The Retrospective 05.03.07: Star Fox (part 2 of 2)
Posted by Sean McCabe on 05.03.2007
More Starfox than you can shake a hunting gun at.
I regret that last week I could not fulfil my commitments because my Mother was sick and I had to spend most of the week with her. However, she's fine now, and I'm back to wax lyrical on the great (and not-so-great) games of the past. But first, I have to say something on a most hilarious article I read today.
Yes, as part of the God of War 2 launch party in Athens (great locale) a couple of months ago, Sony's main shindig saw a return to the past in more ways than one. All I can say is who on Earth thought this was a good idea? Actually, I can tell you that, and that is my weird friend from Finland, who applauds this marketing campaign as being interesting and daring. I'd go with stupid and feckless but maybe that's just me. Hell, since they used fake intestines… why not just use a fake Goat carcass? Honestly, this could have been done without the backlash, but I have to think Sony are deliberately trying to attract publicity by the simple mantra that "All publicity is good publicity."
Like that really helped to sell the PS3…
Well the Daily Mail got ahold of the story, blew it out of proportion and basically kicked up a stink. That is par for the course for them, one of the most detestable UK tabloids, however, Sony left themselves wide open with this. As for God of War 2 itself, it's a good enough game. It's not, like the first one, as good as some might claim what with the combat being glorified, button bashing. Fun button bashing perhaps, but still button bashing and I can't really rate that better than games that really require strategy like Ninja Gaiden or God Hand. Yes… I just said God Hand is a better game than God of War 1 and 2. It'll be interesting to see if I get any responses to that statement anyway.
Also I've been playing Grandia 3, and finding it to be a fine game, a very fine game. And heck, the voice acting is actually impressive. Rare for any kind of RPG. I also found that Shadow Hearts 3, will in fact be receiving a European release in May. After all the moaning and bitching from this column, it seems someone finally listened. Shame I bought the game last December.
Hotel Dusk: Room 215
I guess since I've been doing it for quite a while now, shilling what I think are awesome things in my column, why not continue to do it? Anyway, this week I bring to you an excellent and memorable DS experience. Hotel Dusk is the tale of Kyle Hyde, a disgraced former New York cop who is on the trail of his former partner, hoping to find the answers to question that have been plaguing his nightmares for 3 years. He is working as a travelling salesman and floats around, hoping to catch the sniff of a trail. Eventually a retrieval job takes him to a lonely hotel in the middle of nowhere, and before long, he becomes convinced that the answers to his questions can be found within the walls of Hotel Dusk.
The game is developed by Cing, the guys behind Trace Memory/Another Code. Hotel Dusk is only their second game for the DS, but the improvements over its predecessor are quite astonishing. It's a far more complex, much longer tale and is a more interesting game for it. Its story is as good as any novel you could care to name, and is full of heartfelt moments. This game is a must own for the DS as far as The Retrospective is concerned.
VG Babe of the Week: Mina Majikina
Also know as the "hot bowgirl from Samurai Showdown" I can also say that she is one of the most popular fanart subjects on the Internet. Hm, wonder why?
The Breakdown
Star Fox Adventures
Developer: Rare
Format: Gamecube
Release: 2002
Notes: Originally an N64 game by the name of Dinosaur Planet that starred original characters Sabre and Krystal. Was developed into a Gamecube Star Fox game at the behest of Shigeru Miyamoto due to the similarity of the anthropomorphic character designs.
Ah, Star Fox Adventures, unkindly called Zelda-lite by some. Adventures is another chapter in the tale of the Star Fox team, and sees Fox McCloud take to the ground in order to save a planet inhabited by peaceful dinosaurs from being over run by the Sharpclaw tribe led by General Scales. The game opens with the player controlling Krystal, who of course as we all know would become a fully fledged Star Fox team member later. The game plays very much like a 3D Zelda game, same basic structure of beating a temple, fighting a boss, do some wandering and puzzle solving, rinse, repeat, and so on. As I said all the way back when I was doing Zelda for this column, there is nothing wrong at all with this structure. Indeed, any other way of structuring an action/adventure game like this would probably just be plain incoherent. Anyhow, the game's most notable accomplishment is probably in it's visuals, which pushed the Gamecube harder than any other game except perhaps for Resident Evil 4 and Twilight Princess.
