{"id":15042,"date":"2016-05-20T00:01:22","date_gmt":"2016-05-20T00:01:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/?p=15042"},"modified":"2016-04-27T17:45:50","modified_gmt":"2016-04-27T17:45:50","slug":"star-fox-space-tour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/2016\/05\/20\/star-fox-space-tour\/","title":{"rendered":"Star Fox Space Tour"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"PEPPY\"<\/a>You know, there are a lot of Nintendo franchises that I really like, such as Kirby, Zelda, Animal Crossing, Metroid, etc. And there are some that I don\u2019t like as much, but I don\u2019t hate either.\u00a0 Star Fox is one of those franchises.\u00a0 But for as indifferent as I am about Star Fox, I\u2019ve ended up playing every game in the series, so I guess I at least like it a little bit.\u00a0 So in honor of the recent release of Star Fox Zero, I thought I\u2019d go through all the Star Fox games and give my quick impressions and personal experiences with each one.\u00a0 I\u2019m not really rating each of these games on this list, although if I had to say, the first three here would be my favorites.\u00a0 So hop into your Arwing and let\u2019s take an intergalactic tour of all the Star Fox games!<\/p>\n

Star Fox (SNES)<\/strong><\/p>\n

I wasn\u2019t even planning on getting Star Fox right away at first. This was what, 1993?\u00a0 I was more interested in playing Square RPGs like Secret of Mana instead of space shooters at the time.\u00a0 But shortly before the game came out, my best friend called me and said, \u201cDude, you gotta get Star Fox!\u00a0 I saw a demo of it at the game store, and it\u2019ll blow your mind!\u201d\u00a0 Now, my best friend really knew what kinds of games I liked back then, so if he said I should get a game, I trusted him.\u00a0 And he was right!\u00a0 Straight away the game\u2019s opening intro blew me away, and my best friend and I had fun playing it and we found all the secrets.\u00a0 Even the hidden stage with the slot machine boss!\u00a0 Of course, my friend could\u2019ve just been trying to convince me to get the game since HE didn\u2019t have a SNES, but that\u2019s OK, we still had fun playing it together.<\/p>\n

Even though this game was pretty mind-blowing at first, it didn\u2019t take long for arcades and other consoles to catch up, and by the next year, Star Fox looked pretty bad. But I still like its old world charm and while we can laugh at how bad it looks now, we can also all agree and respect that it was pretty amazing that the SNES could do stuff like this at the time.\u00a0 Argonaut helped Nintendo make the first Star Fox game, and I think it\u2019s pretty interesting how closely the two companies worked together on early 3-D gaming.\u00a0 I heard a rumor that Argonaut was making a 3-D Yoshi game for Nintendo as well, for either the SNES or Nintendo PlayStation.\u00a0 But when Nintendo decided to do their own thing with the N64, Argonaut released the game on the Sony PlayStation as Croc: Legend of the Gobbos.\u00a0 Even though that\u2019s just a rumor, I could see how that may be true since Croc and Yoshi look a lot alike.\u00a0 But it\u2019s just as well that didn\u2019t happen, because I didn\u2019t think the Croc games were that good anyway.<\/p>\n

Star Fox 64 (N64)<\/strong><\/p>\n

I imagine this is most people\u2019s favorite Star Fox game, as it took what was fun about the first one and improved on it in just about every way. But like the first game, I had no plans on getting this one right away either.\u00a0 By the time this game came out, I was a poor college student and couldn\u2019t afford to buy many games, and I guess I didn\u2019t get to review this one for The Dallas Morning News.\u00a0 But my college roommate\u2019s girlfriend (now his wife), she really wanted to play Star Fox 64, so she bought a copy so she could play it on my N64, as she didn\u2019t have one.\u00a0 When we graduated, I asked if she wanted her Star Fox 64 game back.\u00a0 She still didn\u2019t have a N64, so she told me I could just keep it.\u00a0 So that\u2019s how I got Star Fox 64!<\/p>\n

3-D gaming wasn\u2019t as groundbreaking with Star Fox 64 as it was with the first game, but Star Fox 64 was a trailblazer in two other ways. One, it had tons of voice samples.\u00a0 Now, while voices in game were fairly commonplace on the Sony PlayStation, it was unheard of to have that many voices on a N64 cartridge!\u00a0 The other thing Star Fox 64 contributed to gaming was that when it came out, it came bundled with the Rumble Pack, which you could plug into the N64 controller to give you force feedback.\u00a0 Considering that nearly all game controllers now have force feedback built into them, that\u2019s just another way that Nintendo set the groundwork for future game controller designs.<\/p>\n

