Star Fox (1993)

The very first Star Fox entry was one of the most technically ambitious games of all time. The game used the Super FX to render real-time 3D polygon graphics, which may not sound fancy for today's standards, but this was a technological marvel for its era. This technology allowed the SNES to display rotating objects, large bosses, and open environments that were far beyond what most console games could achieve. While the visuals now appear extremely simple and angular, they represented a major leap forward for console graphics at the time and gave the game a futuristic aesthetic.

The gameplay is structured as a rail shooter in which you pilots the MC's Arwing fighter through a sequence of scripted stages, similar to 2D top-down shoot-em-ups of the time. Enemies approach from multiple directions, there are obstacles and bosses appear at the end of most levels, so when it comes to the level design there isn't really anything special about it. The controls focus on maneuvering within the screen’s boundaries while lining up shots on enemies, creating a fast-paced experience, even for today's standards.

Throughout the levels, your teammates communicate through radio messages that provide hints and warnings. These interactions give the game personality and help establish the characters that would later become staples of the series. Though this is way less impactful simply because all you are interacting with are dialog boxes, as opposed to fully voice-acted quotes in the subsequent entries. You also need to constantly try to help them when they get ambushed by enemies, otherwise they'll have to abandon mission and go to base. And they also try to help you with some shots here and there, but nothing special like the subsequent entries to the franchise.

Despite its innovation, the game does show some technical limitations, like the frame rate that can drop noticeably when many objects are on screen, and the polygonal visuals can make it difficult at times to judge distances. However, the developers compensated for these constraints with strong level design and varied environments. Each stage introduces new patterns, enemy formations, and hazards. The less interesting levels are the asteroid ones, which feel almost exactly the same, depending which route you take, about the only difference being the difficulty, and not really the level design itself.

Another aspect that adds depth is the presence of branching paths through the campaign, which is masterfully carried to the sequels. You can take different routes depending on their performance or actions during missions, leading to alternative levels. There is even a skip that you can do by going to the level called "Black Hole", which works similarly to the Super Mario Bros 3's Flute item to warp between worlds. This design encourages replayability and experimentation, especially for those trying to reach more challenging routes or improve their score.

And finally, about its difficulty level, I felt that it was somewhat balanced, with some really hard sections here and there, like most of the bosses, even in the "easy" route, for example. I highly encourage to play all the routes since they promote a very unique experience, though I don't recommend trying to get 100% score on all of them, only if you are a die-hard fan of the series. Overall, this title stands as an important milestone in the transition toward 3D graphics. While its visuals and performance are extremely dated, its ambition and creative technology still make it enjoyable and a historically significant title. It is definitely a must-play for the SNES library if you enjoy this era of gaming.

While the graphics certainly haven't aged like a fine wine (pixel art in contrast ages well IMO) it was one of the first fully 3D games on a home console system. It has a consistent and well realized style even if it will be polarizing for the modern audience. I think the worst flaws with the graphics are less the polygonal shapes that fly at your face and more the frame rate stutters and texture pop-ins. Both of these flaws are results of the devs pushing the hardware to the absolute limits. It does add some artificial difficulty since giant boulders can suddenly materialize in front of you (leaving very little time to react).

Still the game has a consistent (mostly) visual language that is distinct. It's always clear who an enemy is and what you should be shooting (anything that flashes, typically red and yellow). Though this rule does change sometimes which is a problem. Sometimes you need to target something that is flashing blue. Not sure why they did this but it's really just the final boss and maybe 1 or 2 minibosses.

Level design is simple but a ton of fun. It controls surprisingly smooth which is more important than an aesthetic choice IMO. The game is short, but it does offer some replay value in the form of different "courses." While the three courses all play pretty similar, they make each course a different level of difficulty. I actually really like this approach to "Easy," "Medium" and "Hard" mode. Instead of artificially inflating enemy health bars and making you take more damage, they design a more difficult course to maneuver. IMO this is more satisfying to beat though it is significantly harder to design.

Honestly this feels like a classic to me.

You have to respect Star Fox’s technical achievement on a SNES, its personality, its simple, clean, straightforward structure. It’s not as deep as Sin & Punishment or as bizarrely original as Panzer Dragoon but it works. That being said, I never was able to really appreciate it, maybe because the contemporary release of X-Wing instantly turned Star Fox into a big “whatever” (at least from my point of view). I’m sorry but what can I say? Re-playing it today, I still appreciated the technical achievement, even though thirty years later that also became kind of a “whatever”, I had fun, I liked how challenging it can be and I loved the more ambitious/out there stages (like the assault on the “star destroyer-likes” or the one with space animals) but I steel kinda think “whatever”.

(Played on SNES Mini)

I remember really enjoying Star Fox 64 on the 3ds and i recently noticed that i had never played the original. I think the biggest reason for that was... Andross... That pale skinned, bathroom tiles spitting mother-flipper always freaked me out as a wee lil' bab but in retrospect, i think it's a really cool concept !

Really glad i got to play this game, though i prefer the 64 version mainly because of the framerate.

3.5 out of 5, would save the galaxy as an anthropomorphic fox again !

(Ps: Okay, i said that Andross was creepy but the "Out of this dimension" secret stage is a true unescapable nightmare.)