Star Fox (universe)



The Star Fox universe refers to the Smash Bros. series' collection of characters, stages, and properties that hail from Nintendo's Star Fox series of on-rails space shooter video games. They are developed by various companies such as Rare and Namco and are published by Nintendo. The series takes place in a Star Wars-like galaxy whose characters are a diverse cast of anthropomorphic animals. The games in the series generally revolve around an interstellar mercenary team named Star Fox, consisting of the Arwing pilots Fox McCloud, Falco Lombardi, Peppy Hare, Slippy Toad, Krystal and ROB64 from the outset, and the team is assigned to combat forces that spontaneously threaten the galaxy

Franchise description
The original Star Fox was released in 1993 for the SNES, and it was heavily hyped and garnered much critical acclaim for its then-revolutionary feature: 3-dimensional polygon-based graphics, which was uncommon and new for a console video game at the time, allowed for obstacle-course gameplay presented in the third person in 3D environments. It was made possible by the game cart's Super FX chip, a coprocessor used to accelerate graphics display. While the game was very successful, in 1997 the franchise got its officially canonical start with the immensely acclaimed and successful Star Fox 64 for Nintendo 64, which was essentially a redesigned and upgraded version of the previous game. Featuring a revised and better-designed on-rails 3D space-shooting system, along with better visuals and a cinematic storyline driven by voice acting which reviewers considered impressive, Star Fox 64 was noted as an instant classic for its time and was the second best-selling game of 1997, behind Mario Kart 64. The game also included a rumble pak for the Nintendo 64 controller and was the first game to support it. The characters, world, and storyline were rewritten and made the start of Star Fox series continuity, and it remains one of the most popular games in the series.

The franchise underwent a 5-year hiatus, during which main series character Fox McCloud was featured in 1999's Super Smash Bros. for the Nintendo 64 as a playable character, and in 2001 he and series costar Falco Lombardi were featured as playable characters in the 2001 sequel Super Smash Bros. Melee. The franchise returned to the video game mainstream through unusual circumstances: British developer Rare, creater of the Donkey Kong Country series and subsequent franchise, was developing a 3D Zelda-style adventure game for the Nintendo 64 titled Dinosaur Planet featuring anthropomorphic animal characters, which Rare canceled far into development. Nintendo president Shigeru Miyamoto looked at the game's content and noted similarities of character design to the Star Fox series, so it was decided that it be redesigned into what would become Star Fox Adventures for the Gamecube in 2002. Set eight years after Star Fox 64, the game was a dramatic departure for the franchise and featured immensely praised graphics and new characters such as female fox Krystal and dinosauric Prince Tricky. Its reviews ranged from glowing to mediocre, however.

Since then several more installments in the Star Fox franchise have been and continue to be released. In 2005 Namco developed Star Fox Assault for the GameCube, returning to its space-shooter roots but with additional on-foot missions, and in 2006 Q-Games developed Star Fox Command for the Nintendo DS, again with aircraft-based gameplay and continuing the continuity. It is the first Star Fox game developed for a handheld and is also the first to feature online multiplayer. In 2006 a trailer for 2007's Super Smash Bros. Brawl showed that Fox McCloud will be available as a playable character like in previous Smash Bros. games, and although it was unannounced, Shigeru Miyamoto has expressed interest in developing a Star Fox game for Wii in the future.

The Star Fox series depicts a galaxy where anthropomorphic animals exist on various planets, and whenever a new threat of interplanetary proportions emerges, a mercenary team titled "Star Fox" is called on by the planet Corneria's Defense Forces commander-in-chief, General Pepper, to combat and vanquish the threat using their assault spacecraft, the Arwings, as well as other classes of vehicles. Stages of gameplay in traditional Star Fox games are on-rails space-shooting stages where the player, as Star Fox team leader Fox McCloud, is accompanied and helped by computer-controlled wingmen, and stages will be made easier if the wingmen are kept alive so that they can return the next mission. Story unfolds in epic, cinematic fashion throughout most Star Fox games, enough that it may be said that Star Wars is an influence on the franchise.

In Star Fox 64, it is wizened scientist Andross, a scientist exiled from Corneria by General Pepper, that wages war against Corneria from the planetary wasteland of Venom, and Star Fox team's Fox McCloud, Falco Lombardi, Peppy Hare, and Slippy Toad must defeat the now biologically-twisted and enlarged being. Eight years afterward in Star Fox Adventures, series vixen Krystal, from the destroyed planet Cerinia, is trying to assist the residents of the crumbling Dinosaur Planet Sauria in combatting General Scales, and Star Fox goes over there to rescue both Krystal and the planet. One Year later by Star Fox: Assault, Krystal has taken Peppy Hare's place, and the team must now take flight to combat and defeat a race of half-mechanical insects called the Aparoids. And after that in Star Fox: Command, the team must take flight again to combat and defeat a race called the Anglars, hailing from the acidic oceans of the planet Venom. Many endings are available in this game, but it is implied that there will be one ending that will be used canonically as the base of what is suspected to be a new Star Fox game that will be released for Wii in the future.

