"You've met with a terrible fate, haven't you?"

Majora's Mask is a game which I consider to be a genuine masterpiece, one last hurrah for the N64-era of Zelda games.
It is a game where the mechanics tell the bulk of its story and themes, accompanied with a haunting soundtrack that has never left my frontal temporal lobe ever since I first played this game in the year 2000.
It's jam-packed with interesting story ideas bringing forth a vibe that is like nothing I've ever experienced before or probably will ever experience again. It's evidently a depressing game with a profound tinge of melancholy and deep, almost neverending sadness. And I'm still debating myself whether all of this was intentional or just the result of a string of random circumstances.

So let me unpack all of this just to get a sense of what I'm talking about.

BE WARNED THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS.

The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask is the direct sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, widely considered to be one of the best games of all time, if not the best game of all time. It is a seminal piece of work, one of the biggest adventure games in 3D-gaming at the time. It set the standard of what an adventure game should be and how things like exploration and combat should work in a 3D-space. It inspired a lot of games for decades to come and it's still revered to this day.

So Nintendo had big shoes to fill for the eventual sequel. And what they came up with was lightning in a bottle, a sequel that retained a lot of elements from Ocarina but deviated rather drastically in terms of structure, scale and atmosphere.

In the beginning of the game Link gets ambushed by a creature known as Skull Kid wearing the eponymous Majora's Mask. They are accompanied by two fairies, Tatl and Tael. They steal Epona, the horse we rode on and our precious ocarina of time. As Link gives chase, he falls into a hole. Skull Kid is waiting for Link and he changes him into a Deku Scrub. Skull Kid flees, Tael follows them but Tatl gets left behind with Link.

Together they venture forth and they come across an odd tree-like figure with a face.

It looks like the lifeless corpse of a Deku Scrub. The creature looks sad, almost as if it's been through a great deal of pain and agony. As a sidenote, this becomes really important later. It also sets the tone right away and the game doesn't shy away from injecting a lot of heavy themes and messages into the story.

After a while they come across The Happy Masked Salesman, an individual who will be familiar if you've played Ocarina of Time and this is where he will utter the game's most recognized quote:

"You've met with a terrible fate, haven't you?"

He's now a central character to the plot of this game and acts drastically different than in Ocarina of Time.
Now he's a tad unhinged and a bit menacing. He begs Link to retrieve Majora's Mask, the mask that Skull Kid is wearing. Skull Kid stole the mask from him and he warns Link that the mask is incredibly dangerous and is capable of inflicting a lot of damage to the world and its people. He can also help Link get rid of his transformation if he retrieves his ocarina. But Link only has three days time. After that, the moon crashes into the world killing everything and everyone. The game ends.

And thus Link sets foot in Clock Town, the largest city in Termina and the game finally begins.

Link can't use his sword, people are kinda racist against him and he cannot leave town because the guards view him as a defenseless child.

You as the player know that that's not true, you've proven yourself in the previous game to be more than capable of defending yourself. But the people only look at the mask. Not what's behind it.

Eventually Link retrieves the ocarina of time just before the moon crashes. You reset the timeline and everything goes back to the way it was, right before you enter Clock Town. The Happy Mask Salesman teaches Link the Song of Healing and he turns back to his human self. You obtain the Deku Mask and you can turn back into a Deku Scrub whenever you want. From there you're tasked to travel to the four corners of the earth to find the Gods to help you put a stop to Skull Kid. Or more fittingly, put a stop to Majora's Mask.

That's the basic plot of the story. But everything gets much deeper than that.

From what I remember when this game came out, I get the feeling that it was liked by some but hated by others. For some it deviated too far from the established formula and forced players to play by pretty stringent rules. There is a three day time limit and everything in the game unfolds by a strict schedule. Things happen or don't happen depending on your actions. People move and according to set schedule and you can interact with NPC's in certain ways to influence their actions thus changing the flow of time. When three days have passed according to the in-game clock, your time is up and you have to "reset the timeline", bringing you back to square one. Everything you did will be undone. It is like you were never there to begin with. Everything and everyone lives on borrowed time in this world.

