Star Fox Adventures - What Happened?

[Music] hello and welcome to another episode of what happened the show that's not profiled the single Nintendo published games since oh [ __ ] ever yes well that's not to say there aren't a few we can gab about but Nintendo is a fairly secretive company as are a lot of their rivals in the Japanese game industry the fact is typically to get behind-the-scenes information on Nintendo titles good bad or yeah you just might need to be related to an uncle who happens to work for them that being said Trey Alan's a big boss member of the flop house VIP patreon has helped narrow the focus onto what's certainly a topic worthy of discussion that be in the last game release under the legendary partnership between Nintendo and rare 2002's dinosaur planet 2002 starfox adventures ah rare rare where one of the building blocks of many a childhood beetlejuice Who Framed Roger Rabbit WWF WrestleMania Donkey Kong Country Killer Instinct jet force Gemini on top of them all grabbed by the Ghoulies now while there are several things worth talking about when it comes to those crazy Brits over their legendary 30 plus year career Star Fox Adventures was the first game of the fruitful collaboration with Nintendo that signaled the end of let's not mince words a magical era in video Gaming unfortunately for the talented artists musicians and programmers who worked on starfox adventures there are many factors problems snag Oh boobs trouble t knees and big old toddler blockers that seem to hamper the games development with almost all of it outside of rares control our stories should begin with just how rare operated in the mid 90s which saw all of their many small teams being sequestered into their own offices or barns and left to do whatever they wanted which included slapping googly eyes on just about everything as there was a sort of friendly rivalry to outdo what each team was working on with the elusive stampers presiding over at all these super Stamper brothers also did their best to mediate between Nintendo and the teams themselves communicating Japan's thoughts on each project without having to bog down the teams with constant requests and tinkering one of the more successful of these projects at the time was Diddy Kong Racing one of rares many fondly remembered classics when the adventure / kart racer was first revealed it was then released only a scant few months later giving in Tendo a big holiday title that they would have been otherwise without once work on Diddy was complete the team split into two with one rocketing away on two jet force Gemini and the other moving on to a project called dinosaur planet former longtime producer at rarely Schumann had a wealth of ideas which he then began sketching coming up with the concepts and characters to populate this glorious world of reptiles with nary a single heathenistic feather to be seen even at this early stage the game was going to be a 3d adventure on one large continuous world when interweave duel stories led by two different heroes crystal and sabre no no not that sabre no not that one yeah I know yeah that that's that's the one to save the eponymous dinosaur planet which was under siege by the nefarious they're real scarce once they had settled on the theme rare had to go about you know figuring out how to move characters in 3d platforming space which believe it or not they were still grappling with at that time the only games they'd released on the n64 by 1997 were Goldeneye killer instincts blast core and DK are as banjo kazooie was still a year away from completion and was being made by a completely different team at rare so the young and very small group plugging away at dinosaur planet were coming to terms with full 3d worlds when a huge bit of inspiration came via Nintendo themselves and that would be either tiny experimental project called ocarina of time as you could imagine this milestone in gaming caused the team at rare tube suddenly rethink what they thought they knew which there were never even a hundred percent sure about anyway the then massive open world of Hyrule was the perfect template in which to base dinosaur planet on and thus the project took on a slightly new identity but helped the team focus and hone in on what they wanted the game to be the next few years went by learning and studying from ocarina as well as the deluge of 3d platformers there were being released resulting in the team making obviously slow but steady progress this was kind of rares MO given each project the time they needed to perfect things while also simultaneously getting titles on store shelves because there was so many small groups working at the same time on vastly different games a team would just start kicking off something new while another game was going through the final round of bug testing it took all the way until 2004 rare to formally unveil dinosaur planet at that year's e3 and since it was so late into the n64 his life cycle allowed a lot of people at the show from a technical standpoint by this time rare new the n64 like the back of their hand especially since more members had joined the dinosaur planet team since bringing the experience of having worked on banjo jet force and the like now during the spectacular first showing Nintendo's own Shigeru Miyamoto took an interest in the game when he saw the anthropomorphic characters of crystal and saber in an interview with Nintendo Life rares lead software engineer on the project Phil tousle recalls this pretty pivotal turning point for the game I don't know for sure where the idea originally came from but I definitely heard it mentioned that Miyamoto son had suggested it of course we were slightly disappointed at having to change dinosaur planet as we had all become so attached to it but we could also see the potential of using the starfox license that's because both crystal and saber a fox and a wolf did bear resemblance to how the iconic animal army from Nintendo's flight games were being depicted with that suggestion the project been transformed once more wouldn't even be the last time while Miyamoto has been known to give somewhat vague advice to other studios working under Nintendo Samus should be able to put on other heads equals give her different vision modes the suggestion was pretty cut-and-dry in terms of marketing and familiarity Venice or planet would do better under the furry paw the starfox license which hadn't seen the new entries since early 1997 now while the team at rare had put a ton of work into it already with its world and characters fully fleshed out it was still quite different than the final game you could actually swap at any time between Crystal and sabor by speaking to swap stones these survive the transition to starfox adventures but there used change to being warp stones originally crystal also had a sidekick character called kite similar to tricky in the final game but a pterodactyl that could fly the story was also quite different even with the praise coming from e3 that dinosaur planet was an n64 stunner it liked a lot of e3 titles Nintendo showed that year all went through a really with a few of them such as eternal darkness being moved over to the forthcoming GameCube which was only a year away from launch thus with this new starfox edict and with the arwing his destination locked in on the Gamecube the team was forced to scrap a lot of what had been done