Everyone remembers their first love. The genesis of their journey as a gaming 'connoisseur'. The title that took you by the shoulders, gave you a firm shake, slapped you across the face, and said "This is it. This is your life now, gamer".
That game was Star Fox 64 for me. Prior to it, I've only had brief flirtations with the medium. I've played Super Mario World at a friend's house, maybe a few arcade games here and there - but at the time, they were merely novel distractions to me, as I was completely unaware that games like Zelda and Final Fantasy had been creating worlds within those little carts. To the seven year old me, games felt like fun nonsense, whereas I was much more absorbed by things that could provoke my imagination with silly stories, which is why I enjoyed things like SWAT Kats and Star Wars. You can see where this is going with those two examples.
For all the times my mother had misinterpreted my interests, she was right on the money when one birthday, Nintendo's hottest new console and Star Fox 64 fell into my lap. Anthropomorphic characters, starships, and a Lylat ... WARS? My first honest foray into gaming seemed laser-focused (hah) to my interests, and honestly, shame on the Star Fox team with permanently shackling me with an obsession to video games.
I didn't even know games could be cinematic when I popped that cart into the system, immediately greeted with an introduction of Fox McCloud, Peppy Hare, Falco Lombardi, and Slippy Toad - a quartet that remains one of my favorite teams to this day; each personality defined with the delightfully cheesy yet extremely earnest voice acting; another incredibly novel concept to me that made me slightly disappointed that full voice acting wouldn't be the norm for another generation or so. But it was enough to delight and immediately immerse me into Star Fox 64. I finally got what made video games special; they were a door into living, breathing worlds.
The game involves you liberating planets from an evil, galaxy-brained scientist named Andross, who has the Lylat system under his control after an invasion on Corneria's sovereignty after murdering Fox's ace pilot dad with the help of former Star Fox member Pigma's betrayal. The wise, sagely Peppy narrowly escapes this mortal deception and informs the up-and-coming hotshot Fox, who forms a new Star Fox group with him alongside the hot-headed Falco and quirky, genius mechanic Slippy. Now, it's time to dismantle Andross' army bit-by-bit to his stronghold on the planet Venom, while using starships known as the Arwing to blast, bomb, boost, and barrel roll your way through the game's many missions, while also occasionally getting behind the wheel with the Landmaster tank, or the submersible Blue Marine.
It helps that the gameplay is as simple as they come, while offering plenty of skill expression and a hidden amount of depth for optimizing high scores. Star Fox 64 is a rail-shooter. Being 'on-rails' means that your path is guided by the game and encounters are scripted, which rewards memorization of enemy formations, chances at the various power-ups, and objects you can manipulate for bonuses. Your Arwing is armed with standard lazers with a three-tier power progression, screen-clearing bombs, and boosts/brakes to adjust your speed - which can enable you to do maneuvers like somersaults, and in the case of the game's 'All Range Mode' - where you're placed in an arena with full 3-D control - you are also able to do U-turns. Perhaps the most well-known mechanic is the barrel roll - an acrobatic spin that not only gives you boosted maneuverability when adjusting your position on screen, but has the added bonus of deflecting shots.
However, a game like this is only as good as it's levels, and thankfully, nearly every stage has something to offer - and even the few I dislike are novel enough. Environments range from a war-ravaged metropolis on Corneria to the Asteroid Field of Meteos, to the literal polluted trash planet Zoness. There's even a level where you destroy a train car-by-car in the Landmaster tank. The lively, cheeky, and often amusing banter between the Star Fox crew and towards Andross' captains and lieutenants further enhance the non-stop forward momentum that the game keeps it's entire runtime; you definitely get the sense that the crew aren't just co-workers, they're friends.
Speaking of runtime, perhaps the game's greatest strength - and one that lends itself to high scores - is it's brevity. You can finish a playthrough of Star Fox 64 in less than an hour. For some, they might be disappointing, but for those who like to push themselves and optimize their play, as well as thoroughly charmed by the game's personality and airtight gameplay, it's an addicting thing to chase. Things like branching paths - which involves fulfilling some kind of prerequisite in a level such as certain score, or a test of your aerial acrobatics, or activating a series of locks or switches by shooting them - keep things fresh each time you play. Chasing medals, which are granted after a certain score threshold, add to this variety, which can unlock things like Expert Mode, sound test, and even different modes in the multiplayer.