Saving the game is now a rather elaborate affair. What was once a quick and painless push of a button to save your game is now a game mechanic. You can only, truly, save your game when you play "The Song of Time" and resetting the timeline, basically undoing all your progress. You can, however, save at certain Owl Statues but be warned that this is only a temporary quicksave. If you quit after you've saved at said owl statue, the game starts right after your last time reset.

There are also only four real mainline dungeons, probably the fewest in any Zelda game although I'd argue there are a few mini-dungeons sprinkled in. Some people also took issue with the fact that you're playing as Kid Link and not his adult counterpart.

In some sense, you can view these rules and restrictions as a detriment to the game. Every problem you fixed gets undone.

In truth, they are the game's biggest strength. Every action you take or don't take has its varying degrees of consequences. Almost every character has a name, a story to tell and have relations to other characters in the game. With this the game can differentiate its numerous NPC's and give them real purpose. You really start to feel for these people. The focus of the game isn't to save the princess like the game's predecessors. It is to save the world and its people. This is also where the masks come into focus.

A new set of collectable items in this game are the masks. There were masks in Ocarina of Time but they were only there for a short sidequest. There are three (technically four but I'm not opening the can of worms called "Fierce Deity Mask") that allow you to turn into other characters. There's the aforementioned "Deku Mask" but we also have the "Zora Mask" and "Goron Mask".

As alluded to before, these masks contain the spirits of people who lived and died in the land of Termina. Darmani was a Goron who lived in Snowhead, revered as a hero but died prematurely when he tried to save his people from a calamity. Mikau was a Zora, a guitarist for a music group who died while trying to rescue the eggs of the group's singer Lulu. You play the "Healing Song" to ease their burden and heal their sorrow.

But their work is not done. It is sad to say but they failed in their mission. And now it is your turn to carry on their legacy. The people from their respective habitats look at you as if you are Mikau or Darmani. But you're not. You're just masquerading as them.

Who's the Deku Scrub you might ask? Well we never learn his name. But later in the game there are clues to his identity if you're willing to commit to one of the many sidequests the game has to offer.

To me, this Majora's Mask bread and butter. The ability to tie its story into the gameplay. We can find various themes in this game like identity, dealing with mortality, existentialism. What would you do when faced with the end of the world? Would you help other people? Would you run? Cower? Every character deals with this in a certain way. And it's all tied to their distinct personalities.

These aforementioned masks are not the only ones you can collect. There are a plethora of other masks, each with their varying functionality. There's the returning "Bunny Hood" that lets you run faster, there's the "Bomb Mask" which detonates basically used as a standard bomb and thus blowing yourself up. Some masks are just used once just to collect a Heart Piece. With the exception of the transformation masks, the other masks are a bit underutilized. In some instances you have to do a lot of sidequesting to obtain them and after that, most of them only have a one time use, in most cases to collect a Heart Piece.

So I've extensively written about the story and what makes it so good, what about the gameplay?

It's about the same as Ocarina of Time, you travel the land, collect a key item at the end of the dungeon that you will need to complete the game. It's that typical satisfying Zelda formula of collecting items in order to progress to the next area or unlock upgrades from previously visited areas. To be honest, there is not a lot to talk about here.

The game has some interesting dungeons, most of them will rack your brain more than in Ocarina of Time. Take the second dungeon for example, Snowhead. You have to progress vertically via several rooms all situated around a giant ice pillar. You have to increase or decrease the size of the pillar to progress. The bosses are mostly fought with the masks you use to transform yourself into the other species. It's a unique deviation of the Zelda formula where you would normally fight a boss with the item you obtained in the dungeon.

There are four unique areas ranging from a swamp, a snowy mountain, an oceanside and an area that's filled with ghosts, mummies and zombies. It's all very intriguing and unique.

Let us not forget about the music. The music sets the tone for every location and situation perfectly. Take for example, Clock Town's theme. On the first day, the music encapsulates the mood of a large bustling town with a lot of things to do. People are getting ready for a festival, it's upbeat and lively. As the days go by however, the music gets more frantic, there's a sense of foreboding, the atmosphere gets more dark and gloomy as the moon inches closer and closer to the world. The Song of Healing is maybe one of the most haunting melodies ever composed, an achievement considering it's such a simple melody. The Deku Palace theme is also one of my favorites, perfectly encapsulating the mood of a kingdom in disarray.

