Star Fox (2026) review: Amazing gameplay, but stuck in 1993

Review written by: Alexander Trapp

As I said in my review for Ex.Zodiac, it has been 10 years since Nintendo last attempted a reboot of their Star Fox franchise. And though that game had 2 things working against it, namely being released on the failing Wii U console and the gameplay forcing players to only use Nintendo’s bulky and unwieldy Wii U Gamepad for dual screen mechanics.

I didn’t consider Star Fox Zero to be a bad game. I had even wished that it had gotten a port to the Switch, as did another Wii U game that I really liked, Xenoblade Chronicles X. But it was not to be, and Nintendo once again went back to the drawing board with Star Fox.

In the ensuing decade, many gamers wanted and hoped for Nintendo to try again with Star Fox, to bring it back to its Nintendo 64 era glory days. And now, 10 years later (and a great cameo in the Mario Galaxy Movie) Star Fox is back. Has the series returned to its peak performance or is there something wrong with the G-Diffuser?

The answer is kind of a mixed bag, but I personally lean more to the more positive side of the equation. I’ll talk about the graphics and presentation, the gameplay, the story, and ultimately where I score the game as a whole.

A visual and sonic triumph: Star Fox’s best-looking mission yet

As far as graphics and presentation goes, the series has never looked better. The Nintendo Switch 2 may be the weakest of the current generation of consoles when it comes to generating pixels, details, and graphical fidelity but as has always been the case, Nintendo knows how to make their hardware sing when it comes to their games. Everything from the fur, feathers, and ship details show through in the highest cinematic quality ever seen in the Star Fox franchise.

The best example of this fantastic visual quality comes through when your Arwing fighter craft hits a warp tunnel and your ship is transported to a realm that almost looks heavenly… until you have to blast some ships and glowing rocks that get in your way. Even the characters themselves remark about how insane the space around you looks.

Other locations in the game’s campaign brings you to places that are familiar if you played Star Fox 64 back in 1997 and beyond, the game being a reimagining of that project from nearly 30 years ago after all.

But 30 years of advances in visual effects technology makes these locales shine through like never before. Corneria, where the campaign begins, is a great example of how much visual advancements were made even over the last entry in the franchise, Star Fox Zero. That game was no slouch visually, but 10 years of advancing graphics makes Corneria look even more beautiful, and subsequently devastated, than ever before.

I could go on to cite more specific examples but I’ll just give one, that being the burning furnace of Solar, one of the stars in the Lylat System. The journey above the star’s fiery surface was one of the highest standout experiences for me, including the lava boss battle at the end of the stage.

One other aspect of the presentation I’ll quickly touch on is the musical score. The orchestral compositions, composed by Stephen Barton and recorded at Abbey Road Studios in London is a faithful recreation of the soundtrack originally composed by Nintendo’s legendary Koji Kondo and Hajime Wakai. Honestly you could listen to the soundtrack by itself and be forgiven for thinking it was part of the Star Wars universe. It is at times thumping, heroic, downtrodden, hopeful, and ultimately triumphant.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about the redesigns of the characters. Now there was, and perhaps still is, an argument to be made about Nintendo making the characters look, shall we say, ugly in comparison to how they’ve been presented for the past 30 years, including the aforementioned cameo in the Mario Galaxy Movie.

I was also, for a while, taken aback at Nintendo’s decision to present the characters in what they call a more “realistic” fashion. But after having played the game, watched many of the cutscenes, and experienced the campaign, I have to say that the re-designs of Fox and company doesn’t bother me as much as I thought it would.

Would I have preferred that the characters look like how they did in the Mario Galaxy Movie? Sure. But the visual changes do not ruin the experience for me. It’s just something I’ve adjusted to. Your mileage and preferences may vary however, and if you don’t like what Nintendo did, that is absolutely your right to feel that way.

I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if someone comes along at some point and mods the characters to look like how they did previously. We’ll see what happens.

There’s also the issue of the voice acting. While I wasn’t expecting the new voice actors to copy how the dialog of Fox and company was spoken back in 1997, I have to admit, I do miss the way some of the original lines were delivered in comparison to how they’re spoken now. I miss Falco remarking that the devastation of Corneria City “looks horrible” for instance.

That line is gone entirely in this new version of the game. Later on the boss of the first level screams “MY EMPEROR, I FAILED YOU!” word for word, like in the original. But the feeling is completely different. Is it less cheesy than in 1997? Yes. But I loved that cheese. The rest of voice acting in the game, especially in the new cutscenes, is done exceptionally well.

Except for Andross himself. I don’t know what it is, but he comes across as less creepy and intimidating in this version and more akin to a standard cartoon villain. All of which to say that vocally, he doesn’t stand out. Graphically he does, so there’s still that, but it feels like there’s something missing.

