2016
The critics of this game have thoroughly picked apart what's wrong with this one better than I ever could. It's a completely vapid, soulless husk of the original game. I could go on and on for 20 pages about how much they missed the core appeal of this series with this entry. But, as I said, I'd merely be reiterating what most others have said.
The gameplay is good. In a vacuum it's an ok, well crafted experience. But on that front you could get away with playing almost any other mainline game in the series and get either the exact same thing, or better. Insomniac had gone full auto pilot with this series once it hit the ps3 era and you can really tell they just weren't feeling it anymore by this point. Completely phoned in.
The gameplay is good. In a vacuum it's an ok, well crafted experience. But on that front you could get away with playing almost any other mainline game in the series and get either the exact same thing, or better. Insomniac had gone full auto pilot with this series once it hit the ps3 era and you can really tell they just weren't feeling it anymore by this point. Completely phoned in.
2004
While this remake is pretty rough, it's actually really impressive for its time. It's much harder to appreciate for what it accomplished now though considering we can play the original on basically any device these days, M64 is basically the new Doom in that regard. But, I do still find value in this version. It's just cool to be able to play a somewhat unfamiliar version of one of the most iconic games ever made.
The best of the new content featured here, are the moments that take an existing star or concept from the original game and put a twist on it. Like being able to use the invisibility power up to phase through the mirror room and enter the reflection of the real door to enter a white G-mod lookin' room with a star in it. Or having to break the rocks in watch for rolling rocks instead of the star just being a wall kick away.
Unfortunately though I think a lot of the new stars added to the game don't really add much and only serve to bloat the game. Of course, not helped by the game already feeling more tiring to play than the original as it is due to the controls limited by the hardware. Adding an extra Find 5 of the silver stars mission to these stages really just felt like filler. The few original stages made specifically for these missions ranged from meh to decent, but otherwise the game would be (And actually...IS) better without them. They're never remotely difficult to find and mechanically they're ripped from the multiplayer mode, where the idea of dropping a star when you take damage makes a LOT more sense. And what's up with that Tick Tock Clock silver star mission? They all spawn high up but bounce around and all end up just falling down to the bottom floor where you spawn..?
There's just a handful of things like that that feel weirdly unpolished or not fully realized. Biggest example is the multiple characters. Again this is something that for the time was so cool. So many people have memories trying to unlock luigi, or thinking you could play as yoshi once you got all the stars only for him to give you a bunch of lives and jump away. So finally being able to play as them is kind of a dream come true. Especially interesting is that the game starts off with you playing as Yoshi and you have to unlock Mario. The implementation of all the characters though is like a less graceful version of DK64, and I really don't understand why. To actually change your character you have to go all the way back to the peach's slide entrance room to swap. Otherwise you have to utilize character hats goombas are usually wearing to swap within a level.
Since nobody can turn into Yoshi, as he doesn't have a hat, you're basically forced to play as him for most of the game. Especially since when you play as Yoshi, you actually get a hat select when picking a level. Not sure why nobody else gets this. And when Yoshi's wearing a character hat, you'll be hearing Yoshi's voice coming out of them. Which, is absolutely a minor thing but it's one of the many things making the multiple characters feel kinda sloppy and less fun than it really should have been. Mario 64 isn't made better by splitting all the caps from the original game into character specific power ups. Special shoutout to Wario having the most abysmally slow swim speed in the entire gaming industry. Mario arbitraily is the only one who can wall jump 'cuz he needed to have SOMETHING over the others I guess.
I imagine the game would be a lot more fun just picking Luigi and getting as much as you can. You can already beat the game without unlocking Luigi and Wario without too much trouble. Without going for 100% the game's pretty smooth honestly. But going for 150 stars reveals some cracks in the structure. Doesn't help that now the reward for 150 stars somehow manages to feel even less substantial than the original's, which was already a joke for a 120 reward. You get a second slot machine in the minigames...? The first slot machine only requiring 15 stars to get.
As for the controls which often get criticized with this game, they're mangeable, you can get used to them. They're satisfying enough to weave through levels with if you get good. I had more of a problem with the physics though. So many small actions you do all the time in the original for repositioning, now have this fake momentum shoving you forward a tiny bit. You definitely had a lot more control over the finer details of your momentum in the original, leading to you falling off a cliff 'cuz the game wants to push you forward when in the original you could have held back and survived.
The minigames are seemingly more iconic than the game itself at times. And while I have my fair share of memories and love for them, I actually know the minigames from New Super Mario Bros. Both games share quite a few and 64DS actually has more if I'm not mistaken. But I think NSMB has more of a curated list of games that are generally better than what's seen in this game. They can be a fun distraction though and some are deceptively challenging.
But yeah I think it's definitely worth playing at least once if you're a fan of the original, and plenty of people do actually say the extra content makes it just a better version entirely. I see it as more of an interesting oddity. They really just made this to prove the DS CAN do 3D gaming, and proceeded to almost never use the DS for 3D gaming afterwards. This game serves as both a proof of concept, and a proof against that concept at the same time. I like that it exists more than I actually like playing it. Because personally, I'd rather not just enter and re-enter the castle repeatedly, waiting for RNG white rabbits to spawn until I get 10 of them for a single star. Had a good enough time with it, but I'll take my Mario 64 with less bloat please.
The best of the new content featured here, are the moments that take an existing star or concept from the original game and put a twist on it. Like being able to use the invisibility power up to phase through the mirror room and enter the reflection of the real door to enter a white G-mod lookin' room with a star in it. Or having to break the rocks in watch for rolling rocks instead of the star just being a wall kick away.
