Too much Star Fox on the ground, not enough Star Fox in the air. If I wanted an adventure game on the ground, I have other options that I'd probably choose instead.
Quite interesting. A flawed gem. Horrible timers.
Star Fox Adventures is not a remake. The game Dinosaur Planet has not released, and was reused to make a different game: Star Fox Adventures. There's a difference there.
Star Fox Adventures is not a remake. The game Dinosaur Planet has not released, and was reused to make a different game: Star Fox Adventures. There's a difference there.
If I wanted to play a bad Zelda game I’d load up [Insert your least favorite Zelda game here]
"Put that down! You don't have enough scarabs!"
I liked how they took a risk and tried something different with Star Fox. A fun Zelda-esque experience with decent gameplay and interesting story and world. There's some frustrating elements but overall a great Star Fox entry.
I liked how they took a risk and tried something different with Star Fox. A fun Zelda-esque experience with decent gameplay and interesting story and world. There's some frustrating elements but overall a great Star Fox entry.
The worst game I've finished in a while. It borrows a ton from 3D Zelda, and in way less graceful way than Banjo borrowed from Mario 64. The controls, the lock and key design, the finding a new item animation---none of the things that made 3D Zelda good exactly, and the absences, like the genuine sense of place, the atmosphere, the mystery, the sound work, the intuitive world design, the puzzles, the characters, it's all missing. Its a world of dinosaurs where none of them are interesting and their world feels like it was built for a fox who carries a thousand items.
But it's less than a ripoff of 3D Zelda that doesn't work, it's all embellished further by all the worst tendencies of Rare's design at the time. It's long, bloated, full of tedious backtracking, fetch quests, a load of pointless resources and collectables, embarrassing minigames, and no feeling for storytelling in the slightest. I know it's not Starfox, it's Dinosaur Planet, but would it have hurt to have the arwing segments feel more robust and better implemented than the gummi ship interludes in Kingdom Hearts? It's Dinosaur Planet alright, and like that game it still feels unfinished.
But it's less than a ripoff of 3D Zelda that doesn't work, it's all embellished further by all the worst tendencies of Rare's design at the time. It's long, bloated, full of tedious backtracking, fetch quests, a load of pointless resources and collectables, embarrassing minigames, and no feeling for storytelling in the slightest. I know it's not Starfox, it's Dinosaur Planet, but would it have hurt to have the arwing segments feel more robust and better implemented than the gummi ship interludes in Kingdom Hearts? It's Dinosaur Planet alright, and like that game it still feels unfinished.
Recently played through this here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQD-V_4nmeE
a T. Rex is as threatening as a mushroom.
you can parkour roll.
everyone is hungry.
a T. Rex is as threatening as a mushroom.
you can parkour roll.
everyone is hungry.
Es un Zelda con furros, así de sencillo. La batalla final es muy anticlimática, las pruebas son estresantes especialmente la de la palanca, pero, para jugarla una vez cada 10 años, está bien.
Now this is a game!!
J'ai juré le jeu est incr
Adventures is one of the messiest games I've ever played. It has a lot of charm and is technically very impressive for its time, but the rushed development really shows through sometimes.
The pacing falls apart in its second half, with important encounters either being rushed through or slapped together. I also have a problem with how overly simplistic and repetitive both the combat and puzzles are. But it at least has good music, fun exploration, amusingly campy writing and voice acting, and isn't usually too frustrating (except for the staff aiming controls, dear lord they're atrocious).
It all somewhat balances out into a mediocre experience for me, and isn't essential to go out of your way to play nowadays. Unless you have a lot of nostalgia for it... or it was responsible for your furry awakening years ago... which is totally not applicable to me... cough.
The pacing falls apart in its second half, with important encounters either being rushed through or slapped together. I also have a problem with how overly simplistic and repetitive both the combat and puzzles are. But it at least has good music, fun exploration, amusingly campy writing and voice acting, and isn't usually too frustrating (except for the staff aiming controls, dear lord they're atrocious).
It all somewhat balances out into a mediocre experience for me, and isn't essential to go out of your way to play nowadays. Unless you have a lot of nostalgia for it... or it was responsible for your furry awakening years ago... which is totally not applicable to me... cough.
