According to Takaya Imamura in a 2002 interview with Nintendo Dream, a lot of time was spent between Rare and Nintendo brainstorming on what kind of equipment and weaponry Fox should have during the transition from Dinosaur Planet to Star Fox Adventures. Imamura wanted Fox to use a gun, similar to his original EAD-created prototype of Star Fox Adventures before it was merged with Dinosaur Planet. However, this was not well suited for the Zelda-esque framework established by Dinosaur Planet, so this was abandoned and they embarked on a long period of trial-and-error to determine what weapon Fox should use.

After experimenting with ideas such as a whip, or a gun and sword combo (possibly based on how Fox was already using Sabre's sword in the leaked Dinosaur Planet build), Rare and Nintendo finally settled on Krystal's staff. Imamura claims that this was decided upon because it was a weapon that doesn't require the player to slash the enemy, as he felt uncomfortable with the idea of an animal character like Fox being able to decapitate opponents.

There's a fairly common misconception that the character of Krystal was originally meant to be a cat in Dinosaur Planet, prior to being redesigned as a vixen when the project was transformed into Star Fox Adventures.

The reality is that despite having a somewhat feline look, Krystal was always intended to be a fox as early as Dinosaur Planet, her original backstory even claiming that she belonged to the "Vixon Tribe" on planet Animus (Sabre and Randorn on the other hand belonged to the "Wolven Tribe", as they were both wolves). Former Rare artist Kevin Bayliss has stated multiple times that she was meant to represent a stylized arctic fox in particular.

In the original Dinosaur Planet, Krystal would come across a pachycephalosaurid dinosaur at CloudRunner Fortress, who is revealed to be one of the SpellStone guardians, who also gives Krystal the Illusion spellpage to bypass the SharpClaw guards within the dungeon. In-game hints and task summaries reveal him to be of the "BoneHead" tribe.

This individual would appear in the final Star Fox Adventures, with his role slightly rewritten as the chief engineer at CloudRunner Fortress (The Queen CloudRunner took over his original role as the SpellStone Gatekeeper for this area). Talking to him in a cutscene will reveal his name to be "Gradabug". While not mentioned anywhere in-game, the Star Fox Adventures Nintendo Power guidebook reaffirms him belonging to the BoneHead tribe.

When Fox frees Krystal from her crystal prison at the top of Krazoa Palace in Star Fox Adventures, she immediately grabs her staff back from him and begins firing at the newly resurrected Andross as Fox runs off to his Arwing to confront the latter in Dinosaur Planet's orbit. Strangely enough, in the ending cutscene after Andross' defeat, Fox once again has Krystal's staff in his backpack. When asked about this in a January 10th, 2003 issue of Rare's scribes, the development team responded with:

While the Brain Squids that float around in Krystal's opening prologue segment at Krazoa Palace are often thought to be the only common enemies in Star Fox Adventures that she can kill (as she is otherwise stripped of her staff and imprisoned at the top of the palace for the rest of the game), it's actually possible for her to kill a SharpClaw during this segment. The player will need to grab a barrel from the hallway before the flame jet room and place it on the pressure plate in the room after the jets, letting Krystal use the barrel generator in that room for a free barrel. After grabbing that barrel, the player will need to run over to the lift, and once they're in the next hallway, they'll have to go left to the watery barrier, opposite of the Krazoa head where the player normally deposits their Krazoa spirit. From there, if the player waits long enough, a SharpClaw will patrol right by on the other side of the barrier, and from there Krystal can throw her barrel on top of him, immediately destroying him.

The floating planetoid representing CloudRunner Fortress on the world map screen in Star Fox Adventures very clearly resembles its original, rockier iteration from the Nintendo 64 version of Dinosaur Planet, as opposed to its remodeled look in the final Star Fox Adventures.

A rendition of Star Fox 64's Area 6 theme can be listened to in Star Fox Adventures' sound test, despite it being otherwise unused in the final game. In a January 10th, 2003 edition of Rare's Scribes, composer David Wise explained that the Area 6 theme was temporarily used as the theme for the final confrontation against Andross, but was always intended to be replaced with the music that plays there now in the final game, which is a rendition of Andross' battle theme from Star Fox 64. According to Wise, this track was literally substituted in the final hours of development, and Rare did not have time to remove it from the final version.