Unfortunately though I think a lot of the new stars added to the game don't really add much and only serve to bloat the game. Of course, not helped by the game already feeling more tiring to play than the original as it is due to the controls limited by the hardware. Adding an extra Find 5 of the silver stars mission to these stages really just felt like filler. The few original stages made specifically for these missions ranged from meh to decent, but otherwise the game would be (And actually...IS) better without them. They're never remotely difficult to find and mechanically they're ripped from the multiplayer mode, where the idea of dropping a star when you take damage makes a LOT more sense. And what's up with that Tick Tock Clock silver star mission? They all spawn high up but bounce around and all end up just falling down to the bottom floor where you spawn..?
There's just a handful of things like that that feel weirdly unpolished or not fully realized. Biggest example is the multiple characters. Again this is something that for the time was so cool. So many people have memories trying to unlock luigi, or thinking you could play as yoshi once you got all the stars only for him to give you a bunch of lives and jump away. So finally being able to play as them is kind of a dream come true. Especially interesting is that the game starts off with you playing as Yoshi and you have to unlock Mario. The implementation of all the characters though is like a less graceful version of DK64, and I really don't understand why. To actually change your character you have to go all the way back to the peach's slide entrance room to swap. Otherwise you have to utilize character hats goombas are usually wearing to swap within a level.
Since nobody can turn into Yoshi, as he doesn't have a hat, you're basically forced to play as him for most of the game. Especially since when you play as Yoshi, you actually get a hat select when picking a level. Not sure why nobody else gets this. And when Yoshi's wearing a character hat, you'll be hearing Yoshi's voice coming out of them. Which, is absolutely a minor thing but it's one of the many things making the multiple characters feel kinda sloppy and less fun than it really should have been. Mario 64 isn't made better by splitting all the caps from the original game into character specific power ups. Special shoutout to Wario having the most abysmally slow swim speed in the entire gaming industry. Mario arbitraily is the only one who can wall jump 'cuz he needed to have SOMETHING over the others I guess.
I imagine the game would be a lot more fun just picking Luigi and getting as much as you can. You can already beat the game without unlocking Luigi and Wario without too much trouble. Without going for 100% the game's pretty smooth honestly. But going for 150 stars reveals some cracks in the structure. Doesn't help that now the reward for 150 stars somehow manages to feel even less substantial than the original's, which was already a joke for a 120 reward. You get a second slot machine in the minigames...? The first slot machine only requiring 15 stars to get.
As for the controls which often get criticized with this game, they're mangeable, you can get used to them. They're satisfying enough to weave through levels with if you get good. I had more of a problem with the physics though. So many small actions you do all the time in the original for repositioning, now have this fake momentum shoving you forward a tiny bit. You definitely had a lot more control over the finer details of your momentum in the original, leading to you falling off a cliff 'cuz the game wants to push you forward when in the original you could have held back and survived.
The minigames are seemingly more iconic than the game itself at times. And while I have my fair share of memories and love for them, I actually know the minigames from New Super Mario Bros. Both games share quite a few and 64DS actually has more if I'm not mistaken. But I think NSMB has more of a curated list of games that are generally better than what's seen in this game. They can be a fun distraction though and some are deceptively challenging.
But yeah I think it's definitely worth playing at least once if you're a fan of the original, and plenty of people do actually say the extra content makes it just a better version entirely. I see it as more of an interesting oddity. They really just made this to prove the DS CAN do 3D gaming, and proceeded to almost never use the DS for 3D gaming afterwards. This game serves as both a proof of concept, and a proof against that concept at the same time. I like that it exists more than I actually like playing it. Because personally, I'd rather not just enter and re-enter the castle repeatedly, waiting for RNG white rabbits to spawn until I get 10 of them for a single star. Had a good enough time with it, but I'll take my Mario 64 with less bloat please.
2003
It's really cool to see the Wario platformers get a 3d entry. On the same console that launched with Luigi's mansion even. Big fan of the more fleshed out extended Mario universe Nintendo went for in this era. Wario games have always been a more unhinged version of Mario, and that really shines in this game especially in the boss fights.
It's very short but I think that's in its favor. Does not get the opportunity to overstay its welcome, and it maintains its pretty clean pacing for a majority of the game. I wish money did more than act as a revival in the rare case you die. But otherwise the collectation elements are a lot of fun, ranging from mandatory progression items, optional stuff that just unlocks Wario ware crossover levels for the gba link cable, optional stuff that effects the ending, health upgrades, etc. Love the challenge rooms and their light puzzle solving and especially the platforming rooms. You never quite know what to expect and almost all of them are good. Except that one where you just slowly pick up and throw like 20 Wario head statues. They break up the gameplay really nicely and just like the game itself, are generally pretty fast and feel good to play.
Great music, graphics hold up very well, most of the bosses are really fun and bare minimum just absolutely wild. Good personality, sound effects, level themes, etc. Very solid aside from a few small moments that feel like padding and the final boss being a bit of a dud. Also I really like the hub world, something about it feels so alive.
Nothing to blow your mind or anything but a very cool little oddity that I wish Nintendo would do more of these days. Don't really have anything bad to say about it.
It's very short but I think that's in its favor. Does not get the opportunity to overstay its welcome, and it maintains its pretty clean pacing for a majority of the game. I wish money did more than act as a revival in the rare case you die. But otherwise the collectation elements are a lot of fun, ranging from mandatory progression items, optional stuff that just unlocks Wario ware crossover levels for the gba link cable, optional stuff that effects the ending, health upgrades, etc. Love the challenge rooms and their light puzzle solving and especially the platforming rooms. You never quite know what to expect and almost all of them are good. Except that one where you just slowly pick up and throw like 20 Wario head statues. They break up the gameplay really nicely and just like the game itself, are generally pretty fast and feel good to play.
Great music, graphics hold up very well, most of the bosses are really fun and bare minimum just absolutely wild. Good personality, sound effects, level themes, etc. Very solid aside from a few small moments that feel like padding and the final boss being a bit of a dud. Also I really like the hub world, something about it feels so alive.
Nothing to blow your mind or anything but a very cool little oddity that I wish Nintendo would do more of these days. Don't really have anything bad to say about it.