While I didn\u2019t get to see my best friend as much in college (he went to a different school), we did get together in the summer and found all the secrets in Star Fox 64. I don\u2019t know why there are so many internet gags about Star Fox 64 lines like \u201cDo a barrel roll,\u201d and \u201cCan\u2019t let you do that, Star Fox.\u201d\u00a0 But I guess it has to do with the fact that I imagine that many people have a lot of childhood memories with this game.\u00a0 The game was even re-released on the 3DS, but I didn\u2019t get that version because I\u2019ve been blind in my left eye since birth and can\u2019t see the 3-D effects, so I\u2019d just have a handheld version of the original game, and I didn\u2019t like it THAT much to get it on a handheld.<\/p>\n

Star Fox Adventures (GameCube)<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m sure many of you know this already, but Star Fox Adventures wasn\u2019t originally a Star Fox game at all. It was an original Zelda-like adventure by Rare starring a fox character on a prehistoric planet.\u00a0 And that\u2019s what it was called: Dinosaur Planet, and it was going to be on the N64.\u00a0 In fact, I remember seeing previews of it at E3s I went to back in the late 90s. But Nintendo had them push it back to the GameCube, and told Rare to change it to have Star Fox characters instead.\u00a0 This isn\u2019t the only time Nintendo\u2019s ever done this.\u00a0 Kirby\u2019s Epic Yarn wasn\u2019t really a Kirby game at all.\u00a0 It was originally called World of Fluff and starred Prince Fluff, the player two character.\u00a0 But Nintendo had it changed to a Kirby game since the characters looked so similar.\u00a0 While I think it would\u2019ve been nice if Nintendo let the original games shine on their own merits, I can understand why they made the changes.\u00a0 Nintendo is a business, and like any business, they want their products to get the most bang for the buck.\u00a0 So if they feel that changing things would make the games sell better, I can understand that.\u00a0 It certainly worked for Kirby\u2019s Epic Yarn, as it was one of the best-selling Wii games and one of the best-selling Kirby games period.<\/p>\n

A lot of people don\u2019t like Star Fox Adventures, and in a way, I can understand. The Star Fox stuff felt very tacked on.\u00a0 To get from area to area on the planet, you have to play these Arwing shooter sections that felt very uninspired.\u00a0 And the final boss (you can probably guess who it is), also felt like they just slapped him in there at the last minute.\u00a0 And while the game looked great for an early GameCube game, you could really tell it was meant to be a N64 title, by the size and scope of the levels.<\/p>\n

But personally, I enjoyed Star Fox Adventures. A lot of people hated the annoying characters like Tricky the Triceratops, but I liked him.\u00a0 But then, annoying characters like Scrappy Doo, Big the Cat, Xianghua, etc., don\u2019t really bother me.\u00a0 I think it\u2019s funny that Tricky was also a Triceratops character in another Rare game: Diddy Kong Racing.\u00a0 Plus, with other past Star Fox games, I mostly played them with my best friend, as I wasn\u2019t as good with space shooters.\u00a0 But by the time Star Fox Adventures came out, I didn\u2019t get to see my best friend as much anymore, so this was the first game in the series that I really beat on my own in its entirety.\u00a0 I think the only thing I really hated about Star Fox Adventures was that the fanfare they played when you opened a treasure box, no matter how minor the item, was ten times as long as the Zelda treasure fanfare.\u00a0 It was ridiculous!<\/p>\n

Star Fox Assault (GameCube)<\/strong><\/p>\n

The interesting thing about Star Fox Assault is that it was made by Namco! At this time, Nintendo teamed up with Sega and Namco to make home and console games under the name \u201cTriforce.\u201d\u00a0 You really saw more of this with Sega, as they made the GameCube F-Zero GX and the arcade F-Zero AX (if you\u2019ve played the arcade version, consider yourself lucky).\u00a0 Namco was going to make an arcade Star Fox, too, but it got cancelled unfortunately.\u00a0 But since Namco has lots of experience with space shooters like StarBlade and flight games like Ace Combat, it seems natural that Nintendo would have them make this.\u00a0 Namco even put some of their signatures in Assault, including Special Flags, a longtime item found in many Namco titles, even the new Smash Bros.!\u00a0 And you could also unlock Xevious as a playable game!<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, while I do have the game, I didn\u2019t play Assault very much. I did watch my brother Jeff beat the game, and I liked how they included the planet and Tricky from Adventures (and my favorite character got to shine in the end).\u00a0 But I really didn\u2019t play it much myself.\u00a0 At the time, I was probably really busy with work or reviewing lots of other games, and I never got around to it afterward.\u00a0 Sometimes that happens.\u00a0 But I heard it wasn\u2019t the best Star Fox game out there, and the on-foot sections were not well thought out.\u00a0 Too bad they couldn\u2019t get the Ratchet and Clank folks to do those parts.<\/p>\n

