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Stunning Handheld Gaming at Your Command

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 66 / 69
Date: August 29, 2006
Author: Amazon User

The Nintendo DS has enjoyed much success lately. Star Fox Command joins the ranks of being one of Nintendo's better DS games out there. It has a couple of misses, but it excels heavily in the places where it counts. Star Fox Command is a fantastic handheld gaming experience.

The Star Fox team, after defeating Andross, has disbanded. Soon afterwards, a new threat known as the Anglar has emerged. It's up to Fox McCloud to deal with these foes, and there's no way he can go at it alone. When you first go through the game, there's not really a whole lot you can do, and the story doesn't seem very satisfying. In fact, the first time through the game the path you go is completely set for you. The standard storyline is pretty short and easy. The good news is once you complete the standard story you can choose different paths to take, and uncover several different endings in the process. Each character has his/her own storyline. In short, the game will keep you busy for a while.

Star Fox Command definitely sports some fantastic graphics. Perhaps even some of the best the DS has seen. There's no slowdown, and the character models and storyboards are fantastically detailed. It's far superior to Star Fox 64. The graphics are just one of the high points of Star Fox Command.

One of the high points of Star Fox Command is the gameplay. While in the past Star Fox has pretty much been your standard flight/shooter. Before it was to kill everything in sight. Now the gameplay has taken on a more strategic feel. Just about everything you do is done on the touch screen for the game. At first it feels a little strange, but the execution is straight on. You'll have to plot out your ships courses and then fly to them.

This isn't to say you won't be doing any aerial combat. The game has a map mode and a battle mode. When in battle mode it's basically the same as all-range mode on Star Fox 64. This will mostly be used to battle bosses and shoot down enemies. From time to time you'll have to do a "chase" mission. In these mission you'll have to fulfill special tasks, such as shooting down a missile. The only thing the touch screen isn't used for is to shoot. You'll use the face buttons (or directional buttons) for that. Other than that, all your flying mechanics take place on the touch screen.

There are plenty of things to beware in a mission, however. The objective is mainly just to kill all the bad guys, but there are plenty of ways you can lose. If the Great Fox is destroyed, or the time runs out, or you lose all your spare pilots, the game is over. It may seem like a lot at first, but most of the areas to fight your missions in are pretty small, and it's not so hard to deal with everything going on at once. Of all these assets that could cause you to lose a mission, the only one to pay any real attention to is making sure the Great Fox doesn't get destroyed.

Star Fox also has multiplayer. Up to six people can play off of one card. Or you can go online and battle with three other people. Multiplayer drops the strategic ploy, though and instead pits you in aerial combat against your friends (or online opponents). Multiplayer basically consists of you shooting down your opponents and collecting the stars they drop. It's on a time limit, though, so you have to work fast. When the time runs out, the one with the most stars at the end wins. Multiplayer is a blast, but there really should've been a lot more of it to go around. There really aren't enough modes.

There's no voice acting in Star Fox Command. It's mostly the gibberish you heard in the original Star Fox on your SNES. However, the game does allow you to record your voice using the DS's microphone. You can say a few things into your DS microphone and Fox, while in combat, will say these things in your tone of voice. It's really cool, but doesn't really enhance the gameplay any at all. It's just a neat little gimmick.

Star Fox Command is a great game. It has a couple of short-commings, but for the most part, it's a great gaming experience. Star Fox fans should be pleased at the new strategic direction of the game, and the intuitive gameplay.

On the Positive Side

+The game looks absolutely gorgeous
+The strategic gameplay is fairly addictive
+The touch screen controls are great
+Extras after you complete the main storyline
+Different scenarios
+Recording your own voice is pretty cool
+There's Multiplayer

On the Negative side
-The main storyline is rather short
-The game is also rather easy
-Multiplayer is fun, but severely limited
-Even though it's really nice to record your own voice, it's rather sad that the characters don't have real voices, and instead have the same gibberish used in the original Star Fox

Great Space Combat Fun, Few Complaints

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 10 / 10
Date: December 31, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Star Fox Command DS brings the fun space combat world of Star Fox to your DS handheld. It's actually quite fun, strategizing your order of attack and spinning into action!

Your favorite characters of Star Fox are in trouble, and need to a series of enemies. First, you get the overall top-down map screen. Each character's ship can fly a certain amount of distance in a turn - simply draw a line to say where they go. Use the stylus to wipe out some of the 'fog of war', and your main ship can shoot missiles. You only have a certain number of turns available, so plan your movements wisely.