2017
A pretty solid return to form for the series. I still have my problems with some of the design. But, despite this they made a lot of really smart design choices that allow this game to be fun for both beginners and long time fans. Which is a balance Nintendo has finally found in the Switch era I think. This is easiest to convey through the boss design compared to mario 3D world. Yes the bosses are still baby easy, BUT where 3D World bosses will always play out near identical whether you're playing the game for the first time, or a world record speedrunner, the same cannot be said for Odyssey fights. They're designed like the typical 3D world style of fights but most of them have a lot of hidden periods of vulnerability where they're more difficult to hit, but doing so speeds up the fight. This keeps the agency on the player to dictate the speed of the fight instead of something like 3DW's car Bowser where you're just waiting for it to slay itself basically.
And that design philosophy carries into a lot of the game. And for the most part, it's fantastic. My only gripe with how they pulled this off, is that I find unless you're into speedrunning, it's not quite as fun to replay as it is on the first playthrough. Thankfully this is a fantastic speed game, skippable cutscenes, no obnoxious lengths of dead air in the run, a lot of different possible categories due to the multiple end points. I just find that while that aspect is great, mario 64 and sunshine are still fun to this day even just to do a casual playthrough of. Love speedrunning all 3 of these games but with Odyssey I almost feel like I have to, to get the most out of it. This is because a casual playthrough of Odyssey, you'll be questioning if the game is even a platformer most of the time. Would have really liked to see some dedicated platforming levels like Sunshine's "secret" missions or SOMETHING. To reiterate, the game gives you all the tools to have an incredibly satisfying platforming experience, and most of the level design has room to allow you to utilize it fully. But the game itself really feels like it's designed at a base level, for people who don't know what the jump button is. But thankfully it's not ONLY designed for those people.
There's definitely a lot of quantity over quality moons, but that didn't end up bothering me too much as the game is simply just fun. Which is something I hadn't felt for a mainline Mario in a long time. Just controlling mario feels great. Though that aspect does have the unfortunate effect of making the game look a bit unimpressive in hindsight. Similar to breath of the wild, you can be thoroughly loving every second of it and appreciating all the master class game design. But years later find yourself downplaying its accomplishments due to the quantity over quality focus. And like I said unless I'm speedrunning it, I'm likely not gonna bother 100% the game again. It has some cool rewards along the way, but what you actually get for 100% completion is (spoilers I guess but it's literally nothing) Peach's castle gets a top hat and it plays the mario 1 end of level jingle. Would have REALLY appreciated a you can now play as luigi in your next save in this game.
A more major criticism I have is world theming and the pacing involved with that. Not that there's pacing issues in the traditional sense, it just feels like the game's hurdling towards the end, rushing past its best worlds with a dash of filler mixed in. Cap and cascade kingdom are excellent first impressions but I want to see a lot more of them, unfortunately they're just tiny tutorial levels. The one they chose to make huge? Sand kingdom. Would have much preferred Cap Kingdom be a big sprawling stage and not the one that's mostly just a sand landscape. To make matters worse we're 3 levels in and we've already seen the game's biggest level. Lake kingdom is a tiny swimming pool. Wooded kingdom is great but cloud is a boss arena into Lost, which is another very tiny level (Which doesn't really utilize its no-cappy idea for more than 30 seconds before you get cappy back and it never happens again) After that you've got the iconic metro kingdom. But honestly at this point the game is kind of over already as far as interest peaking. Snow kingdom is a few short challenge rooms and a minigame. Seaside is for some reason the 2nd biggest level in the game and it's almost all water. Luncheon is an ok though quite linear stage. Ruined kingdom being just a boss arena is a crime. Bowser's kingdom and moon kingdom are just short linear obstacle courses.
All of these levels get some decent open ended exploration added to them for the most part, in the form of the quantity over quality moons I mentioned earlier. But it just feels like a very unbalanced set of levels that doesn't hit the peaks as often as I wish it would. Every level IS enjoyable, but for such a return to form as well as a big leap forward for the series, it's kind of a shame levels like ruined kingdom get a single boss fight, and cap/cascade are just a simple tutorial stage, and yet we get a massive bowl of water and a huge desert as our big stand out stages. It would have been so sick if Bowser's Kingdom was one of the massive open ended ones, but alas, it's like a 3 minute long hallway. Again, I like the level, but it leaves me wishing it was a lot more than it ended up being.
More experienced gamers may not see what the hype is about if they're not the speedrunning type. Sure basically every boss has a fantastic layer of design to make it still fun for veterans like I went over, but to many people they may just kill the boss in 10 seconds and not even realize the extra care was there. Excellent for speedrunners and beginners, potentially too easy for anyone else, as this game is even easier than 3D land on the surface.
But, criticisms aside, as someone who's been very critical of every game released from Galaxy 1 til' Odyssey, this game was thoroughly enjoyable and singlehandedly restored my excitement for the future of the series. I absolutely recommend this game to just about anyone.
And that design philosophy carries into a lot of the game. And for the most part, it's fantastic. My only gripe with how they pulled this off, is that I find unless you're into speedrunning, it's not quite as fun to replay as it is on the first playthrough. Thankfully this is a fantastic speed game, skippable cutscenes, no obnoxious lengths of dead air in the run, a lot of different possible categories due to the multiple end points. I just find that while that aspect is great, mario 64 and sunshine are still fun to this day even just to do a casual playthrough of. Love speedrunning all 3 of these games but with Odyssey I almost feel like I have to, to get the most out of it. This is because a casual playthrough of Odyssey, you'll be questioning if the game is even a platformer most of the time. Would have really liked to see some dedicated platforming levels like Sunshine's "secret" missions or SOMETHING. To reiterate, the game gives you all the tools to have an incredibly satisfying platforming experience, and most of the level design has room to allow you to utilize it fully. But the game itself really feels like it's designed at a base level, for people who don't know what the jump button is. But thankfully it's not ONLY designed for those people.
