"If it wasn't for a few glaring flaws, this game could've easily gotten a 10/10."

Ah, Star Fox. Of all Nintendo's franchises, Star Fox is the only one whose quality fluctuates as much as the weather of summer days in New Jersey. Not only that, but Star Fox is also one of Nintendo's lesser-known franchises. Before Super Smash Bros, I doubt that most people even knew of the series.

Fans of the series will know that the previous two entries did not live up to Star Fox 64, which is undeniably the best in the series so far. Star Fox Adventures, though a decent action-adventure game, played nothing like Star Fox and Star Fox 64. Star Fox Assault was plagued with crappy controls, so that, too, was deemed a failure. Now, for the first time in several years, Nintendo themselves have handled the creation of a brand new Star Fox game. Have they succeeded where others have failed?

The Star Fox games have always had excellent visuals, and this game is no exception. The ships, both friend and foe, look metallic, mountains have a rough, rocky look to them, and in the underwater stage, it feels as if you're underwater. No complaints there.

The music is decent, at best. None of it really stands out, and although there are some remixes from Star Fox 64, they aren't really memorable either. Then again, Star Fox was never really known for its music, so that is to be expected. Nevertheless, there isn't any music in there that will make you want to turn the volume down, so it's fine.

The storyline is branching. If you don't know already, this means that you can choose what path you want to go on, and the storyline will be altered because of that choice. The basic storyline goes something like this:

Team Star Fox has disbanded quite a while ago, with each member now doing something else. Fox now does missions solo, Slippy is getting married, Falco is...well, he's just blowing the crap out of stuff he doesn't like, Peppy has replaced Pepper as the general of the Cornerian army, and Krystal has completely disappeared. A new threat has appeared, however: the Anglars, who come from Venom's poisonous oceans. Naturally, Fox comes to stop the threat, but he soon realizes that he's going to have to reform Star Fox.

The story is fairly interesting and deep, especially for a handheld game. You won't believe what Krystal's been up to since Assault.

And now we move on to the gameplay. A game can be the best game ever, but with poor controls, it won't be able to live up to that title. Now, Star Fox Command's controls aren't horrible by any means. However, they are flawed.

Everything but shooting is controlled with the touch screen. Aiming? Touch screen. Barrel rolling? Sorry, guys, you don't press Z or R twice anymore. Now, you slide the stylus back and forth across the screen quickly. To use bombs (wisely), you drag a bomb onto where you want to detonate it. Boosting is performed by double tapping the top of the screen. To use the brakes, you double tap the bottom. U-turns and somersaults are performed by tapping buttons located on the sides of the screen.

I'm perfectly fine with everything but aiming. Aiming is SO DAMN HARD to do in this game. It feels too loose, for lack of a better word. You could slide the stylus from one end of the screen to the other, and your aim would only move a bit. For those of you with Metroid Prime Hunters, think of the lower sensitivity levels for an example of what it's like. Your targets are always moving, so that makes it even harder.

Another problem with the controls is that you sometimes boost or brake when you don't want to. There are several battles in which you must go through a bunch of squares, then barrel roll into the ship. However, if you wait too long, you automatically die. There are times when I've accidentally used the brakes, and died because of it.

With that being said, let's move onto the gameplay itself. The game is like a combination of turn-based strategy and the all-range mode from Star Fox 64. You plot out courses for your ships, and then they move. If you encounter an enemy, you get into a fight in which you have to destroy specific enemies which hold cores. Your mothership, the Great Fox, can fire missiles at enemies from afar, provided you have some. Your goal on each map is to destroy all the enemies. Sometimes, there will be a fog, and you have to use your stylus to disperse sections of the fog.

The multiplayer mode is surprisingly good. Matches are composed of three dogfights, in which the player with the most stars wins. There are a variety of powerups, such as the stealth mode and plasma beam. When a player is killed, they leave behind a star. However, other people may take the star that appeared. This means that it's possible, albeit somewhat difficult, to win a match without killing anybody.

This game has quite a bit of replay value, with nine possible endings. The multiplayer will also make you want to keep this game for a long time to come.

Buy or Rent?

Star Fox Command is definitely a buy. It's a step in the right direction for the series. If this keeps up, we might have a Star Fox game that surpasses Star Fox 64.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 09/06/06