July 5, 2023 • 22 mins
The last F-Zero game was released nearly 20 years ago but with Mario Kart going strong how could F-Zero return to make a splash? Check out our socials: https://switchclicks.carrd.co/ The Switch Clicks Podcast Intro Track: Dreams Are Pretty — Seoul June [Audio Library Release] Music provided by Audio Library Plus Watch: https://youtu.be/Y6sVyLLakhM Free Download / Stream: https://alplus.io/dreams-are-pretty #FZero #Nintendo #NintendoSwitch
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
How could Nintendo revive F-Zero to return in new ways? Let's talk about that.
(00:10):
Welcome to Switch Click Podcast episode 143 recorded on July 4th, 2023. My name is Dakota
and today I'm joined by Tyler. Hello! And Nathan. Hi there. Now, last week you guys talked about
reviving 2D series from Nintendo and this week just so happened that in the news from an interview
(00:31):
from VGC, I believe the designer... You would know the best of the three of us. I don't know.
It says the now retired 30-year Nintendo veteran Takeya Imamura who designed characters such as
Captain Falcon, Fox McCloud, and for some reason Tingle. He did an interview recently with VGC
(00:55):
and people have been taking this quote and running with it to make news and we are doing the same.
The quote is about F-Zero and if he thinks that it'll come back or not, the question was,
so why do you think F-Zero gets less attention from the company than Star Fox does? There hasn't
been a new F-Zero game for almost 20 years. He answers with, I think it's because Mario Kart is
(01:20):
Nintendo's most popular racing game and a new F-Zero would cost a fortune. My impression is
that Miyamoto is very affectionate about Star Fox. Yeah, he loves Star Fox and it's not...
He really likes Star Fox. But I don't know how he feels about it now after his attempts, his two
attempts at trying to bring it back. Yeah, the Star Fox fans, not to the same degree as F-Zero
(01:45):
fans, have kind of been living off of Smash Bros for the past while in good representation.
Because I don't... What's like why is it the last good Star Fox? Last good Star Fox? Star Fox 2,
technically, I guess. I heard that's not very good. That's not very good? Okay. I've heard it's not
(02:06):
very good. It's slightly unfinished. I just know... I'd say probably 64 is the last good one. 64,
64. You could count 64 DS. I was trying to play Star Fox... I think it was Star Fox 64 I was
trying to play the other day and it has, I think all the old Star Foxes, if you have like a game
(02:29):
over mechanic where you start at the beginning and I hate old games that do that so much. Oh, it's
so frustrating. I'm a waster. Yeah, it really does just feel like they're trying to waste my time.
But you know, like Star Fox, F-Zero I feel could have a random, completely out of the left field
(02:51):
game that could... Well, I mean, Star Fox, it didn't kind of ruin credibility a little bit further
with Star Fox Adventures. So it was called the one with crystal in it. Yeah, that's GameCube.
Yeah. But who knows maybe with F-Zero that could be a great way to breathe some fresh air into the
franchise. But obviously, we have to address the elephant in the room that we already talked about
(03:17):
earlier with Mario Kart still existing. Yeah, it has to be way different than Mario Kart. And I think
one of the main problems is just the switches hardware if they want to make a game where you go
fast. I mean, it's not impossible. If you look back in the PS3, they had a game called
(03:40):
Wipeout, not Wipeout the parkour, optical course game, but Wipeout as in the super fast
sci-fi racer game. Was that game called Wipeout? It's called Wipeout, yeah. Wipeout HD, Wipeout
Fury on the PS3. I think it was also on the PS Vita. Whoa, that's a deep cut. Yeah. I have no idea
(04:03):
what you're talking about. It's basically like this. I'd say it's been it's heavily inspired by
the F-Zero franchise. It's also sci-fi. It also involves really high like high speed races.
I don't think it's impossible to do it. I don't think it's impossible to do it on the switch
hardware, especially if we're talking about older hardware. And yeah, like F-Zero has always been
(04:27):
based off of like racing game, except it's like really difficult and very like the visual of a
car going so fast that everything's super blurry when you're still like grinding against edges in
like a chaotic fashion. That's at least what my thoughts always go to with F-Zero. Like it's a very
just like not like rough around the edges, but in like a good way kind of game. Yeah. Yeah. Of course
(04:57):
most people have only played the original, which is understandable. Because if you look at the sales
data, the first game peaked its sales at 2.85 million. And the next one got 1.1. Next one got
1.05 and then it got to F-Zero GX on the GameCube. 0.6. What is it? 600. Nearly 700,000 copies.
