Even though I technically did say I was gonna join in I was never added as a participant. But that wont stop me... I hope you guys don't mind.
Man, its been quite some time since I played through the original Star Fox. I forgot how bad I really am at this game. Over the past few years I have only popped the game in to play the first few levels of section 1 just for kicks but never really got invested in playing route 2 or 3. That being said I did beat this game in its entirety for this playthrough. And holy crap I beat all 3 sections! But holy hell this game is brutal and unforgiving.
First off I started on section 2. The medium difficulty route. This was dumb, as I was rusty with the controls and game in general. I mostly struggled with this run but I managed to pull though it. I'll just give a brief overview of my experience level by level.
Section 2 -Play time about 1 hour 15 minuites
Corneria- Simple and straight forward. A training level to get you acclimated to the gameplay. A classic level that started it all.
Sector X- Kinda annoying level as the main thing is to avoid the giant pillars that are both spinning and stationary. I think I whacked into two of them. Not many enemies here. The boss isn't too bad but does lunge at you which damn near took me out.
Titania- This level dragged on forever. Apparently there is a large gate on the right your supposed to go through to collect a object to progress the level. Like a moron I did not know this and kept going through the center gate a million times cycling the level over and over. I swear I can never time the gates right and smash into them. There is also big crabs that are quite annoying. The boss under the bridge was very easy. I just blasted the lasers and he was dead in no time.
Sector Y- There are things that cling to your Arwing that aren't too bad. The Stingrays ram into you if you shoot them. These are very annoying as it's near impossible to not hit them when spamming the screen with gunfire. I got lucky and just barely beat the spinning arm boss who also rams into you. This boss made me sweat. Also the music is very cheery.
Venom- The main part of the level was pretty easy. Just blasted my way through, literally. The boss was easy. He just splits in two and you shoot the cores. The only part that gave me trouble was ramming into him multiple times.
Stage 6 (The boss)- Crash, crash and more crash. This level is very narrow untill you reach the boss. I crashed into enemies and pillars... alot. Holy hell! Your skills (or lack thereof in my case) will be tested. Thankfully they throw you a bone with a health recharge near the boss, only to throw more moving pillars my way that I hit.
I made it to Andross with 3/4 health, the double fire power up and no nova bombs. I had not lost any lives by this point. That all came to an end as I tried to figure out how to kill this bastard spitting doors at me. Thankfully I got to restart with a fresh set of bombs and figure this guy out. He was annoying but it wasn't hard to figure out. Really just circle the screen, try to shoot his eyes out and wait to shoot his cube form.
[img width=350 height=307]https://i.imgur.com/3GRMg22.jpg[/img]
[img width=350 height=275]https://i.imgur.com/DNiVsIL.jpg[/img]
After I beat section 2 I thought I'd move onto section 1, the easy route. I really did struggle to shake years of rust off on the section 2 playthrough. I just wanted something easy to move onto to hone my skills.
Section 1- Play time around 40 minutes.
Corneria- Same as above. Super easy.
Asteroid- Not hard at all. Mostly avoid the asteroids. They are mostly spaced out and you can shoot a good chunk out of the way. I'm pretty sure I did hit two asteroids. The boss was easy as its just the boss from Sector X. But slightly easier I think.
Space Armada- Just spammed the guns until I got to the boss. Really easy up to the boss. The enemies with the ring/donut laser hit me a few times, that's it. The boss on the other hand confused the crap out of me. I felt like I was in one of those gravitron amusement rides. Most of my playthrough time was spent on this boss. Once I figured it out it was easy to finish off the core when it opened.
Meteor- Again another pretty easy level. There was a giant boulder that came out of nowhere that I hit but that's about it. The boss was a bit tricky with the spinning blades that hit me several times but once you knock the blades off he's nothing more than a little bitch. You can send him back to the sink garbage disposal where he belongs.
Venom- Yet another straightforward level you can blast through. Just spam the fire button until the snake like boss appears. Maybe it's just me but this boss was lame and didn't seem to put up much of a fight. Not much of a pattern to follow, just blast him away.
