Takaya Imamura Expresses His Love For F-Zero 99, Awaits 'Revival Of The IP'

This is what that monkey paw gave us F-Zero fand when we wished for a new game.

Hoped this was in development as a new entry in the series

Man in in love with this game, fzero99.

I hope a new ip has online play somewhat like this. 99 mode survival mode lol.

This was probably the biggest surprise for me out of the entire direct. The formula lends itself very well to the "99" format of games.

Tetris 99 was, and remains, an excellent title. But the Mario 35 game was a novelty at best. And Pacman 99 fell far short of the mark for me.

If the game still has a solid player base a few months from now, then this just might be the boost in popularity that F-Zero needs to score a new entry in the series.

"We are looking forward to the revival of this IP." sounds like he knows something we don't... but that could be inference from an innacurate google translation. "Awaiting" (like in the title) is more like wishignful thinking/hoping. But Nintendo always says to "look forward" to things they have anounced... 🤔

This was sadly my dissapointment of the direct. i was so hoping for a new entry, not just another 99 version of a good game with tetris and mario it was at least original, now it gets a little boring.

I feel like this game is a very lazy quarter-step towards what I know I certainly want from a proper new F-Zero title.

Other then the racetrack being a bit cluttered, F-Zero 99 is fantastic! Definitely better then PAC-MAN 99, although Super Mario 35 will always be my favorite of the retro battle royale games...

I'm not crying! Shut up!

Everyone, I know this isn't the F-Zero we were looking for. But if you want to see a new entry, the best way to let Nintendo know that is to play this game.

@Desrever Mario 35 was awesome, maybe even better than Tetris 99.
But yeah, After just a few races, F-Zero feels great!

Pay no heed to the moaners. This is a chaotic and very fun game, and a great way to show Ninty that a new F-Zero entry can succeed 😎 It's very touching that an OG dev even gives it praise!

@Paraka not really, because this entry doesn’t exclude others being in dev, Nintendo was never going to come out with a big budget new game in the series at this point. F-Zero 99 is absolutely FANTASTIC, it just pains me to think this game might disappear in a year or so. We’re probably going to see a GX remaster DX soon, Nintendo is clearly not done with Gamecube’s remakes/remasters. Sure, I’d prefer an entirely new game with new tracks, and hopefully that’s on the horizon.

While I did want a new entry, I'm totally fine with this. Especially considering that it would've been a whole lot worse. Like if they made a new F-Zero, instead of it being a racing game, it would've been a weird tacky first-person shooting or something.

@Tirza it’s mentioned in the article., translated via Google. And it’s not a machine translated “piece”, it’s a machine translated Twitter/X post, that’s it. So no, it’s not unprofessional in the least. @RetroGames oh, you’re one of those people, ugh. Stop using lazy to refer to something you don’t like and expand your vocabulary, it’s so freakin disrespectful, there is nothing lazy about game development and definitely not this project.

I implore ppl to download this at least..... Even if you don't really play it much, it's free to download and it would be nice to show Nintendo that interest for this franchise still exists

@DashKappei - Technically you can ALWAYS say that about every franchise ever. Like Nintendo Pro Wrestling, even though no game has been done for over 35 years.

But those leaks, and what fans wanted versus what they got. Definitely a monkey paw wish.

As Tirza commented, the google translation may be a little off. The final sentence regarding the IP:
これを機にIPの復活を心から楽しみにしております。
I feel this is better translated as "I look forward to the opportunity for a revival of this IP from the bottom of my heart."
The kanji 復活 does indeed mean revival/resurrection, but it is proceeded by 機 meaning chance/opportunity. I read this as him being hopeful for the future, but not definitively stating anything will happen. I am not a fluent speaker however and have been studying as a hobby over many years.

I didn't think I would like the F-Zero 99 at first but it is alright. I do hope to see a totally new F-Zero (and 1080) game in the future. That would be sweet.

F-Zero 99 isn't likely going to be shut down even if its playerbase diminishes. Super Mario Bros. 35 was part of Nintendo's frustrating experiment with limited-time releases, and Pac-Man 99 is entirely Bandai Namco's - Nintendo didn't publish it. Nintendo has yet to shut down online for any one game as far as I"m aware

The game doesn't seem quite "99" enough for me, would love a game mode with no lap limit, you just steadily eliminate the back markers until there's one winner

I really wish there was more love for what F-Zero 99 is, and less mourning for what it isn't.
It's a fun game. It's addicting, frantic, racing fun.
It's free.

