.....this frustrates me.  If Criterion declined, why couldn't they have solicited other developers?

I totally agree!

Who else do you trust to make a good F-Zero game? Slightly Mad Studios was already talking Project Cars for Wii U. Codemasters promised Dirt and F1 but never delivered, and were probably going to say they were just as busy as Criterion.

What you may not be getting is, this is merely saying they were looking at Criterion to possibly make a mockup video/demo for what a hypothetical F-Zero game running on the hardware could look like for demonstrative purposes. While such demos always have the potential to evolveinto actual games, they apparently weren't seriously looking to jumpstart an F-Zero project, so there was no reason to go searching for developers. Basically, what I'm taking away from this is that Nintendo simply casually offered to fund an F-Zero demo from Criterion if they wanted to make one. They didn't, so it ended there.

Quit using logic.

I won't lie, I don't necessarily know the landscape for developers whose primary function is racing games, but the artcile as ran implies Nintendo went to Criterion asking if theyd be interested in producing a demo under a constrained time table, Criterion understandably declined, and Nintendo went "oh well, don't care enough to extend the offer to any other studio".

Just let me have my Metroid: Federation Force moment!

Who says they didn't ask any others? They probably did, but they declined too.

f zero fan boy coming in 3...2...1...

.... *whew!* Made it! What'd I miss in this topic?

Pretty much proves the point there's no such thing as a dead franchise to Nintendo outside of some one shot really obscure titles.  Some of the games might take long vacations, but if they can find a dev willing to do it, the series will eventually get a new installment.  Yeah F-Zero's lack of polarity from the last games hurts it's chances from Nintendo making one of their major studio's to make a new one, but if they can find the right 3rd party to do it, it'll happen.

Let's just both agree we're making assumptions about things we know nothing about and move forward.  :D

When the article mentions that Nintendo of Europe approached Criterion does that mean that NoE was spearheading this or am I just reading too much into that?  Criterion is English so I can see why the local Nintendo branch would be the ones to contact them.  Still "can you make a teaser" seems so broad.  I would assume there would be more specifications than that.