A FOREWARNING:
For those expecting a scripted re-enactment of the nicely drawn 1997 Nintendo Power comic, a by-the-level breakdown of the video-game, or a fan insertion of myself having sex with Fara, Zelda, or Princess Toadstool (ah ha), you'll probably be disappointed in the utmost. I pride myself on exercising my creativity with very little to work with as a power base. I believe, like Stephen King, that excellent stories wait beneath the bedrock of our own imagination and that they must first be unearthed – with an archaeologist's brush, a sculptor's chisel, or a workman's jack-hammer.
I've always loved the Nintendo era of gaming – before the finer plotlines of scripted role-playing ventures like the Final Fantasy series and before graphics and gameplay replaced the perfect simplicity to Super Mario Bros. (died with the 64, natch). There is so little to these games – the Legend of Zelda, Mega Man 2, Power Blade, River City Ransom, Contra… excluding Ninja Gaiden, you'd be hard-pressed to point any of the preceding to be very "plot-heavy" at all.
In the time since I first read Jeff Rovin's How To Win At Nintendo Games series of novels (back before strategies and walkthroughs were so expensively packaged in heavy, foil and holographic guide-books) and since I first decided the pen would be my instrument of wrath (although to be honest, the C7A1 assault rifle is up there, you know), I've always wanted answers to questions CAPCOM steadily refuses to provide continuity on, the truth about Zelda's tumultuous and sometimes gratingly insensible plotline, and what exactly the fuck happened to the original Mega Man anyway.
Since the big corporations decided unanimously not to provide any service – I decided, hey, what the hell, why not make up my own answers? I was told once (or read once, I'm not giving credit where it ain't due) that questions were like grains of sand caught between an oysters gum. They would itch, annoy, pain you, until finally they are cocooned in the pearl of an answer and await discovery like lost pirate's treasure.
These stories, all of them and not limited to my brief foray into the Star Fox universe, or my plans to twist the Super Mario Bros., explore in-depth Sonic The Hedgehog, novelise Power Blade and maybe make serious River City Ransom, are my pearls.
May you find them as valuable.
Star Fox was a bit of a random decision on my part to explore. I'd perused through the old Nintendo Power comic and enjoyed the artwork (I always did enjoy their more tactful artwork, including their personal envisioning of the Dragon Warrior and Final Fantasy series). I'd warmed up the old 64 and blasted through the Lylat galaxy bringing Andross's well voice-acted army down in flames. And I remembered back in my younger message-boarding days a particular debate on whether or not Doctor Albert William Wily could outsmart the mad-ape in question. For the fun of it, I stood behind the monkey man, and me and my friend Cameron unearthed theories on biogenetics, biological reincarnation, dimensional physics… anything we could use of the ridiculous and fictionalised realm of Nintendo in order to transfer it to a scientific spectrum and, well, beat out that loud bastard Cody.
I won't say there was pride in it – never did see the king of the jungle let out a roar atop pride rock on how Centaur Man's level in Mega Man 6 neatly presented a defiance of scientific gravity that required some kind of technological prowess (beating the highest score on Asteroids, though…).
It did, however, in hindsight, gift me with a sizeable repertoire of ideas at my disposal ready for practical usage in the world of fiction. And these I will use. Also, recently my interest in the political turmoil of the civil war and Vietnam era America, as well as scathing interest in my own country's more recent political failing (and succeeding) has presented me with the desire to write something out in a universe of civilisation where this sort of cold-war paranoia and warmongering can be easily put into play (while favouring the blaster over the sword). I could have more than likely built something completely unique from the ground up – and, seeing as my cover-to-cover outline of a massive and otherwise complete novel on the NES Legend of Zelda became in its own right a completely unrelated and original work of fantasy, there's no reason to believe this won't evolve over the course of my writing it.
Hell, anthropomorphic animals in space? I remember reading Camille Bouchard's Les Griffes de l'Empire, which at that age was as engrossing and fantastic to me as The Empire Strikes Back (the greatest Star Wars movie, hands down, may you die if you so heathenistically believe otherwise) and A New Hope. Moreso, even. Humanity enslaved by anthropomorphs in a galaxy far, far away (or in a distant future, I can't recall).
Hell, that prospect interests me already.
In any case, all this put together, including a zest to create characters of unfathomable psychological depth (ala Watchmen, Alan Moore), allowed me to use the Lylat galaxy as my canvas.
But here's the thing.
For all you fans of Star Fox who could recite to me the Cornerian constitution backwards, you will be hard pressed not to find "plot line" inconsistencies with my work and the actual "plot line" inconsistencies of the game chronology. This is my story, its fan fiction, and I will take whatever liberties I feel like or think up with the series ad infinitum. So don't badger me about Fox's biological uncle actually being John Steward McCloud and not John Stuart (if he even has one).
Well, that's all on my end. I present to you now Star Fox: Flying As To War, a novelization of the events leading up to, and of the Second Lylat War (better known as Star Fox 64), including a brief aftermath. I hope I stick to it, and I hope you all enjoy it.