find ways to incorporate Fox and crew and suddenly be thrust into working on a vastly different machine than what they had been working on for the last three years despite now working directly on a beloved Nintendo IP Phil tousle found Nintendo's involvement on the project to be hands-off as usual aside from one trip to Kyoto to speak to Nintendo's higher-ups as well as having Takaya Emma Mora one of the creative minds behind the star fox universe visit the UK to oversee things while the bulk of the game had been done that didn't mean the transition was without its own fair share of hiccups when we first conceived the idea of a no loading world it was on the n64 which of course had cartridges making instant loading much more straightforward however by the time you moved to GameCube we were faced with our first experience of a disk based medium which added complications in addition with a move to starfox branding we had space levels which we had never envisaged in the beginning also keeping that misbehaving little dinosaur tricky in check was a lot of work there was tons of setup involved to ensure that he always stayed with Fox and never got lost or trapped goddamn a tricky tricky wall rare was a custom taking all the time they need to polish games and make sure every dinosaur was in their place starfox adventures had the dubious distinction of being caught in something bigger than just wayward AI pathing in September 2002 the same release month as starfox adventures Microsoft confirmed the worst kept secret in gaming at that time they were buying rare which would then become 100% fully owned by the technology giant ant endo had sold their 49 percent stake in the company back to the Stamper brothers and the deal was struck now even though this was only confirmed that month multi hundred million dollar deals like that just don't happen overnight and had been in the planning phase for months the stampers were very open about the situation at least as much as they could be I think for me it was a blessing to be working on starfox adventures because we still had a clear deadline for completion of the game we knew we had to get it done before any sale occurred other parts of the company struggled for focus around that time because of all the uncertainty so from our perspective it really just spurred us on to get starfox adventures finished that being said because of the many different directions the game took not unlike many rare projects sar Fox adventures was a unique case in rares history as so many orbiting elements impacted the game in one way or another which may have resulted in some aspects of the game feeling somewhat padded tacked on or in the worst case simply unfinished wall rare had increasingly increased the number of collectibles and all their 3d platformers Fox's quest had taken this to new unseen levels of collect the hall ism you know you're gonna need to go to collect the halls anonymous to spending five minutes with this thing also the arwing sections as nice-looking as they were philip devoid of any real substance with their inclusion only being there because they needed to be there and finally the clumsy mishandling of the games main villain general scales he simply vanishes from the game only to make way for one of the most shoehorn final bosses of all time no spoilers here but it's [ __ ] and Ross I totally understand the reaction because many of us on the team felt the same way personally I knew the game had its flaws it borrowed a little too heavily from Zelda I think it also felt a little too much like the starfox elements were tacked on which of course they were yeah a game changed so many times they're in development that was impossible to keep track of what was added and removed I think the only thing that we wanted to make more of was the arwing sections these were added fairly late and because the game had not been designed with them in mind from the beginning it stretched some of our tools beyond what they were really designed for limiting the scope and refinement of them so when starfox adventures came out it also had the added baggage of being the last rare game to be released under Nintendo thanks Microsoft maybe you could have delayed that announcement like up like a month later regardless it unfairly found itself with this heavy burden weighing on its brittle furry shoulders while some fans greatly appreciated dinosaur planet its attractive visuals characters and seamless world those aspects that felt tacked on frustrated unpolished sections and a story peppered ab by strange pacing and plot holes let its reception feeling somewhat lukewarm at best and even with the subtitle of adventure being added on the game wasn't what everyone was expecting especially hardcore starfox fans as the more melee focused encounters and holo flight sections failed to inspire now even with a tepid response even long after the game's release it would result in Nintendo and others taking several key elements introduced in rares take and running with them by literally while on foot combat was sort of touched on in the multiplayer starfox 64 who is Namco's starfox assault which put a huge emphasis on ground-based skirmishes with similar polarizing results crystal was also fully brought into the fold pack clan whatever as a series always lack a strong female presence and has appeared in almost every single starfox game since strangely though tricky never saw a similar rise in popularity unfortunately since then Nintendo hasn't quite nail what starfox should be again and again and again it remains to be seen if they ever truly well as for rare themselves well after having just about every non connect game pitch gets shot down by Microsoft for almost an entire console generation sea of thieves despite a rocky start has grown to be a hit and modern-day rare are currently working hard on the promising-looking ever wild but what about Phil tousle well he stayed with rare until the dark years right about here and like many other staffers decided the time was right to leave he even formed his own company in 2014 and released the charming tengami before shacking up with platonic to work on ukulele again like most rare employees he reflects on his time at the company and working with Nintendo in the earlier days as the best time of his career without a doubt of all the time I've worked in the industry it was the most trusting and respectful relationship of course it helped because technically rare was independent intend to only own 49% of the company this meant that the Stamper brothers didn't have to do anything they didn't want to this contrasts sharply with how it is now or Microsoft owns the whole company in many ways for me rare doesn't exist anymore that is the rare that I knew and loved and that I got up every morning like an excited child to go work for the rare where all my friends were most of whom are no longer there and so that rare exist anymore the rare that does exist is a new rare and involved rare with different goals in different aims and I think and hope they will go on continue to thrive in their own way and with that if you know of any other tragically tearful tales of total travesty let me know in the comments below or a barrel roll your way over to the flop house VIP patreon to nominate your own custom subject for us to analyze and agonizing detail see you next time and thanks for watching [Music]

