Will’s Unpopular Opinion – Fox This Shit! – 5-2-16
About a week ago Wii-U released their newest iteration into their Star-Fox franchise with ‘Star-Fox Zero’, as in ‘Star-Fox Zero shits given’. This isn’t a game review. That’s not what this column or article is about or for, but rather a step back and quick analysis of why this game seems to be making waves the way it is. I’ve played the game, and can attest to a lot of the backlash and sore impressions it seems to be leaving, but I may be able to offer a few “apologists” points that seem to be going overlooked by bloggers, vloggers, and reviewers alike. The truth is, is this game is not the one everyone was expecting. It’s better.
When I sat down to play SF-Z, I was excited to command my Arwing as I hadn’t been able to in 10 years since it’s 2005 Namco foray with SF-Assault on the Gamecube. This game was met with generally decent reception, but changed the core gameplay as it added actual 3rd person action levels into the mix. Personally I loved it, but it took some getting used to. The same goes for ‘Zero’ as I’m now relearning how to pilot my spacecraft and utilize two screens at once. I’m not going to lie, this was hell to learn. But it seems as though changing the rules with every current version has become Star Fox’s m.o. 
– It first accomplished this with the SNES version in 1993 with the FX chip, revolutionizing gameplay and graphics at the time, and hadn’t turned back since. –
[Until now, where in an odd design decision, it’s lead the game down a degraded path as the game visually comes off as have being released five years ago. This isn’t a huge inconvenience, but a rather bizarre one, making me wonder if this game was shelved for years and finally “polished” and pushed to shelves for the sake of verisimilitude, so Nintendo would not have appeared to have abandoned it’s fan favorited flight sim property.]
– This isn’t a huge issue for new gamers but again seems to stick in the craw of players over 25. This in turn has created an issue where all of the kids who grew up playing the SNES 93′ version or the 1997 remake for N64, are now fully grown and are now doing reviews of their own for the beloved Slippy saving fox. And quite honestly, they sound like old men complaining about the weather.
Without naming names, I thought I’d take a trip down to the Googles and see what was the word on the proverbial Youtube streets. It was of no surprise that every video I pulled up was of a guy trying to play the new game, all while talking about “the way it used to be” and how “it should have been”. They all seemed to start off hating the game, and then around the halfway mark of their subjective rant, came to the realization that the game wasn’t as bad as they had initially lambasted it for, but “different”. Reviewers/vloggers seemed to all have midlife, mid sentence epiphanies about a topic they realized they had no baring in, and the videos typically ended with a wishy-washy pseudo review about how there should be some option to play it the old way, but the new way is just fine once you get accustomed to it.
When you (or anyone for that matter) has expectations of what something is going to be over what it turns out to be, it always seems to ruffle feathers. I’ll use The Force Awakens as a reference. (again.) Star Wars 7 would have been a fine movie if it was billed as a remake rather then a sequel. As a sequel, it’s laughable. It tries nothing new. It retells a story we had all seen before. (and better told.) Now Star Fox was never billed as a sequel. It was billed as a remake, and to expect the same thing just because it carries the same title is self indulgent and lazy. If SF-Zero had come out in 1994 as the sequel to the original, it would have been championed as being the most innovative game ever made. This would partially be due to it being “future tech”, but also because it wouldn’t have over 20 years of fan boys clamoring and attaching themselves to the 93′ edition, building memories and gestating with them for decades to come.
Whether you agree or not, this all seems to funnel into the idea that expectations and subjectifying the reviewed medium seem to go hand in hand. It’s seems to be an unavoidable consequence and after-math of reviews by reviewers today. A property is not what you want it to be. It’s it’s own thing, and comparing it to something you knew previously does the movie/game/song a disservice. It’s why you can’t say things like “It used to be like this.” It’s not. A remake is a different story, but even then creative liberties need to be made to push the medium into new territory. (albeit, motion controls for a flight sim.) Otherwise why even try to do it again at all if you’re just going to make the same thing again.
Art is always changing. It’s what makes it art. Games are not what 30 somethings remember them as from a time when you had to blow into cartridges to make them work.
There’s a saying in every Star Fox game, “do a barrel roll!” I feel like that could be the meta mantra for the entire Star Fox series, with every incarnation that follows. Don’t get used to what you know. Keep moving and overcome new obstacles. Maybe it’s time for some of these “pro-gamers” and reviewers to realize this game isn’t made for them. It’s made for children. Children who haven’t played the same game for 20+ years, and aren’t trying the new one for nostalgia sakes. They aren’t looking to relive any melancholy experience because this is their first. In fact if these older guys want to stay in the industry and be able to continually review games objectively, they might need to learn just how to let go and move on. It’s akin to my grandfather arguing they don’t make movies (or anything really) like they used to. Nintendo clearly has these seasoned gamers over a barrel. Now it’s time for them to roll with it or get out of the way….. “Good Luck”..
-Will Valle
