Star Fox Zero

Star Fox Zero offers a blend of a familiar story with fresh gameplay experiences and mission variety. The controls are the biggest hurdle for this game and will likely deter a lot of players. Those who stick with it and eventually get the hang of things will be thankful that they did in the end.

A rather halfhearted remake of a true classic, with less focus on the story of epic teamwork than one would have expected. A frustrating release for the fans, but nonetheless a fine addition to the Wii U roster.

Despite the familiarity of the characters and the story, this is strange, exotic territory, and quite like anything else. [June 2016, p.108]

Players that have graduated past the simplistic design of the original Star Fox games won’t find much to bring them back in, but those that still enjoy doing barrel rolls will feel right at home with Fox’s latest adventure.

There are plenty of nostalgic aspects present in this crisp and beautiful high-definition title, reminiscent of games gone by. At the same time it shakes things up with some drastic changes to the game play that can be too jarring for some to want to put up with, making it a bit of a black sheep to many. For those who take the time to master the play style, however, it is incredibly rewarding and satisfying.

I just wish it felt like a cohesive experience and not a bunch of polished demos for different control interfaces. I’ve rarely been as simultaneously frustrated, startled by and, for fleeting moments, exhilarated with an interface. It’s a measure of all that’s right and wrong with Star Fox Zero that you’ll probably have all three reactions as you play.

Star Fox Zero tries new things while trying to stay true to the franchise. The controls are something to get used to, but you'll get over them. What is difficult to accept, though, is the repetitive nature of the missions and the brevity of the game. Such a pity, because deep inside this was such a good game with awesome air battles.

Hearing about how different Star Fox Zero was compared to its inception, it's almost like Miyamoto jettisoned most of the new ideas in favor of playing it safe due to complaints from testers. Even with Platinum's involvement, it's a confusing project that isn't quite sure of itself, wanting to try new things while simultaneously reigning it in. Despite these blemishes, I enjoyed my time with it.

Beyond my issues with the controls, the final boss, and leaning too heavily on fandom rather than redefining these characters for a fresh audience, what bums me out about Star Fox Zero is that for me it lacks the special something that defines a Nintendo game.

There's a lot to like about Star Fox Zero, but those ideas are rooted in games past and the new features muddle the whole thing up.

Star Fox Zero brings the series back in a big way. Taking the franchise back to its roots, while amping up the action to new heights. Unfortunately not everything that was added was perfect though, with the Gamepad controls actually taking away from the experience, rather than adding to it. Once you get past them there is a great game here, but it will take some players quite a while to do that.

Star Fox Zero’s status as a love-letter to the past is solidified. While it does a good job channeling a lot of what was great about Star Fox 64, it fails to really build on it in new and exciting ways, and stumbles because of the Wii U Gamepad.

Star Fox Zero falls short in a lot of ways; but for better or worse, it's still the best game the series has seen in years.

So, Star Fox Zero is a pleasant return for Fox McCloud and his merry squadron, albeit one with a few flaws that stops it from sitting alongside the Wii U's best.

While I don't like the new control scheme, it's a small price to pay to hop into the seat of an Arwing. Though I feel like I've seen most of this adventure before, Zero is a good-looking homage with some new locations to find and challenges to overcome. It doesn't supplant Star Fox 64, but it does its legacy justice.

Star Fox Zero follows the classic structure of its predecessors and tops it off with a new control system that will make or break how the players perceive Nintendo's latest opus in the Star Fox series. It could certainly benefit from a more luxurious visual environment but once its new control system has been mastered, the players will find this new collectables-packed journey across the Lylat system nothing short of rewarding and satisfying.

While Star Fox Zero offers up some exhilarating dogfights with a unique control scheme that actually makes motion controls work, its highest highs are let down all too frequently by repetitive, mundane on-rails segments that sour the freedom that the game gives you in short bursts.

Star Fox Zero suffers from ambition without a cause. A fun, light space shooter has been crippled by a horrible implementation of gamepad controls. [May 2016]

Star Fox Zero isn’t ever bad, but it’s generally uninspired. It’s a musty tribute that fails to add much to the series, aside from tweaked controls and incremental vehicle upgrades. I loved Star Fox when it came out, and I’ll even defend Star Fox Adventures (to a reasonable degree). For now, I’ll stick to Super Smash Bros. when I feel like reuniting with Fox.

Star Fox Zero is a passable reboot/remake of the original but the controls are simply horrible.