The multiplayer is feels admittedly a bit tacked-on. It's a good time with four people, but for me, anything less feels like an unfulfilling game of cat-and-house. I don't really have much to say about it. There are only two maps, and one of them I do not like in the least; Sector Z. Which bares true for it's single-player counterpart as well. And while we're on the subject of levels in singleplayer, the marine planet Aquas is a chugging, laggy slog that may be an impressive showcase of the game's already excellent visuals, but isn't fun to play when stuck in that Blue Marine. The music saves that level.
And it's no surprise that a Nintendo game has excellent music all around. While many prefer the SNES original's score by Hajime Hirasawa, Koji Kondo still brought his A-game to the 64 classic. The aforementioned Aquas theme sounds straight out of a Metroid game, and when you face your rival dogfighting team Star Wolf, their eponymous theme is a sweeping, dramatic epic that instills trepidation and is an absolute banger. Area 6 has a bombastic, almost orchestral 'finishing lap' quality to it that feels like the build-up and culmination of your space-faring journey. I can't get enough of these tunes, and it's helpful to never get sick of them and hum along after my 1000th run.
I haven't even talked about things like the pack-in peripheral Rumble Pack, which when placed into the controller, would vibrate the controller with force feedback - which went a long way into further imagining myself in the cockpit of an Arwing. Honestly, I could talk all day about how much this game means to me, and how it sculpted me to take a keen interest in gaming as a hobby.
The only complaint I have is that I think 2 of the levels aren't great, and even then, I can just skip them if I really feel like it - even though I at least suffer through Aquas to get to my favorite level. Other than that, it's peak rail-shooting perfection to me and it's a shame it seems like Star Fox's lightning in a bottle as far as the franchise's concern, with every game after it living in it's shadow - despite myself finding no particular entry awful (even Zero).
Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to practice my charged unlock shots to wrack up extra hits with splash damage so I can get my Corneria score to 250.
That game was Star Fox 64 for me. Prior to it, I've only had brief flirtations with the medium. I've played Super Mario World at a friend's house, maybe a few arcade games here and there - but at the time, they were merely novel distractions to me, as I was completely unaware that games like Zelda and Final Fantasy had been creating worlds within those little carts. To the seven year old me, games felt like fun nonsense, whereas I was much more absorbed by things that could provoke my imagination with silly stories, which is why I enjoyed things like SWAT Kats and Star Wars. You can see where this is going with those two examples.
For all the times my mother had misinterpreted my interests, she was right on the money when one birthday, Nintendo's hottest new console and Star Fox 64 fell into my lap. Anthropomorphic characters, starships, and a Lylat ... WARS? My first honest foray into gaming seemed laser-focused (hah) to my interests, and honestly, shame on the Star Fox team with permanently shackling me with an obsession to video games.
I didn't even know games could be cinematic when I popped that cart into the system, immediately greeted with an introduction of Fox McCloud, Peppy Hare, Falco Lombardi, and Slippy Toad - a quartet that remains one of my favorite teams to this day; each personality defined with the delightfully cheesy yet extremely earnest voice acting; another incredibly novel concept to me that made me slightly disappointed that full voice acting wouldn't be the norm for another generation or so. But it was enough to delight and immediately immerse me into Star Fox 64. I finally got what made video games special; they were a door into living, breathing worlds.
The game involves you liberating planets from an evil, galaxy-brained scientist named Andross, who has the Lylat system under his control after an invasion on Corneria's sovereignty after murdering Fox's ace pilot dad with the help of former Star Fox member Pigma's betrayal. The wise, sagely Peppy narrowly escapes this mortal deception and informs the up-and-coming hotshot Fox, who forms a new Star Fox group with him alongside the hot-headed Falco and quirky, genius mechanic Slippy. Now, it's time to dismantle Andross' army bit-by-bit to his stronghold on the planet Venom, while using starships known as the Arwing to blast, bomb, boost, and barrel roll your way through the game's many missions, while also occasionally getting behind the wheel with the Landmaster tank, or the submersible Blue Marine.