If you get the sense that I'm gushing more about this game than critiqueing it then I guess your right. I love this game. Are there flaws? Yes plenty. Most of which are a product of their time, wonky camera-controls, low framerate. But I can't help myself. I just love this game so much.

If you want to play Majora's Mask, you can't fail with the original of course, playable on the Switch NSO. You can play the remake on 3DS, but it changes a lot about the game and I would personally not recommend to play the remake as your first playthrough. I would recommend that excellent Recompilation. It runs at 60FPS, looks incredible, there's widescreen support and there is a fully functioning 3D-camera. It's an incredible achievement.

I've always found it strange how little Nintendo lets their developers innovate with 2D Mario experiences in comparison to their 3D brethren. I don't want this review to become a referendum on the New Super Mario Bros. games and what they did/did not do well, but I do think it's clear they were mandated to largely stick to the principles established in the classic Super Mario Bros. games. In contrast, the 3D Mario titles have been constantly reinventing themselves over the last 25 years. Super Mario 64, Sunshine, Galaxy, 3D World, and Odyssey share a lot of same design ethos but how you interact with those worlds varies wildly.

Now, for the first time since Super Mario World, we have a Mario in the second-dimension that does the same. Super Mario Bros. Wonder loves to upend the tea table at every opportunity, constantly throwing new gimmicks, ideas, powerups, and surprises at you until you're blue in the face. It's not a drastically unfamiliar experience, but at no point does it ever leave you bored or content with the prior Mario knowledge you've built up over the years. The Wonder Flower mechanic, in particular, is the most obvious example and gives every single level multiple flavors to it. Even when it reuses particular gimmicks it always does so with a purpose, finding even more bizarre ways to twist and turn the world in ways you won't expect. In addition to transforming levels, Wonder Flowers can also transform you. This, in addition to the new base items like Elephant and Drill Mario, gives this game powerup variety rivaling that of Super Mario Bros. 3. That rocks.

But what makes Wonder also special among Mario games is some of the smaller design decisions it makes, like letting each world be slightly more open so you don't feel like you're hamstrung along one path the whole game. The sheer variety of level types in every location also does, well, wonders for keeping things fresh. There are your traditional platforming levels of course, but also ones where you race against Wigglers, battle hordes of enemies in arenas, use the game's new badge mechanic to accomplish set challenges, or hunt for hidden treasures in search levels that are specifically and smartly designed around Mario Wonder's online mode. Someone on the team seemingly fell in love with the concept of music-themed levels too, because you'll see a lot of those. You can't tell me the final boss of this game wasn't heavily inspired by the DJ Octavio fight in Splatoon.

If I had to level some minor criticism at this game, it'd mostly have to do with the game's difficulty curve - or lack thereof. Most Mario titles tend to have a very gentle one throughout most of the game until it rockets upward toward the end, whereas Wonder sees random fluctuations in challenge all over the place. It never feels like each world is getting steadily more difficult - instead, every one has courses that are largely on the easy side with a few difficult ones smattered about. Part of this is because the last three worlds can be done in any order, but still, it was a little lame to be playing stages in World 6 that felt like they belonged in World 1. Boss battles also never rise to anything resembling a challenge, although I guess that's pretty in line with past Mario games. Feels like they could have tried a bit more here, but I digress.

(On a personal note, I'm also disappointed with the lack of playable Rosalina in this game, especially with such a large cast already, but perhaps, given the elephant powerup, they wanted to spare her the indignity of that transformation. If that's the case, I can forgive her lack of inclusion this once.)

So hey, there you go - if you're the kind of person who's been clamoring forever for a truly unique and fresh take on the classic Mario formula, your wish has been granted. Super Mario Bros. Wonder is proof that no matter how far we stretch into the future, Nintendo still has a ridiculous amount of talent and creativity left to power their decades-old franchises into relevancy today and beyond. They sometimes just have to let those guys off the leash.

𝑴𝑨𝑹𝑰𝑶 𝟐𝑫 𝑫𝑬 𝑽𝑶𝑳𝑻𝑨 𝑨̀ 𝑮𝑳𝑶́𝑹𝑰𝑨

Após anos preso na série New com jogos muito similares finalmente a franquia 2D traz algo realmente novo, Wonder não é só um respiro da fórmula que se reciclava, é uma grande evolução e um dos melhores games da série, mas vamos aos detalhes, aqui está minha opinião de Super Mario Bros. Wonder.