The life bar icons for the SnowHorn and HighTop in Star Fox Adventures sport different, more cartoony designs from their respective in-game models. The reason for this is because they're clearly based upon their original N64 Dinosaur Planet models, which too are much more cartoonier than the final SFA models that go for a more semi-realistic look.

Star Fox Adventures' Japanese localization marks the first and only instance of the Star Fox team's robotic operator, ROB 64, actually being referred to as such in-game (at least through the Japanese subtitles) by his teammates (ロブ), as opposed to by his usual Japanese name, NUS (ナウス). This also occurs in Farewell Beloved Falco, the Japan-only manga prologue to Star Fox Adventures.

The Farewell Beloved Falco manga introduces a new member of FREE AS A BIRD, a blue feline character named Kool. The climax seems to imply that Kool and Katt Monroe have romantic feelings for one another, with Falco Lombardi looking on in approval.

Kool wouldn't appear again after this, and Katt would go back to following Falco in certain story routes in Star Fox Command. When asked about Kool's whereabouts by Nintendo Dream staff in 2011, Takaya Imamura responded with:

Found within the files of Star Fox Adventures is an unused audio track for the WarpStone's introduction cutscene, which also includes verbal dialogue. This was clearly an earlier version before Rare had done a voice-acting retake.

Most notably, the music that plays in the background is a remnant from Dinosaur Planet, from the scene where Krystal first arrives in SwapStone Circle and thus meets her respective SwapStone, Rubble. In the final Star Fox Adventures, music performed by bagpipes is played instead in this particular cutscene.

In an interview with Phil Tossell (the lead software engineer for Star Fox Adventures) within an issue of Retro Gamer, he admitted the development team thought the game may have never actually even been released because of the impending Microsoft buyout.

Contrary to popular belief, Shigeru Miyamoto and Nintendo did not singlehandedly force Rare (who was never even fully owned by Nintendo) to convert Dinosaur Planet into Star Fox Adventures. It was merely an offer and suggestion Miyamoto gave to Rare, and many of the key team members like director Lee Schuneman and character designer Kevin Bayliss supported the idea, as they felt that using the Star Fox brand would give the game a higher profile, especially as a GameCube launch title. An October 2004 edition of Rare's Scribes says as such:

One of the enemies Sabre and Krystal would encounter in Dinosaur Planet were these robotic Scorpion-like automatons, typically found in Krazoa-build strongholds such as the Force Point Temples and Cape Claw. While removed in the final Star Fox Adventures, they could still be found hidden within the E3 2002 kiosk version via hacking.

In the early concept art and initial gameplay footage for Star Fox Adventures, Krystal’s staff was originally designed to transform at the tip whenever Fox used one of its magical abilities. For instance, when performing the Ground Quake ability, the staff would morph into a hammer. Interestingly, one piece of concept art even shows the staff transforming into a wing tip, suggesting it would allow Fox to glide. These transformation models were still present in the E3 2002 kiosk demo, but the feature was ultimately never implemented in the retail release.

Found within the E3 2002 kiosk version of Star Fox Adventures is an unused cutscene of Fox talking with Tricky, Peppy and Slippy after placing presumably the final SpellStone. Various unused SFA voice clips sync up perfectly with this sequence, revealing the dialogue exchange to be:


This presents bit of a different story from what is presented in the final game. In the retail release, it's discovered that returning all of the SpellStones to the Force Point Temples does not single handily restore Dinosaur Planet to its original state, and that Fox also needs to return all of the Krazoa spirits to Krazoa Palace to fully stabilize the planet, in addition to freeing Krystal from Krazoa Palace.

Here, it does seem returning the SpellStones restores the planet, and collecting the Krazoa spirits is for a separate task, that being merely freeing Krystal.

