Star Fox 64

aka: Lylat Wars
Moby ID: 3536
Nintendo 64 Specs
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Description official descriptions

Fox McCloud returns to once again rid evil from the Lylat System in this 64-bit remake of the SNES hit.

The main aim of the game is to fly your Arwing through many levels of deadly enemies and huge end bosses with three wingmen (Slippy Toad, Peppy Hare, and Falco Lombardi) following to help you out. Every once in a while, you will also use the Blue Marine submarine and the Landmaster tank.

The 15 levels range from forward scrolling levels (much like Panzer Dragoon or some elements of Star Wars Arcade) to full 3D arenas, each with a certain goal to achieve or boss to destroy. The bigger your frags are at the end of each level determines which direction you take on the universe tree, which is split into three levels: easy, medium, and hard. All three link back to the end for the final level.

Multiplayer modes are also included, allowing four people to battle in Arwings, or if you complete every objective in the single player missions, they can battle on-foot, where the four main characters run around with laser cannons.

Spellings

  • スターフォックス64 - Japanese spelling
  • 스타폭스 64 - Korean spelling

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Credits (Nintendo 64 version)

67 People (60 developers, 7 thanks) · View all

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 89% (based on 40 ratings)

Players

Average score: 4.0 out of 5 (based on 116 ratings with 5 reviews)

Brilliant shooter

The Good
Quick, pick-up-and-play fun

The Bad
No level select, the "hard" route is the least fun.

The Bottom Line
Star Fox 64 (or Lylat Wars as I knew it as a kid) is a fast-paced on-rails shooter made by Nintendo. The gameplay is extremely solid. Fox’s Awring has lasers that you can charge up for a lock-on, along with limited bombs. Movement is fast and precise and you can perform loops and barrel rolls – the latter reflects bullets.

If you complete levels normally, you’ll go through a really fun route through the game. On top of the on-rails levels, you’ll also encounter “all range mode” where you can fly in 3D. These typically aren’t as “cinematic” as the on-rails levels, but still a lot of fun.

Slippy will get attacked by one of the bosses and will crash land on a planet, here you get to use the Landmaster, a tank that is also really fun to use. You can hover temporally and barrel rolls will now move you across most of the screen.

To get to the credits for the first time, Star Fox 64 is a very short game, but that’s because it’s made to be replayed for a high score, and because it’s so much fun, you don’t mind doing so, trying to get a higher score than last time – but that’s not all of it.

Most missions in the game has a secret objective, complete this and you’ll get “Mission Accomplished” and to a different mission, the “hard route” will take you across some more challenging missions, although personally this is my least favourite route of the games – while all missions but one of the missions in Star Fox 64 are good, I do think these are some of the weaker ones, plus the one bad mission is in this route - The underwater level. It’s slow, plodding and is rather boring. The bombs are replaced with infinite torpedoes which also light up the way, because the level is also dark and dreary. This is easily the worst part of the game, but at least it’s just the one mission.

Some of my favourite missions are in the middle, including the best all-range mission as you fight an Independence Day-style UFO and the second Landmaster tank mission as you chase a train.

Once you’ve played all the levels, there are also gold medals to unlock, which are extremely difficult. A level select at this point would be nice so you wouldn’t have to work through previous levels, but it does provide something to work towards.

Star Fox 64 is a incredibly fun game, and one you can just have a quick blast through every now and then.

Nintendo 64 · by Cube1701 (1) · 2024

Fun game but it seems too short.

The Good
The bosses were complex and difficult at times. The multiplayer mode was pretty fun.

The Bad
It was too easy to beat and not a whole lot of replay value. It'll take you about 3 weeks to beat all three difficulty levels. The game could have a used a lot more powerups and different weapons. The multiplayer can get boring quickly.

The Bottom Line
Rent it once but don't buy it.

Nintendo 64 · by Attila (553) · 2001

Entertaining way to kill an hour

The Good
One of the most interesting things for me is the characters. Although other than the main characters, they all seem quite shallow at first, all are intensely likable, even the enemies. There are also another couple of good guys to meet who have more depth, though they aren't really explained that well. The four main characters (one being you, the others your wingmen) all seem to have a bond - even when they're all calling Slippy an idiot. Keeping your wingmen in action is a crucial part of the game, they'll often get themselves into trouble and yelling for help, and thanking you when you save them (except Falco, who says such nice things as "Well gee, I've been saved by Fox, how swell!" in his best sarcastic voice). The bosses are done well, also, being very typically boss-like and taunting you, and being incredibly surprised when you beat them.