It would also be notable for another reason, that being it would be Rare's last game as a second party developer for Nintendo. Nintendo would sell most of their shares in the developer over to Microsoft to the chagrin of many, but in the long term Nintendo did not loose too much, whereas Microsoft never really gained as much as they might have hoped. Of course, the game's critical acclaim was mixed, and that was perhaps because of the circumstances surrounding it. Therefore…
In Retrospect: Not a masterpiece or anything, but I really enjoyed the game. There is always room in gaming for games like Star Fox Adventures, as gamers are quite starved of good action-adventure games in the vein innovated by Zelda. Why this game was disliked for merely using the blue prints of some of the greatest games ever made, I don't really know.
Star Fox Assault
Developer: Namco/ Nintendo EAD
Format: Gamecube
Release: 2005
Notes: Originally slated to be a multiplayer focused Star Fox title, but initial reaction of the audience to the game may have forced changes.
Star Fox Assault is an interesting game. It did away with the route based level structure in favour of having one set list of levels that the player can save in between. In that way the game was a bit more user friendly to new players, but also lost a bit of the freedom the previous games had. The story was simply about Aparoids, alien insects who are invading the Lylat system and must be stopped once again by the Star Fox team. The Aparoids represented, it had to be very said, a very dull antagonist. The more interesting aspect of the story is when Star Wolf puts history aside and sides with Fox, a mark out moment if there ever was on in this series. The game included on foot levels that were the main criticism of the game.
The controls for these levels weren't great. I don't think they were terrible, but they certainly could have been better. Probably the main cool new addition to the game was the ability to switch vehicles mid level, which did give some levels a nice variety. I also did dig shooting from the wing of the Arwings. The game included a solid multiplayer component, although it suffered from a lack of interesting levels and modes.
In Retrospect: An altogether playable and decent game… but a mere shadow of Star Fox 64, unfortunately, suffering from having a really boring enemy and the mediocre on foot sections.
Star Fox Command
Developer: Nintendo EAD
Format: DS
Release: 2006
Notes: A game that mixes some of the proposed strategy functions of the defunct Star Fox 2 and the DS's touch screen controls and 3D hardware.
Star Fox Command is to date on of the better selling games on the DS. It offers a very nice set of touch screen based controls that works quite well for the game's flying sections. It also brings back the multi-route system however you need to beat the game to unlock the other routes, which I'm not sure is a good thing or not really. The game also employs a strategy based set up to the levels, with the player directing the Star Fox team on a map to engage enemies.
It is turn based, the player must wipe out every enemy on the map and protect the Great Fox from attack before all the turns are used up. The game's graphics are very nice, among the best on the DS system. As for the story, it's a lot more complex than previous games, offering up 15 playable characters and numerous sub-angles to the plot. The main plot however concernes the Anglar race, denizens of Venom's deep stirring up trouble in the Lylat system like their tree-based forebears. The game had no less than 9 endings which can be earned by trying out the various unlockable options through the game. Having spoiled them for myself (because I never did beat the game for reasons given below) I do have to say they sound interesting, but not half as interesting wondering what one Nintendo might decide to make canon.
In Retrospect: I really found this game to be too difficult to be much fun. The player cannot afford to make one error of judgement in the strategy part or they will get a game over and will have to start again. To be frank, it's really annoying, and killed this game for me. It's somewhat more liked by the people who can put up with that flaw though.
That's all for this week, although be sure to check out all the other articles this week, especially the What If? Column. I really wish I participated, but I guess I just didn't have time. There's always next week of course, and talking of next week… well I'm playing with the idea of a certain fighting game series…
Keep things in perspective rookies, and get serious! (yeah, that was a clue)
