Some of the most frustrating puzzle design in any game I’ve ever played- always drops you in the deep end before showing you how to swim. Story is a horribly, horribly bland break up plot- if you’ve seen romance fall apart in any story before, you’ve already seen what this one has to offer. It’s really too bad though, this game does have some unique visuals and intriguing ideas at play- not to mention a stellar soundtrack. All of that cannot help the game overcome the slog it is to play through, though.

Sometimes it feels like I'm the only one in the world that feels these games are the Taylor Swift albums of the game industry; Impossibly revered as masterpieces every time they play the same song wrapped up in another 15 song set. I almost feel the need to ask someone to explain the appeal but I never will because their answer will merely be as it always is: "You just don't get it." And I certainly don't - they're very right. Just as I am not one of the girlies that just gets it with swift, so too do I not understand the appeal of getting to the end of a stage in Mario. It elicits no feeling of accomplishment, no satisfaction of mastery, only relief that I don't have to touch the level ever again.
Please understand I write this in admittance of defeat, that to me- I've failed as a well-versed "gamer" to appreciate a game series near universally loved as Super Mario. So badly I want to get it, so badly I'd love to appreciate more than the endearing designs of the characters and the timeless music and actually love the GAME part of the games, but I think that as long as the point of them remains as simple as "get to the end", I fear that I never will. If one feels it necessary that I am burned at the stake for not getting the appeal of mario games, so be it.