More Star Fox Wii U details and Miyamoto comments
- Uses the GamePad screen for a first-person cockpit view while displaying a third-person behind the Arwing-fighter view on the TV
- Can swap views
- Concept is to enable players to have independent control of where they fly and where they shoot
- The GamePad’s control sticks steer Fox’s fighter jet, but the GamePad’s gyro controls act more like a fighter pilot’s targeting visor and let players tilt the pad to “look” in any direction to shoot
- This means that the player will move wave the GamePad around to track targets if they so choose, instead of turning their Arwing to chase the targets down
“Before, in the N64 [game's] levels, when we had these valley modes, it was difficult to play those levels because the aiming was synced to the movement of the ship. So, as you were trying to aim, the movement of the ship was flying around within the valley. But now what we’re able to do with the Wii U GamePad is, because the ship can move independently of your aiming, it makes it much more interesting and much more fun to play these valley modes where you’re flying the ship but simultaneously aiming at a lot of different things in the level.”
- Visuals/art not final in E3 demo
- The cockpit view’s displays for speed and altitude and even the lines defining the shape of the glass canopy were simple enough to look like “programmer art”
- Audio clips based on dialogue from Star Fox 64
- First mode: simple arena combat
- Fox McCloud Arwing along with allies Slippy and Falco flying into a square-shaped arena level against dozens of enemy fighters and tanks
- Fly around using most of the standard suite of Star Fox moves… lasers, lock-on bombs, loop-de-loops, u-turns and, of course, barrel rolls
- Gyro controls
- Second mode: similar to first, but added Star Wolf for more intense dogfighting
- Third mode: set in and above several square blocks of a city, invincible Godzilla-like monster walking the streets as well as some destructible quadruped robots
- In this level, Fox flew a winged flying craft that behaved more like a helicopter with rotors in the wings allowing for hovering
- Press the right stick in would cause the craft to drop a robot that could shoot or drive
“when you first start to play, your initial reaction is, ‘Which screen should I be looking at it?’ But once you get used to looking back and forth between the two, you very quickly get used to it and you begin to feel that you can’t play without both screens.”
“We’re in an era when people have a limited amount of time… to play these long story-based games, so there will be a story for the game, but you’ll be able to choose the missions you want to play.”
- He said there will be arena-like missions and “valley” missions
- Supposedly on track for 2015 release
- Miyamoto himself said that he thought development could go quickly
“The game started off as an experiment and what we’re showing you here is in full development. We’re planning to complete the game in a year.”
- Nintendo is seeking development partners on it
“The way I design games is I start by experimenting with different aspects and play styles. Once we have that laid out and understood we go in and build the graphics [around it].”
“We’ve been working on a number of different games that use the GamePad as the focus of the gameplay. Among the games we were working on, this was one of them. But originally we weren’t targeting E3 as the announcement time for the Star Fox game. But in developing it, we really came to like it and I also wanted to motivate ourselves to complete the game as quickly as possible. So we brought it here to E3 to announce it to give us that motivation.”