When your ship encounters an enemy ship, you switch into real time combat. In this mode, you drag your stylus around on the bottom screen to "steer" while the top screen shows you where you're flying. You fly through rings to get power-ups, and shoot at enemies (with the D-pad on the left) to fire. It really is quite intuitive - no up/down, left/right issues. Simply drag your stylus as the ship flies. You spin your stylus in a circle to do the classic barrel roll, and there are two easy-access spots to tap to do a U-turn or a loop.

I love space combat, and it was really fun to have this type of game available on a handheld. I kept expecting to put the game down after a mission - but I'd say "just one more ..." and keep going. Note that these missions aren't easy! Expect to have to replay some of them several times to get through. You do have to learn the strategies and tactics of three dimensional combat.

The game expects you to go through a single pass rather quickly - but the beauty is that you then go back and re-play it, now having new options available at every stage. Instead of just contacting Slippy, now you have other choices you can do instead that are more difficult. You choose at each step what to do, and it affects the types of missions you take on and the endings you get to see. Think of it as built in difficulty levels.

A key element of space combat games are the visuals - with you trying to move and think real time in three dimensions, it's critical that you can see the terrain, your enemies, and anything else that might get in the way. While the DS graphics in general are nice, it wasn't always easy to see what you were fighting. The graphics were sometimes unclear - the ship's faded graphic would blend right in to the background's faded graphic.

Also, your ship is right in the center of the screen, and takes up a fair amount of it. This makes it challenging if you're right behind a ship, to see it. Surely they could have given you an in-cockpit view or at least a transparent ship.

For vocals, they give you the high pitched gibberish that means it's perfect for all languages. No need to do new vocal tracks for this game! Still, in modern times, it would be nice to have a regular vocal track available. It adds a whole additional dimension of enjoyment when you have great voice actors bringing life to the characters.

Still, this is a superb game for the DS, and one I really enjoy. Well recommended!

Fox McCloud is back

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 8 / 9
Date: September 13, 2006
Author: Amazon User

One of Nintendo's lesser known, but nonetheless fun, franchises has now hit the DS too. Star Fox Command returns the series to it's dog-fighting, space shooting roots that made the series such a hit on the Super NES and N64 years ago, by ditching out of the ship platforming and rail based missions in favor of some pretty wide open environments and some innovative features using the touch screen to help pilot your ship. The graphics are some of the best to be seen on the DS so far, despite some polygonal break up here and there, visually the game still packs a punch. The touch screen features are also some of the best of any game to take advantage of on the DS, and the multiple strategic options and braching storylines help make Star Fox Command a winner. The only real drawbacks of Star Fox Command is that it's ultimately too short and may be too easy for some, but the multiplayer modes are fun enough (only needing one DS card to play with others is always something to be happy about), and the WiFi capabilities are a nice touch as well. All in all, while it's not perfect, Star Fox Command is yet another great, first party DS game that further helps sell the dual screened hand held as the best portable system on the market today.

A Great Game for a 9 Year Old

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 6 / 6
Date: May 09, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I purchased this game for my [...] son for our China trip. He started to play the game as soon as it arrived - 2 days before our trip. I was worried about him getting bored of the game during the trip. To my surprise, he had been playing the game during the entire 3 weeks. He was fascinated by it and told me that this was the best game I've ever bought for him!

Touch screen NOT a negative point!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 5 / 5
Date: September 07, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I just thought there might be one big concern (and a few small ones) for almost EVERYONE who was considering buying this game - the touch screen, and how it's used to control nearly every single aspect of the game. Here's the mindset you need: It's gonna be really hard to pull off a really sweet portable flying game. So you get used to the controls, 'cos once you do, you're gonna have a totally awesome flying game in your pocket. And it's not that hard. You get it, and it's worth it - even becomes nearly intuitive.

Graphics - FANTASTIC! IGN and Amazon have some lo-res shots that really didn't convey how beautiful this game is - in fact, in the online screens, the game kinda looks straight-up BAD. Don't be fooled - it's gorgeous.

The story and dialogue - the voice acting, or lack thereof replaced by tweetering and twittering, SUCKS. The dialogue ITSELF, though, is pretty cool - the characters are way more fleshed out than they ever were in the N64 StarFox - Fox's history with Krystal, Flaco's independance and refusal to admit to softer emotions and feelings (that in the N64 game was just a blustery façade), Slippy's insecurity (which was just idiocy in the N64 game), and the dialogue from Star Wolf - it's all way better.

