I never played much Star Fox as a kid. Save for maybe a few minutes here and there at a friend or cousin’s house, I’ve basically not played the series whatsoever. So I was safely out on playing the new one arriving this summer for Switch 2. But a funny thing happened this morning: We actually learned who is making it–something that oddly doesn’t happen much with Nintendo games until we can watch the credits–and the answer has completely changed my plans.
The New York-based Velan Studios was delighted to announce today that it’s the development team working with Nintendo on Star Fox, and that the game is built on Velan’s proprietary engine, Viper. If you don’t know it by name, Velan is a fairly young team, established in 2016, with several games to its name. Of those, the most important one to me is Knockout City. The 3v3 dodgeball game was an incredibly fun arcade sports game, and I’ve never really gotten over the game coming offline a few years ago. It’s one of my favorite games ever.
I’ve followed the team since then and have been enjoying its more recent release, Midnight Murder Club, a PvP shooter set in a completely darkened mansion that demands players rely on flashlights and sounds to track down their opponents.
What these two very different games have in common, beyond their novel gameplay mechanics, is their abundance of charm. Both games offer ample opportunities for players to showcase their skills, but they were also soundtracked by the frequent laughter from those playing. There’s a childlike heart to both games that can’t be missed–what better way to capture a youthful spirit than things like dodgeball and hide-and-seek?
I don’t know much about Star Fox, but to me, that sounds like the perfect team to take on a Nintendo franchise where players fly through space and perform daring combat maneuvers on an adventure with colorful characters. To the extent I can get away with “rooting” for a studio, a relatively small team that made one of my favorite games but has since suffered some commercial struggles seems to qualify.
I assume the publisher and developer rekindled their relationship from earlier to make Star Fox happen. Believe it or not, the team’s very first game was Nintendo’s Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, an augmented-reality racing game. Velan would later go on to use the same tech in a Hot Wheels game, too, and has also released a virtual-reality pinball game called Bounce Arcade. This type of portfolio suggests a team willing to try unconventional things, and to bring Star Fox back, I think you need to think outside the box.
I’m excited to see Velan get called on for such a major project. As many players are surely returning to Star Fox as longtime fans hopeful for a revival that feels like it was worth the wait, I come to it from a decidedly different angle, but suddenly eager to play it, too.