Star Fox Review – A Stunning, Faithful Revival

Nintendo deserves a lot of credit for never quite letting their major IP fall by the wayside. Over time, any IP that they have is fair game for a brand new release. Which is how, in the year 2026, we find ourselves with a new Star Fox release, as a headlining game for the Switch 2. Ten years after the catastrophic last entry, no one expected the IP to ever show signs of life – and yet, here it is, back in style, the missteps and fumbles of Star Fox Zero firmly in the rear view mirror.

“Brand new” is a bit of a misleading adjective for this release. You see, in an attempt to wipe the board clean off the decades of baggage of poorly conceived experiments and entries that never quite resonated with the market, the new Star Fox is pitched as a reboot of the series. And in an attempt to be a reboot, it goes back to the beginning – Star Fox 64, the series’ high watermark, which represents the “first” entry in the chronology (it itself having been a retelling of the SNES Star Fox game).

"Personally, I was never attached enough to the original look of the characters enough to be against a redesign."

Star Fox on the Nintendo Switch 2, then, is a remake of Star Fox 64 (and in turn, Star Fox on the SNES). Counting Star Fox 64 3D, which was an earlier remake of the game for Nintendo’s 3DS handheld, and Star Fox Zero on the Wii U, which was a retelling of the same story in a new continuity, this represents the fifth time this story has been told by Nintendo in a major game.

But honestly, it works. The story of Star Fox 64 is straightforward, but allows for a lot of great and frenetic arcade action. It has some great character moments, iconic moments and lines, and enough lore to keep a lot of players busy trying to uncover it all.

But ultimately, no one plays Star Fox for the story. Barely anyone is even playing Star Fox for a straightforward “completion”, in fact. You see, Star Fox is an arcade game. I don’t mean that in the way that the adjective is used today – I mean that it is literally an arcade game, as in, it is designed with the sensibilities that a game played at a physical arcade would be. The game, which is a rail shooter, sees players running quick levels, with the goal being not completion, but maximizing your score. The game, and each level, is designed around being replayed – there are secret routes through many levels, for example, which can unlock new paths through the campaign for you in the form of alternate levels and paths that you can take.

There are sub-objectives and secrets to find, which re usually reserved for players who have a thorough mastery of the level – mastery that comes, mind you, by replaying those levels repeatedly, until you know what enemies, hazards, and impudences to expect, when, where, and how. Running through Star Fox start to finish once takes very little time – probably 2-3 hours for most players – but the game is designed around that not being the point, and instead players continuing to play and replay levels. It works well, and lends itself remarkably well to the Switch’s pick up and play nature, while also allowing for hectic and frenetic longer sessions.

"The game, and each level, is designed around being replayed"

As a remake of Star Fox 64, Star Fox on the Nintendo Switch 2 is extremely faithful – the changes are all visual and to the storytelling (which we’ll get to in a bit). The actual layout of each level, its structure, encounters, and progression, is pretty much the same as it was in the N64 game. Those visual changes, however, are comprehensive – the game looks nothing like the 64-bit skeleton that it is built on. Developed by Velan Studios, on their in house VIPER Engine, there is actually a convincing case to be made that Star Fox is the best looking game on the Nintendo Switch 2 so far.

In terms of the rendering technologies underlying it, from the lighting, the physics based rendering pipeline, the asset streaming, and the number of stunning transparencies and alpha effects, this is decidedly the most modern a Nintendo game has looked. Most of Nintendo’s games have looked great on the Switch 2, but every single one of them is based on tech and rendering stacks that started out on the original Nintendo Switch, and use their strong art style to compensate. Star Fox is the first time on the Switch 2 that a Nintendo game looks like it is visually a generation apart from what Nintendo was doing on the original Switch.

A lot has been said about the art style this remake uses. The extremely photorealistic look was initially divisive – while it means the environments look gorgeous, the interpretation of the classic and beloved Star Fox cast as realistic looking animals was a big enough departure from the expected aesthetic that there was a bit of a pushback when the game was originally revealed.

Personally, I was never attached enough to the original look of the characters enough to be against a redesign, and the redesign itself seemed, while not necessarily better than the classic designs, still good enough, and fitting with the game’s overall look enough, that I didn’t mind. And certainly, once you are actually playing the game, your screen filled with explosions and particles effects as you try to save the Lylat System from Andross’ evil machinations, those redesigns cease to even register.

Other than the graphics, the other big change over the original game that Star Fox on the Nintendo Switch 2 brings is the expanded storytelling. Yes, really – the cutscenes and storytelling are a major part of the pitch for this game, and they’re actually really good.

Expanding on the CODEC style conversations of the original game, these cutscenes are now fully animated and fully voiced, expanding upon not just the story of the game, but also some of the lore and backstory behind it, and perhaps best of all for a lot of fans, the inter team dynamics of the various members of the Star Fox team. Getting, for example, an opportunity to see more banter between Fox and Falco, is excellent, and exactly the sort of thing that long time fans of these characters will appreciate (while doing a good job at endearing these characters to any potential new fans).

"The other big change over the original game that Star Fox on the Nintendo Switch 2 brings is the expanded storytelling."

These cutscenes are very impressive – not only are they fully voiced, it appears as though they are fully voiced in every language the game supports. Not just that, but the cutscenes (all real-time) also adjust to reflect your path through the story – if, for example, one of your team members was downed in a mission, and is not going to be available to fly for the upcoming one, the cutscenes reflect that. This is the sort of reactivity in storytelling that we have seen go down in games as they have embraced voiced dialog, so it is nice to see Star Fox retain all of it, while expanding on the storytelling in the process.

A big concern people may have with this game is the content to cost ratio. The value it could provide, in other words. It’s far too easy to see the “game can be beaten in 3 hours” number and be scared off. And to be honest, if you are only going to play through it once and then move on, you should probably not buy Star Fox, because it will not be worth the price to you.

But for everyone else, Star Fox more than justifies the cost – the amount of value, across all the replays of a campaign, the secret and alternate paths, the sub-objectives, the new achievements system, the brand new multiplayer mode (which, mercifully, supports online and voice chat – not something that is a given for a new Nintendo game, sadly, but it holds true here), the new cutscenes, new gimmicks such as support for mouse mode, and its overall high production value, certainly make it worth it. It helps, too, that the game is very cheap, which also helps it seem like a better proposition.

While another remake of Star Fox 64 may seem unnecessary, Star Fox on the Nintendo Switch 2 gets a lot of mileage out of the premise. Between the improvements to controls, UI, QoL, storytelling, new multiplayer mode, and of course, the graphics, this is decidedly the definitive edition of this classic tale and game so far. Now let’s hope that this represents a true new beginning, and a new era, for the franchise. If future Star Fox games on the Switch 2 end up being as well done as this one is, fans, both veterans and newcomers alike, are in for a treat.

This game was reviewed on Nintendo Switch 2.