𝗥𝗘𝗡𝗢𝗩𝗔𝗗𝗢 𝗘 𝗖𝗥𝗜𝗔𝗧𝗜𝗩𝗢

Mario Wonder é a volta de Mario 2D após anos de Mario U. Então é um ambiente familiar, mas com várias coisas novas, sendo a principal as flores fenomenais que em toda fase faz algum tipo de mecânica e diversidade, é absurdo o quão esse game traz algo novo que te surpreende. Algo muito forte do jogo é a quantidade de novos inimigos, estávamos em um padrão muito seguro e tem muitos novos tipos com design e jeitos diferentes de te atazanar.
Wonder traz vários personagens jogaveis, Mario, Luigi, Peach, Toadette, Daisy pela 1° vez jogável num jogo 2D, 2 Toads e como modo "easy" junto a 4 Yoshis e Ledrão que não levam dano mas não usam power-ups. Infelizmente tivemos downgrade em alguns personagens como Luigi que perderam suas habilidades como ser escorregadio e pular alto ou a Peach flutuar, mas faz sentido pra equilibrar o jogo com às insígnias que vou falar em detalhes logo. Temos também adições de power-ups, tendo a Maçã elefante, Flor de bolha, Cogumelo broca e a mecânica de insígnia que traz 3 tipos de vantagens, as de ação, poder e avançadas, entre melhorias tem como planar, receber mais moedas, correr mais rápido, subir mais alto, iniciar a fase com um cogumelo e muitos outros.

𝗠𝗔𝗣𝗔𝗦 𝗩𝗔𝗥𝗜𝗔𝗗𝗢𝗦

Acabou aquela estrutura de mesmos mundos da série New, claro temos alguns temas similares mas que ainda tem sua identidade, são 7 áreas diferentes com algo novo sempre. A progressão diferente dos jogos anteriores segue estilo dos 3D com um mapa livre pra andar estilo 3D World e podendo escolher qualquer fase do mundo que diz a dificuldade em forma de estrelas. Além das fases tem adição de desafios de insígnia, corrida, loja com um tipo roxo de moedas e outros, você precisa conseguir um número de sementes para liberar o chefe do mundo, você ganha 1 só de passar de fase e uma se conseguir passar o desafio da flor Wonder e também tem algumas que são secretas.

𝗧𝗘𝗠𝗢𝗦 𝗨𝗠𝗔 𝗛𝗜𝗦𝗧𝗢́𝗥𝗜𝗔

Óbvio é Mario, ela é simples, mas ainda sim temos uma narrativa estilo Super Mario World com um pouco mais de diálogos, é básico mas é legal ver um esforço em fazer algo mesmo que simples.

𝗩𝗜𝗦𝗨𝗔𝗟 𝗟𝗜𝗡𝗗𝗢

Após anos de New Super Mario Bros. com aqueles gráficos sem graça tivemos uma reinvenção com um visual e direção de arte única e linda com animações com tantos detalhes, tanto nos personagens principais e os inimigos, um upgrade foda.

𝗨𝗠𝗔 𝗕𝗢𝗔 𝗧𝗥𝗜𝗟𝗛𝗔

Temos também uma trilha muito mais interessante que a série New que reutilizava tudo, tem algumas músicas que não gostei tanto mas muitas curti bastante e tem várias de jogos antigos.

𝗥𝗢𝗗𝗔𝗡𝗗𝗢 𝗦𝗨𝗔𝗩𝗘

A Nintendo não costuma errar nisso, Mario Wonder roda suave e satisfatório.

𝗗𝗨𝗕𝗟𝗔𝗚𝗘𝗠 𝗠𝗔𝗜𝗦 𝗣𝗥𝗘𝗦𝗘𝗡𝗧𝗘

Wonder conta com dublagem principalmente nas flores, o jogo se tornou bem mais vivo, pra quem não curtir tem a opção de desligar. Além disso tem a dublagem dos personagens que agora não temos mais Charles e até outras mudanças no elenco, a dublagem está boa e com personalidade própria, mas dá um corte no coração perder alguém tão especial como o incrível Martinet. Novamente sobre os personagens uma falta é não ter dublagem em português do Mario, Luigi, Peach e os outros controláveis, não incomoda muito porque eles falam bem pouco, só poucas palavras ou frases mas poderia estar em PT-BR também.