(05:28):
That is painful. And then after that, there's a F-Zero game on the Game Boy.
Really? Yeah, there's one in 2004 F-Zero Climax. It did 0.005 million.
So what does that? Was it like 50k? That can't be right. That's like 50k. That might be 50k.
(05:50):
There's no way that's right. None of us have heard about it. And like, if it was well known,
that I like at least decently well known, it'd be on so many like forgotten Nintendo games that
you've never heard of YouTube video. It's the last F-Zero game ever released. So far. It was only
released in Japan. Oh, no wonder. Maybe that's why. Because there's a number of games that are
(06:15):
also exclusive to Japan. Yeah. Oh dear. Nintendo and like ending their franchise with a
Japanese exclusive. I'm trying to think of, I'm really trying my hardest to just strap Mother 3
into this, but it's not a, I like half of it, I just realized it's not a Game Boy Advance game.
(06:40):
I mean, it's a good test market most of the time. I guess that's true.
I think the reason I mentioned the Switch's hardware earlier is for some reason, like,
you know how on Xbox, they have the Forza series, and you can only go a certain speed in that game
because of the hardware. I think they max out on the Xbox One, it was like 190, and then on
(07:06):
Xbox Series X, it's like 210 or something. But which Forza game are we talking about?
Specifically, I think Forza Horizon 5. Oh, okay, obviously, because open world games.
If they're going to make an open world game, of course it's going to be limited. But if we're
talking about like a narrow track, and we're talking about developers that actually work
(07:31):
specifically with the hardware, then I doubt they're going to, I doubt they need something
stronger than that. True, true. I'm trying to think of, do you know, does like PlayStation have a
premier racing game? Is it Gran Turismo? It's Gran Turismo. Okay, yeah, because it, like every
(07:52):
console has one, and then any others that try to fit in tend to die a little bit. Like Nintendo,
like F-Zero didn't live on, but Mario Kart is the biggest racing game. You have Forza for the Xbox,
Gran Turismo for PlayStation stuff. And I would argue that like PC Trackmania has been destroying
(08:14):
all like big racing games that have come out on Steam. I think so. Yeah, there's a very broad
PC racing game field. You can either get super realistic, super arcadey, or like a sandbox game.
Yeah, I do think on average, if you're putting a game on a PC, people like, primarily PC gamers
(08:36):
tend to prefer like a technical experience, which I think Trackmania loves to do. Yeah, and Nintendo
has the arcadey down to a science. Oh yeah. Pretty much pick up and play, beat it, and you've had your
fun. Yeah, I'm thinking they could maybe angle it similar to like, kind of like speedrun games,
(09:04):
like how Neon White did it. If you have multiple paths, and you can just keep beating your time,
stuff like that. Yeah, that could be a fun kind of stuff. That is actually a very viable option
considering how very little Mario Kart's actually focused on like the time trial type of thing.
It's always been much more of a competitive game, or well, casually competitive game,
(09:30):
rather than something that you'd try to beat yourself at. Yeah, and it is wild. Like,
not that they would ever do this, but Captain Falcon is a much bigger character than F-Zero
is as a franchise, to the point where like, they could literally just make a Captain Falcon game,
and I think it would maybe do better. E plus tier in Smash Ultimate, so I mean, why not?
(09:55):
Yeah, it's weird that they could just slap Captain Falcon into like a completely other,
separate genre of game. They could hold a title of Captain Falcon and that title alone could sell
even more than F-Zero. I think so. I think Captain Falcon as a title is more marketable,
which is insane to think. That's so sad.
(10:17):
What does the F in F-Zero even mean? Falcon Zero? Or like speed?
I think it has to do something with speed. Let me just double check.
I think it's got to be something with speed. There's no way. Something speed. It's something
with speed. Oh, I think it's just like Formula One, because it's called F1. Formula Zero. Oh,
(10:40):
wait, how did nobody... Formula One, F1 racing. That seems so obvious.
