+this is pretty much mario 64 in its entirety... and it looks good as hell. if anything this was an excellent showcase of the DS's 3d chops, and even if the psp beat it out in terms of raw horsepower, this game proved the ds could do 3d games justice
+there is one major flaw the ds has when playing 3d games though, and that's the lack of an analog stick. however, I highly doubt anyone who's interested in playing this now isn't going to play it on a 3ds, which has the circle pad. using the circle pad makes this game control much more decently, especially as nintendo stil managed to add a surprising amount of nuance to the original digital controls. it can certainly still be frustrating, but in certain situations it offers more control than the original, esp since the original's controls haven't held up amazingly either
+the way that the separate characters are handled is a little odd but you almost always have options to switch when you need to, and the different abilities that each offer make certain tasks from the original game much less frustrating. for example, the stars where you must fight bullies are very aggravating with the stiff controls until you get wario and the task is made much simpler thanks to his strength
+there are brand new areas added and they're pretty great overall. they're usually limited to just a star or two, but overall I enjoyed being surprised by them in a game that otherwise hewed pretty close to the original
+there's QoL changes here and there: the big one that I can remember now is that the stars where you have to guess which order to open various chests in have been made much less annoying by never having more than three chests.
+I'm not going to spoil it but the way that you save wario is perfect; it expands on the "find the snowman's land painting in the mirror while it's invisible in the real world" gimmick beautifully while clearly telegraphing what it is that you're supposed to do
+I didn't play the minigames this time around but when I was a kid the minigames here and in NSMB were so fun with friends
-a lot of the new stars are "press the switch and then get to the star in time" or "find five silver stars", which overall are not that interesting. I did a few of them but I ended up sticking to stars from the original game for the most part
-perhaps I didn't explore the late late game enough but it seemed like a lot of the later stages didn't get full additions (ie new subareas) like the earlier ones did. the only one that comes to mind is the igloo in snowman's land getting renovated
-occasionally the new partners break the game a bit... for example in shocking arrow lifts and quick race through downtown in wet-dry world, it's very easily possible to skip the main challenges of each just by using luigi and his backflip (though the latter star was already broken by the changes in the powerup system)
-fighting bowser sucks so bad thanks to the lack of an analog stick. it shouldn't be this way, since the game offers the ability to draw a circle on the touch screen to throw bowser, but I found that this worked very poorly
this game has gotten a lot of flak for potentially being worse than the original, but I'd say it's certainly on-par overall thanks to the new content and QoL changes it has. on 3ds this game has been made much more playable, and while I don't think it will blow the mind of anyone who's played the original, it's still a nice little portable romp from the days before nintendo had actually released the original on a handheld console.
+there is one major flaw the ds has when playing 3d games though, and that's the lack of an analog stick. however, I highly doubt anyone who's interested in playing this now isn't going to play it on a 3ds, which has the circle pad. using the circle pad makes this game control much more decently, especially as nintendo stil managed to add a surprising amount of nuance to the original digital controls. it can certainly still be frustrating, but in certain situations it offers more control than the original, esp since the original's controls haven't held up amazingly either
+the way that the separate characters are handled is a little odd but you almost always have options to switch when you need to, and the different abilities that each offer make certain tasks from the original game much less frustrating. for example, the stars where you must fight bullies are very aggravating with the stiff controls until you get wario and the task is made much simpler thanks to his strength
+there are brand new areas added and they're pretty great overall. they're usually limited to just a star or two, but overall I enjoyed being surprised by them in a game that otherwise hewed pretty close to the original
+there's QoL changes here and there: the big one that I can remember now is that the stars where you have to guess which order to open various chests in have been made much less annoying by never having more than three chests.
+I'm not going to spoil it but the way that you save wario is perfect; it expands on the "find the snowman's land painting in the mirror while it's invisible in the real world" gimmick beautifully while clearly telegraphing what it is that you're supposed to do
+I didn't play the minigames this time around but when I was a kid the minigames here and in NSMB were so fun with friends
-a lot of the new stars are "press the switch and then get to the star in time" or "find five silver stars", which overall are not that interesting. I did a few of them but I ended up sticking to stars from the original game for the most part
-perhaps I didn't explore the late late game enough but it seemed like a lot of the later stages didn't get full additions (ie new subareas) like the earlier ones did. the only one that comes to mind is the igloo in snowman's land getting renovated
-occasionally the new partners break the game a bit... for example in shocking arrow lifts and quick race through downtown in wet-dry world, it's very easily possible to skip the main challenges of each just by using luigi and his backflip (though the latter star was already broken by the changes in the powerup system)
-fighting bowser sucks so bad thanks to the lack of an analog stick. it shouldn't be this way, since the game offers the ability to draw a circle on the touch screen to throw bowser, but I found that this worked very poorly
this game has gotten a lot of flak for potentially being worse than the original, but I'd say it's certainly on-par overall thanks to the new content and QoL changes it has. on 3ds this game has been made much more playable, and while I don't think it will blow the mind of anyone who's played the original, it's still a nice little portable romp from the days before nintendo had actually released the original on a handheld console.