It's not a "monkey's paw" wish, F-Zero 99 is a good game. And I plan to enjoy it while it's here.

I see there's talk in regards to which "99" is superior. In my opinion it's really a apples to oranges situation amongst them all. Tetris 99 is a straight up puzzler while Mario 35 was a platformer and Pac Man 99 was whatever you call that. I for one am still absolutely in love in Tetris 99 and still play it frequently. Mario 35 was good but it was more of a slower burn for me. I think it's because with Tetris you NEED to stay on your toes from the beginning to end. At any moment you could get bombarded and need to zero in on intense focus to keep going. For me Mario was very repetitive up until the final number of people then it really got interesting however it took time to get there. I just couldn't get into Pac Man 99. I did give it a good try but it just didn't get its meat hooks into me, so I dropped that pretty quickly.

I need more time with F Zero 99 to see if it will sustain itself with me. So far I see it having the potential however just like what @Coversnail just stated I'd prefer it was more of that "last man standing" style like the other "99" games. Oh well to each their own I guess.

@judaspete
Not if you aren’t a subscriber it isn’t.

@mrMike
It’s not free. It costs you perpetually.

@samuelvictor put >hopeful< in front of "the revival" I'm sure that's what he meant.

Despite the fact that I'm not really into the F-Zero series (as I'm more of a Mario Kart player myself), I actually had fun with this one.

@Bobb it's about money. Is this a franchise that can sell two million copies. If it's not then Nintendo doesn't have time for something like that. Sony or Microsoft might but Nintendont

@EmpathTheOracle Yeah that's what I figured. We can hope!

Here’s the thing. I have to love this game.

I love F-Zero, it’s among my favorite franchises from Nintendo, and I got this game the day I got my SNES as a kid.

And look, I know it’s not a new one, but it’s also not not a new one? So when I get something that pays clear respects to something I love, I can’t help but feel an excitement and gratitude for this, because it gives me a twist on a game I adore that was, also, previously only single player (SNES entry, I mean).

But the thing about games is I don’t need them. Any of them. I just love them. So when more are announced, whether they’re for me or not, I get excited. This is for me. This game is very for me.

And for games that aren’t, I still get excited, because when I see something that I say “oh man, my friend _______ would love this,” I get amped because I love my friends, other gamers, and circle of gaming far outside of myself.

I dunno, I just don’t think I have the energy to be disappointed by things that legitimately wouldn’t affect my life negatively if, say, I didn’t know about them, and I’ve been in the racket of local and corporate retail, as well as working for big scale developers for over 25 years.

I dunno. I just love it all.

And F-Zero 99 is probably the most for-me announcement that they could make.

I hope you all get the blessing of games, revivals, sequels, or whatever it is you may not even know you want. 💚

F-Zero 99 is incredible. It tops SMB 35 as my favorite battle royale that's been offered on Switch. I love how high octane it is, and the boosting adds a tactical element to races.

@mrMike
It’s free yes but unplayable without the subscription. So ergo to play it’s a perpetual yearly fee. They could have it with a offline single or local multiplayer and it would be played by those without subs.

F-Zero 99 is amazing! I think anyone who loves F-Zero, especially the SNES game, would love it.

@PikaPhantom Or Nintendo could just make a physical version with more contents just like Tetris 99. Even if a 99 game is remove at least the offline contents are still there. Super Mario 35 being the only exception as that game had no offline mode.

I hate this.

Yet I got mocked for not playing it. Apparently, my standards are too damn high, for a piece of garbage like this. Online-only, no single player, only the SNES cars. And people say that you NEED to play it to support the IP in CASE they want to revive the IP. This is giving me flashbacks of Capcom promising Darkstalkers fans things they STILL haven't followed up on.

No, the IP is still dead, this thing is a corpse desecrated for clout.

@MirrorFate2 The IP isn't dead, otherwise they wouldn't have released this. Nintendo just picks the IPs they want on a certain system, it's all up to them. And sometimes they completely revive an old IP that hasn't had games in decades. They even did that on the Switch.

@Bobb I'm going to say it simply like it is:

Every single (for profit) company in the world does everything for money. And people seem to forget that Nintendo is still a company, one that is publicly traded even.

Without money there would be no Nintendo.

@MirrorFate2 Well, it is a bit silly to hate something you haven't played. It reminds me of my 5 year old when he says he doesn't like a food that he's never even tried!

There is something about the angry 10% of F-Zero fans that make you not want there to ever be a new F-Zero game.
I haven’t given the game a shot yet, but I am excited to, I’m slightly better at F-Zero than I am at PAC-Man or Tetris, so I should have a decent shot.

