Retro Vault is our regular weekly feature in which we dive into gaming's past and share five classic nuggets of retro nostalgia. If you missed last week's Retro Vault you can read it here.
April 1997 - Star Fox 64 artwork
After the success of its SNES game Star Fox (known in Europe as Starwing due to copyright issues), Nintendo got to work on a sequel. Star Fox 2 was also originally designed to be a SNES game, making use of an improved version of the Super FX chip that allowed the polygonal graphics of the first game.
Although Star Fox 2 was completed, the game was scrapped before release. According to the game's programmer Dylan Cuthbert, Shigeru Miyamoto decided to cancel it because he wanted there to be a clean break between 3D games on the SNES and 3D games on the upcoming Nintendo 64, which was originally due to be released much sooner than it ultimately was.
After Star Fox 2 was scrapped, a new sequel went into production for the Nintendo 64. Star Fox 64 (known as Lylat Wars in Europe... that pesky copyright again) saw Fox McCloud and the Star Fox team once again trying to put an end to the evil Andross, while also trying to keep their distance from the similarly nasty Star Wolf team. The game was also notable for the Rumble Pak, a peripheral included with the game that plugged into the back of the Nintendo 64 controller and provided rumble for the first time in console gaming.
While numerous Star Fox sequels have since been released, it's argued that Star Fox 64 was the high point of the series and has yet to be bettered. A recent 3DS remake only served to make the wait for a new (and excellent) Star Fox game even less bearable.