There's definitely a lot of quantity over quality moons, but that didn't end up bothering me too much as the game is simply just fun. Which is something I hadn't felt for a mainline Mario in a long time. Just controlling mario feels great. Though that aspect does have the unfortunate effect of making the game look a bit unimpressive in hindsight. Similar to breath of the wild, you can be thoroughly loving every second of it and appreciating all the master class game design. But years later find yourself downplaying its accomplishments due to the quantity over quality focus. And like I said unless I'm speedrunning it, I'm likely not gonna bother 100% the game again. It has some cool rewards along the way, but what you actually get for 100% completion is (spoilers I guess but it's literally nothing) Peach's castle gets a top hat and it plays the mario 1 end of level jingle. Would have REALLY appreciated a you can now play as luigi in your next save in this game.
A more major criticism I have is world theming and the pacing involved with that. Not that there's pacing issues in the traditional sense, it just feels like the game's hurdling towards the end, rushing past its best worlds with a dash of filler mixed in. Cap and cascade kingdom are excellent first impressions but I want to see a lot more of them, unfortunately they're just tiny tutorial levels. The one they chose to make huge? Sand kingdom. Would have much preferred Cap Kingdom be a big sprawling stage and not the one that's mostly just a sand landscape. To make matters worse we're 3 levels in and we've already seen the game's biggest level. Lake kingdom is a tiny swimming pool. Wooded kingdom is great but cloud is a boss arena into Lost, which is another very tiny level (Which doesn't really utilize its no-cappy idea for more than 30 seconds before you get cappy back and it never happens again) After that you've got the iconic metro kingdom. But honestly at this point the game is kind of over already as far as interest peaking. Snow kingdom is a few short challenge rooms and a minigame. Seaside is for some reason the 2nd biggest level in the game and it's almost all water. Luncheon is an ok though quite linear stage. Ruined kingdom being just a boss arena is a crime. Bowser's kingdom and moon kingdom are just short linear obstacle courses.
All of these levels get some decent open ended exploration added to them for the most part, in the form of the quantity over quality moons I mentioned earlier. But it just feels like a very unbalanced set of levels that doesn't hit the peaks as often as I wish it would. Every level IS enjoyable, but for such a return to form as well as a big leap forward for the series, it's kind of a shame levels like ruined kingdom get a single boss fight, and cap/cascade are just a simple tutorial stage, and yet we get a massive bowl of water and a huge desert as our big stand out stages. It would have been so sick if Bowser's Kingdom was one of the massive open ended ones, but alas, it's like a 3 minute long hallway. Again, I like the level, but it leaves me wishing it was a lot more than it ended up being.
More experienced gamers may not see what the hype is about if they're not the speedrunning type. Sure basically every boss has a fantastic layer of design to make it still fun for veterans like I went over, but to many people they may just kill the boss in 10 seconds and not even realize the extra care was there. Excellent for speedrunners and beginners, potentially too easy for anyone else, as this game is even easier than 3D land on the surface.
But, criticisms aside, as someone who's been very critical of every game released from Galaxy 1 til' Odyssey, this game was thoroughly enjoyable and singlehandedly restored my excitement for the future of the series. I absolutely recommend this game to just about anyone.
2013
The other most average middle of the road game you can get out of this series.
But, it's more of the same from 3d land. With some aspects being better, some being worse. The cat power up is a lot better than the tanooki. In that, it doesn't trivialize the entire game. The co-op focus is definitely big for some people but I can't help but feel like having to design around 4 players at once forces them to have even less engaging design than usual, and they already struggled with that in the last 3 3d Mario games. And requiring basically 5 playthroughs for 100% unless you're playing with other people to lower that number is some of the worst padding the series has seen. To top it all off it's like the devs are issuing themselves a challenge to make bosses less and less enjoyable with every game. They went from braindead easy but still fun in Galaxy, to now where they're genuinely so bad it's a problem. Seeing a world end in a boom boom boss or a pom pom is absolutely pathetic. Even the better boss, Bowser in car, is practically an auto scroller where you're waiting for him to slay himself.
This entire game is in one ear out the other. I've beaten it 4 times and still feel like I haven't even played it. I always hold off saying anything about it because I feel like I haven't experienced enough of it to really say there's nothing here for me. Then I boot up the game ready to finish it only to find Mario standing next to one of the last post-game levels with almost everything in the game collected. Then I go oh, I guess I'll start over beat it in a couple hours and immediately forget I did so. At least 3d land was a handheld game, it was already pretty dull in that context let alone here where it's THE 3d Mario for home console. One thing I do remember absolutely hating is the auto scrollers. There's way too many and they range from dull to horrible. The train stages specifically scroll so slow you're never not ten steps ahead waiting for it to end. And of course they made the final boss an auto scroller too.
Meh. If you've got the right group of friends to play with I could see some good memories being made here. Otherwise this formula had gotten beyond cheap feeling and tired by this point. And the multiplayer aspect isn't even new to this game. Perhaps the design being even more basic than New Super Mario Bros could be a plus in a big group or for younger kids, but it really doesn't make for anything interesting to talk about otherwise.
--Super Mario Odyssey Review next--
But, it's more of the same from 3d land. With some aspects being better, some being worse. The cat power up is a lot better than the tanooki. In that, it doesn't trivialize the entire game. The co-op focus is definitely big for some people but I can't help but feel like having to design around 4 players at once forces them to have even less engaging design than usual, and they already struggled with that in the last 3 3d Mario games. And requiring basically 5 playthroughs for 100% unless you're playing with other people to lower that number is some of the worst padding the series has seen. To top it all off it's like the devs are issuing themselves a challenge to make bosses less and less enjoyable with every game. They went from braindead easy but still fun in Galaxy, to now where they're genuinely so bad it's a problem. Seeing a world end in a boom boom boss or a pom pom is absolutely pathetic. Even the better boss, Bowser in car, is practically an auto scroller where you're waiting for him to slay himself.