Star Fox Zero isn't a bad game - far from it - but it doesn't provide anything new of value to the franchise and it's not as good as the earlier games in the series.

Star Fox Zero tries and fails to blend the nostalgic feel of StarFox 64 with new controls. While the game can be enjoyable and comes with some exciting moments, it is muddled down by unwieldy controls and bland level design.

Star Fox Zero is a game that every fan of the series will enjoy, but its lack of effort and technical restrictions keep it from making the long waited transition to modern gaming.

tar Fox Zero is a good game to play and it’s one many will get stuck into through some frantic attempt to rack up an even greater high score. Just don’t be surprised if that franticness ceases short of what you may have initially come to expect.

The learning curve makes it likely you’ll want to blast through again at least once with your flight skills finally under control. And this is when Star Fox Zero is at its best: a thrilling, fleeting and flawed joyride.

I had a good time with Star Fox Zero, but it feels like a game whose design is built on contradictions; the desire to have the new targeting control, but with the classic Arwing gameplay keeps both from being entirely functional. It prizes arcade-style progression, but lacks modern concessions for console titles, like adequate checkpoints or multiple difficulty levels.

It’s hard to understand why Nintendo committed to an overly complex control scheme, even after the loud criticism that accompanied the development of Star Fox Zero. The game feels better than last year, but while enjoyable for brief moments, it made us hope for a motion-free single-screen option. The nostalgia is all there though, if that’s what you’re looking for.

StarFox Zero is the real followup to StarFox 64. Actually it's more a reboot of it than a totally new episode. It still offers hard-to-master but nice asymmetric gameplay and new vehicles, but it fails to be as surprising and as good as its model was in 1997, which is quite disappointing... without mentioning the graphics. Nostalgic fans will probably love it, though the others should be warned.

As much as there is to love in Star Fox Zero, sadly the awkward controls of various vehicles, and the horrendous forced second viewpoint and gyroscope targeting of regular Arwing and Landmaster stages almost ruin the entire experience.

Sometimes great, sometimes rough but mostly patchy, Star Fox Zero is depressingly mediocre. Fox and the gang deserve much better next time around.

It's a game that doesn't have the courage to be itself, so it throws every half-baked design idea it has at you instead. Next time, Nintendo, listen to the rabbit: trust your instincts.

Star Fox Zero is a decent but unspectacular return of a once great series, and is held back by forced motion controls and some questionable level design.

As a game that lives and dies on its mechanics, Star Fox Zero is only intermittently successful at selling its dual screen dynamics. It’s at its best during the classic Arwing sections, but the Walker form becomes overly fiddly and the different viewpoints often cause more problems than they solve. Sadly it’s somewhat fitting that one of the final Wii U first-party games still doesn’t convince us on the viability of a dual-screen home console.

The sad part is that Nintendo nearly always nails the controls in their games, and it's disappointing to see them fail here. As such, while I did enjoy seeing the sights and blasting enemies to bits, Star Fox Zero is far from perfect.

Star Fox Zero is a frustrating experience because it has the potential to be a great game – a fantastic game, actually – but fundamental flaws not only hold the game back, they make it downright unplayable at times despite relatively easy fixes.

StarFox Zero is torn apart between traditions and modernity, here embodied by PlatinumGames. Both were probably compatible but Nintendo's will to make the GamePad something essential to the gameplay mechanics definitely kills all the other good ideas around.

As fan service, it does a solid (if a little lazy) job of hitting all the right notes, it’s fun in brief moments, but we’ve seen far too much of it before in previous games. True fans have been waiting so long for a proper sequel that it’s hard to not walk away disappointed.

A bit too short, a little fiddly and a little less than invitingly re-playable to recommend to many more than the concrete fans or curious WiiU owners intrigued by the last hurrah of a dying platform.

The simple, enjoyable rail shooting of Star Fox 64 has in Star Fox Zero been replaced by contrived and obscure hardware gimmicks. A few decent levels salvage the overall experience to a small degree.

As a game, Star Fox Zero isn’t so much broken as deeply and disappointingly lacking in inspiration. Shiny but not smooth, it’s a game about a space-faring fox in a spaceship that turns into a chicken without any sense of joy, and that might be the biggest disappointment of all.

On a visual level Star Fox Zero looks great, and it has several really interesting ideas. Sadly the controller scheme is so frustrating that it ruins almost everything. And that’s really is too bad because it would have been a great nostalgic trip for fans of Lylat Wars/Star Fox 64.