F-Zero racing. Fair enough, I guess. Good job. The philosophical reasoning behind F-Zero,
and then it's just like... Oh, it's just a play on F-Zero racing.
Yeah, we just drop it down. Just drop it down. The Zero number.
(11:04):
The Zero being associated with futuristic stuff is kind of...
That is true. Yeah.
It's a very 80s thing. I think another thing that I mentioned before the show is that they could
even do like a challenging open world where you walk around as your custom character, similar to
(11:26):
how 356 is doing it right now. And I think that's a good thing. I think it's a good thing.
Yeah. And I think F-Zero has a lot of characters that they could use because they've introduced
them a lot in the GameCube one specifically. They fleshed out a few of them. So you walk around,
challenge the guys, challenge random racers. It doesn't have to be street racing or anything.
(11:51):
You can, I don't know, also make a custom track maker. Then you get... There you go. You got your
game. The open world and you challenge someone, it's like slot car racing, except it's slot car
racing mixed with like Beyblade. Yeah.
(12:13):
Wait, that's actually kind of interesting. I know that the Hot Wheels game just got a sequel.
So they just pull that. And I think that could totally work. I don't know, it doesn't feel very
F-Zero-y, but at the same time, I don't think it has to because again... It's F-Zero Origins.
(12:34):
You play as the kid versions of them. Oh my gosh.
Pull a baby Muppet. Show him off, babies.
But then actually things can be so much slower.
Nah, Captain Falcon's built different. He goes back in time. Boom. There you go.
Captain Falcon goes back in time. Full grown man in his own baby body.
(13:00):
But he's still like buff. I do think like the fact that honestly, even if it was like
slot car weird, or even like RC car racing or something, where you're going around a city,
it's such a weird series that has like so many characters. Like there's so many characters that
(13:27):
are never going to be used again because of just how F-Zero has kind of died as a franchise.
To the point where I feel like the casual person doesn't really know anything about the series.
You could just do anything with it. Yeah, it's kind of scary though.
(13:50):
Like even if they do try to change up the formula, how well do you think it's going to attract
people, any type of gamer in there? Especially if Mario Kart exists.
How do you justify them, even if it's a different formula, how do you justify it for them to play
(14:11):
this game? What makes it look attractive to them? I think that's ultimately the one thing that
the designer was probably looking into as well. Because the art style of this is kind of more
geared towards slightly older audiences. It's not like completely cartoon like Mario.
Comic booky almost. Yeah, comic book.
(14:33):
And we saw how that kind of worked out with, actually I wouldn't say arms, but you know what?
Yeah, arms kind of works. That's more for cartoon.
It's just kind of there. Yeah, it's just like, I don't know if art is something that could factor
into how many people would be jumping into this game. We couldn't have cartoony Captain Falcon.
(14:57):
There's no way. No way to do that. No way they're going to do that.
But like, what if I just thought about this because the art for the F-Zero Climax game
looks very like 80s, 90s retro anime. Yeah.
How people are making music for that right now. It's like lo-fi almost.
(15:18):
And I'm thinking, why don't they just pull into the Spider-Verse and make the entire game that
art style. I mean, not really 3D models, but I don't know how well that translates to racing.
Like it might look, you actually, it could be very, very pretty. It's just, it's so difficult
(15:40):
for Nintendo to market literally any other racing game because they have the king of all racing games
still selling like crazy. With new content still coming out.
I get such a weird problem that a beloved series has fallen into, that it's just so
(16:02):
unbelievably outclassed by a little Italian guy in a go-kart.
Who does happen to race on two of his tracks anyways.
Yeah. He was gotten big enough to steal his tracks from him.
Yeah. Perhaps in the next Mario Kart,
there's a new CC, zero CC, and you're just going blinding fast.
(16:25):
Zero CC. Oh dear.
F-Zero coming back, like I feel the most plausible way for F-Zero to come back
is as a mode in a Mario Kart game. That is so unfortunate.
At that point they'd have to re, it'd have to be Nintendo Kurt and they'd have to include
so many more characters. Yeah.
(16:48):
Yeah, probably. But that'd be a very
sad way to reintroduce F-Zero. It's like, actually it's such a like limping
franchise. It's probably, it is, the more we're talking about this, the more I'm realizing like
every other kind of dying dead franchise on the, in like Smash Bros and stuff could come back.
