Star Fox-like Wild Blue Skies is coming out this August

2 hours ago 1

Published Jun 2, 2026, 11:00 AM EDT

Wild Blue Skies is an on-rails shooter with heavy shades of Nintendo's dogfighting classic

Star Fox fans are eating well this year. Fox McCloud is in movie theaters and returning on Switch 2, but what are furry merc fans without a Switch 2 to do? Play Wild Blue Skies instead.

Chuhai Labs and Balor Games announced that Wild Blue Skies, an on-rails dogfighting action game in the mold of Fox McCloud’s adventures, will be released on Aug. 13 for PlayStation 5, Windows PC, and Xbox Series X.

Wild Blue Skies follows Bowie Stray (a dogman) and his group of ace pilots, the Blue Bombers, as they battle Grimclaw’s intergalactic forces. As this description implies, the game seems to be aiming for a Saturday morning cartoon tone. As for gameplay influences, a press release specifically mentions “classic on-rails aerial shooters of the N64 and PS1 era," calling to mind Star Fox 64, alongside deeper cuts like Omega Boost and Novastorm.

As for some obvious similarities to Nintendo’s series, the game will feature secret paths through its on-rails levels, there will be a scoring system to encourage replayability, banter with squadmates appears in text boxes at the bottom of the screen, and perhaps most importantly, you can do a barrel roll. Everything from the aiming reticule to the spaceship designs is clearly meant to evoke a certain quest through the Lylat System. The studio behind the game, Chuhai Labs, previously released the generally well-received roguelike Cursed to Golf.

Perhaps the biggest barrier for Wild Blue Skies is its proximity to the next installment in Nintendo's legendary sci-fi series. A Star Fox 64 remake was revealed just last month via an unexpected Nintendo Direct. It's out on June 25. When Wild Blue Skies was first revealed, Nintendo hadn't touched Star Fox in quite some time, but with a new entry on the way, the airspace is suddenly looking quite busy.

That said, Wild Blue Skies does have one big factor working in its favor: It’s not another remake of a game that many have already played. The Star Fox series has struggled to define itself since Star Fox 64, and as a result, has returned to the same well (this is arguably the fifth remake of Star Fox 64). While there was the oddball Star Fox Adventures — a Zelda-style action adventure title that didn’t feature much rail shooting — this was followed up by many less well-received entries that were criticized for their lack of evolution from the N64 game. We’ll find out if Wild Blue Skies gets the drop on its more seasoned rival this August.