𝗗𝗨𝗥𝗔𝗖̧𝗔̃𝗢 𝗔𝗧𝗘𝗡𝗗𝗘 𝗢 𝗦𝗨𝗙𝗜𝗖𝗜𝗘𝗡𝗧𝗘

Como tinha dito antes o game são 7 áreas e conteúdo após zerar, o que pode ser decepcionante ao ouvir porque costuma ser 8 mundos e um secreto, mas eles são muito diferentes com muitas fases e desafios, não faz falta nenhuma pela qualidade.

𝗠𝗨𝗟𝗧𝗜𝗣𝗟𝗔𝗬𝗘𝗥 𝗤𝗨𝗔𝗦𝗘 𝗣𝗘𝗥𝗙𝗘𝗜𝗧𝗢

Eu não testei esse modo então não posso falar muito, mas gostaria que essa opção fosse estilo Mario Maker 2 sendo todo mundo jogando junto de verdade, bom ter alguma opção mas é meio decepcionante o estilo de "fantasma" que seguiram, em co-op local você consegue jogar normalmente.

𝗣𝗥𝗢𝗕𝗟𝗘𝗠𝗔𝗦? 𝗳𝗲𝗹𝗶𝘇𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗲 𝗽𝗼𝘂𝗰𝗼𝘀

Na real eu não tenho uma grande crítica, o máximo que me incomodou um pouco foi que o Bowser Jr. é sempre o chefe final de cada mundo, exceto o final, mas sempre a batalha é diferente, só seria legal ter outro inimigo pra mais variedade.

𝙋𝙍𝙊́𝙎 ✅
- Varidade e criatividade incrível
- Visual lindo
- Sem bugs ou glitches
- Narrativa mais elaborada

𝘾𝙊𝙉𝙏𝙍𝘼𝙎 ❌
- Chefes dos mundos poderia não ser só o Bowser Jr.
- Online poderia ser no estilo tradicional

𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐄𝐃𝐈𝐓𝐎 - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Mario Wonder é um abraço forte após minha raiva de New Super Mario Bros., ter uma das minhas franquias favoritas renovada com tanto cuidado me dá uma felicidade enorme, que a franquia continue nessa jornada por criatividade, Wonder é 10.

No puedo con tanto encanto (Soul para mis compas)...

No sabría decir si es mi Mario favorito, pero sin duda es el mejor Mario 2D, es muy creativo, se siente demasiada la libertad y cada nivel es muy único, los niveles secretos son muy hard, tiene demasiados niveles, muchos ocultos. Si tuviera que quejarme de algo sería un nitpick mío que en el mundo de los Slimes usas la misma habilidad 3 veces seguidas, cuando todo el juego varía bastante el Wonder.

Algo realmente negativo que tiene es la cámara en el multijugador, el mejor jugador que se define por quien queda más alto en la meta, es muy malo, afecta al resto que no tiene preferencia y es fácil equivocarse, por ello, en los New alejaban la cámara, es mejor solución, incluso el Sonic Superstar hace ello, ojalá lo cambiaran. Igualmente, es un 10/10 y lo recomiendo de todo corazón.

Finally, a NEW 2D Mario game! Super Mario Bros. Wonder is the latest mainline 2D entry after the last few entries resulted in 2D Mario stagnation. There's nothing inherently awful about the New Super Mario Bros series, but at the time New Super Mario Bros. 2 and U were released, it started to feel samey and stale. The early 2010s was more of a bland era for Mario when it comes to the quality of games. The mainline entries around that time frame, NSMB2, U, 3D Land, and 3D World were serviceable, and in some cases enjoyable, but they sort of feel generic and uninspired as opposed to the past entries that strived to innovate and revolutionize gaming as we come to expect from the Italian plumber. While they served their purpose as being solid Mario games, it's clear that 2D Mario needed to change, and change it did. Watching the June Nintendo Direct trailer took me by a bit of a surprise. It looked different visually, and it looked like they were trying to innovate with a fresh new gimmick, and watching the Mario Wonder Direct solidified my decision to pick up the game at launch. Now that the game has been released, it's about time I give my overall thoughts on Mario's wondrous adventure.

