Wild Blue Skies Review – Flying Too Close to Star Fox

Wild Blue Skies Review

Flight-based Rail Shooters are few and far between. Although the genre was dominant on the arcades, its presence has diminished on consoles. With Nintendo remaking Star Fox 64, the excitement for games of this ilk has been rekindled and Wild Blue Skies aims to take advantage of this. With its cartoon aesthetic and fast and frantic gameplay, will it manage to recapture the genre’s golden era, or will it struggle to soar above its inspirations?

The evil Grimlaw was exiled by the mighty Blue Bombers years ago. However, after biding his time on the outskirts, he ventures inland to launch a daring attack and seize control. A new generation of the mighty squad is sent out to destroy his minions and ultimately thwart his evil plans. It’s a typical narrative, but one that gives purpose to the high-octane action. While a stunning animated sequence introduces the characters, the story is otherwise delivered through brief Comms conversations featuring minimal animation and voice acting. Each character has their own personality, which is expressed through little quips while flying around, but these feel all too familiar to its inspirations. Ultimately, it’s a disappointingly thin tale, opting to focus on the gameplay rather than the story.

In the Shadow

The influence of Star Fox is evident throughout. Levels feel familiar as you dive under falling columns, collect items and shoot the array of enemies that flood the screen. Structurally, these are a little too close to its inspirations, with certain stages feeling like they were taken directly from the aforementioned title. This does make the adventure feel derivative as it rarely steps far enough outside its influences to establish its own identity.

In addition to the rail-based levels, there are also open areas where dogfighting is central. Here you must chase down opponents and protect your opponent by eliminating them. Using your boost and brake becomes more important here as they allow you to quickly turn and chase down foes. While these areas are nice diversions from the other sections, they stick too close to conventions.

Bosses culminate stages, forcing you to use your abilities to take out large foes. Each has signalled weak points which you must attack while avoiding a plethora of bullets. These are challenging and exciting encounters that demand quick reflexes, sharp positioning and precise aim. If you die, you can respawn from a checkpoint. As this is an arcade-style title, you must keep an eye on your lives, as otherwise you may have to restart your entire run again.

Speaking of which, there are different routes to the end, adding replayability to the experience. In addition, you can collect four letters scattered through the level, earn ribbons for your end score and complete challenges, giving further incentive to replay stages.

Piloting the Fight

Controlling the aircraft is similar to the Arwing. You can tilt from side to side, shoot lasers and of course, do a barrel roll. Although all the same abilities are there, these are remapped, making it much more intuitive to play. Single and charged shots are on different buttons, which helps you deal with the overwhelming number of enemies onscreen at once. Barrel rolls also send back shots, but activating this shifts you over to the left or right, which can make it harder to time deflections.

The visuals are great. Bright and vivid, each stage pops due to its colour palette and stylised design. The screen can fill with ships and setpieces such as falling buildings and a cinematic tone. Unfortunately, the frame rate can drop when things get particularly busy. For the most part, it’s stable, but I did notice odd drops with the off-rails segments.
Wild Blue Skies is a tribute to the legendary Star Fox. Its inspirations are clear, from its similar protagonist and crew to the level design and structure. While it delivers a fun homage, it fails to add its own spin, making it feel too familiar to Fox’s adventure.

Wild Blue Skies is a tribute to the legendary Star Fox. Its inspirations are clear, from its similar protagonist and crew to the level design and structure. While it delivers a fun homage, it fails to add its own spin, making it feel too familiar to Fox’s adventure. Despite this, its aerial combat, imaginative boss battles and charming presentation ensure it’s an enjoyable ride for fans of the genre, even if it never quite escapes the shadow of the classic that inspired it.

***A PS5 code was provided for this review***