Channel: Matt McMuscles

Views: 386,545

Rating: 4.9467521 out of 5

Keywords: Star Fox Adventures, Star Fox, Nintendo, Rareware, Rare, Fox McCloud, Crystal, What Happened, Wha Happun, Video Game Documentaries, Video Game Disasters, Matt McMuscles

Id: pWJg0kNkltg

Length: 16min 39sec (999 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 02 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/ScarecrowFM]

Matt Voice “Where are we going???”

My favorite part of this whole LP was Liam’s hustle that Falco didn’t appear in this game and being so adamant about it.

[u/jitterscaffeine]

I wish more people had given Star Fox Command a chance. It was actually pretty cool and had some CRAZY alternate paths. Like if you go down one path, you end up playing as Star Wolf and save the day as them. Another is Slippy stepping up and saving the day all by himself.

[u/CrazysaurusRex]

I liked it cuz muthafuckin dinosaurs yo. Also sexy warrior chick

[u/SexyAssMonkey]

This is the game with all the Cloud******s, right?

[u/The_Draigg]

I can’t believe Matt skipped over how Allen designed the entire last act of the game during his lunch break.

[u/Sh0esy]

Dinosaur Planet is a tragedy honestly, I think it could've been a really cool game if it was given the time and didn't have the Star Fox brand.

[u/everettescott]

Viva Pinata

dark years.

Yeah, sure. Ok.

[u/legendaryemerald]

I just realized how much I hate this title card format. It’s basically the same shit as that “before you buy!” Channel that I had to block youtube from recommending me every goddamn day.

[u/CongoTempest]

I only ever played Star Fox adventures as a kid for the first 5 minutes but those 5 minutes were all Krystal needed to change me into the man I am today

Will definitely check this out later