"I hate that frog..."

Not a hit, but on the right Track

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 5 / 7
Date: November 26, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Star fox is one of nintendo's many great franchises, and one with many fans. Unfortunately, the newer starfox have strayed away from the games roots, with not-so-fantastic results. This newest starfox hopes to change that, and succeeds at taking the series back to space combat, but some new changes do not sit too well with the overall gameplay.

This game is a space shooter, and all active gameplay is played through the cockpit of a spaceship. The last traditional Star fox game, Star fox 64, handled controlling your ship with ease by using the analog stick on the N64. In command, there is a new control scheme, in which you use the touch screen to maneuver your ship and target your enemies. This takes a little gatting used to, and granted it is not the best way to play star fox, it does work in delivering precision and handling on the most basic level. But this gets very dificult when trying to make a turn over 90 degrees, because the ships turn slowly, unless you want to look down and push the 180 turn button at the bottom of the screen, which is a chore. Also speeding up and breaking is done by double-tapping either the top or bottom of the screen, which is a nighmare while in an intense dogfight. But the worst of the meneuvers is the barrel roll, which is done by scribbling back and forth on the screen. This is increadibly unresponsive and takes way to much effort to pull of the move, which in earlier games, could have been taken care of by the push of a button. These issues are big and definately pull the game down from being great.

The next dissapointment is the inclusion of turn-based strategy portions of gameplay before each battle. These parts of the game are not fun, and are very frustrating due to the interupting fog. This also leads to the inclusion of a time limit. It is supposed to represent fuel, but if this is true, how are all of your ship sharing the same fuel tank? It is a stupid idea to make it a huge part of the game, and could have actually worked if it was less crucial, and more developed.

This leads to my final gripe about the game. The game is very repetative. You wont be doing much more than flying in an empty open course shooting the same old enemies, and looking out for that darn time limit. All the environments look different from each other, but they all play the same because there is nothing there. You wont be seeing much else in the game, and the childish story does not help much either. The next Star fox should feel more epic, not kiddie. Multiplayer also has no variety, just flying around an empty course, shooting the other people. Its fun for a few times, but it wears of rather quick. The whole game's novelty wears off rather quick. Once you master the controls, you realize that there is not much more to do.

This game would make a nice rental. What was mentioned above is mostly what is wrong with the game, but there is fun to be had here. This game is a pathway to putting the franchise back on track, and it does make changes, but it is too flawed and shallow for its own good. That is why I give it a 3 out of 5.

Finally, the Star Fox team goes back to what they do best - Flying

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 4 / 5
Date: September 21, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Star Fox Command (2006.)

INTRODUCTION:
When Nintendo and Shigeru Miyamoto (Mario, Zelda) released Star Fox on the Super Nintendo in 1993, they released a game that was revolutionary in a number of ways. And when they followed it up in 1997 with Star Fox 64, the game was hailed as one of the greatest video games of its kind ever made.

Unfortunately, from there this series went down the toilet.

The Gamecube games strayed far from the classic, excellent formula of earlier games, forcing the player into too many "on-foot" missions, and not enough of the awesome flying missions that won gamers over to begin with. Would there never be another Star Fox 64? Was this series doomed?

Nintendo promised fans a new Star Fox for the Nintendo DS portable gaming system.

One that was all flying.

So, how does this new one measure up? Is it another stinker, or is the series finally redeemed?

OVERVIEW:
Nintendo released Star Fox Command for the Nintendo DS in late August of 2006. The game features a single-player adventure mode with multiple, branching paths and endings that can be unlocked. There are also multiplayer modes, both ad-hoc and wi-fi.

REVIEW:
I waited a long time for this one. Sure, the game doesn't top Star Fox 64 (not likely Miyamoto is ever gonna top that one), but this definitely stands as one of the finest entries in the series so far. It's not perfect, but far better than the hit-and-miss stuff this series has been churning out for the last decade.