Right off the bat, the one thing I can immediately praise the game for is the art direction. It's exquisite and charming, filled with cute little animations and character expressions that I heavily adore. Stuff like how the characters sprint, the Goombas having snot bubbles while they sleep, the Koopas panicking as they're closing their impending doom, or the way how the characters look in their smaller form just makes me feel giddy inside. It is brimming with personality and takes inspiration from past entries that impacted this game. It'll certainly age like fine wine as opposed to the dull New Super Mario Bros art style that we've grown sick and tired of four games in. For the characters, we have the usual NSMB gang plus Toadette, while bringing along Peach and Daisy on the adventure. Seeing Daisy again in a mainline Mario entry after her last appearance was in Super Mario Land in 1989 to be eventually relegated to spin-offs, but as a playable character this time is huge, and I'm happy that fans were able to play their favorite princess. Nabbit from New Super Mario Bros. U returns as a playable character and Yoshis are full characters now, which is really nice. It's nice that people can play the four-colored Yoshis as individuals, though they fall under the easy mode section. I do get Nabbit since he was already one for New Super Luigi U, but having Yoshi as one would sting some people as they would avoid playing their favorite dinosaur if it meant playing in baby mode; so yeah, kind of disappointing. I do wish the character selection could use a little more variety, but it's a solid selection nonetheless.

The game is split into seven worlds with the Petal Isles being the center of the Flower Kingdom, and each world has a linear and non-linear progression. Let me explain what I mean by this. It has your typical linear progression with new paths being unlocked under the form of a straight line when clearing a course, that part hasn't changed. For the non-linear side, each world has open areas where players can roam freely and play any stage in that particular area in any order they want. Later on, when you clear the first three worlds, the game opens up a little more and lets you play the next three worlds in no particular order. It's minor, but I like how we're given the choice to play the levels and worlds however we want. The levels themselves are solid overall and are decent in length, that is until we reach the Wonder Flower, the game's main gimmick. Touching the flower transforms the stages in a variety of ways, and this is where the creativity shines in Mario Wonder. When Nintendo said "Always expect the unexpected," they meant it, as you'll see Wonder effects like a stampede of Bulrushes coming your way, the perspective changing, music numbers, floating through space, transforming into a spike ball, etc. Did I mention this game has music numbers? There are also many references from past games that make the Mario nerd inside of me happy. Not only does the game take inspiration from past Mario games, but it also takes some inspiration from other 2D platformers, like Retro Studios' Donkey Kong Country games like taking advantage of the foreground and background sections and silhouette levels, and any 2D platformer that has levels like these is a winner in my books. It felt like Nintendo was catching up to other 2D games that dominated the genre and what made them special in the first place, and that pleases me coming from a longtime Mario fan. Even if you don't remember the names of the levels themselves, you'll remember the Wonder effects like the one where you transform into a Goomba and it turns into a stealth mission or a silhouette level where the characters are stretched out or the music levels. When I cleared the second level, I knew this game was going to be special. Outside of the regular levels, we have bite-sized Break Time stages that range in variety, from KO Arenas, to music levels that take seconds to complete, Wiggler Races, and the puzzling Search Party challenges. These stages offer something different and are nice little breaks from the standard levels if you want something short and sweet or grab the collectibles.