This entire game is in one ear out the other. I've beaten it 4 times and still feel like I haven't even played it. I always hold off saying anything about it because I feel like I haven't experienced enough of it to really say there's nothing here for me. Then I boot up the game ready to finish it only to find Mario standing next to one of the last post-game levels with almost everything in the game collected. Then I go oh, I guess I'll start over beat it in a couple hours and immediately forget I did so. At least 3d land was a handheld game, it was already pretty dull in that context let alone here where it's THE 3d Mario for home console. One thing I do remember absolutely hating is the auto scrollers. There's way too many and they range from dull to horrible. The train stages specifically scroll so slow you're never not ten steps ahead waiting for it to end. And of course they made the final boss an auto scroller too.
Meh. If you've got the right group of friends to play with I could see some good memories being made here. Otherwise this formula had gotten beyond cheap feeling and tired by this point. And the multiplayer aspect isn't even new to this game. Perhaps the design being even more basic than New Super Mario Bros could be a plus in a big group or for younger kids, but it really doesn't make for anything interesting to talk about otherwise.
--Super Mario Odyssey Review next--
2011
The most average middle of the road thing you can get out of this series. I honestly love the idea of a 3d Mario game that's strictly a linear obstacle course platformer like the 2d games. Unfortunately by the time they started making games like that, they were insisting Mario had no personality, level themes as basic as possible, and level design without an ounce of creativity or challenge.
Also the tanooki power up completely trivializes what's already a very easy platformer. It honestly does more damage to the game than anything. I already find it too easy without a power up that lets you almost entirely ignore all platforming.
Certainly not bad, just thoroughly unimpressive. Slightly better than Galaxy at least imo since it at least goes all the way with the linear platformer concept instead of pretending it's still a collectation. Keeps the pace up in a way Galaxy 2 pretended to try and do. But yeah I don't really have much to say about it. Kind of a shame they didn't go for the more wacky, unique concepts that the older Mario Land games went for.
-Super Mario 3D World Review Next-
Also the tanooki power up completely trivializes what's already a very easy platformer. It honestly does more damage to the game than anything. I already find it too easy without a power up that lets you almost entirely ignore all platforming.
Certainly not bad, just thoroughly unimpressive. Slightly better than Galaxy at least imo since it at least goes all the way with the linear platformer concept instead of pretending it's still a collectation. Keeps the pace up in a way Galaxy 2 pretended to try and do. But yeah I don't really have much to say about it. Kind of a shame they didn't go for the more wacky, unique concepts that the older Mario Land games went for.
-Super Mario 3D World Review Next-
2010
This game has all the problems of the first game on top of removing some of the only things it actually did right. By the time levels start getting remotely fun the game's about to end and you're subjected to some of the most obnoxious padding in the series. People always say They just had so many ideas after the first game they had to make a full sequel But that's purely PR talk, as in reality the dev team felt they had done basically everything they wanted to in the first, and were burnt out by the idea of making another. It's absurd just how fast this game runs out of ideas and resorts to reused content and/or filler stars. I will say at its best the levels are better than the first game's, but ultimately not by much, and it's very rare anyway.
Yoshi adds very little to the game. Base yoshi just acts as a point and lick adventure. And by that I mean just aiming at stuff and pressing B with the wii remote. The swing flowers are just pull stars without the physics that make them kinda fun. Eating bullet bills and firing them back at stuff feels good enough I suppose. But, instead of expanding on what yoshi can do, they invent yoshi specific power ups because just like the first, they absolutely REFUSE to truly iterate on their ideas for more than one to two levels. Nothing is allowed to get off the ground, they'd rather just make up some random thing for the next level. It's so frustrating because there's more than enough ideas in both games to completely fill out the star count, but they so quickly throw everything away and end up having to resort to filler. Blimp yoshi has you slowly floating up, at best dodging some easy obstacles. Red Pepper yoshi has one pretty fun level based around it and not much else. Yellow light yoshi reveals platforms in an area around you, the radius slowly shrinking over time. Gets like one level and they weren't confident in the player enough to make it a challenging section so you can just rush ahead without even seeing an inch ahead of yourself because the level design is so predictable and straightforward. It has one other appearance, where it's a strictly visual thing. You're on some candy bars and the light circle sees through the wrappers, showing the chocolate inside...? Like usual all great ideas that at absolute best get one, MAYBE two really short levels of use.
Then there's cloud mario. Which is a cool powerup as you make your own platform by spinning, and you can use up to 3 of them. The problem is again, they weren't confident in making you engage with the mechanic. This is one that they actually use fairly frequently. And consistently, the scenarios they make for it, are flooded with refills. So instead of trying to make the most of your limited instant platforms...what ends up happening is you long jump, make one, and you're already within jumping distance of a refill. So even ideas that aren't thrown out, don't get to shine.
So without further rambling, it suffers from the exact same design philosophy I already didn't like in the first game. Except now a lot of the ideas are even more shallow to begin with. Like really? A drill where you walk to the drill spot and use your drill move? They were stretching so hard thinking of new ideas for every level that being engaging must have been far from the priority, and I definitely don't blame the devs on that one. Reading interviews and quotes from the teams involved with the galaxy games gives me the impression that Miyamoto was almost 100% satisfied with the first game. But felt that it including a more involved story with Rosalina and its bigger scale in general...held it back for some reason. It's like he just wanted them to make the same game again but this time without the story, which is how he viewed a perfect mario game would be like.
But that leads into problems specific to this game. As I already said, it almost entirely drops the space aesthetic the first game nailed. A lot of the music is just remixes of random mario songs, which is kinda cool to hear but in the context of this game meandering for content or an identity it just falls flat. I much prefer the beautiful spacey sounds of the first game's ost. Besides them dropping the galaxy from mario galaxy, I find them "streamlining" the process of a 3D mario game down to the most basic level select map possible, was entirely undermined by the most bloated system possible. Grabbing a star, and landing in the next level at bare minimum is frequently about a full minute long on average. A little less if nothing interrupts you but despite how entirely worthless the faceship hubworld is, they are CONSTANTLY showing you things that showed up on your ship after levels. Nothing of any worth either. NPC's 1-ups, 3D models of a power up you used in a trophy case...literally any excuse to make getting to the next level take longer.