It’s not Star Fox, but that’s probably for the best. Shut that bloody frog up.
Literally could not finish this game because this happened. But hey, thanks for burying the weird saxophone Krystal scene in my mind, Rare.
How many scarabs do you wish to gamble?
I’ve never played this controversial GameCube title and, as a massive Star Fox fan, I felt it the right time to finally see what all the hub-bub is about. The game falls more in line with that of a Zelda title, featuring serviceable puzzles and entertaining yet simplistic combat. The overall story is fairly clumsy and dated, and the voice acting of everyone aside from the Star Fox crew is laughable at best.
Full Review: https://neoncloudff.wordpress.com/2020/09/01/now-playing-august-2020-edition/
Full Review: https://neoncloudff.wordpress.com/2020/09/01/now-playing-august-2020-edition/
Another game that gets unfair criticism. Wasn’t the best game, but I really had fun and enjoyed this as a Rare title. Didn’t have a GameCube and missed out on this back in the day. Played it handheld on the Steam Deck, which was perfect.
Started but didn't get far. Would like to revisit.
I get that they forcefully slapped Star Fox over what was originally an N64 new project, but this was the proof that this franchise could have more interesting variety. People bash on this too hard because "it's a Zelda wannabe" but it's a pretty good game still. The writing is kinda meh, I'll give that.
Game looks amazing for a early 2000s game(cube title).
Game looks amazing for a early 2000s game(cube title).
To the people who played Zelda: Breath of the Wild and thought "I really wish this had traditional dungeons", go and play this game. That is right, Star Fox Adventures is just a Zelda game with a Star Fox skin, but this time almost every level is designed like a Zelda dungeon. Too much Zelda dungeon if I may.
I picked this game up back in the day at full price fully excited to give this a try. I was kinda expecting an action game where you get to play Fox on foot as I always wanted to do that in Star Fox 64's singleplayer. I played through the first hour and never touched it again as it was not at all what I was expecting. Fox only has a staff? It's more of an adventure game than action? Damn, I just wanted to run around a dinosaur planet as Fox and shoot things. And it went up there with one of the most disappointing purchases I had saved up for with my allowance.
20 years later, I gave Star Fox 64 another try and found it to be one of my favorite games of all time. With that, and playing pretty much all of the Zelda games during the pandemic, I became both a massive Zelda and Star Fox fan. Having remembered Star Fox Adventures was just a marriage of those two franchises, I was more than willing to revisit this one.
Now I won't get into the Dinosaur Planet details, because it's pretty much a known fact by everyone that Star Fox Adventures was meant to be another IP, but Nintendo forced Rare to slap the Star Fox IP on this. With playing this game you could clearly see that.
The story here is really basic and not at all intriguing like a Zelda game, you're just saving a planet from an evil general. Collect X amount of thingamaobs and defeat the final boss. Pretty straightforward. You can tell all the "Star Fox" aspects of the story were stiched on. All the important characters you'd expect to see from a Star Fox game is either put to the sidelines as an excuse for the UI, or they are left out until the end of the game. Most of the characters that are in the limelight are fox himself and the uninteresting dinosaur races you meet.
Considering Star Fox was a shooter prior to this, you'd expect this game to have some decent action. This cannot be further from the truth as somehow the combat is so barebones, it makes Ocarina of Time's combat look like Dark Souls. There will only be 2 or 3 enemy types you will be facing in the whole game and they all die with the same strategy, going up to them and mashing the A button. With that said, there's only like 3 bossfights here too, which aren't even that good. That's 2 for 2 so far where Zelda mogs this game in both Combat and Bosses.
Where the game's main strength is the level design and puzzles. As previously mentioned, the best way to describe the structure of this game is that you're playing dungeon after dungeon with sometimes having an on-rails shooter in between. But there is too much dungeon here. The good thing is that the puzzle design is great and not once did I have to ever look up a guide. At the same time, nothing was too simple that it felt like it was easy.
One of the really sinful things this game does is the amount of backtracking. Now I know backtracking is a thing in these type of adventure games, but I never thought about how painful the backtracking once when playing a Zelda or Metroid game for example. Here, you are forced to go through every section you've already been through twice, sometimes even 3 times. This is including some dungeons you need to backtrack to. This singlehandedly kills so much of the pacing and enjoyment of this game, it is probably my biggest gripe that prevents me from calling this a great game.