Speaking of collectibles, the primary one this time around is the Wonder Seeds, and these can be collected when triggering the level's Wonder Effect. There are at least two Wonder Seeds in each level and will receive one when reaching the goal pole. Some will contain three if they have secrets and Break Time levels. The 10-Flower Coins are the replacement for NSMB's Star Coins; collecting one equals 10 unless it was already collected before, and these coins in particular can be used in the Poplin Shops that contain Wonder Seeds, Standees, and Badges. The Standees are used for connecting with people online as Live-Player Shadows and act as an excuse for the absence of online co-op. It essentially revives players who've died and transformed into a ghost, jumping them right back into action depending on where you placed your Standee. I don't have much to say about the online mode, but from my experience, it was solid. Honestly, this was the right utilization for online, or else we would've gotten another Mario Maker 2 catastrophe given Nintendo's history with online services. Outside of the Wonder Flowers, the other standout feature is the Badge system. They can be discovered in Badge Challenges, giving players a taste of what they can do and how they can assist them in levels; this is the only time where Prince Florian is useful. I love the concept of the system as it gives players some experimentation and encourages replayability as there are 24 badges to collect splitting into three categories, Action, Boost, and Expert. My favorites are the action ones, specifically the Parachute Cap and Grappling Vine as I love how it's utilized and take full advantage of it in near-death situations. Then we have the new items. The Bubble Flower lets Mario and friends blow bubbles that can suck enemies up from a distance and can be used for jumping to hard-to-reach places. It's a nice addition to Mario's catalog of power-ups but is the one I used the least because the other two were so much fun to use. The Drill Mushroom allows us to ground pound through crystals, burrow, and move through the ground and ceilings, and can be used to take down spiky and hard-headed enemies in a breeze. Finally, we have the Elephant Fruit, the most outlandish and wackiest power-up in the series bar none, and I love it. You can break through small blocks easily, knock out enemies with your trunk, store and spray water with it, and dash through large gaps. Seeing the main cast transform into an elephant is the most blursed thing to come out of this game and is easily the best item. I also like to give a quick shout-out to the audio design. From the trombone-like sound when transforming into an elephant to the silence of the main percussion when standing idly to the Marimba Blocks, there's a ton of adaptive music poured into this game, and Mario is no stranger when it comes to this type of background music.

You know, for a game titled "Wonder", the bosses are so disappointing. Most of your encounters are going to be with Bowser Jr. and while I like the battle environment is affected by the Wonder Effects, the variety just takes a hit. It's even lamer because, in New Super Mario Bros, they had a mixture of new and old when it came to the boss department, and hell, in New Super Mario Bros. Wii, the Koopalings, even if they were overused, had a bit of variety to them. They could've come up with new bosses that were exclusive to the Flower Kingdom or implemented past bosses to take advantage of the Wonder Effects, but they didn't. Kamek shows up in the game, but you don't fight him; all he does is summon airships and that's it as opposed to the NSMB games where you did; what a pussy. The Bowser fight is arguably the best fight in 2D Mario that makes the most of the Wonder Effects, but still, the boss variety is completely lackluster. While I do love the concept behind the Badges, the execution is pretty shallow. I did say that the badges offer experimentation and encourage replayability, but for a casual playthrough, you're most likely going to play through the Badge Challenges and pick a few that you like, and a few of these are OP like the Parachute Cap for instance.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder surprised me. While it does have a few faults, I love the ingenuity that is poured into the game, and what was delivered was one of the best 2D Mario games in years. Given that the development team was comprised of younger developers who were allegedly given no deadlines and had thousands of ideas that were eventually cut, it's clear that there was a lot of passion behind this game. Mario Wonder not only made me hopeful for future 2D Mario games, but it made me more hyped for mainline Mario in general, and I can't wait to see where Mario goes next.

This is a BIG step in the right direction for 2D Mario games!

2D Mario games are some of the first video games I’ve played with Nintendo and they have a special place in my heart. That being said I actually wasn’t very excited to play this game. Yeah I was interested and knew I was going to enjoy this game before even playing but wow, Nintendo executed a lot of cool ideas perfectly with this new entry to the franchise. To start I just love that you can play as anyone with a decent amount of playable characters. I played as Princess Peach the entire game and it was worth it. It really doesn’t make much of a difference on who you play unless you play as any of the Yoshis or play as Nabbit which I personally don’t recommend playing as them just because it really wasn’t that fun to play as them. Like any Mario game there were new power-ups. My favorite is the bubble flower since it’s very essential to use if you know how to use it properly. We have the Elephant power-up which transforms you to be a really strong elephant that can carry water to use in certain situations and you have the Drill power-up which was my least favorite power-up in the game since I felt like Nintendo didn’t really find many reasons to use them. And of course we have the good old classic Fire Plant that works well with certain enemies as usual. While there aren’t many power-ups in this game there’s a good reason for that. In this game, you instead can use badges which give you a unique ability to use for ANY level and for different situations. This was handled very well since there were times I struggled to get a purple coin and switching badges can be a real game changer. Not to mention it was fun to experiment with these badges if you care enough to do so. In each level you’ll find a Wonder Flower which basically turns the level into a crazy and trippy challenge to collect a Wonder Seed and that’s only if you want to. This added so much random and unexpected fun and really feels so nice, relaxing and cheerful. Throughout the game you go through your levels where you collect 3 purple coins and 1-3 Wonder Seeds and then you’ll have all kinds of dynamic challenges that make you use different badges to earn a Wonder Seed. While I did like most of them, some were pretty frustrating to take on and I ABSOLUTELY didn’t like the KO Arena ones. Every world the moment I got to a KO Arena I honestly didn’t feel like playing anymore and I even wanted to skip them but since I was going for 100% I went ahead did them. I also started another playthrough just to play with 2 other friends and we all had a blast. We messed around and just generally played for fun and it was worth it. Also this some of the best art for any 2D Mario game. I was actually very fascinated by the art style.

