For as long as I’ve been writing, I have had a near-obsessive tendency to focus most of my attention on the same two or three games with a deluge of content. It should come as no surprise to frequent EZIYODA readers, who have had to endure every stray thought I’ve ever had on Resident Evil, Pokemon, and Fire Emblem.

But little do they know that long before that (and still to this day), I absolutely adored Star Fox. I’ve previously anointed the Super Nintendo original as my favourite game of 1993, and my friends and I sunk countless hours into Star Fox Assault’s hectic, bombastic, and altogether unbalanced multiplayer mode.

My top entry? It’s no surprise, and it’s no contest: it’s Star Fox 64, known to some as Lylat Wars back in the day. It has remained unsurpassed as the definitive Arwing experience, combining arcade style sessions with the newfound precision of the Nintendo 64’s control stick.

I have made mention of how the sixth console generation offered an impressive visual upgrade — and make no mistake, Star Fox Adventures is simply gorgeous — but the leap from the SNES’ modest rendering ability to the N64’s mastery of polygons made this franchise come to life.

Although Star Fox was a technical marvel in 1993, its limitations were apparent when compared to the crisp, smooth aesthetics that pixels provided with ease. Of the original entry, Shigeru Miyamoto once said, “When we showed the game to people, they said, “Uh, what’s with the triangle?” For us the polygon shapes were part of a ship or building, not just a flat triangle. Now after finishing Star Fox 64, I can see that it really was just a flat triangle.”

The N64 wasn’t exactly a juggernaut either by today’s standards, and similarly, some of its character models now appear a bit rough around the edges, literally. But for a vehicle-focussed shooter like Star Fox? Oh, it was perfect. The spaceships really looked like spaceships, whizzing by and billowing flames as they were pelted with laser fire.

In hindsight, Katina is a barebones arena, marked only by a singular base at its centre. I didn’t care, though, because I was floored by the sheer number of aircraft on-screen at one time. Was that an allied unit? Or an enemy fighter? It didn’t matter to my morally ambiguous nine-year-old brain; I shot ’em all and let god sort ’em out.

Even more impressive was the fact that the game was fully voiced, from start to finish. How on earth the developers were able to cram all of that audio on a humble cartridge in 1997, I cannot say. Sure, it sounds a little compressed, however just like the blocky models, you can write that off as simply being how the comms sound from within the cockpit.

From “Do a barrel roll” to “My emperor, I’ve failed you,” the melodramatic lines have become as famous as the game itself. Alas, my personal favourite, “Cocky little freaks”, hasn’t quite reached the same heights.

It looked good, it sounded good, and my god, it felt great. There is a peerless satisfaction in how the Arwing handles in Star Fox 64 that is hard to quantify. It was smooth and responsive, without being downright kinetic as it was in Assault. The latter example more resembled a puppet on a string with the way it could suddenly jerk into any direction, whereas SF64’s was the ideal interpretation of futuristic technology.

This was the N64’s showcase piece for the second year of its fledgling life cycle; a cinematic, thrilling adventure that was imaginative, memorable, and challenging. And yes, the series has never come close to recapturing that same lightning in a bottle.

From the genre-shifting Star Fox Adventures to the stubbornly experimental Star Fox Zero, each new entry has been a distinct example of one step forward, two steps backward. Indeed, the best game since Star Fox 64 was… Star Fox 64, when it was remade for the 3DS. I named it my favourite game of 2011, despite the fact that it was essentially a fresh coat of paint on a 14-year-old formula.

Ultimately, it just worked, and it has stood the test of time as the flagbearer for rail shooters. There’s some bells and whistles thrown in to differentiate itself from the SNES edition, too, like additional vehicles and all-range mode, alongside branching paths options that are delightfully creative.

I’m not really saying anything that people don’t already know. But for some reason, I wanted people to know that I felt this way, too. I treasure this franchise, and anxiously await its return to form. This love was formed all the way back in 1993, with those silly little triangles on the Super Nintendo. But it was consummated by Fox McCloud and company when they triumphantly arrived on the Nintendo 64.

…Wait, does that phrasing imply I had sex with Star Fox 64? Fuck it, I’m not confident people will have read this far anyway.