Star Fox Remake Coming to Switch 2: Is the Console Finally Worth Buying?
Nintendo's killer-app problem may have just gotten an answer.
Nintendo announced a full remake of Star Fox 64 during a surprise Star Fox Direct on May 6, 2026, with the new game headed exclusively to the Switch 2 on June 25.
The 15-minute presentation, hosted by Shigeru Miyamoto, showed off a modernized version of the 1997 N64 hit. Updated graphics. Redesigned versions of Fox McCloud, Falco, Peppy, and Slippy. Expanded story cutscenes and new gameplay modes. Mouse controls on the Switch 2. Pilot-and-gunner co-op. Online multiplayer. Even an AR-style mode that uses GameChat to turn players’ faces into pilot avatars.
Pricing is set at $49.99 digital and $59.99 physical. The title is a Switch 2 exclusive and the first new mainline Star Fox game since 2016.
The announcement landed the same week Bloomberg reported that investors are pressuring Nintendo to raise the Switch 2’s $449.99 price tag to offset DRAM-driven hardware losses. The Star Fox Direct dropped two days later. That’s not nothing.
TL;DR
Nintendo announced Star Fox, a cinematic remake of the 1997 N64 hit, for Switch 2 during a dedicated Direct on May 6, 2026.
Launches June 25, 2026, with upgraded visuals, redesigned characters, new cutscenes, mouse controls, co-op, and online multiplayer.
First new mainline Star Fox game since 2016. Hosted by Shigeru Miyamoto himself.
Fox McCloud also plays a major supporting role in The Super Mario Galaxy Movie, which hit theaters in April 2026 with Glen Powell voicing the character.
The announcement comes the same week investors pressured Nintendo to raise the Switch 2’s $449.99 price tag amid disappointing holiday sales.
What Nintendo Actually Showed
This isn’t a port or a HD remaster. The Direct framed it as a full remake with redesigned character models, expanded cutscenes, and new gameplay layered on top of the original Star Fox 64 structure. Miyamoto, who created the franchise in 1993 with the original Star Fox on the Super Nintendo, hosted the presentation himself. That’s a signal in itself. Nintendo doesn’t trot out Miyamoto for marginal projects.
The new features lean into Switch 2-specific hardware. Mouse controls are a Switch 2 exclusive feature that Nintendo has been quietly developing the use cases for since launch. Pilot-and-gunner co-op turns the on-rails shooting into a two-person experience. Online multiplayer goes beyond what the original supported. The GameChat AR mode that maps players’ faces onto pilot avatars is the kind of weird Nintendo flourish that only Nintendo would think to ship.
Pricing at $49.99 digital and $59.99 physical follows the pattern Nintendo started in May 2026, where digital titles carry a lower MSRP than their physical counterparts. The remake is a Switch 2 exclusive, which matters for the killer-app conversation discussed below.
Star Fox Has Been Quiet for Almost a Decade
The franchise has had a complicated history since Star Fox 64. Miyamoto created the series in 1993 with Star Fox on the SNES, which used the Super FX chip to deliver early 3D polygon graphics — pretty wild stuff for the time. The 1997 sequel, Star Fox 64, became the series high point with on-rails shooting, branching paths, and the voice work that gave the internet do a barrel roll and can’t let you do that, Star Fox.
Later entries struggled to find the same audience. Star Fox Adventures on the GameCube in 2002 pivoted toward open-world action and confused longtime fans. Star Fox: Assault in 2005 tried to mix on-rails sections with ground combat and didn’t land cleanly. Star Fox Zero on the Wii U in 2016 used the system’s gimmicky two-screen control scheme and was a critical and commercial flop.
The franchise has been quiet since then. Almost ten years. Today’s announcement is essentially Nintendo saying we know we whiffed on the last few of these. Here’s the version that gets back to what worked.
The Glen Powell Setup
Worth noticing what Nintendo set up two months ago. Fox McCloud, voiced by Glen Powell, plays a significant supporting role in The Super Mario Galaxy Movie, which opened in theaters in April 2026. Nintendo and Illumination revealed the character’s involvement just before release, and the cameo wasn’t a throwaway moment. It gave Fox real screen time and real character work in a major theatrical release.
The cross-promotion timing now reads as deliberate. April theatrical introduction. May Direct announcement. June game release. That’s not coincidence. Nintendo has been pulling movie audiences back toward the games for several years through the Mario movies and the various Pokémon film projects, and the Star Fox cross-promotion is the same playbook applied to a property that needed the broader audience reach more than Mario does.
