Star Fox remake lands an 81 on Metacritic but divides critics on whether it does enough

Star Fox, Nintendo's hyper-realistic remake of Star Fox 64, launches exclusively on Switch 2 on June 25. Early reviews have settled around an 81 on Metacritic — decent, but not a unanimous slam dunk for a game that's essentially the sixth remake of the same on-rails shooter.

The core campaign is still the same branching structure fans know: a single run clocks in at around an hour, but seeing every one of the 16 stages across alternate paths and earning medals on both normal and expert difficulties can stretch the experience to roughly 10 hours. The visual overhaul runs on Unreal Engine-style hyper-realistic rendering, and reviewers broadly agree it looks stunning — reflections, wormholes, the works. Brand-new fully voiced cinematics flesh out the Star Fox crew more than the original ever did, giving Slippy an engineering obsession, Peppy some battlefield wisdom, and Fox a sharper wit. The revamped soundtrack also gets consistent praise. New additions include a Challenge mode, reworked multiplayer, and a GameChat feature that lets players do a kind of Zoom-call karaoke with the Star Fox team if they have a camera. Game Informer found the multiplayer more robust than expected; Eurogamer called it a tacked-on afterthought. VGC's Andy Robinson noted that "under the gorgeous surface, the shooting doesn't quite match the satisfaction of 1997, while some odd story, voice and cut-scene changes feel like downgrades." IGN was warmer, saying the new cutscenes and coat of paint made them smile like it was their first barrel roll, even after nearly 30 years with the game.

This is the sixth time Nintendo has revisited Star Fox 64's basic structure, and that repetition is the elephant in the room for most critics. The remake doesn't reinvent the formula or add enough new layers to feel like a fresh sci-fi adventure — it's a very good version of something you may have already played multiple times across older Nintendo hardware. The short campaign length isn't a dealbreaker for everyone, but for players who've already done this ride five times before, the new modes don't fully compensate.

For newcomers or lapsed fans, Star Fox 2026 is probably the best the series has ever looked and played. For veterans hoping Nintendo would finally push the franchise somewhere new, the 81 Metacritic score tells the story: it sticks the landing, but only just.