There are also little nitpicky things like the aiming segments not controlling well. The on-rails shooter segments not being as nearly as good as Star Fox 64. The annoying little dinosaur companion that you need to keep finding mushrooms to feed it. A lot of tiny aspects hold this game from being the great singleplayer adventure it could've been.
It's still a good game and worth playing through once if you enjoy Zelda dungeon design. But if you had a GameCube and had to decide between this or Wind Waker, I would play the Wind Waker a hundred times over.
I picked this game up back in the day at full price fully excited to give this a try. I was kinda expecting an action game where you get to play Fox on foot as I always wanted to do that in Star Fox 64's singleplayer. I played through the first hour and never touched it again as it was not at all what I was expecting. Fox only has a staff? It's more of an adventure game than action? Damn, I just wanted to run around a dinosaur planet as Fox and shoot things. And it went up there with one of the most disappointing purchases I had saved up for with my allowance.
20 years later, I gave Star Fox 64 another try and found it to be one of my favorite games of all time. With that, and playing pretty much all of the Zelda games during the pandemic, I became both a massive Zelda and Star Fox fan. Having remembered Star Fox Adventures was just a marriage of those two franchises, I was more than willing to revisit this one.
Now I won't get into the Dinosaur Planet details, because it's pretty much a known fact by everyone that Star Fox Adventures was meant to be another IP, but Nintendo forced Rare to slap the Star Fox IP on this. With playing this game you could clearly see that.
The story here is really basic and not at all intriguing like a Zelda game, you're just saving a planet from an evil general. Collect X amount of thingamaobs and defeat the final boss. Pretty straightforward. You can tell all the "Star Fox" aspects of the story were stiched on. All the important characters you'd expect to see from a Star Fox game is either put to the sidelines as an excuse for the UI, or they are left out until the end of the game. Most of the characters that are in the limelight are fox himself and the uninteresting dinosaur races you meet.
Considering Star Fox was a shooter prior to this, you'd expect this game to have some decent action. This cannot be further from the truth as somehow the combat is so barebones, it makes Ocarina of Time's combat look like Dark Souls. There will only be 2 or 3 enemy types you will be facing in the whole game and they all die with the same strategy, going up to them and mashing the A button. With that said, there's only like 3 bossfights here too, which aren't even that good. That's 2 for 2 so far where Zelda mogs this game in both Combat and Bosses.
Where the game's main strength is the level design and puzzles. As previously mentioned, the best way to describe the structure of this game is that you're playing dungeon after dungeon with sometimes having an on-rails shooter in between. But there is too much dungeon here. The good thing is that the puzzle design is great and not once did I have to ever look up a guide. At the same time, nothing was too simple that it felt like it was easy.
One of the really sinful things this game does is the amount of backtracking. Now I know backtracking is a thing in these type of adventure games, but I never thought about how painful the backtracking once when playing a Zelda or Metroid game for example. Here, you are forced to go through every section you've already been through twice, sometimes even 3 times. This is including some dungeons you need to backtrack to. This singlehandedly kills so much of the pacing and enjoyment of this game, it is probably my biggest gripe that prevents me from calling this a great game.
There are also little nitpicky things like the aiming segments not controlling well. The on-rails shooter segments not being as nearly as good as Star Fox 64. The annoying little dinosaur companion that you need to keep finding mushrooms to feed it. A lot of tiny aspects hold this game from being the great singleplayer adventure it could've been.
It's still a good game and worth playing through once if you enjoy Zelda dungeon design. But if you had a GameCube and had to decide between this or Wind Waker, I would play the Wind Waker a hundred times over.
This is another game I rented as a kid, liked well enough, but never finished at the time and never got back to. With the recent resurrection of Dinosaur Planet (this game's N64 original version) via dumped files and Project64, I resolved to finally play through this game to the end. Luckily, it isn't a particularly hard to find game here or terribly expensive. I got some 96% of the content done and beat the Japanese version over the course of a couple days (like 15 or 16 hours).