(17:11):
But F-Zero, it feels like almost impossible.
I think if F-Zero just got a completely different genre and what people know Captain Falcon for.
Yeah, you'd need like a Captain Falcon beat-em-up game.
You know, make him like a beat-em-up game, make him like a superhero, make him like a
like a Street Fighter, not Street Fighter, but like have a, like if they, if they were to make
(17:36):
just some sort of beat-em-up or fighting game with Captain Falcon.
Yeah. I think that'll turn
people's heads more than just, well, another F-Zero racing game. Just because of the fact
how much his brand, like just his character itself has changed over the years.
Honestly. Literally like
after, after F-Zero climax, it's really just been Captain Falcon fighting.
(18:01):
Yeah. He's probably more well known for fighting than racing. I could honestly see like a F-Zero,
like a Captain Falcon game being like a high budget neon white, essentially.
Oh.
Like a, because I'm just thinking like even in Smash Bros, his character is kind of going fast.
(18:22):
So I feel like they could just, they play into that his whole thing is that he is,
he's just like get through levels as fast as possible, but it is Nintendo. So they always want
like some fun gimmick that like no other game has touched that they would like toss in to the mix
to make it interesting.
(18:43):
Oh, they make a F-Zero game with fighting mechanics, with more fighting mechanics now.
And what Captain Falcon can hop out of his racer and start beating other racers up.
Wait, that's actually insane. It's like a first person or third person game.
Kind of like just breath of the wild view. You can jump out of your cart.
(19:05):
You hop on a high speed race or high speed chase and you jump across to the next car and,
and like try to beat up opponents and take down as many racers as possible.
Or you're maybe in an arena.
I love it.
It's like you're on a car almost, but you're on top of the car. Like
(19:27):
it's just a racing game where everyone is out of their car, just running on foot really fast.
Yeah. It's like what people thought of in the Mario movie when Mario like
got his cart destroyed, landed on the Koopa, destroyed the Koopa and took over his cart.
Exactly. Exactly. I mean, we could actually blend it in with maybe like rocket league or something
(19:50):
with a more arena based approach, or they could do it on the midst of a high speed racetrack.
Either one of those I'm, I'm, I'm open for.
Let him cook. Let him cook.
He's got to do, he's got to do the Falcon punch if he's, if, if they're going to make a game
for him. Like he's got to, he's got to do it because that's what people know him for now,
(20:11):
nowadays. Hero fighter racing game. Hero fighter racing game.
Yeah. What a weird thing. We landed on it. All right, Nintendo,
now you got to make this. Just imagine how they would implement multiplayer for this.
That'd be so, you're just driving and you just get obliterated by like,
(20:36):
this is how you ruin friendships. Let a Falcon or something. You're like,
it's all in first person. A dude lands on your car, opens the hatch and grabs you and pulls you out.
This actually sounds sick in like VR.
Commendeering a car in GTA, but your friend's the one in the car.
Exactly. Dude.
(20:57):
Except you, except you end up this game. Now you really.
Now you know how we feel with, uh, well, shoot. WarioWare land.
I know, right? That it's still upsetting. Just blending the two identities.
Yeah. Just I think, um, I think if FZero were to blend his so-called smash counterparts
(21:22):
into his, into his racing, his smash persona into the actual racing formula, this could turn out to
be probably one of the craziest racing games ever made. Yeah, definitely. I feel like a game like
that would either be really, really good or like so unbelievably complicated. Yeah. You have to be
(21:44):
like really limited. You'd be doing like time-based button mashes. Something like that.
It definitely be weird. Yeah. I mean, the day that FZero shows up in Nintendo direct, uh,
is the day that all Nintendo fans are questioning it. Yeah. It's going to be either the really best
reaction or the most questionable one. Knowing smash fans, it'll be a big reaction.
(22:10):
Actually, I think the only FZero fans are now smash fans. It's true. It's going to be like
when, um, Diddy Kong gets a three second cameo in the Mario movie and you're watching with Kaiser.
