Starwing for the SNES

 

Starwing for the snes came out in 1993 and was the first of the starfox games series and was the first 3D game for snes.

The plot is fairly straight forward: Andross the mad scientist has fled to venom after banishment for Corneria and has declared war on said planet with his massive army. General Pepper decides to launch the "airwing"  so he summons you the elite mercenary team which you are a part of. You are the leader Fox Mc Cloud.

The plot of the game is fairly thin and not the most important thing. The most important thing in this game is the gameplay mechanics. Nintendo did an amazing job with the 3D mechanics as when you first start the game you can choose between four different types of controls the main differences being if the up and down controls are inversed. Personally I'm not a fan of the inversion but the fact that you have more than two control options in a early snes game is just fantastic.Now of course this game is where you get the infamous do a barrel roll. When you begin the game you can choose between several different routes. The first level takes place on Corneria and the boss is fairly easy. The second level no matter what takes place in first person mode which made me love the game even more but the problem with this is that it's really hard to manoeuvre around and dodge objects (such as rotating blocks, IN SPACE!!) because you have very little spatial awareness. The boss for this level is quite hard to beat due to the inability to dodge anything. Now on to level 3 which is the same as level two except now you have spatial awareness. The final level is planet Venom where you fight the boss a giant demonic face that vomits square blocks at you.

The graphics for this thing are fairly good for an old 3D game and is of course blocky.The game is great and starts of one the most famous series for Nintendo and it's not to see why, though the plot is as thin paper really it's all about the gameplay. The gameplay in this game is amazing for its time as the 3D mechanics paved the way for many Nintendo games to come. But one of the major problems is the first person perspective is just awful and just doesn't work. The bosses each look unique and that makes them enjoyable and fun but the fights with  the bosses can be fairly repetitive except for the last one. Now for all its faults I will give this game an 8/10 as it is a great introduction into this legendary series.