If you’re yearning for a modern reinterpretation of Star Fox’s rail-shooter gameplay but don’t own a Switch 2 to play the upcoming remake, then you’ll want to consider playing Wild Blue Skies. Developed by Chuhai Labs and published by Balor Games, the game got a release date during today’s The Mix Summer Game Showcase.
Specifically, Wild Blue Skies will be released for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S on August 13. Like Star Fox, it’s a sci-fi rail shooter starring anthropomorphic animals. In this case, players control a dog named Bowie Stray who is on a mission with the Blue Bombers to stop Grimclaw (this game’s version of Andross). They do so during on-rails missions where players have to fly across alien planets and deal with whatever obstacles or gimmicks each level throws at them.
There’s a free demo of Wild Blue Skies you can try on Steam. When you play it, you’ll find that it’s a very polished spiritual successor to classic games like Star Fox. It doesn’t reinvent the genre, but at the time of its reveal, it did not need to.
When Wild Blue Skies was first announced last year, the Star Fox series had been missing in action for several years as Nintendo did not seem interested in continuing it. The game also had the pedigree of being worked on by Giles Goddard, one of the programmers of the original Star Fox.
That changed in April, when Nintendo revealed a Star Fox 64 remake for Nintendo Switch 2, simply titled Star Fox. That game is out on June 25, beating Wild Blue Skies to the punch by about a month and a half. Still, Wild Blue Skies won’t have its thunder completely stolen, as it’s not coming out on any Nintendo systems.
When it comes out on August 13, Wild Blue Skies can serve as a nice alternative for PC, PlayStation, and Xbox players who can’t play the new Star Fox. Perhaps both of these games can kick off a renaissance for the rail shooter genre as a whole.