Star Fox Command (DS)<\/strong><\/p>\n

I got this game for Christmas when it came out. It\u2019s a weird mix of a strategy game and when you encounter enemies, you go into little 3-D dogfight battles.\u00a0 I\u2019m not a big fan of strategy games, and the dogfight sections of other Star Fox titles were not my favorite, so I didn\u2019t really like this game much.\u00a0 It\u2019s probably my least favorite in the Star Fox series.\u00a0 The game had multiple endings, and some of them were just way out there. I heard that in one ending, Fox and Falco quit the Star Fox team to go race F-Zero cars!\u00a0 While I\u2019m all for silly plots, that\u2019s just a little TOO goofy, even for me!<\/p>\n

Star Fox Zero (Wii U)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Before I even start, I wanted to let you know that if you go to Nintendo\u2019s YouTube channel, you can watch a 15 minute cartoon that introduces the game, and it\u2019s awesome. I think they had it made just to promote the game, so I think it\u2019s a one-time thing.\u00a0 But if this were something I could watch on Saturday morning TV, I totally would.\u00a0 Anyway, I think the story of Star Fox Zero is just a retelling of either the first or second game, as they kind of wrote themselves into a corner with Command.<\/p>\n

So, what do I think of Star Fox Zero? Well, the immature side of me wants to say the play control absolutely sucks.\u00a0 But the mature side of me wants to say that the controls just have a steep learning curve.\u00a0 But after beating the game, I\u2019m going to let my immature side win since this is a rather informal review, and I\u2019ll say the play control still sucks.<\/p>\n

The problem lies with the motion controls. You can aim your reticule with the gamepad motion controls, but the reticule also moves as you fly, so it can get out of whack pretty quickly.\u00a0 Luckily you can calibrate your reticule simply by pressing a button, but I found myself pressing that button almost as much as the fire button, and that\u2019s never good.\u00a0 The other problem is that you must look down at the Wii U gamepad screen to see the cockpit mode, and it\u2019s very confusing when they force you to do this by \u2018fixing\u2019 the camera angle on the TV.\u00a0 And by the time I kind of got used to the controls, the game was over.\u00a0 If they could\u2019ve just removed the motion controls, I think it would\u2019ve been a better game.\u00a0 But then, people would\u2019ve complained it was too much like Star Fox 64 (even some of the levels are the same).\u00a0 You know how some modern Nintendo games will give you an item that makes you invincible if you die too much on a level?\u00a0 Well, Star Fox Zero does that, too.\u00a0 Normally I don\u2019t like using those items, but I did it with this game on the last boss because the controls are so bad.\u00a0 I was just like, \u201cScrew it, let\u2019s get this game over with.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is a co-op mode where one person flies and the other shoots, and that may be a little better. Unfortunately, I don\u2019t have many opportunities to try that mode with my brothers or my friends anymore.\u00a0 If there is one lesson you should get from this blog, it\u2019s that if you have a gaming buddy, TREASURE THOSE MOMENTS, because you never know how long they\u2019ll last.\u00a0 But after beating the game, I don\u2019t even know how much of the co-op mode I want to try, as there doesn\u2019t seem to be a whole lot of replay value.<\/p>\n

The game isn\u2019t ALL bad, though. I did like some of the classic nods like the spider boss and fighting the first boss from the original game in All Range mode.\u00a0 I figured the game was delayed so they could add amiibo support.\u00a0 And they did, but I would\u2019ve thought they\u2019d make Slippy, Peppy, or Arwing amiibo figures, too.\u00a0 If you scan the Fox amiibo, your Arwing will look retro, like from the SNES game.\u00a0 The sound effects and explosions are even retro, and they play the old Corneria song when you are in the first stage!\u00a0 If you scan Falco, you\u2019ll get the \u201cBlack Arwing\u201d which looks more red to me.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know what\u2019s different about this one, but I think the lasers are stronger and you can lock on to more targets.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s probably a very good thing that they delayed Star Fox Zero, as Nintendo\u2019s 2015 titles like Super Mario Maker, Splatoon, and Yoshi\u2019s Woolly World just BLOW Star Fox Zero out of the water. Star Fox Zero isn\u2019t necessarily a bad game, but it\u2019s not a good game either.\u00a0 I know one thing; it certainly won\u2019t be on my Best Games of 2016 list!<\/p>\n