This is going to be a bit exhausting to read I realize, but it's to emphasize just how needlessly bloated the way levels are stitched together is. ---
Get star, lengthy animation, load hub world, animation of mario flying in and watching the star fly away, animation of mario resting and taking his cap off to see the luma under it, popup star counter goes up by one, popup tallying up your entirely worthless coin count, fade out to map screen to show you one of the levels has a comet star active right now, fade back to face ship, auto save message pops up, walk to the button, transition animation to the world map, go over to hungry luma, click on it and call it to your ship, animation of it jumping to your ship, fade back to your ship, Lubba says you should feed the luma, talk to luma and feed it star bits, animation of the luma flying off and exploding, fade out to world map, animation of the level appearing, fade back and run to the button again, scroll over to the level, click on it, click play level, watch mario fly to it, fade out and select the only star available, preview screen, mario flies in for a few seconds before landing, level start.
While this is a more extreme example, this is the kind of thing that's filling time between levels. The time it takes to just get to the next level after grabbing the star from the previous one is already too long even when you don't have comet stars, random NPC's showing up, lumas to feed, or random dialogue from lubba slowing it down even more. And when you realize THIS is what replaced things like peach's castle, delfino plaza, or even the comet observatory in favor of cutting the fat for a more streamlined experience...~What fat did they cut?!?!-- They've somehow made it more obnoxious than ever while also making the presentation and world building worse than ever at the exact same time.
And the only other thing I praised about the first game, its 100% completion reward being a playable luigi..Is now playable throughout the whole game at a certain point. Cool i guess? Now that they've lost their trick of making you replay the entire game as a slightly different character for true 100% completion they had to think of something else. So of course the only thing to do to reward you getting 120 stars, is to make another 120 show up and place them in random corners of every single level, sometimes literally just inches away from where the default end level star already is. (Oh and of course they make you beat the final level and boss again to trigger the game to give you the reward for 120 stars to begin with. So yeah beat the end boss again and now play every single level again. All to unlock some final level that's supposed to be some ultimate hardcore challenge thing but it's really not hard in the slightest. So of course after you beat it, it asks you to do it again but this time with only 1 hp because they really couldn't be bothered making level design that delivers an ounce of challenge on its own. And even that run isn't really hard at all until the very last stretch, where they spam hammer bros at you. The rest of the special world doesn't even really require the green stars and has really lame levels like a boss rush of bosses from the first game, and mostly other reused content levels. And your reward for getting all 242 stars is...you can talk to rosalina on the face ship and you're sent a screenshot of the star results screen with a letter of congrats. Very much about the journey over the destination as is common with a lot of games 100% routes, but it's shocking how bad both the journey and destination are in this case.
Everything I said about the first game not aiming for my demographic and a beginner player likely finding it more interesting still holds true. Or of course, someone less critical of "muhhh substance" in platformers like I am. Though even fans of the first game will probably be burnt out if they 100% both games back to back. I'd agree with many people when they say 1 is better with its atmosphere, storytelling, sense of scale. Whereas 2 is more hyper focused on the gameplay. Thing is Galaxy gameplay is not only Mario at its worst, it's Nintendo at their worst. A company that prides itself on creativity and innovation making a set of games that goes out of their way to burn out their devs creative muscles and waste every cool idea anyone has.
Their design philosophy on these games was not sustainable imo. Thank goodness they didn't make a third.
"I was completely dried up. I felt like I had done everything with the first one. We had come up with tons of ideas and then packed in all the good ones, and I didn't think there were many leftover."
-Koichi Hayashida, level design director of the first mario galaxy.
-3D land Review Next-
Yoshi adds very little to the game. Base yoshi just acts as a point and lick adventure. And by that I mean just aiming at stuff and pressing B with the wii remote. The swing flowers are just pull stars without the physics that make them kinda fun. Eating bullet bills and firing them back at stuff feels good enough I suppose. But, instead of expanding on what yoshi can do, they invent yoshi specific power ups because just like the first, they absolutely REFUSE to truly iterate on their ideas for more than one to two levels. Nothing is allowed to get off the ground, they'd rather just make up some random thing for the next level. It's so frustrating because there's more than enough ideas in both games to completely fill out the star count, but they so quickly throw everything away and end up having to resort to filler. Blimp yoshi has you slowly floating up, at best dodging some easy obstacles. Red Pepper yoshi has one pretty fun level based around it and not much else. Yellow light yoshi reveals platforms in an area around you, the radius slowly shrinking over time. Gets like one level and they weren't confident in the player enough to make it a challenging section so you can just rush ahead without even seeing an inch ahead of yourself because the level design is so predictable and straightforward. It has one other appearance, where it's a strictly visual thing. You're on some candy bars and the light circle sees through the wrappers, showing the chocolate inside...? Like usual all great ideas that at absolute best get one, MAYBE two really short levels of use.
Then there's cloud mario. Which is a cool powerup as you make your own platform by spinning, and you can use up to 3 of them. The problem is again, they weren't confident in making you engage with the mechanic. This is one that they actually use fairly frequently. And consistently, the scenarios they make for it, are flooded with refills. So instead of trying to make the most of your limited instant platforms...what ends up happening is you long jump, make one, and you're already within jumping distance of a refill. So even ideas that aren't thrown out, don't get to shine.
