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Star Fox: Grand Prix - 4 more Nintendo spin-offs we'd like to see on Switch

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Star Fox: Grand Prix - 4 more Nintendo spin-offs we'd like to see on Switch
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| Star Fox Grand Prix

If you've been following the Nintendo rumour mill, you've no doubt heard mutterings of a curious spin-off that's possibly in the works.

Could Retro Studios be working on a secret Star Fox Switch game?

The maker of the wonderful Donkey Kong: Tropical Freeze and the even more wonderful Metroid Prime, Retro Studios, may well be working on a Star Fox-based racer called Star Fox: Grand Prix. Apparently, it'll play a bit like F-Zero mixed with a little Diddy Kong Racing.

That might sound like a weird mash-up of elements, but if you stop and think about it for a second it makes quite a lot of sense.

The F-Zero series has lain more or less dormant since 2004, and die-hard Nintendo fans have been craving a new fast-paced futuristic racer ever since. It's pretty easy to see how Star Fox's slick sci-fi world and fluid ground-to-air traversal systems could be adapted to suit, with an added dash of mascot magic.

All of which got me to thinking about other Nintendo spin-offs and mash-ups I'd like to see, borrowing elements from both Nintendo's own roster and elsewhere.

Metroid Prime meets Destiny

Nintendo already tried a multiplayer first person shooter spinoff from the Metroid universe with 2006's Metroid Prime: Hunters. The response was decidedly mixed.

The main problem with that DS game, however, was the focus on an ill-fitting old school FPS format. It jarred with the sprawling, exploratory tone of the Metroid Prime series from which it drew its lore.

My proposition is a more epic massively multiplayer FPS in the vein of Bungie's Destiny. You could crew up with your buddies and embark on lengthy co-op missions in a huge alien environment that mixes tense exploration with spurts of manic action, vertiginous first person platforming and formidable bosses.

Kid Icarus meets Metroid/Castlevania

There have only been three Kid Icarus games in 32 years, with 2012's Kid Icarus: Uprising for 3DS playing nothing like the earlier two.

It's worth recalling, though, that 1986's NES original was very much a sister game to the original Metroid. It shared an engine, development staff, and gameplay elements - but with a Greek myth theme in place of sci-fi.

With the next Metroid for Switch set to be a first person Prime sequel, my proposal is that Nintendo produce a classic 2D Metroidvania platformer set in the fantastical Kid Icarus universe. Not so much a spin-off, then, as going back to its roots.

Pikmin meets Minecraft

I've used Minecraft as the attention-grabby example here, but really I mean any multiplayer survival game. And it's the survival element I'm interested in rather than crafting.

Imagine a vast, verdant garden environment set in the Pikmin micro-universe, one filled with lumbering monsters and every-day bric-a-brac. Your little spaceperson is dropped into that environment along with a bunch of other players and given two simple tasks - survive and thrive.

You'd do this in familiar Pikmin fashion, picking and growing the titular helpers and sending them out to accumulate materials. Here, though, those materials would be used to build shelter and defences.

Meanwhile there'd be epic RTS-style battles as you scrap with others for finite resources, or perhaps form alliances and build wonderful things together.

Kirby meets Super Monkey Ball

Kirby has kind of become Nintendo's dogsbody, running any errand that his master requires of him. For his next role, I'd like to see him evoking the spirit of Super Monkey Ball.

The first two SMB game turned out to be defining titles for the GameCube. Their breezy-yet-infuriating brand of 3D maze puzzles and multiplayer mini-games has been sorely missed.

Kirby's bright abstract world, range of powers and ball-shaped body would fit this style of game brilliantly. Nintendo has already experimented with this sort of gameplay - with added motion controls - in the likes of Super Mario Galaxy and Breath of the Wild, so it's clearly keen on the concept.

Are there any particular Nintendo spinoffs you'd like to see? Let us know in it comments below.
Jon Mundy
Jon Mundy
Jon is a consummate expert in adventure, action, and sports games. Which is just as well, as in real life he's timid, lazy, and unfit. It's amazing how these things even themselves out.