“THIS is Zoness???”

Peppy Hare is shocked to see what has become of the once beautiful resort planet, though his remark and his tone implies a lack of familiarity. Maybe he’d only heard stories of its crystal clear waters and breathtaking scenic views; had only seen pictures in travel brochures or aerial shots in late night getaway commercials. An oceanic planet dotted with islands, it’s interesting that we never get to see exactly what Zoness originally looked like. All we see in the game is what it’s become after Andross’ forces began using it as a dumping ground, polluting its waters and dyeing them a murky, frothy mix of toxic greens, and warping the local marine life into sickly monsters.

“I can’t believe they did this.”

Falco’s reaction is interesting. His dejected tone is one of the few points of the game where the mask slips on his brazen, cocky persona. He also gets particularly shaken when Katt Monroe appears to help, with whom he appears to have some personal history. The Zoness mission, as a whole, seems very personal to Falco in a way that other encounters don’t, and it feels implied that Zoness is actually his home.

S: “What a dump!” F: “I hear ya, Slippy.”

There’s a melancholy that pervades the score for Zoness that other pieces of the Star Fox 64 soundtrack don’t necessarily have. Most of the OST invokes grand scale battles and the sense of white-knuckle adrenaline and peril that comes with intense spaceship piloting and dangerous mercenary work across a far-off galaxy. Zoness includes much of the same action as the other levels in the game, but the music reminds us that while most of the locations we visit are still largely intact despite Andross’ invasion, others are irreparably changed, and would be without the firing of a single bullet, laser, or bomb. The immeasurable disrespect for natural beauty and life is all it took for this transformation.

As the mission carries on, the fight to take out both enemy ships as well as the searchlights that make up the primary objective intensifies, and the music crescendos while the original melody carries on underneath it. It’s one point in the game where I find myself picturing Falco, not Fox, with the burning heart to lead the fight against Andross. He was as devastated as any member of his team to see the attacks on Corneria City, or the fleets of battleships moving across open space, but the sight of this devastated natural beauty is what made the fight personal. It’s not a piece written about war, but about courage, and the journey to find it.

GaMetal’s cover impresses me simply with instrumentation. The acoustic guitar giving way to the solo piano is a lovely transition, while the more pronounced mixing of the marching snare drum really hammers home the call to arms that the piece is conveying, in spite of one’s sorrow. And, of course, the mandatory “standing on a mountaintop with your amp at 11 with the most intense rendition of the theme” is a must for any metal-adjacent cover. The cherry on top for me, personally, is also the outro where the bass gets to groove out that A section melody in a wildly different timbre than we’re used to. An all around emotionally-charged performance that tugs the heartstrings as intended.