So without further rambling, it suffers from the exact same design philosophy I already didn't like in the first game. Except now a lot of the ideas are even more shallow to begin with. Like really? A drill where you walk to the drill spot and use your drill move? They were stretching so hard thinking of new ideas for every level that being engaging must have been far from the priority, and I definitely don't blame the devs on that one. Reading interviews and quotes from the teams involved with the galaxy games gives me the impression that Miyamoto was almost 100% satisfied with the first game. But felt that it including a more involved story with Rosalina and its bigger scale in general...held it back for some reason. It's like he just wanted them to make the same game again but this time without the story, which is how he viewed a perfect mario game would be like.
But that leads into problems specific to this game. As I already said, it almost entirely drops the space aesthetic the first game nailed. A lot of the music is just remixes of random mario songs, which is kinda cool to hear but in the context of this game meandering for content or an identity it just falls flat. I much prefer the beautiful spacey sounds of the first game's ost. Besides them dropping the galaxy from mario galaxy, I find them "streamlining" the process of a 3D mario game down to the most basic level select map possible, was entirely undermined by the most bloated system possible. Grabbing a star, and landing in the next level at bare minimum is frequently about a full minute long on average. A little less if nothing interrupts you but despite how entirely worthless the faceship hubworld is, they are CONSTANTLY showing you things that showed up on your ship after levels. Nothing of any worth either. NPC's 1-ups, 3D models of a power up you used in a trophy case...literally any excuse to make getting to the next level take longer.
This is going to be a bit exhausting to read I realize, but it's to emphasize just how needlessly bloated the way levels are stitched together is. ---
Get star, lengthy animation, load hub world, animation of mario flying in and watching the star fly away, animation of mario resting and taking his cap off to see the luma under it, popup star counter goes up by one, popup tallying up your entirely worthless coin count, fade out to map screen to show you one of the levels has a comet star active right now, fade back to face ship, auto save message pops up, walk to the button, transition animation to the world map, go over to hungry luma, click on it and call it to your ship, animation of it jumping to your ship, fade back to your ship, Lubba says you should feed the luma, talk to luma and feed it star bits, animation of the luma flying off and exploding, fade out to world map, animation of the level appearing, fade back and run to the button again, scroll over to the level, click on it, click play level, watch mario fly to it, fade out and select the only star available, preview screen, mario flies in for a few seconds before landing, level start.
While this is a more extreme example, this is the kind of thing that's filling time between levels. The time it takes to just get to the next level after grabbing the star from the previous one is already too long even when you don't have comet stars, random NPC's showing up, lumas to feed, or random dialogue from lubba slowing it down even more. And when you realize THIS is what replaced things like peach's castle, delfino plaza, or even the comet observatory in favor of cutting the fat for a more streamlined experience...~What fat did they cut?!?!-- They've somehow made it more obnoxious than ever while also making the presentation and world building worse than ever at the exact same time.
And the only other thing I praised about the first game, its 100% completion reward being a playable luigi..Is now playable throughout the whole game at a certain point. Cool i guess? Now that they've lost their trick of making you replay the entire game as a slightly different character for true 100% completion they had to think of something else. So of course the only thing to do to reward you getting 120 stars, is to make another 120 show up and place them in random corners of every single level, sometimes literally just inches away from where the default end level star already is. (Oh and of course they make you beat the final level and boss again to trigger the game to give you the reward for 120 stars to begin with. So yeah beat the end boss again and now play every single level again. All to unlock some final level that's supposed to be some ultimate hardcore challenge thing but it's really not hard in the slightest. So of course after you beat it, it asks you to do it again but this time with only 1 hp because they really couldn't be bothered making level design that delivers an ounce of challenge on its own. And even that run isn't really hard at all until the very last stretch, where they spam hammer bros at you. The rest of the special world doesn't even really require the green stars and has really lame levels like a boss rush of bosses from the first game, and mostly other reused content levels. And your reward for getting all 242 stars is...you can talk to rosalina on the face ship and you're sent a screenshot of the star results screen with a letter of congrats. Very much about the journey over the destination as is common with a lot of games 100% routes, but it's shocking how bad both the journey and destination are in this case.
Everything I said about the first game not aiming for my demographic and a beginner player likely finding it more interesting still holds true. Or of course, someone less critical of "muhhh substance" in platformers like I am. Though even fans of the first game will probably be burnt out if they 100% both games back to back. I'd agree with many people when they say 1 is better with its atmosphere, storytelling, sense of scale. Whereas 2 is more hyper focused on the gameplay. Thing is Galaxy gameplay is not only Mario at its worst, it's Nintendo at their worst. A company that prides itself on creativity and innovation making a set of games that goes out of their way to burn out their devs creative muscles and waste every cool idea anyone has.
Their design philosophy on these games was not sustainable imo. Thank goodness they didn't make a third.
"I was completely dried up. I felt like I had done everything with the first one. We had come up with tons of ideas and then packed in all the good ones, and I didn't think there were many leftover."
-Koichi Hayashida, level design director of the first mario galaxy.
-3D land Review Next-
2007
This is the game that started a decade long drop in quality for the series. To start positive, this game nails the space aesthetic. It's got the best use of an orchestral soundtrack Nintendos ever done still to this day, really aiding the space theme. Its ideas are largely really cool conceptually, and the art direction holds up very well.
The problem is that their design philosophy Nintendo kept using starting from here is extremely limiting. It's like it never leaves tutorial mode. Constantly throwing new mechanics at you, and of course starting them off very safe and harmless. They're so afraid of a mechanic becoming dull that they almost entirely refuse to actually utilize any of their ideas. Instead of increasing in complexity or difficulty, or mixing ideas together... or literally anything interesting... it would rather make a brand new mechanic and start the process over. Making matters worse is how slow and incapable Mario himself is. Movement options from previous games are entirely gutted. So not only is Mario not inherently fun to control, he's so limited that the actual level design itself is gimped to compensate. Can't really design a whole lot when your character is so incapable. Meaning, the level gimmicks do ALL the heavy lifting now since Mario himself can do none of it. But as I said, the gimmicks refuse to iterate on themselves and go nowhere. As a quick example, one of the most stand out levels, matter splatter Galaxy. Phenomenal concept for a 3d platformer but it's got one extremely short and cool 3d section, a relatively more lengthy 2d bit thats mostly an auto scroller, and the rest of the level is a generic auto scroller that doesn't really take advantage of the cool idea the level presented. It's more focused on the spring mushroom power up at the end. The matter splatter mechanic is then never used ever again. This is one of the best levels in the game and it's still a total disappointment.