Oh my gosh. That's going to, that's like your one friend who likes FZero watching the Nintendo
direct with you. He's going to say it's peak fiction again. The six people in the world would
(22:31):
be popping off so hard right now. Thank you for joining us and discussing how Nintendo could
revive FZero. We'd love it if you could follow us on Twitter and listen to future episodes on Spotify
and iTunes. Join our community to support server to continue today's discussion and we'll see you
next time on the Switch Clicks podcast.
How could Nintendo revive F-Zero to return in new ways? Let's talk about that.
(00:10):
Welcome to Switch Click Podcast episode 143 recorded on July 4th, 2023. My name is Dakota
and today I'm joined by Tyler. Hello! And Nathan. Hi there. Now, last week you guys talked about
reviving 2D series from Nintendo and this week just so happened that in the news from an interview
(00:31):
from VGC, I believe the designer... You would know the best of the three of us. I don't know.
It says the now retired 30-year Nintendo veteran Takeya Imamura who designed characters such as
Captain Falcon, Fox McCloud, and for some reason Tingle. He did an interview recently with VGC
(00:55):
and people have been taking this quote and running with it to make news and we are doing the same.
The quote is about F-Zero and if he thinks that it'll come back or not, the question was,
so why do you think F-Zero gets less attention from the company than Star Fox does? There hasn't
been a new F-Zero game for almost 20 years. He answers with, I think it's because Mario Kart is
(01:20):
Nintendo's most popular racing game and a new F-Zero would cost a fortune. My impression is
that Miyamoto is very affectionate about Star Fox. Yeah, he loves Star Fox and it's not...
He really likes Star Fox. But I don't know how he feels about it now after his attempts, his two
attempts at trying to bring it back. Yeah, the Star Fox fans, not to the same degree as F-Zero
(01:45):
fans, have kind of been living off of Smash Bros for the past while in good representation.
Because I don't... What's like why is it the last good Star Fox? Last good Star Fox? Star Fox 2,
technically, I guess. I heard that's not very good. That's not very good? Okay. I've heard it's not
(02:06):
very good. It's slightly unfinished. I just know... I'd say probably 64 is the last good one. 64,
64. You could count 64 DS. I was trying to play Star Fox... I think it was Star Fox 64 I was
trying to play the other day and it has, I think all the old Star Foxes, if you have like a game
(02:29):
over mechanic where you start at the beginning and I hate old games that do that so much. Oh, it's
so frustrating. I'm a waster. Yeah, it really does just feel like they're trying to waste my time.
But you know, like Star Fox, F-Zero I feel could have a random, completely out of the left field
(02:51):
game that could... Well, I mean, Star Fox, it didn't kind of ruin credibility a little bit further
with Star Fox Adventures. So it was called the one with crystal in it. Yeah, that's GameCube.
Yeah. But who knows maybe with F-Zero that could be a great way to breathe some fresh air into the
franchise. But obviously, we have to address the elephant in the room that we already talked about
(03:17):
earlier with Mario Kart still existing. Yeah, it has to be way different than Mario Kart. And I think
one of the main problems is just the switches hardware if they want to make a game where you go
fast. I mean, it's not impossible. If you look back in the PS3, they had a game called
(03:40):
Wipeout, not Wipeout the parkour, optical course game, but Wipeout as in the super fast
sci-fi racer game. Was that game called Wipeout? It's called Wipeout, yeah. Wipeout HD, Wipeout
Fury on the PS3. I think it was also on the PS Vita. Whoa, that's a deep cut. Yeah. I have no idea
(04:03):
what you're talking about. It's basically like this. I'd say it's been it's heavily inspired by
the F-Zero franchise. It's also sci-fi. It also involves really high like high speed races.
I don't think it's impossible to do it. I don't think it's impossible to do it on the switch
hardware, especially if we're talking about older hardware. And yeah, like F-Zero has always been
(04:27):
based off of like racing game, except it's like really difficult and very like the visual of a
car going so fast that everything's super blurry when you're still like grinding against edges in
like a chaotic fashion. That's at least what my thoughts always go to with F-Zero. Like it's a very
just like not like rough around the edges, but in like a good way kind of game. Yeah. Yeah. Of course
(04:57):
most people have only played the original, which is understandable. Because if you look at the sales
data, the first game peaked its sales at 2.85 million. And the next one got 1.1. Next one got
1.05 and then it got to F-Zero GX on the GameCube. 0.6. What is it? 600. Nearly 700,000 copies.
