Save Dinosaur Planet from the evil General Scales.
- NA release: 23rd September 2002
- JP release: 27th September 2002
- EU release: 22nd November 2002
- Developer: Rare
- Publisher: Nintendo
- NGC Magazine Score: 72%
- Mods Used: None
One thing I want to say right out of the bat is that I think Star Fox Adventures is a great game. I know I’m going to be highly critical of it in this review because it really could have been something truly special. The game started out as a new IP called Dinosaur Planet and was very far into development before it was changed into a Star Fox game, with one of the main characters removed and another now taking a background role. I’ve played a build of Dinosaur Planet and I do think that the game is worse off because of this change, with some big emotional moments completely removed. Another huge change was being turned from an N64 game to a GameCube game.
This change was a bit of a mixed bag. Rare did a wonderful job of improving the graphics massively in such a short time, with some phenomenal fur effects that still look amazing in motion. In some areas, though, you can very clearly see the game’s N64 origins. This created a somewhat disjointed look (especially so in screenshots), yet the majority of the time it still looks great. Another thing that had to be changed was the world, due to the loading time added in using DVDs. Rare didn’t want to resort to loading times, so they added some oddly winding corridors (some with puzzles you have to solve every single time you go past) to hide the loading zone. Great for making the world seem more connected, but also somewhat annoying.
One clever thing that Rare did was understand that by changing the story and reducing the scope of the game late on, as well as these “loading zones”, the world they had to rearrange and cobble back together would feel disjointed, so they added a story element where chunks of the world had broken off, so Fox needs to use his Arwing to visit them. This adds some Arwing sections which are decent enough, but all feel the same.
For the most part, Star Fox Adventures is a wonderful game in a very similar style as Ocarina of Time, with a lovely world to explore and dungeons to work though. It’s not quite as natural in terms of progression, with a lot of instances where people randomly give you the item you need to progress (instead of a more natural progression), a problem that was part of the prototype I played as well. The world is fascinating, which makes it more annoying as Fox acts like he’d rather not be involved in anything that’s happening – it’s just a payday. There are plenty of powers Fox can get for his (or, rather, Krystal’s) staff, which in turn allows for more access to locations. It does feel a bit odd that the world is catered so much to the staff, though (in the original, Krystal and Sabre could use magic, their weapons were just used to direct it).
I’ve used the word disjointed a few times and it really is the best way to describe the entire game. While I loved it as a kid, something always felt off about it, and now I’ve played the prototype Dinosaur Planet, I can see where things have been cut apart and moved around, with it not matching its new placement very well. While I’m sure things would have needed to have been scaled back when turning it into a GameCube game, I feel like also turning it into a Star Fox game meant they had to tear away some interesting parts of the world and lore and didn’t have time to replace it, meaning some of the stronger story moments had to go. Even with all that, Rare’s brilliance still shines through all the cracks and it’s still wonderful to play.
Great
Once you’ve realised that health power-ups (or Dumbledand Pods in Starfox speak) are so plentiful, you need never die even once during the course of the game, you’ll just plough straight through every hazard you encounter, simply to save time. Fire traps in dungeons; barrels bouncing down slopes; freezing water that you’re not supposed to swim across; irritating little things that pop up and shoot gobs of shield-sapping stuff every few seconds… There’s no point expending the puny effort it takes to get past such uninspired traps the ‘right’ way because (a) if you can be bothered to ‘defeat’ them, they always regenerate anyway; and (b) there are crated filled with Dumbledang Pods around every corner. More Dumbledang than you ever dreamed of. And that stuff regenerates, too.
Martin Kitts, NGC Magazine #74
Remake or remaster?
It would be nice for Star Fox Adventures to get a re-release, but I would absolutely love it if Nintendo and Microsoft/Rare worked together on using Star Fox Adventures as a base to make a remastered Dinosaur Planet, with the original story restored and the lost locations added back in, featuring Sabre and Krystal’s original design. There’s something magical in this game that deserves a second chance.
Official Ways to get the game
There is no official way to get Star Fox Adventures.
Europe
Japan
North America
GameCube Games by Date
2002: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
2003: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
2004: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
2005: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
2006: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
It’s a real shame how the game turned out, ultimately ending the Nintendo-Rare partnership on a bit of a sour note.
Having finally now played the legendary N64 Dinosaur Planet means that we can now look at this game from a different perspective. As it turns out, the decision to change it into a Star Fox game was made well before it began being remade on the GameCube; meaning that its disjointed and unfinished nature had nothing to do with Nintendo’s meddling and everything to do with the looming Microsoft buyout setting a hard deadline on the project.
The original Dinosaur Planet appeared to be much grander in scope and ambition than the final game, but also more in-tune with point n’ click adventure game style interactions with the environment… which perhaps goes somewhere to explain why the combat system in Starfox Adventures is so utterly brain dead. You can literally just mash A to win against every enemy, it’s mind-numbing.
Playing Dinosaur Planet N64 though, I think what shocked me the most was just how much of it did end up in the final game. The snowspeeder minigame, the opening rail shooter section, the Spellstone, the hilarious shopkeeper, it’s all here in 64bit form! The majority of what made up the final Starfox Adventures was here and accounted for on the N64; you can see the parts of Dinosaur Planet that were preserved in Starfox Adventures.
But ultimately, the game never managed to coalesce into a satisfying whole. The core movement and combat just isn’t very fun, and the level design is too basic to really engage and compel the player. It’s impossible to look at Starfox Adventures and pine for its lost potential. Still, at least we can now get a glimpse at what could’ve been.
Also General Scales is a jobber and was always meant to be a jobber. That’s satisfying closure :p
Best Star Fox game, don’t even attempt to @ me!
I’ve been eager to play this one again, but with the GameCube Classics app being a thing, I’m holding off until that inevitably gets released there.
EDIT: The last sentence DCubed just posted was probably the most surprising thing about N64 Dinosaur Planet. That bit everyone complains about? Nah, it barely changed, plotwise. Just swapped in a different Final Boss.
Some stuff was kept even if it doesn’t make much sense. Like when Fox gets kidnapped and tied to a post and has to issue orders to a random Cloudrunner to defend him. It just comes out of nowhere, and vanishes right after. In the original, this was with Krystal’s companion.