It's been a hot minute since I played this, and it's still one of my favorite games ever, my favorite 3D platformer outside of Mario. This time I played on Steam, most of the game in co-op, and messed with mods a bit. I will say playing a version of this game that doesn't always feel like it's on the brink of exploding was really nice, but if I wanted to, I could easily nitpick the hell out of this. The game is not perfect and on a second run the little gripes are a lot more noticeable.

Mustache Girl is a pretty nothing villain, set up early on and then barely ever seen again until the endgame. Alpine Skyline in general, while not a bad chapter, is a very noticeable weakpoint compared to every other chapter in the game. Not all of the hats are that useful, the ice hat and time stop hat feel very underutilized in particular. The presentation isn't the best either. Whether or not characters emote during cutscenes seems to be random? It's very distracting. However, does any of this bring the game down for me? NOPE!!!

I'm sorry I love this game too much. The issues it has aren't big enough for me to dislike it even a little bit. The platforming feels amazing. The levels are full of so much stuff to collect, it's so much fun to just run around. The game constantly throws you into different absurd scenarios, yet it never feels jarring. From a murder mystery, to performing in a big parade, to selling your soul to a shadow...demon...guy...thing, it never stops being super entertaining. It's also really funny. It might look ridiculous for a game like this to be rated T but that dark humor is much appreciated. And do I even need to say anything about the soundtrack, it speaks for itself.

I just love this game. I'm absolutely biased and overlooking its problems, but hey, Super Mario Galaxy is another one of my favorite games ever, and that game has some of the most obnoxious padding ever. Let me have this one >:)