Star Fox Guide | How to Earn Medal on Katina

Here's a guide on how to earn medal on Katina in Star Fox.

Game Guide by Groot on Jun 28, 2026

Star Fox on the Nintendo Switch 2 retains the scoring system from Star Fox 64, which is based on hits. Each enemy you shoot down increases your count, and once you reach a certain number by the end of a mission, you earn a Medal. To unlock Expert difficulty, you must have a Medal on each level of the campaign on Normal difficulty.

Katina is one of the missions where that threshold is easy to miss if you don't know what to focus on. The mission is designed so that you can complete it with less than 150 hits, but you must get at least 150 hits to earn the Medal here.

Star Fox Guide How to Earn Medal on Katina

How Katina Starts

The mission puts you at an outpost on Katina, where Bill is holding off enemy fighters. You're there to support him. Bill and the Star Fox team are not the only ones on the field, there are friendly units as well, so watch the radar to distinguish enemies from allies. You will not lose the Medal or the mission for shooting a friendly unit, but you will not gain any hits for doing so either, so why bother?

Recharge your lasers and begin targeting enemy targets. Once the majority of the enemy ships have been eliminated, the Saucerer mothership appears. This is where your score really begins to count.

What the Saucerer Does

There are four hatches on the Saucerer. When a hatch opens, ships pour out. Those ships are the ones you need to shoot down to increase your hit count. Each hatch will deal 5 hits, but will also prevent ships from exiting that hatch. Destroying all four hatches exposes the core. After the core is removed, a timer is set. If the core is destroyed before the timer expires, the mission is lost and the path to Solar is unlocked. However, if you run too quickly, you will not have enough hits for the Medal.

Star Fox Guide Locking Target on Katina

The first method is to destroy three hatches, then farm ships.The first method is to destroy three hatches and then farm ships.

The safer method to get to 150 hits is to remove three of the four hatches and then pause and concentrate on shooting down the ships that are still emerging from the remaining hatch. Three hatches removed, the number of ships on the field remains manageable without things getting out of hand. Keep shooting ships until you hit 145, then destroy the last hatch and the core to finish the mission. The remaining hits will be covered by the last hatch and the core.

Method Two: Ignore the Hatches Completely

If you don't use the hatches at all, the Saucerer will reveal its core on its own. This ensures that ships are constantly coming out, providing you with more targets and a higher score. The downside is that your teammates will take more damage with that many enemies on the field, and you will take more damage as well. It takes longer and it's more difficult to control, but it yields the most hits in total.

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