Later this month, on September 23rd for North America, Star Fox Adventures will officially be 10 years old. Can you believe it's truly been that long? I remember the time very well. I was excited for the next Star Fox game after the smash hit of Star Fox 64. I got a pre-order from the now bankrupt Circuit City, where they provided the most amazing pre-order bonuses.

That's right! This is the Star Fox Adventures Survival Kit. It contains a Star Fox-branded Jones Soda, toilet paper with game hints on it, a Fox McCloud air freshener, a door sign, and a box to put it all in. Actually the air freshener was separate. I have two of those, one still hangs in my car's rear-view mirror to this day.

But of course, that's not the most important thing I got out of the release of Star Fox Adventures. Not by a long shot! First, I got to play a quirky, Zelda-style game with Star Fox characters, amazing graphics, and fun gameplay. Even more important, at least to me anyway, was that Star Fox Adventures gave all of us that wonderful, cute, blue vixen. A warrior with a kind heart. So compelling was she, even as a secondary character, that she inspired artists to draw, writers to create works of fiction, modelers and animators to create 3D graphics, and at least two groups to start websites devoted to her (the founders of the Krystal Lovers Association, and yours truly, the creator of the Krystal Archive).

Through the more than 6 years I've had the pleasure of running this site, I've gained so much from Krystal's existence. I've gained friends, learned many technical skills, and been on the receiving end of so much love and support from all of you, my fellow Krystal fans.

So here's to you Star Fox Adventures! The same goes to you, the entire team of engineers, artists, designers, producers, and all the rest responsible for bringing this game into existence. We know that the development was rocky to say the least, but in the end you produced a game with lasting effects and a small, but dedicated, group of dedicated fans.

All this month, the Krystal Archive will be bringing you news and stories specifically devoted to Star Fox Adventures and Dinosaur Planet (the game it originally came from), beginning with the previous post by VranceMovado about the lost Dinosaur Planet footage.

For our friends outside of North America, Wikipedia reports that Star Fox Adventures was released September 27th in Japan, November 15th in Australia, and November 22nd in Europe, all in 2002.

An hour long video of the original Dinosaur Planet was recently uploaded to YouTube, which includes the first 18 minutes of the game showcasing Krystal's first chapter. This footage shows 40 minutes of gameplay for both Krystal and Sabre.

Long time reader and previous donor VranceMovado is now a guest poster here on the Krystal Archive. He will be helping me by making news posts and helping me rebuild the site. He should be making his first posts in just a few minutes. Please welcome him!

I've re-added the Fanfiction section. You should see the link on the left in the sidebar. Right now, it contains only those fanfictions that were there before the hacking incident. I haven't had time to redesign the fanfiction section or add the newly reviewed fictions, as planned. That's coming.

On the subject of improving the site, a couple of you reported very laggy performance on the site when viewed in FireFox. I've found and corrected that issue, the site should be snappy in all browsers now.

Just to give you a little insight into why this is all taking so long: The Krystal Archive's files are spread out across 2 computers and 1 external hard drive. I have partial copies in multiple places, some of which have changes that each of the others don't have. This means I have to find those changes and merge them, one of the most time-consuming, error-prone, and difficult tasks. Backups after the hacking incident are mostly complete. I can restore MOST of the old posts and content, but with the new design, that will likely break things. I'm going to try to restore one major section at a time. So, first it will be fanfictions. Next, something else. Probably cosplay, since I have some recent cosplayer info to post. It would go a lot faster, as it did in the past, if I wasn't working, but I have a full time job and often side-jobs to work on during the weekends. I can't just sit and update the KA for 2 straight days like I once could while in college. But don't worry. I do NOT give up easily.

Forgot to post about this earlier. I'm in Seattle to go to Everfree NW, a Brony con. If any of you are there, you might spot me. I'll be wearing a badge that looks like this. Otherwise, see you when I get back. Lots of updates to post!

KakaretteKosplay, or Bridgette Rockette, did a bodypaint-based Krystal cosplay back in March for MomoCon 2012. I believe she said she created the costume very quickly using materials obtained very near the beginning of the con. There are only a few photos, but I've already contacted her for more and additional information.