(05:28):
That is painful. And then after that, there's a F-Zero game on the Game Boy.
Really? Yeah, there's one in 2004 F-Zero Climax. It did 0.005 million.
So what does that? Was it like 50k? That can't be right. That's like 50k. That might be 50k.
(05:50):
There's no way that's right. None of us have heard about it. And like, if it was well known,
that I like at least decently well known, it'd be on so many like forgotten Nintendo games that
you've never heard of YouTube video. It's the last F-Zero game ever released. So far. It was only
released in Japan. Oh, no wonder. Maybe that's why. Because there's a number of games that are
(06:15):
also exclusive to Japan. Yeah. Oh dear. Nintendo and like ending their franchise with a
Japanese exclusive. I'm trying to think of, I'm really trying my hardest to just strap Mother 3
into this, but it's not a, I like half of it, I just realized it's not a Game Boy Advance game.
(06:40):
I mean, it's a good test market most of the time. I guess that's true.
I think the reason I mentioned the Switch's hardware earlier is for some reason, like,
you know how on Xbox, they have the Forza series, and you can only go a certain speed in that game
because of the hardware. I think they max out on the Xbox One, it was like 190, and then on
(07:06):
Xbox Series X, it's like 210 or something. But which Forza game are we talking about?
Specifically, I think Forza Horizon 5. Oh, okay, obviously, because open world games.
If they're going to make an open world game, of course it's going to be limited. But if we're
talking about like a narrow track, and we're talking about developers that actually work
(07:31):
specifically with the hardware, then I doubt they're going to, I doubt they need something
stronger than that. True, true. I'm trying to think of, do you know, does like PlayStation have a
premier racing game? Is it Gran Turismo? It's Gran Turismo. Okay, yeah, because it, like every
(07:52):
console has one, and then any others that try to fit in tend to die a little bit. Like Nintendo,
like F-Zero didn't live on, but Mario Kart is the biggest racing game. You have Forza for the Xbox,
Gran Turismo for PlayStation stuff. And I would argue that like PC Trackmania has been destroying
(08:14):
all like big racing games that have come out on Steam. I think so. Yeah, there's a very broad
PC racing game field. You can either get super realistic, super arcadey, or like a sandbox game.
Yeah, I do think on average, if you're putting a game on a PC, people like, primarily PC gamers
(08:36):
tend to prefer like a technical experience, which I think Trackmania loves to do. Yeah, and Nintendo
has the arcadey down to a science. Oh yeah. Pretty much pick up and play, beat it, and you've had your
fun. Yeah, I'm thinking they could maybe angle it similar to like, kind of like speedrun games,
(09:04):
like how Neon White did it. If you have multiple paths, and you can just keep beating your time,
stuff like that. Yeah, that could be a fun kind of stuff. That is actually a very viable option
considering how very little Mario Kart's actually focused on like the time trial type of thing.
It's always been much more of a competitive game, or well, casually competitive game,
(09:30):
rather than something that you'd try to beat yourself at. Yeah, and it is wild. Like,
not that they would ever do this, but Captain Falcon is a much bigger character than F-Zero
is as a franchise, to the point where like, they could literally just make a Captain Falcon game,
and I think it would maybe do better. E plus tier in Smash Ultimate, so I mean, why not?
(09:55):
Yeah, it's weird that they could just slap Captain Falcon into like a completely other,
separate genre of game. They could hold a title of Captain Falcon and that title alone could sell
even more than F-Zero. I think so. I think Captain Falcon as a title is more marketable,
which is insane to think. That's so sad.
(10:17):
What does the F in F-Zero even mean? Falcon Zero? Or like speed?
I think it has to do something with speed. Let me just double check.
I think it's got to be something with speed. There's no way. Something speed. It's something
with speed. Oh, I think it's just like Formula One, because it's called F1. Formula Zero. Oh,
(10:40):
wait, how did nobody... Formula One, F1 racing. That seems so obvious.
F-Zero racing. Fair enough, I guess. Good job. The philosophical reasoning behind F-Zero,
and then it's just like... Oh, it's just a play on F-Zero racing.
Yeah, we just drop it down. Just drop it down. The Zero number.
(11:04):
The Zero being associated with futuristic stuff is kind of...