Star Fox Adventures sees our titular hero on the orders of General Pepper to aid the extremely troubled Dinosaur Planet. Due to an invasion of the other kingdoms by General Scales, the planet has broken apart due to him disrupting the magical energy fields the planet is (apparently literally) overflowing with. Dinosaur Planet is, unsurprisingly, populated by various tribes of talking dinosaurs, the prince of the Earth Walkers (triceratops) ends up becoming Fox's companion on this adventure. Many remarked upon this at the time and have since, but it's a very un-Star Fox-y story that is at times irritating but overall inoffensive in setting up the stakes and core action. Oddly enough, despite this being the Japanese version, there is no Japanese voice acting, with only (even for the time, kinda amazingly terrible) English voice acting accompanied by Japanese subtitles.
The gameplay plays a lot like what it is: a long-lost Rare N64 title. From the level designs to the dialogue writing to the sheer aesthetics, this really does feel like a distant cousin to things like Banjo-Tooie and DK64. Mechanically, you're going through a fairly linear 3D Zelda-sort of action adventure game, with a slew of items to aid you along with the magic staff Fox uses to beat up dinosaurs and even blast magic at them! The prince of the Earth Walkers, Tricky, is also an important mechanic to use as you guide him around to have him dig up stuff for you, but he's ultimately not actually that invasive or important a mechanic. He's there, sure, but Resident Evil 4 this is not. He usually just teleports around to wherever you need him, and it's a clever way to minimize inventory management outside of some more complicated inventory system (which the game does manage to have regardless, just not in some Ocarina of Time-like menu screen :b).
This is much more a kin of Rare's rougher N64 titles though, and in the efficacy of its overall design I'd rank it more along more decisive titles like Jet Force Gemini and Banjo-Tooie than any of their greats. For such a linear game, the signposting can be shockingly rough at times, and even when you know where to go, walking from place to place takes ages. The combat, while quite cinematic in an impressively flashy way, is ultimately super button-mashy and gets very boring and uninteresting fast. The dungeon lengths and designs are never really awful but not ever super inspired, and are definitely more mid-/low-tier Zelda fare. None of the design is outright terrible (save for one awwwwwful joystick balancing mini-game around the game's midpoint), but it really does beg to be polished up in certain places.
The game also has some Star Fox flying segments awkwardly put into it as cool novelties/wastes of time when you go between the planet and the broken-off segments, and in a weird turn they even are used for the final boss fight. This game was a totally different game that had Star Fox put into it to help the GameCube release sell better, and these segments are very underwhelming and feel as slapped in to the gameplay loop as they indeed are. The final boss especially is a really weird choice, as it suddenly demands you start using a skill set the game has barely instilled in you at all, and the final boss ends up being pretty bad as a result. Boss fights aren't exactly the game's strong suit to begin with, but the final boss was definitely my least enjoyed out of the handful present.
Presentation-wise, it really is like an N64 game with GameCube graphics. It all looks fine and, Fox himself looks quite nice as a character model. The music is pretty damn good, as one would expect from even a not so great Rare game, but the Star Fox tunes feel super dissonant with the game's score otherwise in a way I didn't really dig. The game can hit some pretty bad framerate dips when you get to areas with lots of enemies and water, but it's never anything that prevents play, and even those dips I did get were very uncommon.
Verdict: Hesitantly Recommended. This game is overall sorta the epitome of "fine", and while you probably won't hate it, I can't really see many people loving this game. If you can get it for cheap and the premise interests you (like it did me), then I'd say it could be worth your money, but I think for most people, they'll ultimately feel like their time was better spent elsewhere. While a neat historical curiosity, outside of some of the awful VA, Star Fox Adventures doesn't really manage to be all that memorable for being anything but a disappointing (i.e. not a successor to Star Fox 64) Star Fox game.
Star Fox Adventures sees our titular hero on the orders of General Pepper to aid the extremely troubled Dinosaur Planet. Due to an invasion of the other kingdoms by General Scales, the planet has broken apart due to him disrupting the magical energy fields the planet is (apparently literally) overflowing with. Dinosaur Planet is, unsurprisingly, populated by various tribes of talking dinosaurs, the prince of the Earth Walkers (triceratops) ends up becoming Fox's companion on this adventure. Many remarked upon this at the time and have since, but it's a very un-Star Fox-y story that is at times irritating but overall inoffensive in setting up the stakes and core action. Oddly enough, despite this being the Japanese version, there is no Japanese voice acting, with only (even for the time, kinda amazingly terrible) English voice acting accompanied by Japanese subtitles.