Stage 6 (The boss)- Another level full of obstacles to crash into. Definitely hit a few of them but made it through ok. The boss from venom pretty much returns only to transform into a grasshopper thing. He did hop into me once but it wasn't too bad. Andross was the same this time around only super easy as I already knew what to do.
[img width=350 height=289]https://i.imgur.com/xqpoTdH.jpg[/img]
[img width=350 height=290]https://i.imgur.com/DyBdim8.jpg[/img]
And my final run, section 3. The hard route. I really intended to call it a day after beating the first two routes. But for the hell of it I gave it a go. I honestly thought I would just get frusturated and rage quit. That almost happened. Boy I'm a glutton for punishment.
Section 3- Play time about 1 hour
Corneria- Ahh, the mood is so right with the sunset orange sky. It's Corneria but harder, duh! Seriously this level is kicked up a notch. But not too hard. This was the time to load up on bombs and power ups for further levels cause your gonna need them all. The boss was pretty straight forward but different from the first two playthroughs. Just a really wide tank.
Asteroid- I think I went cross eyed playing this level. Tons of things to keep an eye on. I focus on one thing and get damaged by another. But pulled through it ok. The boss is another one of these spinnning blade things that shoots some trap out that I got caught in alot. It was hard, I barely got through this guy. Sweat started forming on me. I paused the game and grabbed a Monster energy drink out my fridge. I was gonna need it.
Fortuna- I really liked this level for the most part. The music is so good and it's colorful. The huge downside is the framerate drop. They were really pushing this level to the limits. This is another level where there is tons of stuff to avoid. Crash city here I come. The two headed bird boss was simple as he seems to turn his back alot leaving him exposed to intense gunfire damage.
Sector Z- It's alot like Sector X but with the boss from Space Armada. This level in general is impossible to go through without hitting a bunch of things. It's like a fever dream put into a game. This is the level to put the brake and boost to good use. I got lucky on the boss and somehow beat it quickly.
Macbeth- The canyons scared me at first but the rest of the level was very fun and open. I seemed to get hit by some volcano thing but thats about it. I really had fun on this level. The boss was pretty lame as he spins balls at you that do quite some damage but overall seemed easy to just blast away at. I was expecting this later level to be hard but pleasently suprised it wasn't.
Venom- Again I just blasted my way through to the boss. No obstacles to dodge just shoot, shoot, shoot.
The boss really grinded my gears. He's not hard, he's just tedious. I must have looped around 100 times before I finally finished the ship off. I don't know what the quick way to kill it is but whatever, I slowly took it out.
Stage 6 (The boss)- This level can be summed up by me screaming at the top of my lungs! Good lord every single second I'm dodging something. I wasn't very concerned about enemies it's really just a insane dodge everthing level up untill the sub-boss. The sub boss throws lots of balls that are super hard to dodge. But once you dodge the ball fury it's pretty simple to take him down.
Then there is that damn tunnel I had to go into again before I got to Andross. I really got lucky and made it out but with substantial damage to the Arwing. I finally got to Andross again really was easy to take him out untill he turned into that demon form
and spat out crap nonstop. Finally with alot of strafing and bombing I took him back into the cube form and finished him off with my life meter near zero.
[img width=350 height=248]https://i.imgur.com/9GlRmsp.jpg[/img]
[img width=350 height=254]https://i.imgur.com/zZDqBMk.jpg[/img]
Overall this game really pushed me to the limits. I have fond memories playing this back in the 90's over my cousins house with my brother and my cousins. Usually we just passed the controller around and tried to beat it together. I don't think we ever beat section 2 or 3 back in the day. Anyways if you guys ever get the time take a listen to the music on YouTube. Very lovely to chill to, especially the controls theme at the start. Oh and I played this on the SNES Classic if anyone wants to know. Nice and crisp graphics.
To the rest of you
good luck.
Author