That is true. Yeah.
It's a very 80s thing. I think another thing that I mentioned before the show is that they could
even do like a challenging open world where you walk around as your custom character, similar to
(11:26):
how 356 is doing it right now. And I think that's a good thing. I think it's a good thing.
Yeah. And I think F-Zero has a lot of characters that they could use because they've introduced
them a lot in the GameCube one specifically. They fleshed out a few of them. So you walk around,
challenge the guys, challenge random racers. It doesn't have to be street racing or anything.
(11:51):
You can, I don't know, also make a custom track maker. Then you get... There you go. You got your
game. The open world and you challenge someone, it's like slot car racing, except it's slot car
racing mixed with like Beyblade. Yeah.
(12:13):
Wait, that's actually kind of interesting. I know that the Hot Wheels game just got a sequel.
So they just pull that. And I think that could totally work. I don't know, it doesn't feel very
F-Zero-y, but at the same time, I don't think it has to because again... It's F-Zero Origins.
(12:34):
You play as the kid versions of them. Oh my gosh.
Pull a baby Muppet. Show him off, babies.
But then actually things can be so much slower.
Nah, Captain Falcon's built different. He goes back in time. Boom. There you go.
Captain Falcon goes back in time. Full grown man in his own baby body.
(13:00):
But he's still like buff. I do think like the fact that honestly, even if it was like
slot car weird, or even like RC car racing or something, where you're going around a city,
it's such a weird series that has like so many characters. Like there's so many characters that
(13:27):
are never going to be used again because of just how F-Zero has kind of died as a franchise.
To the point where I feel like the casual person doesn't really know anything about the series.
You could just do anything with it. Yeah, it's kind of scary though.
(13:50):
Like even if they do try to change up the formula, how well do you think it's going to attract
people, any type of gamer in there? Especially if Mario Kart exists.
How do you justify them, even if it's a different formula, how do you justify it for them to play
(14:11):
this game? What makes it look attractive to them? I think that's ultimately the one thing that
the designer was probably looking into as well. Because the art style of this is kind of more
geared towards slightly older audiences. It's not like completely cartoon like Mario.
Comic booky almost. Yeah, comic book.
(14:33):
And we saw how that kind of worked out with, actually I wouldn't say arms, but you know what?
Yeah, arms kind of works. That's more for cartoon.
It's just kind of there. Yeah, it's just like, I don't know if art is something that could factor
into how many people would be jumping into this game. We couldn't have cartoony Captain Falcon.
(14:57):
There's no way. No way to do that. No way they're going to do that.
But like, what if I just thought about this because the art for the F-Zero Climax game
looks very like 80s, 90s retro anime. Yeah.
How people are making music for that right now. It's like lo-fi almost.
(15:18):
And I'm thinking, why don't they just pull into the Spider-Verse and make the entire game that
art style. I mean, not really 3D models, but I don't know how well that translates to racing.
Like it might look, you actually, it could be very, very pretty. It's just, it's so difficult
(15:40):
for Nintendo to market literally any other racing game because they have the king of all racing games
still selling like crazy. With new content still coming out.
I get such a weird problem that a beloved series has fallen into, that it's just so
(16:02):
unbelievably outclassed by a little Italian guy in a go-kart.
Who does happen to race on two of his tracks anyways.
Yeah. He was gotten big enough to steal his tracks from him.
Yeah. Perhaps in the next Mario Kart,
there's a new CC, zero CC, and you're just going blinding fast.
(16:25):
Zero CC. Oh dear.
F-Zero coming back, like I feel the most plausible way for F-Zero to come back
is as a mode in a Mario Kart game. That is so unfortunate.
At that point they'd have to re, it'd have to be Nintendo Kurt and they'd have to include
so many more characters. Yeah.
(16:48):
Yeah, probably. But that'd be a very
sad way to reintroduce F-Zero. It's like, actually it's such a like limping
franchise. It's probably, it is, the more we're talking about this, the more I'm realizing like
every other kind of dying dead franchise on the, in like Smash Bros and stuff could come back.
(17:11):
But F-Zero, it feels like almost impossible.
I think if F-Zero just got a completely different genre and what people know Captain Falcon for.
Yeah, you'd need like a Captain Falcon beat-em-up game.
