various console platforms,” Nintendo’s notification document reads. “More recently, NLG has worked exclusively with Nintendo in developing software titles for the Nintendo 3DS and Nintendo Switch systems, including titles in the critically acclaimed Luigi’s Mansion series of video games.”
In addition to Luigi’s Mansion (an action-adventure spin-off that sees Mario’s brother sucking ghosts up using a vacuum cleaner dubbed the “Poltergust”), Next Level Games is also known for developing Super Mario Strikers and Mario Strikers Charged, which pit a wide variety of Nintendo characters (e.g., Peach, Yoshi, Donkey Kong) against one another on the soccer field.
Next Level Games has also been responsible for various titles based on comic superheroes, such as Captain America: Super Soldier, Transformers: Cybertron Adventures, and Spider-Man: Friend or Foe. Nintendo believes that its acquisition of NLG should speed up the team’s development time to some degree while maintaining the same level of quality.