The gameplay plays a lot like what it is: a long-lost Rare N64 title. From the level designs to the dialogue writing to the sheer aesthetics, this really does feel like a distant cousin to things like Banjo-Tooie and DK64. Mechanically, you're going through a fairly linear 3D Zelda-sort of action adventure game, with a slew of items to aid you along with the magic staff Fox uses to beat up dinosaurs and even blast magic at them! The prince of the Earth Walkers, Tricky, is also an important mechanic to use as you guide him around to have him dig up stuff for you, but he's ultimately not actually that invasive or important a mechanic. He's there, sure, but Resident Evil 4 this is not. He usually just teleports around to wherever you need him, and it's a clever way to minimize inventory management outside of some more complicated inventory system (which the game does manage to have regardless, just not in some Ocarina of Time-like menu screen :b).
This is much more a kin of Rare's rougher N64 titles though, and in the efficacy of its overall design I'd rank it more along more decisive titles like Jet Force Gemini and Banjo-Tooie than any of their greats. For such a linear game, the signposting can be shockingly rough at times, and even when you know where to go, walking from place to place takes ages. The combat, while quite cinematic in an impressively flashy way, is ultimately super button-mashy and gets very boring and uninteresting fast. The dungeon lengths and designs are never really awful but not ever super inspired, and are definitely more mid-/low-tier Zelda fare. None of the design is outright terrible (save for one awwwwwful joystick balancing mini-game around the game's midpoint), but it really does beg to be polished up in certain places.
The game also has some Star Fox flying segments awkwardly put into it as cool novelties/wastes of time when you go between the planet and the broken-off segments, and in a weird turn they even are used for the final boss fight. This game was a totally different game that had Star Fox put into it to help the GameCube release sell better, and these segments are very underwhelming and feel as slapped in to the gameplay loop as they indeed are. The final boss especially is a really weird choice, as it suddenly demands you start using a skill set the game has barely instilled in you at all, and the final boss ends up being pretty bad as a result. Boss fights aren't exactly the game's strong suit to begin with, but the final boss was definitely my least enjoyed out of the handful present.
Presentation-wise, it really is like an N64 game with GameCube graphics. It all looks fine and, Fox himself looks quite nice as a character model. The music is pretty damn good, as one would expect from even a not so great Rare game, but the Star Fox tunes feel super dissonant with the game's score otherwise in a way I didn't really dig. The game can hit some pretty bad framerate dips when you get to areas with lots of enemies and water, but it's never anything that prevents play, and even those dips I did get were very uncommon.
Verdict: Hesitantly Recommended. This game is overall sorta the epitome of "fine", and while you probably won't hate it, I can't really see many people loving this game. If you can get it for cheap and the premise interests you (like it did me), then I'd say it could be worth your money, but I think for most people, they'll ultimately feel like their time was better spent elsewhere. While a neat historical curiosity, outside of some of the awful VA, Star Fox Adventures doesn't really manage to be all that memorable for being anything but a disappointing (i.e. not a successor to Star Fox 64) Star Fox game.
This was the first Star Fox game I ever played, so not knowing that it "went against the star fox formula" didn't spoil it for me.
This is an awesome Zelda-like adventure with lots of great puzzles and skill-based challenges, and I'd love to revisit it in the future!
This is an awesome Zelda-like adventure with lots of great puzzles and skill-based challenges, and I'd love to revisit it in the future!
Listen I know this isn't very good but I enjoyed it as a kid! Star Fox (one of my favorite games from the N64) plus dinosaurs! Sounds good to me!
I thought it was entertaining enough back then. Like a Zelda game, bland characters, nice graphics.
It's an awful Zelda game and an even worse StarFox game. The presentation is great, it's a shame Rare couldn't do more on the GameCube. For me they left Nintendo with a bad taste. There is an ungodly amount of backtracking and every task seems more arbitrary for a video game than it should. Stay away unless morbidly curious.
It also has what is perhaps the worst end in-game sequence I can think of.
It also has what is perhaps the worst end in-game sequence I can think of.
I sincerely apologize to say that this is one of my favorite games. Top fifteen, maybe.