You know, make him like a beat-em-up game, make him like a superhero, make him like a
like a Street Fighter, not Street Fighter, but like have a, like if they, if they were to make
(17:36):
just some sort of beat-em-up or fighting game with Captain Falcon.
Yeah. I think that'll turn
people's heads more than just, well, another F-Zero racing game. Just because of the fact
how much his brand, like just his character itself has changed over the years.
Honestly. Literally like
after, after F-Zero climax, it's really just been Captain Falcon fighting.
(18:01):
Yeah. He's probably more well known for fighting than racing. I could honestly see like a F-Zero,
like a Captain Falcon game being like a high budget neon white, essentially.
Oh.
Like a, because I'm just thinking like even in Smash Bros, his character is kind of going fast.
(18:22):
So I feel like they could just, they play into that his whole thing is that he is,
he's just like get through levels as fast as possible, but it is Nintendo. So they always want
like some fun gimmick that like no other game has touched that they would like toss in to the mix
to make it interesting.
(18:43):
Oh, they make a F-Zero game with fighting mechanics, with more fighting mechanics now.
And what Captain Falcon can hop out of his racer and start beating other racers up.
Wait, that's actually insane. It's like a first person or third person game.
Kind of like just breath of the wild view. You can jump out of your cart.
(19:05):
You hop on a high speed race or high speed chase and you jump across to the next car and,
and like try to beat up opponents and take down as many racers as possible.
Or you're maybe in an arena.
I love it.
It's like you're on a car almost, but you're on top of the car. Like
(19:27):
it's just a racing game where everyone is out of their car, just running on foot really fast.
Yeah. It's like what people thought of in the Mario movie when Mario like
got his cart destroyed, landed on the Koopa, destroyed the Koopa and took over his cart.
Exactly. Exactly. I mean, we could actually blend it in with maybe like rocket league or something
(19:50):
with a more arena based approach, or they could do it on the midst of a high speed racetrack.
Either one of those I'm, I'm, I'm open for.
Let him cook. Let him cook.
He's got to do, he's got to do the Falcon punch if he's, if, if they're going to make a game
for him. Like he's got to, he's got to do it because that's what people know him for now,
(20:11):
nowadays. Hero fighter racing game. Hero fighter racing game.
Yeah. What a weird thing. We landed on it. All right, Nintendo,
now you got to make this. Just imagine how they would implement multiplayer for this.
That'd be so, you're just driving and you just get obliterated by like,
(20:36):
this is how you ruin friendships. Let a Falcon or something. You're like,
it's all in first person. A dude lands on your car, opens the hatch and grabs you and pulls you out.
This actually sounds sick in like VR.
Commendeering a car in GTA, but your friend's the one in the car.
Exactly. Dude.
(20:57):
Except you, except you end up this game. Now you really.
Now you know how we feel with, uh, well, shoot. WarioWare land.
I know, right? That it's still upsetting. Just blending the two identities.
Yeah. Just I think, um, I think if FZero were to blend his so-called smash counterparts
(21:22):
into his, into his racing, his smash persona into the actual racing formula, this could turn out to
be probably one of the craziest racing games ever made. Yeah, definitely. I feel like a game like
that would either be really, really good or like so unbelievably complicated. Yeah. You have to be
(21:44):
like really limited. You'd be doing like time-based button mashes. Something like that.
It definitely be weird. Yeah. I mean, the day that FZero shows up in Nintendo direct, uh,
is the day that all Nintendo fans are questioning it. Yeah. It's going to be either the really best
reaction or the most questionable one. Knowing smash fans, it'll be a big reaction.
(22:10):
Actually, I think the only FZero fans are now smash fans. It's true. It's going to be like
when, um, Diddy Kong gets a three second cameo in the Mario movie and you're watching with Kaiser.
Oh my gosh. That's going to, that's like your one friend who likes FZero watching the Nintendo
direct with you. He's going to say it's peak fiction again. The six people in the world would
(22:31):
be popping off so hard right now. Thank you for joining us and discussing how Nintendo could
revive FZero. We'd love it if you could follow us on Twitter and listen to future episodes on Spotify
and iTunes. Join our community to support server to continue today's discussion and we'll see you
next time on the Switch Clicks podcast.
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