The gameplay is also a series highpoint for the franchise. The Arwing space craft turns and tilts effortlessly in any direction you need it to go in. The lasers and bombs function devastatingly well with a visual flair and accompanying sound effects to go along with it.

I still remember having a satisfying smile on my first play through in the training level where I used the bombs for the first time to destroy a lineup of targets. Nintendo knows gameplay, and Star Fox shines through here with flying colors. Using the charge shot to lock onto enemies and create multiple explosions also adds to the level of satisfaction in destroying the forces of Andross.

And yes, it is expected that you do a barrel roll, as it helps shield you from taking incoming enemy fire. And you will need to use the barrel roll effectively as the campaign continues and the difficulty steadily climbs to match the danger you’re in. Now I personally don’t find Star Fox to be that hard of a game.

But if you get overwhelmed by the enemies on screen, or you don’t pay attention to what’s going on, you can get shot down or destroyed by the environment. So be mindful of your surroundings. I may have crashed into some boulders on the train level where you have to use the Landmaster, but the less said about that the better!

All Range Mode, where the level turns more into a closed off arena, is where the game transforms from an on rail shooter to an aerial dog fight. In cases like these you’ll either be facing down a gigantic mechanized boss, a space station with defenses you’ll have to blow up, or taking on a squadron of enemy fighters, including the infamous Star Wolf.

I have to say, I took immense satisfaction in targeting and shooting down Pigma Dengar and getting revenge for Fox’s father, James. The others? I can’t really say much. It feels like this time that Star Wolf is less a rival squadron and more like enemies that Andross just happened to hire off the street. It feels less personal this time around to Fox himself.

I guess with that said, I should talk about the story itself. Once again, if you’ve played any of the Star Fox games made by Nintendo, then the story is nothing new. Fox McCloud and his team of Peppy Hare, Falco Lombardi, and Slippy Toad are hired by General Pepper and the Cornerian Army to reinforce and do battle against the forces of the mad ape scientist, Andross.

You take back the Lylat system from Andross’ invasion one planet at a time, with your actions determining which routes you can take that ultimately lead to Andross’ home base on the toxic planet Venom. We’ve done this song and dance for 33 years now with little changes. And that’s what makes this review somewhat troubling to me, despite the amazing gameplay.

Why Star Fox can’t escape Andross’s shadow

The original Star Fox came out in 1993 and here we are 33 years later and Fox and company have not moved beyond their battle against Andross.

That saddens me greatly because it seems like Nintendo doesn’t know what to do with their more science fiction franchises. Metroid, F-Zero, and Star Fox do not get nearly the same level of love and attention as do Mario, The Legend of Zelda, or even Donkey Kong. And interestingly enough, we’re going to get a remake of Ocarina of Time, which also came out on the Nintendo 64.

And no doubt it’s going to sell 10 times what Star Fox is going to do for the Nintendo Switch 2. That is so frustrating because Star Fox, like F-Zero, is one of Nintendo’s most underutilized franchises. They could honestly make it the next Star Wars if they took time to add to the lore the way Rareware did with Star Fox Adventures or Namco did with Star Fox Assault.

But because those games, like Star Fox Zero, did not sell as well as a Mario or a Donkey Kong game, Nintendo continues to take Fox McCloud back to the drawing board and back to the battle against Andross only with more shiny graphics.

Will Nintendo ever move this franchise forward? Only time will tell, but I sure hope so. I’ve become a much bigger fan of Star Fox over the years, especially with the Disney era of Star Wars leaving me cold and embittered with the baffling idiotic choices made by that company, and Star Fox has helped fill the void in my heart for heroic space battles.

But Nintendo has not been immune from making questionable decisions about their franchises and I desperately want them to improve. Let Fox and company face new enemies, travel to new locations. You have an entire galaxy and mountains of intellectual properties to work with. I’m not saying do a crossover with Metroid and F-Zero, but I’m not not saying that either.

If Fire Emblem can get 17 games (and yes I had to look that up) surely Star Fox can move beyond the story of the first battle with Andross. I know there was a Star Fox 2 back on the Super Nintendo/Famicom, and the saga behind that game’s multi-decade delayed release is worth an article of its own, but as far as the story goes, we’ve been stuck flying in place for 33 years.

That’s why I sadly have to score this game a 7 out of 10. The visuals, the music, the voice acting and gameplay are top notch. The creatures of the Lylat System have never looked better, even if some of their looks are questionable to some fans of the series. But the fact that the series has not evolved story-wise past its 1993 inception is what knocks my personal score down from what would have been a 9 out of 10 experience. This is the best that Star Fox has ever looked and played.

Now… what else is out there? Nintendo, the ball is in your court.