-THE GOOD-
-FLYING. Finally, you're back in the cockpit once and for all. This is the way Star Fox is supposed to be.
-MULTIPLE CRAFTS/CHARACTERS. You'll control several characters in certain missions, with each one possessing his/her own unique craft. For instance, while Fox McCloud's machine is generally well-rounded, Slippy Toad's craft sacrifices boosting strength for shooting strength. No two ships are totally alike.
-NUMEROUS LOCALES AND BRANCHING PATHS. There are a ton of worlds in this game, and a ton of different levels and paths to get through. You can only go through one path at first, but beat the game once and TONS of paths open up. Even after you beat this game, you'll be playing it for quite some time.
-MULTIPLAYER. Anyone who played Star Fox 64 knows this series had one of the best multiplayer modes ever. And on the DS, Nintendo doesn't fail with the quality of this mode. You can do ad-hoc multiplayer with friends, or you can go on the Nintendo WFC connection, and play against opponents anywhere on the planet! It's one of the best Nintendo wi-fi uses yet.
-NEW TACTICAL ELEMENT. The game isn't all flying this time. You must plan strategically on a map how to attack the enemy, where best to cut them off, how to get power-up items, etc. There's also a fog of war element to keep things interesting, and you can use your stylus to scratch away the fog - but only a little bit each turn. This new element makes for some interesting combat.
-TOUCH SCREEN PUT TO GOOD USE. The entire game is controlled using the touch screen, and while I was skeptical at first, Nintendo does a good job with it here. The only thing you don't do with the touch screen is fire your shots. This may seem a little weird at first, but you should grow to love it.

-THE BAD-
-SOMETIMES REPETITIVE. Similar battle scenarios can occur all too often - the Missile and Mothership scenarios come to mind. Not to mention enemies often repeat.
-TIME/TURN LIMITS. If there's one thing that really hurts this game, this is it. You only have a set number of turns to achieve victory. You can earn more by trashing an enemy base, but this is easier said than done, as enemy bases will often be shrouded in the fog of war. Sometimes I'll be totally killing my enemies, and lose only because I ran out of turns - on account of I couldn't find the enemy base shrouded in the fog of war.
-UNFORGIVING. On the map, if your foes reach the Great Fox, you lose. Instantly. The Great Fox has no defenses, so even if you're doing great on your mission, if even one stray foe or missile gets to the ship, it's all over.
-NO CONFIGURATION MODE. Not everyone is gonna go for the new touch screen scheme. Don't get me wrong, I love it to death, but I would at least like the CHOICE of a button-oriented control schematic.
-IN WI-FI MULTIPLAYER, YOU CAN ONLY PILOT THE FOX-STYLE ARWING. You don't get a choice of ships. This blows, since this game had some cool ones that would have ruled in multiplayer.
-WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO THE VOICE ACTING!? Anyone who played the original Star Fox on the Super Nintendo knows the characters, due to the game limitations of the day, spoke an odd gibberish language. Star Fox 64 fixed this, by hiring voice actors - damn good ones who made the game a lot more enjoyable. With all the improvements in the series, you'd think they would have improved on the voice acting. DEAD WRONG. They go back to the first-game gibberish! This is totally unforgivable. They claim you can record your own voice, but this is not true. You just record your voice and they set the gibberish tones to the tones of your voice.
-NO MICROPHONE USAGE IN THE MULTIPLAYER MODE. Come on, Nintendo! You've got this thing at your disposal, start putting it to use!

OVERALL:
Overall, despite the obvious flaws, Star Fox Command is a great game. Other games gave me doubts on the whole touch screen control scheme thing, but here that has been redeemed. This game is not as good as Star Fox 64, but it definitely ranks as my number two entry in a series that is all too scattershot. Nintendo DS owners should add this one to their collections - although you may want to try before you buy.

EDITION NOTES:
This game is a fairly recent release at the time

Fantastic single player; lackluster multiplayer - Feels like a rushed title

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 4 / 5
Date: September 02, 2006
Author: Amazon User

3 1/2 Stars

This is actually the first Star Fox game I've ever played. I just wasn't into flight games when I was younger.

I was excited to get this game for the multiplayer dogfights. But it turns out I was hoping for too much. To me, it seems like the multiplay was an afterthought (the opposite of Metroid PH where the multiplay is strong but the single player campaign is weak). The game doesn't include any settings to change besides shield strength and controls; no time limit options, level select, CPU vs., or teams. Just 2 - 6 player fights, which is still fun, but a letdown.

However, the single player game is really great. Drawing a path to determine battles adds some nice strategy elements. But the real fun is in the battles themselves which are never too challenging, but not exactly a walk in the park. You get to use many different characters also (including members of Star Wolf), which is fantastic because they each have their distinct strengths and weaknesses. The touch screen controls are intuitive and work well. The game is beautiful. The mountain landscapes you fly over are impressive graphically. And the story is serviceable.

