Does it really represent something bad though?
Yes, it represents something bad. I really don't want to get into another long winded rant about why it's such a tremendously awful idea, as I've exhausted myself across two threads, so I'll try and keep it punchy.
The best games and franchises are more than just gameplay. They're cohesive works of art in all respects, including presentation. And the best games, in presentation, have beautifully realised, cohesive and enthralling worlds. How this is achieved varies between franchise and direction, but the best have one thing in common: thematic consistency. And Nintendo, of all Japanese developers/publishers, is one of the best at doing this. Metroid, Zelda, Mother, F-Zero, Star Fox, and even Mario are franchises that have, in almost all respected, adhered to their established universes. They're all incredibly cohesive, with unique, beautiful identities that define them. And even when each game in the series tries something new, or changes something major, they stay true to their thematic origins.
I firmly believe Star Fox and Metroid are thematically miles and miles apart. And every single argument I've heard as to how they could 'work' together is fan fiction terrible junk. They do not exist in the same realm of universe concept, and parallels cannot be drawn. Attempts to do so are thin and reaching, and that's being kind.
Thus, I feel an attempt to combine the series into a game is an incredible bastardisation of both universes. "But Retro could / be creative". I don't care about this. You could combine any franchises if you're creative enough, but that doesn't mean they should be combined. All effort put into combining these franchises would be better spent on tackling them solo.
And when we get into arguments about marketability of the franchises and where the franchises need to go in order to sell more copies, we enter the world of whoring out your IPs just to make money. It's when the aforementioned beauty and brilliance of cohesive game universes play second fiddle to a bank balance. And that is shamefully poor and disrespective handling of your franchises.
It just doesn't need to be unless you want to mash shit together for the sake of horrible fan fiction. There's no advantage of combining the two except to shit on the existing fanbase and bastardise both franchise simply because you want to make more money.
Or, TLDR: I fucking hate the idea.
Also, it'd appeal to both Starfox and Metroid fans, presumably. So yeah, there'd be some broadening.
It would appeal to neither for the reasons mentioned above. You cant smoosh two franchises together and expect both fanbases to combine. You do it because you want to reboot both and appeal to someone new.
