When Nintendo’s Star Fox crew shows up at the beginning of Ubisoft’s new toy-based space epic, Starlink: Battle for Atlas, they’re ready to see the adventure through to the very end. They’re a surprisingly big part of the Switch version of the game.
We’ve known since June that Star Fox characters would be in the Switch version and, obviously, not in the Xbox One and PS4 versions. But we expected slighter than what we’ve now had a chance to play.
Structurally, Star Fox’s heavy involvement in the game makes sense. Starlink is a toy-based series (though people can play it entirely digitally, if they prefer). The toys are spaceships that come with modular weapons, wings and pilots.
In another toy series like Activision’s Skylanders, Crash Bandicoot can show up and join the Skylanders army in a little cameo. But each of the pilots in Starlink are fully realised characters. They talk. They have personalities. They react according to those personalities as they explore Atlas, discovering new life, making alien allies and battling mysterious mechanical foes.
In the Nintendo Switch version of the game, Fox McCloud is one of those pilots and does all of that.
Since each of the game’s pilots can be flying the player’s ship at any time, each pilot has to be ready to operate under any given situation. Early on in the game, an alien asks the player where they come from. If the game’s main character, Mason Rana is piloting, he says they’re mostly from Earth (specifically New Jersey.)
If Fox McCloud is at the stick, he adds that he hails from Papetoon.
Every story-based battle, every new discovery, every first contact with an alien race, Fox and his team are just as prepared to handle as the other nine playable pilots of Starlink.
And Fox, Slippy, Peppy and Falco aren’t in the Atlas area for no reason. They’re on a mission to hunt down the villainous Wolf. Their mission is part of a side story that opens up as the game’s main story progresses, involving investigation and dogfights against some fearsome foes.
So yeah, Fox McCloud and the rest of Star Fox have their work cut out for them in Starlink: Battle for Atlas. Fans of Nintendo’s fabulous flying fox should be very pleased.
It’s not quite a full-fledged Star Fox spin-off game, but there’s enough of the Nintendo series here to elevate the Switch edition well beyond a passing cameo.
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11 responses to “There’s A Lot More Star Fox In Starlink Than We Expected”
Well, this just went from a ‘maybe’ purchase to a ‘highly likely’ one for me. Hopefully the Switch version of this game does well and we get a dedicated Star Fox game from Ninty ASAP.
I know this comment is super late but i just got it last week and its seriously awesome on the switch. for one i cant believe how good it looks considering the hardware its running on and secondly i havent swapped from the Arwing or Fox for the entire of the game and it honestly felt like a pretty decent starfox game to to me.
Glad you’re enjoying it! I picked it up a few days after it was released and I’ve been having a blast with it. I’ve also spent most of my time as Fox in the Arwing and I agree with your sentiments around it feeling like a pretty good Starfox game. Starlink has received a lot of criticism for being repetitive and a bit boring but that hasn’t been my experience.
I’d love a seamless universe type Star Fox game. Take notes Nintendo, this’d be a great way to evolve the increasingly stale gameplay format of previous Star Fox games.
No Fox’s Sky?
I’m down for that honestly, but with a greater focus on space combat.
I checked out the starter pack in JB Hi Fi today & the toys are pretty massive (in a relative sense). i think the Arwing is bigger than Switch controller, so going to be weird playing with it mounted on top.
Yeah, it looks quite unwieldy. I’m wondering how the top heaviness will affect your hand muscles. If the models are fairly light it shouldn’t be too bad but if they have some weight it could cause some problems.
Some of the other models look even bigger but the box wasn’t heavy, so they might be light enough that they won’t be too much of an issue.
At least you can play the game without the models attached to the controller, since the models transfer data to the console -from what I’ve read on the subject.
A friend was saying the arwing comes in around 350g, while the pro controller is about 250g. Sounds like fun.
I hope there is a demo. I need to know if I will get sim sick