Parent's Guide: StarFox 64 3D - Age rating, mature content and difficulty

StarFox 64 3D is a sci-fi themed shoot 'em up, which sees you leading a squadron of, well, animals in space ships into battle. Letting you move left, right, and up and down, whilst following a set path through the levels, and coming complete with a comprehensive tutorial, StarFox 64 3D is a game that's easy to pick up and play - especially when considering the ability to fly using the 3DS's built in gyroscopes.

The objective here is to simply survive until the end of the level, blowing up as many enemies as you can find along the way, before tackling a cheesy, pantomime-villain-style boss at the end of the level. Everything's very straightforward to get the hang of, and most bosses have glowing weak points to tell you where to shoot. When combined with the adaptive difficulty that means you'll be playing the easiest levels if you're not doing very well at the game, and StarFox 64 3D is a game that children around age 7 and up should be able to handle. The only problem for kids is that it's possible to play through the game from start to finish in under an hour. How much your child enjoys replaying levels, trying to better themselves in order to unlock the harder tiers, and trying for a better score will determine how much value they get out of this game.

As a Nintendo game, there's nothing in here for parents to be all too concerned about. There's no sex, or bad language, but there is a slightly disturbing part towards the end, where (SPOILERS) you eventually come up against the final boss, in the form of a giant head. Again, there's no gore - but after attacking him for a bit, depending on which tier of levels you're going through, the outside of his head will eventually disintegrate, to reveal either an angry robot, or a flying brain, with eyeballs attached by lasers, which it periodically fires at you (the lasers, not the eyeballs). It's a tad disturbing, but it's nothing too scary or unsettling - nor is it intended to be.

StarFox 64 3D has a multiplayer mode with full support for single card download play, letting up to four people play along with just the one cartridge - so long as they each have a 3DS! Unfortunately, the only multiplayer mode on offer is a standard Vs. mode, which sees you struggle to shoot your family down before they do the same to you. A co-op mode would have been a really nice (and much more useful) addition.

Age Ratings

Format Reviewed: Nintendo 3DS