But this is Not a Star Fox game. This is Dinosaur Planet. It honestly should've stayed that way, and it's really frustrating that Nintendo didn't trust the product enough on its own merit and felt they had to shove Star Fox in. I say this as a Star Fox fan. Seeing how the game was nearly completed on its own before the complete overhaul was heartbreaking. I recommend watching any YouTube video that documents and talks about it. Its honestly fascinating.
This game is gorgeous on the GameCube. The visuals were great for the time, and I have too many fond memories of playing this game and wandering all over the planet to explore it. It slogs for a minute at the second "level" with Moon Mountain Pass, but gets more interesting from there.
It's a game that can't help but be silly because it knows its silly (mostly from Star Fox being there, to be honest). Rare did an exceptional job with this one. It really sucks that this game is responsible for tarnishing people's trust in the Star Fox series, though. And I agree that it did.
But take it for what it is, if you can. Just enjoy a silly little adventure about talking animals and talking dinosaurs. You'll really enjoy the unique environments and game world.
But this is Not a Star Fox game. This is Dinosaur Planet. It honestly should've stayed that way, and it's really frustrating that Nintendo didn't trust the product enough on its own merit and felt they had to shove Star Fox in. I say this as a Star Fox fan. Seeing how the game was nearly completed on its own before the complete overhaul was heartbreaking. I recommend watching any YouTube video that documents and talks about it. Its honestly fascinating.
This game is gorgeous on the GameCube. The visuals were great for the time, and I have too many fond memories of playing this game and wandering all over the planet to explore it. It slogs for a minute at the second "level" with Moon Mountain Pass, but gets more interesting from there.
It's a game that can't help but be silly because it knows its silly (mostly from Star Fox being there, to be honest). Rare did an exceptional job with this one. It really sucks that this game is responsible for tarnishing people's trust in the Star Fox series, though. And I agree that it did.
But take it for what it is, if you can. Just enjoy a silly little adventure about talking animals and talking dinosaurs. You'll really enjoy the unique environments and game world.
GENERAL SCALLLEEESSS
This was the first time I realized a game could be bad
This is not the traditional Star Fox title you would expect. Rather than an on-rails shooter aiming for the high score, you are instead thrust out of the cockpit, given a magical staff, and told to explore an island filled with dinosaurs.
It's weird, but it wasn't the worst idea. The bad idea was also having to escort a baby dinosaur around for many parts of the game. A dinosaur that has pretty bad AI, so escorting and even getting him to do the thing you want him to do is a painfully tedious experience.
Other than that, it's a pretty bog-standard adventure game, similar to the Legend of Zelda games at the time. It doesn't do anything unique or clever, and its Arwing sections are honestly super easy. The story also feels mashed together, with a "surprise" boss at the end of the game that feels shoehorned in.
I don't have much else to add to this, it's fine at best and frustrating at worst. Play this only if you're curious about the history of Star Fox or Rareware.
It's weird, but it wasn't the worst idea. The bad idea was also having to escort a baby dinosaur around for many parts of the game. A dinosaur that has pretty bad AI, so escorting and even getting him to do the thing you want him to do is a painfully tedious experience.
Other than that, it's a pretty bog-standard adventure game, similar to the Legend of Zelda games at the time. It doesn't do anything unique or clever, and its Arwing sections are honestly super easy. The story also feels mashed together, with a "surprise" boss at the end of the game that feels shoehorned in.
I don't have much else to add to this, it's fine at best and frustrating at worst. Play this only if you're curious about the history of Star Fox or Rareware.
i love star fox adventures. it's a bad game, it's a bad star fox. when i played it i found myself asking many question: why is this story happening? what the hell are the controls for the arwing? what am i supposed to do now? what's with that weirdly sexual jazz music when fox sees krystal, isn't that a bit much? why am in this room again? why are the controls so bad? do i really have to sit through this animation again? why is fox's face so expressive? what the fuck, cliffracers are in this? how did i get stuck on this simple ass puzzle for 20 minutes? what happened, i just fell through the floor? why does that rock have a bad scottish accent?
why did they hire a horny cameraman?
why are they playing a saxophone?
why?
Not a bad game, though.
why are they playing a saxophone?
why?
Not a bad game, though.