• Whole Cosplay Photo
• Heavy Weapons Krystal

Thanks to whoever submitted this info! (I'll fix the form so you can be properly credited in the future.)

Many of you have already responded to my call for volunteers. Until now, I've been unable to have time to personally send you tasks to do. It's the greatest limitation to getting help from you guys. Well not anymore! I'm happy to report that we now have a way for you to help without having to manage emails back and forth.

Anyone can now submit fanworks (fanart, fanfilms, fanfiction, cosplay, and games/mods) using a simple form.

I've already sent out emails to several people who have expressed an interest in being a reviewer for fanfilms or fanfics. If you haven't already received an email from me about it, and you're interested in being a reviewer, just email me about it.

I've moved Donations under the new header at the top called Volunteering, since donating is helping too.

Read the Volunteering page to find out more. Thanks again guys!

The Krystal Lovers Association (KLA), the world's largest Krystal-focused community forum, is shutting down at the end of 2012 after almost 10 years online. Eggman9713, the long-running admin, announced the shutdown back on June 28th. It basically comes down to losing interest over time and a lack of new Star Fox games. He's not sure what exactly will become of the site after it's shut down, musing that he might freeze the site from new posts, but leave it up as an archive for a while. You can read all about the reasoning and the plan for the shutdown in Eggman's End of Line post.

It was no more than 2 weeks after I created the Krystal Archive (having been a member of Starfox-Online for a few months prior) that I was contacted my a couple of high-profile members of the KLA and asked to join. Since then, for most of the years since, I've been an active member of the KLA community, and chatted with Eggman and many others at length. It was only recently that I have been neglecting the community. Nevertheless, the KLA will always stand in my memory as a great community and a historic location for the announcement of Krystal and Star Fox research (Star Fox Adventures in HD, finding unreleased artist renderings, etc).

This is the first in a series of posts I'll make as the site rebuild continues. The top bar links Podcast, About, and Donations have been updated.

Podcast, or the Krystal Archive Podcast, has been completely restored. Your subscriptions should get updated soon if you're subscribing to the feed. You might also notice that the audio player has been replaced with a specially modified version of the YouTube player. That's right, you can listen to the Krystal Archive Podcast via YouTube.

The About page gives a basic overview of the site and details our policies. In the future, after the Articles have been restored, it will provide information for people new to Krystal or Star Fox. It will probably also have some information about me and how I can be contacted. Not sure yet if I should break that off into a separate article like it once was.

I've rebuilt the Donations as well. During the hacking incident, all the user data was lost. If you were one of the donors and you want your account back, just email me and I'll add it asap. The old Secret Area is gone, but if you as a donor want to have access to those files, just mention it in the email.

We made some small modifications to the theme so the Search page has columns for archived months.

Lastly, I'm almost done with a method to allow volunteers to help review fanfilms, fanfictions, and do other work without needing to be coordinated by me. It's going to work through Google Docs, so everyone can be working at the same time without getting in each other's way. This, combined with some new tools I'll be writing, will hopefully greatly speed up the update time for fan works.

Just kidding. :D

As you all know, Nintendo did not show Star Fox, F-Zero, or Smash Bros at today's presentation. They didn't show a Metroid/Star Fox crossover, they didn't show a lot of things. And while that is initially disappointing, I'd like to point out that there was a very significant thing they also did not show:

What has Retro Studios been working on?

So take heart, Star Fox fans. Nintendo has made major game announcements outside of their keynotes before. E3 isn't over, and we may yet hear some additional news about in-development games like Star Fox and Super Smash Bros 4. There's also another Star Fox possibility: the next Star Fox game could be on 3DS. There's a video presentation just for new 3DS games tomorrow at 6PM.

Either way, Nintendo DID show quite a few great looking games. I'm particularly happy for fans of Pikmin. I don't play that series, but I am happy for those who do. They've been waiting a lot longer than we have for a sequel. Nintendo showed that their new system, the Wii U, is capable of all of the experiences offered by the PS3 and XBOX 360, plus more through the new gamepad. The addition of a touch screen to console gaming might turn out to be more revolutionary than motion controls.

Overall, I'm excited about the new games and gameplay possibilities. Nintendo can't make everyone happy all the time, but I am a little disappointed to not see Star Fox front and center.