In Super Smash Bros.
The Star Fox franchise is represented as one of several "standard universes" found in SSB, with one character and one stage.

Character

 * Fox: The son of Star Fox team founder James McCloud, who was seemingly killed when his supposed teammate Pigma Dengar betrayed him to Andross' custody, Fox leads the Star Fox mercenary team in his father's name. He starts out an amateur Arwing pilot but gets more confident and cockier over the years. His main arch-enemy at first is the villainous ape scientist Andross, but his chief rival pilot throughout the series is Wolf O'Donnel, and his romantic interest is the blue fox Krystal. Among his acts of interstellar heroism are destroying Andross more than once, rescuing Sauria the Dinosaur Planet, destroying the Aparoid Queen, and defeating the Anglars. As a fighter in SSB, Fox uses a slow-ish blaster and is intermediately heavy.

Stage
Super Smash Bros. features one Star Fox-themed stage:
 * Sector Z: The largest stage in the game takes place along the length of the Star Fox central command ship, the Great Fox, and it resides in an area of the galaxy called Sector Z, so named for the Z-shaped nebula in the background. The KO-boundaries on either side of the stage are rather close to the stage's edges, so a Smash hit will probably make for a KO.

In Super Smash Bros. Melee
Melee is much bigger than Smash, and the amount of properties from the Star Fox franchise is increased proportionally - though oddly enough, there are no battling items that represent the Star Fox series.

Characters

 * Fox: Returning from SSB, but redesigned to sport drastically increased agility and dropping speed and a lighter build, Fox becomes one of the swiftest and most effective characters in the game. His blaster is redesigned to do rapid non-knockback damage and he gains a Fox Illusion tackle as his new B-Forward move. He is ranked as a top tier fighter and is often used by the world's best players of the game.
 * Falco: A new character that functions as a direct clone of Fox. Falco Lombardi is the smart-mouthed but experienced and trustworthy companion member of the Star Fox team, and is the most adept Arwing pilot of Fox's wingmates. His past is a mystery to the team, and after Star Fox 64 he left the team for personal reasons, but after Star Fox Adventures he has since returned to his post to rediscover the thrill of flying with the team. It is hinted that Falco was formerly a member of a gang. As a Melee fighter, Falco is a modified version of Fox whose statistics more closely resemble the SSB version of Fox, and his slower blaster features knockback. He is a top-tier-ranked fighter as well for his blend of speed and power.

Stages
Super Smash Bros. Melee features two Star Fox-themed stages:


 * Lylat System: Corneria: The spiritual successor to the original Sector Z stage, this is quite literally the same Great Fox-based stage as before, but with some important differences: The Great Fox is somewhat less large, the ship's blasters at its lower left end can be jumped on as a platform, the Arwings fly around and attack differently, and the background is now the 3D environment of the planet Corneria that the Great Fox flies through as the stage progresses.
 * Lylat System: Venom: This stage is now the Great Fox rotated ninety degrees, so that its front end faces the camera, and the ship's four wings are the platforms where the battling takes place on. The Great Fox travels across the reaches of the acidic planet Venom as the stage progresses. The layout of the stage is rather small and almost cramped, making for unusual battles.

Full Trophy List

 * Fox McCloud's three game trophies
 * Falco Lombardi's three game trophies
 * Andross (trophy)
 * Andross (rare trophy)
 * Arwing (trophy)
 * Great Fox (trophy)
 * Landmaster Tank (trophy)
 * Peppy Hare (trophy)
 * Slippy Toad (trophy)
 * Wolfen (trophy)

Characters

 * Fox has been confirmed to make a return appearance in SSBB, sporting an original look not seen in any Star Fox game or in the previous Smash games. He seems to now hold his blaster in his right hand at all times; whether this affects his fighting ability remains to be seen.

Stages

 * Lylat Cruisehas been confirmed to be a Stage in Brawl and takes place on an original space ship that travels through various locals in the Lylat System, including an asteroid field, a large space battle, and the atmosphere of planet Corneria.

Music

 * Space Armada theme from the first Star Fox game is confirmed to be a lyric in Brawl. Which stage it will be used for is currently unknown, but Lylat Cruise seems likely.