Phil Tossell, the lead software engineer for Star Fox Adventures, had mentioned that Dinosaur Planet had begun development before The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time had released, and thus the development team didn't start taking inspiration from it until afterwards. He also talked about how understaffed the development team was in comparison to most Zelda games, specifically mentioning how they initially had only five programmers, only adding in more later on. This resulted in the team facing many technical and design problems during the development of Dinosaur Planet/Star Fox Adventures:

What exists as LightFoot Village in Star Fox Adventures was originally merely a subarea in a greater location known as SwapStone Circle in Dinosaur Planet. This was essentially Krystal's equivalent to Sabre's SwapStone Hollow, acting as a hub for her adventure and thus connecting together her stages such as Cape Claw, BlackWater Canyon, Discovery Falls, Golden Plains and Moon Mountain Pass. It was also where she'd utilize her namesake SwapStone, Rubble, to transport to Warlock Mountain to deposit Krazoa spirits.

In the transition to Star Fox Adventures, when it was decided to scrap Krystal's co-protagonist role, thus leaving Fox as the only playable character outside of the prologue, Krystal's stages were either removed entirely or given to and reworked for Fox. SwapStone Circle as such would be heavily revamped, expunging the SwapStone element and heavily expanding the LightFoot Village mini-area into its own full distinct location. Similarly to Dinosaur Planet, the area would link to Cape Claw. It's worth noting that within the game files, LightFoot Village is internally called "SwapCircle", as ThornTail Hollow is similarly internally called "SwapHol", referencing their original names.

In Dinosaur Planet, Krystal and Kyte were tasked by the LightFoot to lit their ancient beacons that had gone out. Doing this in turn would reward them access to Discovery Falls. This quest would appear in the final Star Fox Adventures, but re-contextualized as the ThornTails in ThornTail Hollow asking for Fox and Tricky for help in reigniting their beacons, and doing so rewards them a key that let them access Moon Mountain Pass, as well as the Volcano Force Point Temple.

What exists as ThornTail Hollow in Star Fox Adventures was originally called SwapStone Hollow in Dinosaur Planet. It more or less functioned the same as it does in SFA, serving as the hub for Sabre's adventure, connecting his stages such as SnowHorn Wastes, Walled City, Diamond Bay, Willow Grove and Dragon Rock. It was where he'd utilize his namesake SwapStone, Rocky, to transport to Warlock Mountain to deposit Krazoa spirits.

ThornTail Hollow retains most of the same layout, but has noticeable differences: the shop that was originally situated underneath the SwapStone (now WarpStone, as the character swapping mechanic was dropped with Krystal's co-protagonist role scrapped) is now its own distinct establishment settled in the middle of the map. The winding series of tunnels right by the Swap/WarpStone has been replaced by the Mother ThornTail egg mini-game. The areas it was originally connected to such as Willow Grove, Walled City, Diamond Bay and Dragon Rock were either entirely removed or split off the mainland Dinosaur Planet in orbit. ThornTail Hollow also now leads into Moon Mountain Pass on the right side of the area, and what originally led to Willow Grove in the bottom left now leads into LightFoot Village.

Golden Plains was another of Krystal's stages in Dinosaur Planet that was cut in the transition to Star Fox Adventures. It was an open desert area that Krystal and Kyte would have to trek through in order to reach the Desert Force Point Temple. It would be home to other interests, such as the spell page for the Portal ability required to open the way into the Desert Force Point, another jetbike race, and as well as Krystal's final Krazoa shrine test, the Test of Knowledge.

Golden Plains featured a unique mechanic in that Krystal's energy would be drained by visiting this area during the day because of the extreme heat, hence why the SpellStone guardian previously encountered at CloudRunner Fortress (who appears in Star Fox Adventures under the name of "Gradabug") warns her to instead travel at night when the sun is gone.

Golden Plains was removed in the final Star Fox Adventures, but some of its elements would remain: the Desert Force Point Temple was reworked into the Ocean Force Point Temple and would be now accessed through Cape Claw. The Ocean Force Point would even inherent Golden Plain's original background music. The Test of Knowledge would be moved over to the top of the temple in the Walled City and fittingly enough would be Fox's final true Krazoa test, although one more was planned in place of the General Scales "boss fight" in Krazoa Palace.