A new Star Fox game should be a crossover with F-Zero, according to a reader feature. Following current attempts to bring Star Fox back from the brink of obscurity, a reader suggests pairing it up with another of Nintendo’s forgotten franchises.
The Original Rumour
Back in the Wii U era, there was a weird rumour going around that there was going to be a crossover between Star Fox and Metroid. I think it was just before the launch of the Wii U, so before they announced Star Fox Zero. It was odd because any rumour about Nintendo stuff is rare and also because it didn’t seem to make much sense. Metroid is about the most serious franchise Nintendo has got (which isn’t saying much, admittedly) whereas Star Fox is a bunch of cuddly animals having a star war. Back then neither franchise was in a good state and things haven’t really got better for either since. It was one step forward for Metroid Dread and two steps back with Metroid Prime 4 and, well… we’ll see how the Star Fox 64 remake does. Although everyone already likes that game, so the real question is can Nintendo make a new Star Fox game that is both good and popular?
Current State of Star Fox
The rumour at the moment is that if the remake goes well then Nintendo will greenlight a bigger budget new game. That makes logical sense but it also kind of implies they’ve already got an idea ready to go. I doubt we’ll find out what that is unless they want us to, but my idea is to combine Star Fox with another franchise, but not Metroid.
The F-Zero Connection
I’d say that the other most popular Nintendo franchise that doesn’t seem to have much chance of coming back at the moment, and hasn’t had a new game in years, is F-Zero. Hardcore fans will know there is already a connection, because someone called James McCloud (Fox McCloud’s dad) is in F-Zero GX and drives a vehicle that looks a bit like an Arwing. As I understand it, he’s a homage and not meant to be the same character (he’s a human with a weird haircut, not a fox) but I don’t think you’d need to change anything to say that Star Fox and F-Zero take place in the same universe. And even if you didn’t the Super Mario Galaxy movie already had Fox go to the Mario universe, so it doesn’t seem like Nintendo has much of a problem with that type of thing.
Gameplay Ideas
In terms of what kind of game this crossover would be, I would take another idea that I think is fairly common (or at least I’ve seen it mentioned a couple of times in the Inbox) of expanding Star Fox into an Elite style space trading game. I think this is an excellent idea and I think it’d be even better if you had a crossover with F-Zero, because then you’d have stuff to do on ground level, when you land your spaceship. Since I can’t imagine Nintendo wanting everyone to be running around and shooting each other. Captain Falcon is meant to be a bounty hunter (a Metroid and F-Zero crossover also would’ve made more sense than Star Fox and Metroid) so there’s another gameplay hook, as the Star Fox team seem to be basically mercenaries already. So you’d have space combat, car racing, and space exploration and trading.
Why This Works
It’s not something Nintendo has done before – which you can’t say about most genres – and it’s not something that’s common in general nowadays. It’s also a good way to solve the problem of what to do with both franchises. Not enough people are interested in playing F-Zero nowadays and anything that’s not just a linear space shooter has never worked for Star Fox. But open things up a bit, make the game more of a sandbox and I think you’ve got your answer.
By reader Rocky. The reader’s features do not necessarily represent the views of GameCentral or Metro. You can submit your own 500 to 600-word reader feature at any time, which if used will be published in the next appropriate weekend slot. Just contact us at gamecentral@metro.co.uk or use our Submit Stuff page and you won’t need to send an email.