@theModestMouse You’re such a rude person, that was uncalled for.

@mrMike
Without the subscription it does nothing. It’s just a waste of space then.

@sanderev While the ultimate goal of a business is to make money, that doesn't mean that everything they do is purely driven by that desire.

If I'm the One Millionth User to say "monkey paw", do I win a prize?

@Paraka Weird to call getting a good game a "monkey's paw"

@Orpheus79V
Well it’s a F zero game for sure just not what everyone was expecting so that would be the drawback of the wish.

@GameOtaku I don't see this as being any kind of dead end is what I mean. It's an audience gauger I believe, and it's doing well so far - it's probably already the most played F-Zero game. People tend not to think about the bigger picture. You remember the announcement of Federation Force? All of the despair from fans about how they brought back Metroid after a period of absence to "desecrate" it? Yet as we now know, they had been developing Samus Returns at that same time for release the very next year, and were in the early stages of planning Prime 4 - as shown in FF's ending, followed by the subsequent announcement.

@theModestMouse Try not to be so damn miserable and rude to others all the time and maybe your world won't fall apart.

@Skunkfish This is not F-Zero for me, bud. Do I have to eat crap to know something is crap? Or at least not interesting to me?

Every person who wants a new F-Zero has to play this game at least once. Nintendo needs to actually see an F-zero game "move the needle" the more hits the game gets the more they'll see the IP is "hot".

We've seen it before fans demand a new entry in an IP, and the creators release some sort of "taster" content to gauge interest, fans get annoyed it's not a new game and ignore it, and creators then assume there isn't interest in the IP.

So play the hell out of this make it bigger than Tetris 99 and Pac-man 99 to show its the IP not the game type.

Yes, I believe there will be more F-Zero games and I believe there will be more Wave Race games. Looking forward to already.

Honestly, I was disappointed this is what F-Zero got after all this time of nothing but once I played it after work, it's probably the best "99" game since Tetris. The gameplay of F-Zero lends itself so well to the battle royal format and I had trouble putting it down for bed when I first tried it. Hoping word of mouth helps this game picks up enough steam for Nintendo to gain a renewed interest in the IP.

@Orpheus79V
I think GX would’ve been the better gauge of interest. Seriously do they never check fan forums or anything?!

@abe_hikura
Nope not subscribing to play it. If they sold FZero on the snes classic game app I would buy it there and play it offline. That would be the better way to judge interest, if the game actually sells! All this tells Nintendo is that online subscribers like these 99 games that they have to perpetually pay a yearly fee for.

@PikaPhantom Err Nintendo did still shut down Mario 99 regardless of the excuses you state, it was a very well received game and still the axe fell.

@MirrorFate2 I played F-Zero earlier in the week, I played F-Zero 99 today. It does really seem to be F-Zero. If you think F-Zero is crap then this probably isn't the game for you.

@Orpheus79V - Digital only, service reliant, minimal options and modes, player base reliant.

Pretty sure those aren't exactly what the fans wanted when they wanted a new game to play years after the Switch's inevitable closure.

@MirrorFate2 This game is for clout? LMAO.

I put so many hours into this game yesterday. It was so much more fun than the SNES original whenever I gave that one a go. Though I will say Mario 35 is certainly my favorite battle royal they have done and I miss it.

I like F-Zero 99 quite a bit! The "Coming Soon" on the practice mode track select makes me excited for future updates.

That being said, I'd love to see another Switch Online freebie that's co-op rather than competitive. There's plenty of online competitive games on Switch already.

@Smiffy01 Mario 35 was explicitly stated to be a limited time thing for the anniversary from the beginning though. It's an exception rather than the rule

Been playing it all day. Absolutely love it; takes me bs k yo the SNES days, but with a well thought out and executed twist. Brilliant stuff!

Hopefully this will at least lead to F-Zero Clinzx being translated and out on NSO GBA…

I get all the points in this conversation. I'm one of the biggest F-Zero fans out there and I believe everyone is correct.

-Is the game amazing? YES... its pretty fun.

-Does it feel like Nintendo is holding the IP at gunpoint forcing us to play this or they will bury the corpse again? YES... it feels like it.

-Is it a monkeypaw wish? YES it is... but even monkeypaw wishes had always some sort of good & bad consequence.

-Should they gauge interest with this game? MAYBE NOT... because SNES F-Zero is a completely different experience from modern F-Zero like GX.