Star Fox Guard (Wii U)<\/strong><\/p>\n

This little tower defense style side game actually came bundled in with Star Fox Zero. It even had its own separate box and disc and everything.\u00a0 You\u2019d think they could have fit both games onto one disc, since I\u2019m sure they use the same assets.\u00a0 Star Fox Zero even has a demo for Guard, so I guess at one point; they planned or plan to sell each game separate.\u00a0 They could\u2019ve at least put both discs in one box like they\u2019ve done with other games.\u00a0 But I won\u2019t complain too much about something so small as that.<\/p>\n

In the game, you work for Grippy Toad, who owns a metal mining business and is also Slippy Toad\u2019s uncle. Of all the characters they had to use for this game, it\u2019s Slippy.\u00a0 Oh well, at least Grippy Toad has that Texan cattle ranch motif going for him.\u00a0 Anyway, he has mining towers set up on the planets in Star Fox, and they are protected by a maze of walls and a network of cameras.\u00a0 Pesky yet cute robots will invade the bases, and if they make it to the center and destroy the tower, it\u2019s Game Over.\u00a0 So what you must do is find them on the big screen using the cameras, and then tap them on the gamepad screen.\u00a0 Each of the cameras, which were built and designed by Slippy, has a gun on each one and you can aim and shoot at the robots in view.\u00a0 Shoot at all the waves of attack bots to complete the level.<\/p>\n

You know how in Star Fox Zero, you can aim your gun by moving around the Wii U gamepad? Well here you can\u2019t, you must do it by moving the right stick around.\u00a0 But this is the game that could really use that kind of motion control to make things easier.\u00a0 You can also design your own waves of robot troops in a set maze for other players to challenge, which is kind of neat.\u00a0 But I wish they could let you design the mazes as well.\u00a0 This is another Star Fox game that would benefit with more than one person playing, as the other people watching could shout out camera numbers as an extra set of eyes.\u00a0 The game has amiibo support as well.\u00a0 Once per day you can scan Falco or Fox and have them do an air raid on a level and clear out all robots if things get too hectic, and it\u2019s really handy.<\/p>\n

This game was originally conceived by Shigeru Miyamoto as a game idea when the Wii U was first shown at E3 a few years back. It even has some of his signature trademark cuteness, as the robots are pretty adorable and I hate shooting them.\u00a0 They\u2019ll even look up at the camera if they are near one that you are operating.\u00a0 Although this game kind of makes me a little worried about the future of the Wii U if they\u2019re just pooping it out with this game.\u00a0 It\u2019s like they\u2019re saying, \u201cOh crap, we need to get this game idea out the door before we start with our new console.\u201d\u00a0 And that makes me a little sad.<\/p>\n

Conclusions<\/strong><\/p>\n

And that\u2019s pretty much all the Star Fox games! There have been some cancelled ones, though.\u00a0 The most famous is Star Fox 2, which was going to be on the SNES.\u00a0 I even remember seeing preview screens for it in magazines back in the day!\u00a0 It\u2019s amazing how much of that game was finished.\u00a0 But I read that 75 percent of that game went on to be in Star Fox 64, and the other 25 percent is in Star Fox Zero.\u00a0 There was also going to be one on the Virtual Boy, but it\u2019s just as well that got cancelled as I wouldn\u2019t be able to play it anyway since you need both eyes to see the 3-D effects of the Virtual Boy, and I\u2019ve been blind in my left eye since birth.\u00a0 There is also a Star Fox game watch thing, but I\u2019ve never played it.\u00a0 However, the National Videogame Museum<\/strong><\/a> that I volunteer at has one on display!<\/p>\n

There have been lots of Star Fox cameos, like in F-Zero and of course, the Smash Bros. games. But I think my favorite cameo is in WarioWare: Smooth Moves on the Wii.\u00a0 In Nintendo-fanatic 9-Volt\u2019s boss stage, you play a recreation of the first level from the SNES game, and the boss is now a giant polygonal R.O.B.!\u00a0 In the comments section, let me know what your favorite Star Fox games are.\u00a0 Do you have a favorite Star Fox character?\u00a0 Tell me in the comments as well.\u00a0 My favorite is Peppy. You\u2019d think it would be Slippy, since I like annoying characters and frogs are one of my favorite animals.\u00a0 But nope, Peppy is my favorite for no apparent reason.\u00a0 That\u2019s all for now!\u00a0 Later!\u00a0 –Cary<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You know, there are a lot of Nintendo franchises that I really like, such as Kirby, Zelda, Animal Crossing, Metroid, etc. And there are some that I don\u2019t like as much, but I don\u2019t hate either.\u00a0 Star Fox is one of those franchises.\u00a0 But for as indifferent as I am about Star Fox, I\u2019ve ended […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":15015,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15042","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-game-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15042","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15042"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15042\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15044,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15042\/revisions\/15044"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15042"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15042"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.gamerdad.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15042"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}