Not much to say about the story other than it’s a nice and simple story where Bowser is up to no good. The usual plot for 2D Mario games. It’s a nice story and all but I wasn’t all that impressed by it and really only played to enjoy the gameplay.

Overall, Super Mario Bros Wonder is a solid 4 stars. But because I got to play this with friends and did make this game A LOT more fun I’ll give this one 4.5 stars. Not only is this is some of the most fun I had playing videos games this year but this will definitely be a memorable game that I remember in the future and I absolutely appreciate the new ideas Nintendo tried out for this game.

It’s been a good long while since I played a 2D Mario that wasn’t just kind of banging my head off the old ones. Even when going for the more old school structure of a world map and individual levels, I’d say I had the most fun with 3D World, so I was perhaps a little apprehensive as to whether or not I’d like Wonder. I loved the style from the previews, but would I like actually playing it? Or would I end up just kind of shrugging and putting it down a few years in like I did with the New Super Mario Brothers games I tried, along with pretty much every 2D Mario except SMB3 and Yoshi’s Island?

Nah this rules I had a great time, even if I didn’t really feel compelled to 100% the whole thing. When it comes to platformers I’m here for a good time and not a long time, and I wasn’t a big fan of what the Special world was putting forward so I decided not to go through the whole thing. I did decide to go back and get some Wonder Seeds I missed, so that’s something!

Movement feels a lot of fun, and I love jumping around and going Wahoo! It just good to platform in this game, man, even removed from any of the Wonder stuff or the power ups. I do understand why people might be a little underwhelmed by the power up selection but I thought they were fine? Elephant is interesting in its weird situational aspects to me. I think having it as a thing that you can use to get water to dried flowers is a neat little puzzle element, though I’ll admit that I might’ve liked a Wario type charge to go along with it.

Wonder effects themselves are a lot of fun as well. There are some duds or repeats but I definitely found myself excited to see what the next level would bring. I find myself reminded of Odyssey’s transformations, where some were just kinda one minor puzzle solution whereas others I could see being refined and developed out into a full game, with the rhythm game wonder effects perhaps being my favorite. I wasn’t necessarily good at it, but I DID think it was very fun. The great music went a long way towards making that work, and it does feel like the devs knew they had something going since they made a badge out of it!

Badges are kinda neat, though I’ll admit that once you have all of them unlocked I feel like there are only a few I thought were worth using over the others, notably Go Fast, Double Jump, and Grappling Hook. (Grappling Hook is my favorite, I was so excited when I unlocked it…) There’s the passive badges too, which make the game a little easier like letting you know where secrets are or giving you a bottomless pit save. And then there are the challenge badges, which are pretty wild. I don’t think I got all of them, but trying to platform while invisible sure is something!!!

I feel like the only thing I really don’t care for is the character selection stuff. I do like the addition of Daisy, but I think it’s a bummer that instead of every character playing their own way you just have Standard Gameplay with different models and Easy Mode, with the Yoshis and Nabbit being consigned to Easy mode. I dunno, I like Yoshi best and I wish I could have seen Elephant Yoshi and Elephant Nabbit. I feel like the badges were probably designed so you could pick your favorite character and play them however you like, but I dunno, I’ve always kind of liked the different play styles the playable characters offer. Also I don’t know why we need two different colored standard Toads outside of them having been included in the New SMBs. Original Toad and Toadette are good by me.

But yeah, shit’s great! I had a WONDERFUL time, and I might consider going back to actually try and get everything at some point maybe? I am also pretty excited to see what they do next. It feels like Mario’s getting to be Weird again and that rules.