Only the most basic of changes to the established maze formula, and yet this game fucks much harder than its sequels.

This absolutely deserves the love it gets for its stellar presentation and addictive City Trial mode.
It also absolutely deserves the hate it gets for its lackluster Air Ride mode and oversimplified controls.
And it absolutely deserves... whatever it gets for Top Ride mode.

The best Sonic OST ever made is stuck on a clunky racing game that I only truly enjoyed when I was playing Sonic Gems Collection as a kid.

I have complicated feelings on this game, going back and forth between thinking it's just okay and hating its guts. Its length and gameplay depth contrast with its weak level design, long loading screens and change in writing tone. In a way, it goes against everything that the original Portal’s "short but sweet" model stood for.
Valve should have just finished F-Stop instead of listening to their playtesters.

Kate Green is so fucking hot. Her tight red dress with the high leg slit keeps me invested in every cutscene that she's in. More of the world should acknowledge her magnificence and draw art in her honor.
Uh, what else to say... the voice acting is entertaining... the bosses suck compared to other installments... they used the SMG again even though the pistol and shotgun were much more fun to wield...

With this DLC wrapping up, I feel a bit more forgiving towards it. A bit.
A solid roster of characters and retro courses are weighed down by horrible mobile game portjobs. Shit like SNES Mario Circuit 3 and all of the city tracks from Tour have done irreparable damage to an otherwise excellent game.

This shit is way better than it has any right to be, with a surprising amount of polish and content. I miss the time when licensed games had real effort put into them.

This may seem stupid to say, but when I think hard about it, this is as good of a revival for 2D Mario as Sonic Mania is for 2D Sonic.

Must I elaborate on why I think this game is virtually flawless? You can tell how much love they put into it just by looking at one screenshot.

With how much I loved the first NSMB, I was very hyped for this one... but somehow it just didn't hit me the same way.

Yep, I scored this lower than Sunshine, even though it has better controls.
I have a hard time describing my thoughts about it, but perhaps I just didn't feel its magic, not even when I was playing it in childhood.

I am thoroughly convinced that the D-pad controls and inferior artstyle are the only problems with this. Fix them, and it would be better than the original, which is quite the damn feat to accomplish.

Is it bad that the vast majority of hours I spent on this game were just listening to its amazing music through the sound test menu?
Platform fighters aren't a hardcore appeal for me, after all.

Perhaps the only kart racer that really came close to dethroning Crash Team Racing, aside from that game's own Nitro Fueled remake.

This might the best game that could have been recommended to me out of a "hidden gems" thread. A very simple but also very enjoyable roguelite, with a surprise banger of a soundtrack as a cherry on top.