The Arwings look cool, and the Landmaster tank levels (especially the train level) are done well and are a nice diversion. Also, as well as the regular corridor style levels where you fly pretty much straight forward, there are also "all range mode" levels (and bosses) which leave you free to fly in any direction.

It's fast paced - more so than Starfox for the SNES which is very sluggish - and is completable in about an hour going through the hard path. It's also easy enough for this - thought collecting the medals by getting enough kills on each level is significantly harder.

The Bad
The multiplayer isn't very good. Fun, but it seems like it was just tacked on the end. It's also ridiculously easy for most levels, where nothing except some of the bosses move randomly. All enemies fly in the same path on the corridor levels. Some of them don't even shoot at you, but in pre-determined directions. You can complete the game without losing a life time after time after only four or five play-throughs, not even getting hit on some of the earlier levels. The submarine level is quite slow and dull. Also, the game doesn't seem to fit into the plot of the original SNES version at all - it seems they want to pretend it didn't exist.

The Bottom Line
One of the better light games for the N64. Fun, easy to learn, replayable to an extent, and with very likable characters.

Nintendo 64 · by Knyght (677) · 2003

[ View all 5 player reviews ]

Trivia

1001 Video Games

The N64 version of Star Fox 64 appears in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die by General Editor Tony Mott.

Cutscene

In the end sequence, there's a point where Fox, Falco, Peppy and, Slippy are running across what appears to be planet Venom. If you look closely, you'll see that Slippy is running very slightly slower than his comrades and by the time the scene fades out, he's lagging quite far behind the others.

Dialogue

By default, the game characters have actual spoken dialogue. However, there is an option to revert to the gibberish dialogue of the original game, which is listed as Lylat, presumably the actual language of the characters. This only affects the spoken dialogue, not the text, which is always in English (or possibly other languages as appropriate).

Meme

The seemingly normal quote "Do a barrel roll!" spoken by Peppy in this game, has become a well known meme on the internet

Milestone

This was the first home video game to offer "force feedback" in a home console game, in which the game sent signals to the special "Rumble Pak" accessory attached to the controller, causing the controller to vibrate according to in-game actions.

Packaging

The UK PAL edition of the game was originally released in a limited edition large box with a large poster of the Starfox Team and the new N64 Rumble Pak (for which Starfox 64 was the first compatible game).

References

The giant, black UFO in that one level where you help Bill the Dog's squadron was inspired by the big alien ship in the movie Independence Day. The game's manual even implies it, stating that Andross stole the technology for the ship from an Alien race. If you don't beat the UFO in time, it blows up the structure in the middle of the planet in the exact same way that the UFOs in Independence Day blew up the White House.

Star Fox 2

Originally, Nintendo intended to make a Star Fox sequel for the SNES, titled Star Fox 2. This project was almost finished until it was cancelled since the SNES was getting very aged at that time. Many of Star Fox 2's features and scenarios were recycled into Star Fox 64, however, notably the All-Range Mode and the Star Wolf Team.

Awards

  • EGM
    • June 1997 (Issue 95) - Game of the Month
    • November 1997 (Issue 100) - ranked #39 (Best 100 Games of All Time)
    • November 1997 (Issue 100) - ranked #4 (Readers' Top 10 Games of All Time)
    • March 1998 (Issue 104) - Shooter Game of the Year
    • March 1998 (Issue 104) - N64 Game of the Year Runner-Up (Readers' Choice)
    • March 1998 (Issue 104) - Shooter Game of the Year (Readers' Choice)
    • March 1998 (Issue 104) - Best Sound Runner-Up (Readers' Choice)

Information also contributed by Knyght, MegaMegaMan, Paul Jones, Silverfish, Tiago Jacques, and WWWWolf

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Kartanym.

Wii U added by Michael Cassidy. Nintendo Switch added by Kam1Kaz3NL77. Wii added by Sciere.

Additional contributors: Matthew Bailey, Alaka, gamewarrior, DreinIX, Rik Hideto, FatherJack.

Game added April 2, 2001. Last modified January 12, 2024.