In all, I can't help but feel like this game was rushed to be released. It's certainly a nice start for the series on the DS. I'd like to see a sequel so that they can offer a robust multiplayer mode and maybe co-op play. This game could have been so much more, but as it is now, it's a fun and solid game worth the lower $29.99 price (especially with the nine different endings which add lots of replay value).

A foxy DS game

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: October 06, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I've always felt that Nintendo treated its Starfox franchise like a lab rat. Even the original, which was released on the Super Nintendo, used the FX Chip, a new 3D technology. Starfox 64, what I consider the pinnacle of the series, was the first major release to use rumble technology and launched bundled with Nintendo's N64 Rumble Pack. Starfox Adventures took things to the ground and ultimately failed as a boring, fetch quest marathon. Starfox Command, the series' first handheld debut, puts Starfox back where he belongs: in the sky. But it does so in a strange, DS-appropriate way that isn't quite great but it also isn't bad, either.

Consider this experiment a success, because it shows that the Nintendo DS can handle a flight action game very well. Starfox Command utilizes only the Nintendo DS touch screen and the L Trigger (or R Trigger, for left-handed players) and it does so very well. Using the touch screen, players control their pitch and yaw, steering the Arwing with precision. Making a frantic scratching motion sends the Arwing into its classic laser-deflecting barrel roll, and there are buttons found on the touch screen to pull off other maneuvers like flips. The L/R Trigger is the only non-touch-based control button, and it allows you to shoot your lasers. Any other button allows you to shoot as well, but the L/R Triggers are definitely the most intuitive.

The touch screen mechanics don't end there. Q-Games had to implement something new into their game to set Starfox Command apart from other Starfox games, so they made the game's battles spread out into a turn-based strategy mechanic. Each mission will throw you out onto a battlefield diagram where you'll direct your Starfox team around the map, engaging in conflict with enemy ships and taking over bases. The goal in every mission is to keep the big, defenseless Great Fox afloat while destroying all of the bad guys and stopping their missiles from reaching Great Fox. On the diagram you can fly over power-ups that give the Great Fox a little defense of its own, as well as power-ups that give you more time on the master clock for each mission. That's right, each mission has a time restraint. What a bummer.

The conflicts (or more appropriately, scuffles) that you'll engage in are over far too quickly, and that's unfortunate because they're where the old-school Starfox charm is delivered. I've actually completed some of these little battles in mere seconds. Sometimes you're asked to take out several different units, and sometimes they appear right in front of you, making it all too easy. Now, near the end of the storyline, I started engaging in much more difficult battles-some that, admittedly, had me frustrated and wondering what to do-but most of the game I plowed through untouched.

The game's over pretty quickly, but Starfox Command offers branching paths and multiple endings, and is also one of the many games these days that takes advantage of the DS's WiFi capabilities. With a trusty wireless Internet connection, players can connect and duke it out in the Corneria skies any time of the day. The wireless battles are fun and entertaining as you'd expect them to be, after all, they're Starfox flight battles. What more could you ask for?

Visually, Starfox Command is a standout as one of the more impressive DS games that runs on a 3D engine. The frame rate is almost always smooth, though it admittedly does slip up from time to time. There is a considerable amount of things moving around at all times and despite some fog issues, Starfox Command looks fantastic. It also sounds pretty good, and the standard Starfox gibberish is a nice addition-especially when you record your own voice to use in the cut-scenes!

Overall, Starfox Command is a pretty successful lab rat. The gameplay holds up pretty well but it has the same old Starfox problem; the thrills are over far too quickly and far too easily. The visuals run smoothly and the presentation isn't bad. The online multiplayer is quite a service for Starfox fans who want to take on the world with their skills. Starfox makes a decent handheld landing, albeit with a few holes in its wings-it's not perfect, but it'll entertain fans of the series regardless.

Poor controls, boring missions

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: October 22, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Maybe it's just a matter of taste, but I couldn't get into the control scheme. I found it frustrating and painful. That aside the actual missions that I played - though I admit I gave the game away before I got very far - were pretty boring. Fly around in an open environment (pretty much 100% open, no nothing) and shoot 2-6 droids.

I suggest playing the game yourself before buying - you really need to know what you're getting into.

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