Glen Powell as the voice actor is also smart casting. He’s a current-moment leading man with broad recognition coming off Top Gun: Maverick and Hit Man. Pairing his voice with Fox McCloud puts the character in front of an audience that maybe never played the N64 original.
The Killer-App Conversation
The Switch 2 has been having a complicated first year. The console launched in June 2025 and shipped 17 million-plus units globally by April 2026, technically the fastest start in Nintendo’s history. But US holiday sales were down 35% compared to the original Switch’s 2017 holiday performance. UK was down 16%. France was down over 30%. Nintendo cut planned Switch 2 production by 33% in March, citing slower-than-expected consumer demand.
The diagnosis from analysts and from Switch 2 buyer comments has been consistent: the Year One software lineup didn’t include a system-seller on the level of Breath of the Wild, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, or Super Mario Odyssey — the three games that defined the original Switch’s first year. Mario Kart World, Donkey Kong Bananza, and the eventual Pokémon Pokopia drop did real numbers but didn’t land the holy shit, must-buy moment that Nintendo’s biggest first-year hardware launches have produced.
And honestly, the timing on this Star Fox announcement is so on-the-nose it has to be coincidence.
Wednesday: Bloomberg reports that Nintendo is selling each Switch 2 unit at a loss because of DRAM costs and that investors want a price hike at Friday’s earnings call. Today: Nintendo announces a Star Fox remake exclusive to the Switch 2, hosted by Miyamoto, with a June 25 release date that lands right in the summer hardware-pull window.
The optics are that Nintendo is responding to the killer-app concern in real time. The reality is that a remake of this scope was in development long before yesterday’s investor news, so the answer is more like Nintendo had this in the pipeline anyway and the timing is good. Either way, the Switch 2 has a marquee first-party exclusive arriving seven weeks from now, which is exactly what the system needed.
Whether Star Fox qualifies as a true killer-app on the level of Mario Kart 8 or Breath of the Wild is the open question. The franchise’s audience is real but smaller than those properties. Star Fox 64 was a beloved game that sold around 4 million copies — not in Mario Kart or Mario territory. One Star Fox game probably doesn’t single-handedly fix the killer-app gap. But it’s a meaningful signal of the kind of first-party support Nintendo can produce when motivated, and it gives the Switch 2 a hardware-pull moment heading into the summer.
What This Means for Switch 2 Holdouts
The next two months are the test. Star Fox drops June 25. The earnings call Friday will indicate whether Nintendo is raising the console price or holding the line. The summer 2026 software pace will determine whether the killer-app conversation resolves in Nintendo’s favor or whether the holiday miss was the start of a broader pattern rather than a one-quarter blip.
For Switch 2 owners who have been waiting for a reason to feel good about the purchase, this is one. For holdouts who skipped the launch because the lineup wasn’t there, this is a real reason to revisit. For everyone else, it’s a sign that Nintendo is still capable of pulling franchises out of the catalog when the moment requires it.
Friday’s earnings call answers the price question. June 25 answers the killer-app question. Both arrive in the next seven weeks.
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About the author:
Thom “Kneon” Pratt is a former newspaper journalist and working comic book creator turned accidental podcaster, accidental YouTuber, and accidental game maker. He co-hosts the Clownfish TV podcast and the Pirates & Princesses podcast, both with Geeky Sparkles, where they cover our weird timeline, geek culture, tech, games, theme parks, and occasionally the paranormal. Gen X, eclectic, based in Pittsburgh. Follow him on X at @kneon.
Hat Tips:
Nintendo of America, “Star Fox Direct 5.6.2026” YouTube livestream (May 6, 2026)
IGN, “The Surprise Star Fox Remake Looks Incredible — NVC 811” (May 7, 2026)
Gematsu, “Star Fox announced for Switch 2, based on the Nintendo 64 game, coming June 25” (May 6, 2026)
Bloomberg, “Nintendo cuts Switch 2 output by over 30% on weak holiday sales” (March 24, 2026)
Nintendo Life, “Nintendo’s Apparently Cutting US Switch 2 Output After Lower Than Expected Holiday Sales” (March 24, 2026)
Polygon, “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie has a massive Star Fox cameo” (March 27, 2026)