It helps that the gameplay is as simple as they come, while offering plenty of skill expression and a hidden amount of depth for optimizing high scores. Star Fox 64 is a rail-shooter. Being 'on-rails' means that your path is guided by the game and encounters are scripted, which rewards memorization of enemy formations, chances at the various power-ups, and objects you can manipulate for bonuses. Your Arwing is armed with standard lazers with a three-tier power progression, screen-clearing bombs, and boosts/brakes to adjust your speed - which can enable you to do maneuvers like somersaults, and in the case of the game's 'All Range Mode' - where you're placed in an arena with full 3-D control - you are also able to do U-turns. Perhaps the most well-known mechanic is the barrel roll - an acrobatic spin that not only gives you boosted maneuverability when adjusting your position on screen, but has the added bonus of deflecting shots.
However, a game like this is only as good as it's levels, and thankfully, nearly every stage has something to offer - and even the few I dislike are novel enough. Environments range from a war-ravaged metropolis on Corneria to the Asteroid Field of Meteos, to the literal polluted trash planet Zoness. There's even a level where you destroy a train car-by-car in the Landmaster tank. The lively, cheeky, and often amusing banter between the Star Fox crew and towards Andross' captains and lieutenants further enhance the non-stop forward momentum that the game keeps it's entire runtime; you definitely get the sense that the crew aren't just co-workers, they're friends.
Speaking of runtime, perhaps the game's greatest strength - and one that lends itself to high scores - is it's brevity. You can finish a playthrough of Star Fox 64 in less than an hour. For some, they might be disappointing, but for those who like to push themselves and optimize their play, as well as thoroughly charmed by the game's personality and airtight gameplay, it's an addicting thing to chase. Things like branching paths - which involves fulfilling some kind of prerequisite in a level such as certain score, or a test of your aerial acrobatics, or activating a series of locks or switches by shooting them - keep things fresh each time you play. Chasing medals, which are granted after a certain score threshold, add to this variety, which can unlock things like Expert Mode, sound test, and even different modes in the multiplayer.
The multiplayer is feels admittedly a bit tacked-on. It's a good time with four people, but for me, anything less feels like an unfulfilling game of cat-and-house. I don't really have much to say about it. There are only two maps, and one of them I do not like in the least; Sector Z. Which bares true for it's single-player counterpart as well. And while we're on the subject of levels in singleplayer, the marine planet Aquas is a chugging, laggy slog that may be an impressive showcase of the game's already excellent visuals, but isn't fun to play when stuck in that Blue Marine. The music saves that level.
And it's no surprise that a Nintendo game has excellent music all around. While many prefer the SNES original's score by Hajime Hirasawa, Koji Kondo still brought his A-game to the 64 classic. The aforementioned Aquas theme sounds straight out of a Metroid game, and when you face your rival dogfighting team Star Wolf, their eponymous theme is a sweeping, dramatic epic that instills trepidation and is an absolute banger. Area 6 has a bombastic, almost orchestral 'finishing lap' quality to it that feels like the build-up and culmination of your space-faring journey. I can't get enough of these tunes, and it's helpful to never get sick of them and hum along after my 1000th run.
I haven't even talked about things like the pack-in peripheral Rumble Pack, which when placed into the controller, would vibrate the controller with force feedback - which went a long way into further imagining myself in the cockpit of an Arwing. Honestly, I could talk all day about how much this game means to me, and how it sculpted me to take a keen interest in gaming as a hobby.
The only complaint I have is that I think 2 of the levels aren't great, and even then, I can just skip them if I really feel like it - even though I at least suffer through Aquas to get to my favorite level. Other than that, it's peak rail-shooting perfection to me and it's a shame it seems like Star Fox's lightning in a bottle as far as the franchise's concern, with every game after it living in it's shadow - despite myself finding no particular entry awful (even Zero).
Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to practice my charged unlock shots to wrack up extra hits with splash damage so I can get my Corneria score to 250.