Star Fox: Battlefront Assault Squadron Adventures and Star Fox: Arcade.
Here me out.
I think the Star Fox fandom is kind of split. Some people want the arcade-style onrails shooter of Star Fox and Star Fox 64 with nothing else. That's fine. I love those games. But some fans, like me, liked the evolution the Star Fox series took in the Gamecube generation, and understand that there just isn't really a market today for an HD Star Fox 64 style game.
Well, at least it used to be that way.
Star Fox: Arcade
The reason why I say that a SF64 type game wouldn't sell in todays market is because you'd be hard pressed to sell an on rails shooter like Star Fox for $60 and actually sell enough copies to make a profit. That's just a fact. It won't happen. People want more from their games than now than that. Well, from their $60 games anyway.
But what about a $30 SF64 style game, with all of the on rails shooter action you want? Throw in online leaderboards and online and local multiplayer? What if they pulled a NSLU? $30 for the digital copy and $40 for the retail copy? That's what Star Fox: Arcade is. The story is light hearted and mainly there to service the gameplay. Give the SF64 fans what they want, and sell it at a price point that makes sense this day and age, and Nintendo can make a decent profit on a franchise that a lot of fans want to see return to it's roots.
But a lot of fans also want to see Star Fox evolve.
Star Fox: Battlefront Assault Squadron Adventures
Whether it's Adventures or Assault, a lot of fans including me feel that the franchise peaked with the Gamecube. Assault is my personal favorite and I think that is because Star Fox always reminded me of Star Wars. Assault is where it felt the most "Star Wars," but it also felt the closest to the two most popular Star Wars games of that time, the Battlefront and Rogue Squadron series. Now putting aside the obvious inspiration that Rogue Squadron 2 takes from Star Fox 64, Assault basically took these two games and put them together in a nice, but flawed, package. That package doesn't have to be flawed though.
I think that Assaults biggest problem, and this is going to rustle some feathers, were the on rails sections. Don't get me wrong, they were the best part of the game and I agree with you guys there, but it doesn't fit the kind of game that Assault was. I think that all the flight sections should have been completely off rails, and that it should have flowed better into the on foot sections.
Let me put it another way. Wind Waker. Open world game. Land and sea. A lot of sailing. A lot of sword fighting. You travel the world seamlessly by jumping in your boat and sailing from island to island. The world is populated with towns and people.
Replace Wind Waker with Star Fox. Open world game. Planets and space. A lot of flying. A lot of on foot battles. You travel the galaxy seamlessly by jumping in your arwing and flying from planet to planet. The world is populated with colonies and people.
The flying works mechanically like it does in the Rogue Squadron series. The on foot shooting works mechanically like it does in thr Battlefront series. And don't worry. I didn't forget you Adventures fans. There's also sword play that works like it does in Adventures. Beam Sword play, to be specific. (like from Super Smash Bros.) Imagine fighting Wolf in hand to hand combat. You both have reflectors, so your shooting effectiveness is limited, so you must fight with a combination of the martial arts every flyier must be proficiant at, and your Beam Sword. A perfect balance between 3rd person shooting and hand/sword would be perfect.
But then there's the online. Oh, the online. Literally just take the Battlefront 3 leaked footage of the online and copy past it onto this game. Instead of summoning famous Star Wars characters, you can unlock the ability to use your beam sword and hand to hand combat along side your shooting in that same light. You also get to customize your online character by choosing to be any animal and customizing your looks from there. There's local and online co-op too, of course.
Throw in another outstanding orchestrated score, much better voice acting, and a deep and compelling storyline, and only then will it be the perfect Star Fox game for me and I'm sure for many other fans out there.
One Star Fox game will never satisfy all Star Fox fans, but two? Two definitely can. I'd buy both.
Star Fox: Battlefront Assault Squadron Adventures and Star Fox: Arcade.