-Should everyone play this to revive the IP? ABSOLUTELY

-Will Nintendo take this as if we want more SNES F-Zero instead of GX? SADLY YES

@theModestMouse what a disgusting comment. You are gross please go away

Wasn't expecting an F-Zero thread to have some of the most astoundingly contrarian takes on video games I've come across on this site, but here we are.

@Skunkfish No, the primary and only goal of any company is to make money. Or make more money than last year. (growth)

The things they do: make games, make bread, make a website, etc. etc. is always all to achieve this goal. And sure, some companies "donate" their money into charity. But that is just to make even more money. (you need money to make money, as the saying goes). Even if a company gives you something for free: it is for them to make money either by selling your data (Google, Meta, etc), or to entice you to spend your money on their other products, or to get you to subscribe to a service, or stay subscribed to a service.

@Skunkfish I love the series but battle royale crap isn't for me. Is that so hard to get?

I recorded videos from F-Zero 99 with my Elgato S60+ and it's running natively at 1080p/60 with 99 players.

At least we're saying out loud that 99 is NOT a revival. Because it isn't actually a game. Always online, no ownership, manufactured FOMO, this is not a game worth paying attention to.

@Ventilator The only framerate hitch I've spotted is when you exit the skyway but only for a few miliseconds and appears only when it's a cluster.

I could only ask that people download and play this so Nintendo can see the numbers of people playing and decide that F-zero is worth making a new game for.

If I remember correctly, Imamura-san handled much of the art for the original F-Zero. I’m glad he gets to see his work revitalized for a new generation. He must be a proud papa.

Here’s hoping Tingle gets another shot, too! 😁

@RetroGames this is a tricky one that can swing both ways with reactions.

I appreciate your reaction because that's basically how I felt when I first saw this on announcement. I was annoyed, I thought it looked cheap and barebones and this felt like exactly the kind of out-of-left-field nonsense Nintendo normally pulls. I personally wanted a new entry in the series, or a simple port / remaster of GX. Not this game. And I'm not the biggest fan of the original SNES F-Zero either for multiple reasons. So that was another strike against it.

...but then I played it. And genuinely? This is anything but a mid/lazy effort on the developers part. A 99 battle royale for a car racer is inventive, insane, addictive, and actually really really fun. The presentation is also far more impressive than I think the debut trailer makes it out - with wonderful menus and art that hark back to the original and N64 comic book styling, and them adopting the SNES "appearance" because the reality is the switch could only handle this much (99 cars on track? If you want to maintain the performance at 60fps, you got to compromise somewhere).

Also worth considering that it's "free" based on their cheap-ass NSO basic plan service (which ultimately grows in value year on year anyway). With this added onto the service it's not only a steal, but actually adds value to the NSO in quite a surmountable and meaningful way.

Another way to look at this is that it is Nintendo testing the waters for an IP revival. They've been upfront about F-Zero in the past by making comments on their low desire to pursue making more entries because of either low user interest or them being unsure how to progress this series in a meaningful way (both I disagree with, but that's more a personal take).

A strictly positive outlook is that we finally have something and it could lead towards more. If F-Zero 99 gains enough traction in the right way then the mainline series could be on it's way to a proper revival later down the line. That's what I hope anyway. I still want my GX remaster / followup after all.

@mrMike
Kinda hard to vote with your wallet when it’s a free download only available to subscribers. The only FZero I own is GP Legend and it’s a used copy. Now if they were to sell me the others I’d be more than happy to purchase them.

@Bobb Exactly. A lot of people on the online message boards complain about not getting F-Zero, but if you look at the way F-Zero has sold... since the SNES it's been struggling to even make 1 million. In fact after Maximum Velocity on the GBA, it seems like sales were starting to fall off a cliff with GX only selling approximately 692,000, GP Legend only selling 159,000. and Climax only selling 5,000 copies (although Climax was Japan exclusive, but that's still pitiful even for a Japan exclusive GBA spinoff). With those kinds of numbers it shouldn't be surprising that F-Zero's been on a hiatus for 20 years, that is nowhere near enough to justify continuing the series. 99 needs a lot of downloads to convince Nintendo that there's really enough interest in the series as opposed to a vocal minority of fans on the internet echo chambers.

