Wild Blue Skies Review

Have you ever played Star Fox and wished you could revisit that old-school style of space shooter? Wild Blue Skies aims to deliver just that.

Wild Blue Skies (or WBS, as I’ll refer to it from here on out) delivers a classic Star Fox-style experience with tight controls, action-packed levels, and a storyline that leaves you thoroughly confused. It’s a game that pays homage to its main source of inspiration, but by staying so close to the original formula, it may have crossed the line into being overly derivative.

With that being said, let’s dive right in to see how it holds up.

The Story:

The world has become war-torn by the evil scientist Grimclaw, an ex chief engineer of the army who seeks for world dominance. He was originally stopped by the Ace pilot Squadron named the Blue bombers which forced him into exile. Years later an armada of robotic forces emerge from the volcanic regions of the north, Grimclaw has returned, and it's up to a new generation of Blue Bombers to take him down, for good this time.

That's the setup of the story, sound familiar? Keep that in mind, because it's going to be a running theme here. 

In the game you play as Bowie, the leader of the new generation of Blue Bombers, alongside his fellow pilots and friends Roe, Thorne and Chuck. As you progress through the stages you'll get to learn about what Grimclaw is attacking and what you're trying to prevent...

Did you expect me to add anything more here? Yeah, WBS has a classic story setup and a great presentation to sell it, but when it comes to the characters themselves, you literally learn nothing about them. They have fairly generic dialogue that barely gives a hint as to what kind of person they are. In fact, the intro gives you far more info about Grimclaw than about the world or its characters.

Granted, this game isn't focusing that much on story, similar to its main source of inspiration, but even in Star Fox, the characters had more dialogue than "Leave it to me!", "Bombs away!", or "We got this!" The story leaves you confused because you're expecting more actual dialogue between characters, or for them to react to their situation. Bowie himself is the biggest problem here; he basically never really reacts to anything, except for one rare exception. 

The more I played, the more I got the impression that WBS took the skeleton of Star Fox, but never filled it with meat, so to speak, and that is sadly going to be a running theme, as stated earlier.

Gameplay:

WBS is a on rail space shooter that is heavily inspired by Star Fox 64 in particular. In every stage you use bombs, charge shots and barrel rolls to take down as many enemies as you meet to get that score higher, and meet a cool boss at the end. On occasions you get to do side objectives, which if you manage to succeed with, unlocks an alternate path, or for a perfect run of the stage you need find secret symbols that present the word WILD. The goal is to get to the last stage to defeat Grimclaw, with branching paths which could lead to two different endings depending on which path you end up at.

So, what makes this different from a typical Star Fox experience? Mostly, the controls of the ship itself.

The charge shot is its own separate button now, which is an interesting choice, but it makes it easier to do quick charge attacks. The ship's slowdown allows you to drift for very sharp turns in the more open stages, and overall, the controls for the game feel snappy, responsive, and tight, which in turn makes it genuinely fun to play.

What is an interesting choice, and for some a bit too old-school, is the fact that there are no continues—just the lives you start with and earn through play. WBS isn't a long game, especially if you're experienced with these types of adventures (as yours truly is), or in particular its source of inspiration. I clocked in per run at a max of forty minutes to one hour. It's the type of game where you're supposed to play through it multiple times to see all the stages and get the best score for 100% completion to really get everything out of the experience.

What was an annoyance was that if you wanted to repeat a stage to try getting that alternate path, the game wants you to sacrifice one of your extra lives, which are limited, and you'll have to play the entire stage again instead of going back to a checkpoint.

Related: Star Fox Review

There is one other major difference between this game and it's inspiration, your teammates are actually next to worthless, and at best, meat shields. WBS wants to be a tougher experience in general, but by doing this it becomes a fairly frustrating adventure if you're aiming to get perfect scoring on stages. I'll be honest, dear reader, in my playthroughs I don't think I ever saw any of the teammates shoot anything. I am unsure if this was a bug, or the game is just designed like that, but more often than not, you're the one baby sitting them because they will just die constantly.

Pros and Cons:

Let's start with the pros: The game is gorgeous! If anything, the presentation is its strongest point, and is what made me initially interested in giving it a try. The voice acting is also surprisingly good, even if there isn't much to hear.

The controls are genuinely well done as well. It feels great to control the ship, do tight turns, and improve your piloting skills, and most deaths in this game are on you. It also helps that the game does run and perform very well, making for a smooth experience.

Let's go over the cons now: The biggest problem with this game is that it's quite literally Star Fox 64, but without the Land Master, and with a new skin. There is a certain limit where homage/tribute becomes a carbon copy or worse, and WBS balances this very thin red line back and forth a lot during the experience. For me it does do just enough to not get legally labeled as a carbon copy, but at the same time it doesn't do anything unique to be it's own thing.

Most stages can be argued to be a copy of stages from Star Fox 64 as well, obviously not all of them, but more than a few raises eye brows. The final boss is also a straight up copy of Andross, with minor differences. Which is quite the shame, because I do want to see more and more indie teams do their own take on Star Fox in general, and WBS gets so close to getting it right! This is thanks to its great controls and understanding of what makes Star Fox so much fun. They could have had the same branching paths and gameplay, but it really needed to have it's own story, far more characterization, and not to be afraid to be different. It could've formed its own identity.

The soundtrack tries very hard to be cinematic, but it's just not memorable at all I am sorry to say, there was one track I liked though, and it was the rival pilots theme.

Of course also why are the teammates like three different Slippys? Hopefully this gets an update soon.

Closing Thoughts:

This is a tough one, dear reader. At the end of the day, Wild Blue Skies isn't a badly made game. It runs well, controls well, and looks great! However, it really is just Star Fox 64 all over again. Considering the current state of that franchise, I know how ironic that sounds! But that is my point: this game had the opportunity to be unique, to be its own thing, and to truly stand out. I sincerely hope the developers aren't afraid to take a few risks and try something different next time.

Wild Blue Skies delivers a Star Fox experience you have most likely already played. If you haven't, then you get a game that performs and controls well, and is fun. Still, nothing about it is unique compared to its source of inspiration. If you don't own a Nintendo console, you might want to give this one a shot, otherwise it doesn't offer a lot that's new.

VERDICT:  Maybe
Reviewed on PC
Review Copy was Provided

Available On: PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S