Wild Blue Skies

I'm gonna start this review by saying that the game IS fun while also stating that I was expecting a bit more from it. I had a good, but short, time with it. I think everyone who became interested in Wild Blue Skies did it because there are not that many on-rails shooters anymore, at least that's why I wanted to try it out. The worst possible thing imaginable that could've happen to this game actually happened: Nintendo remembered the Star Fox series exists by including Fox in the Mario Galaxy movie when he had no business being there and becoming a memorable part of it, and then announcing and releasing a new remake of SF64 on Switch 2 out of the blue, all of this happening before this game was able to be released. While the game by itself is well made, it lacks its own identity by trying to emulate so many things SF64 did in the past and also not being up to par in terms of content as it has 3 fewer missions and most of them are quite short (especially Archipelago and Temple). Some things I didn't like are the following: -No Somersault or U-Turn in All-Range mode missions, meaning evasive maneuvers are restricted to brake-banking. -Having two different buttons for Charged Shot and Rapid Fire seems weird but not the end of the world. However, Rapid Fire cannot be pressed at the same speed it could in SF64 so the setting for Continuous Rapid Fire has to be always on as it's more efficient that way. -No memorable music (I'm not saying the music is bad, but there are no tracks like Katina or Area 6 and the mission intros and outros don't stand out either). -Almost no character development between the Blue Bombers through the missions; it's like Roe, Thorne and Chuck are just there for the sake of being there. -No mission select after clearing both routes, meaning that if you want to go back to get the Ribbons and Medals you missed, you'll have to go through missions you probably already completed before trying out the one you're missing. For its price, I think it's absolutely fine if you wanna scratch that itch of playing an on-rails shooter but consider that this is an inferior version of SF64.

Game crashed 3 times in 70 minutes, twice in mines, once in foundry. Will provide VODs as proof game cannot run

I wanted to support and Indy dev that wanted to build something fun with a nod to a great game. What I got was TEMU Star fox 64. They did not even TRY to add any thing original. I was ok in the first level. Neat, they are paying respect to a great game. By the 3rd level I realized they didn't even change the dialog. They did not even try. I did not expect perfect gameplay. I can get past mid boss fights, but come on. This is not a NOD to SF64, this is a meme with no soul

Curiously enough, i've never played Starfox anything - but DO A BARREL ROLL

This is an amazing little game. If you like starfox, you will probably like this game too. It is sad that the remake came out a few weeks before this, which felt malicious on nintendo's part. And some of the super fans will just hate it like im sure they hated palworld. The gameplay does take a little getting used to as the charge button is mapped to a separate button. And im sure there are a few small tweaks that could be done to make it a little more tight. But there is nothing wrong with the game or its characters. I still havent beaten it on the easy route as of writing this review, but that will soon change! Give the demo a go if you are unsure on if you like it or not.

why are the ships red if theyre called the blue bombers

I want to say up front that this is really close to a positive for me despite how derivative it is to Star Fox 64. I love the art direction, keeping this on the ground was a good call. The character designs are great and the voice acting is solid. The characters are so similar to their Star Fox counterparts but I appreciate the tweaks to the story. I think when you have the max gold blaster upgrade and you've learned the rail shooter levels they can be super fun to try and master. Most of the time I don't really mind the slightly more sluggish ship when I'm using the banking and rolling right. Finding and collecting the W.I.LD letters is one of the few neat additions they made. The core issue most people will probably have with this game is that it doesn't just try to play like Star Fox 64, it just straight up recreates level design and narrative beats too much. It's way more than a wink and a nod, since almost every level in the game is a reintrepretation of a SF64 level and it feels like getting robbed what could have been a bunch of new SF-type levels. And it's not their fault the Star Fox 64 remake ended up coming out after the WBS announcement, but it does a way better job of recreating those levels with polish and the specific feel that people who have been playing them for decades would expect. A couple omages to the original levels and lines of dialog would have been appreciated but they went too far. The worst part of the game right now is the all-range free flight levels. It feels like their is barely anything I can do to keep my wingmen alive. The chatter in Star Fox could get annoying but I appreciated that it would clue me in to when an enemy was targeting them. In Wild Blue Skies it just feels like their randomly taking damage instead of from a pursuer, never saying anything until they leave and I don't think I've seen one of them get a kill, which feels like maybe actual bugs? The True Ending path is the best mostly because you get one easy fight against the Prowlers (Star Wolf) and that's it, no all-range otherwise. The other major issue is that the lowest tier of Blasters is too weak. It's genuinly impossible to kill many enemies even if you concentrate fire for as long as possible and weak enemies feel like they take too many hits compared to one upgrade in Blasters. It drags out boss fight mechanics too much, the amount of damage to lose an upgrade seems random. You basically never want to restart a checkpoint if your down to the bottom tier of blasters, your better off restarting the level or possibly restarting the run. And then there are the bugs like certain enemies becoming unresponsive, the UI claiming I have the gold blaster upgrade after a checkpoint reload even though I'm clearly firing the base tier, Roe's windshield often not rendering transparent in the post-level scene. Their not game breaking but unfortunate. Like I said when this game clicks it's fun to play. The price is right. It's too late for them to design a whole new set of levels but if they fix the bugs, tweak the design on the all-range levels and adjust the balance I think it could be a cool alternative to Star Fox that I could see myself playing a decent amount more of to get the medals and chase high scores. It's just definitely not the evolution of the Star Fox formula I was hoping for.