I have never played a F-Zero game in my life. I tried F-Zero 99 this morning, and I had a lot of fun and kept playing... and almost missed an important doctor's appointment.
Given this, I think it deserves a better chance. I'm not going to force anyone to play it; I had only originally intended it to download it for showing support for the F-Zero crowd since, as a Metroid Fan, I understand the pain. The 2010-2016 years weren't good to us. Not to mention, it took 19 years for a direct sequel to Metroid Fusion, released on the GameBoyAdvance, to happen.
Now, Metroid seems to be thriving whereas before the MP 4 announcement and the release of Samus Returns, we all thought Samus would become a Smash-only character.
Perhaps this is best time to exercise "hope, but do not expect." You hope, you wish for the best, and you expect to get nothing. That was my attitude before Samus Returns. And it has rewarded me greatly.
I hope Nintendo will continue forward, revive the IP, and reward the F-Zero Fanbase greatly.

@Captain_Toad Yes. The frame rate overall is stable.

I hope many tries this game, because Nintendo will see if there is enough interrest to make a new proper F-Zero.

If only 100.000 try it, Nintendo will probably never make a new F-Zero game ever again.

5% of Switch owners should be enough to judge the interrest.
Only 5% is over 5 million people...

I don't know how anyone could call this game lazy. There is a lot more to it than just adding 98 other racers to the SNES game.

@mrMike
To be fair there’s only been what 3 FZero console games, 2 or 3 GBA games and one arcade game. Of the console games (snes, 64 and GameCube) the latter two didn’t sell as many consoles as the competitors either.

Anyway if they had looked online at any message boards concerning FZero they would’ve seen that GX would’ve been the more appropriate choice. It has something for everyone on switch from single player modes (especially story mode) to online play. I don’t see how a free game to subscribers tells them any viable information. They play the game because it was free and can only be played with said subscription.

I love the game so far! F-Zero was one of the first 4 titles I had when I was given the SNES for Christmas in 1991. The original will probably always be among my favorite games for the console, and F-Zero 99 does it justice. It took my only complaint about the SNES version - the lack of multiplier - and basically fixed by 99 orders of magnitude. What's not to love?

I thought F Zero fans would take anything. Remake, port, or this?

Maybe we can have a new F-Zero and a mainline Mario as launch titles for the next console, party like it's November 21, 1990. 😛

(Yes, I have sweet spot for the Super Famicom launch 🥰 )

@LinktotheFuture - True, which I found surprising, but I’m glad they did.

@GinMiguel - I’d take this and a remaster of GX at this stage, with a new game later down the line.

I’ll admit, I found my brief time a lot more fun than I thought I’d have, but at the same time, I wish this were accompanied by something like a GX remaster to take the bulk of the spotlight, so this little side project didn’t have to be the one metric for interest in the IP (And also, I just really want to play GX on the go).

@LadyCharlie
Exactly this. Its brilliant fun, and hopefully a step toward at the very least a GX/AC remaster.

@judaspete F-Zero fans are weird, am I right? They keep asking for a new game, and when they finally get one, they don’t play it.

Maybe nintendo is testing the waters with this for a potential new F Zero game down the road.

@LexKitteh yeah he hasn't worked for nintendo in some years so he really only would have had insider knowledge while he was there. And while he was working for nintendo in his last decade there, a f-zero game wasn't in the works or was quickly canceled early on in development.

@Coversnail so a true death race mode

@Serpenterror I hope they update it and make at least the practice mode work offline. Because it would be nice if you were in a place with terrible or no wifi.

@Synecdoche he's not very modest is he?

@Jhena maybe they'll do a wave race 99 or a 1080 99.

@GameOtaku they definitely never check fan forums or anything like that. The closest they'll ever do is check if something is trending on Twitter.

@EightyTwoStu seeing what they recently did with some Japanese exclusive games (especially Kirby's Star Stacker), they won't bother with translating them. So if you want to play a Japanese game, your best option is a translation patch on an emulator.

@mrMike f-zero's success is mostly tied to the success of the console it is on. Each title selling less than the previous entry. N64 sold less than the SNES, and the Gamecube sold less than the N64. But with the gba maximum velocity was the worst title in the series. Gp legend was a anime tie in and climax was Japanese exclusive.

@Aegis_Runestone the only "smash only character" that we don't care if they never get another game is ice climbers. Keep them smash only. The Nes game was terrible.

@RobbWes I guess I’d be happy enough with a Japanese version. Really not into ‘unauthorised’ emulators. Much prefer original hardware. Play as intended

@RobbWes
99 players racing on a dolphin. That would be quite the sight.

@Jhena that would be hilarious

Merge it with the metroid series and give me a 3rd person action game where I can live out my bounty hunting fantasies. Og Yakuza style beat-em up game play and traditional fzero car racing mode that's baked into the story.

It'll never happen but thats the potential of the ip right there.