To be fair, I imagine more of a beginner to platformers wouldn't find the levels as mindless and dull as me. Which makes sense considering the Wii's demographic. But to me, it really feels at times like even the devs knew absolutely NOTHING has happened in a level by the end. So they just throw in a boss to give a sense of climax that the level design rarely even attempts to deliver itself. Which is lame to begin with without considering most bosses in this game are over as fast as they begin. They've got good game feel, punchy sound effects and visuals, but due to Marios extremely limited moveset and the overall refusal to have an ounce of challenge, they're pretty lame 9 out of 10 times. I like Bouldergeist, otherwise gone are the days of challenges that are engaging for both beginners and experts alike.
One last thing I never see anyone talk about...100% completion is padded to an unbelievable level. First of all it locks the purple coin missions behind...beating the final level. There's really no reason to make these missions post game content, doesn't even make sense in any way and kills the finality of the (pretty cool) ending. Not only this but the purple coin comets are only on one level at a time. So the process is going to the front of the comet observatory to talk to the npc that opens the map, so you know which level it's in. Walking to that level to go do it. Then revisiting the npc at the front of the observatory to find the next one. Loop this about 16 times or so. The setup of these is already basically intentionally a complete waste of time, and the missions themselves are almost all entirely devoid of anything interesting. There's a couple decent ones like the 8bit Mario map one, but what's essentially the replacement for 100 coin missions from the previous 2 games, doesn't really work in a game with levels not designed around exploration. They just tend to be really slow and mindless. And this is to say nothing of all the redundant missions that also feel like padding. Beat this level, now beat it again except free Luigi at the end. And of course it doesn't have the high skill ceiling or expressive moveset that made redundant missions generally still enjoyable in sm64. And to top it all off, to get your reward for 100% you have to beat the final level and sit through the ending again. And your reward is to replay the game as luigi. If you do the entire game a second time as luigi your reward is to replay the beginning of the game but as a very short purple coin mission that sends a postcard to your Wii system. Sunshines postcard reward is mocked but it's rarely brought up galaxy does the same thing and if you ask me 100% here is way worse than sunshine. That said, being able to replay the game with a different character with slightly different properties IS one of the better rewards for 100% as far as 3d platformers go. Id be a lot more receptive to that in pretty much any other 3d platformer.
Extremely basic platforming at best, style over substance bosses, wasted ideas at almost every corner, horrible late game padding. Maybe they wouldn't have had to pad the game out so hard if they just made a few more levels expanding their genuinely good ideas. Love the space aesthetic though, hopefully the sequel doesn't completely drop it @_@. Like I said though, I think I'm just not the target audience for this game. If you're either a beginner, or even just not as critical of platformer level design, you'll likely enjoy the game like most people. I certainly liked it a bit more when I was a small lad. Just found the surface level appeal that they absolutely nail, is let down by basically everything else once you have a more critical eye. Very style over substance. Though even then the game's style is a little confused considering it presents itself like an open world sandbox mario despite not being that kind of game at all, leading to pointless bloat. (Doesn't help that the way this game is designed was replicated in every Mario game for a full decade, making it really hard not to see certain patterns and habits and get thoroughly sick of it)
-Galaxy 2 Review Next-
The problem is that their design philosophy Nintendo kept using starting from here is extremely limiting. It's like it never leaves tutorial mode. Constantly throwing new mechanics at you, and of course starting them off very safe and harmless. They're so afraid of a mechanic becoming dull that they almost entirely refuse to actually utilize any of their ideas. Instead of increasing in complexity or difficulty, or mixing ideas together... or literally anything interesting... it would rather make a brand new mechanic and start the process over. Making matters worse is how slow and incapable Mario himself is. Movement options from previous games are entirely gutted. So not only is Mario not inherently fun to control, he's so limited that the actual level design itself is gimped to compensate. Can't really design a whole lot when your character is so incapable. Meaning, the level gimmicks do ALL the heavy lifting now since Mario himself can do none of it. But as I said, the gimmicks refuse to iterate on themselves and go nowhere. As a quick example, one of the most stand out levels, matter splatter Galaxy. Phenomenal concept for a 3d platformer but it's got one extremely short and cool 3d section, a relatively more lengthy 2d bit thats mostly an auto scroller, and the rest of the level is a generic auto scroller that doesn't really take advantage of the cool idea the level presented. It's more focused on the spring mushroom power up at the end. The matter splatter mechanic is then never used ever again. This is one of the best levels in the game and it's still a total disappointment.
To be fair, I imagine more of a beginner to platformers wouldn't find the levels as mindless and dull as me. Which makes sense considering the Wii's demographic. But to me, it really feels at times like even the devs knew absolutely NOTHING has happened in a level by the end. So they just throw in a boss to give a sense of climax that the level design rarely even attempts to deliver itself. Which is lame to begin with without considering most bosses in this game are over as fast as they begin. They've got good game feel, punchy sound effects and visuals, but due to Marios extremely limited moveset and the overall refusal to have an ounce of challenge, they're pretty lame 9 out of 10 times. I like Bouldergeist, otherwise gone are the days of challenges that are engaging for both beginners and experts alike.
One last thing I never see anyone talk about...100% completion is padded to an unbelievable level. First of all it locks the purple coin missions behind...beating the final level. There's really no reason to make these missions post game content, doesn't even make sense in any way and kills the finality of the (pretty cool) ending. Not only this but the purple coin comets are only on one level at a time. So the process is going to the front of the comet observatory to talk to the npc that opens the map, so you know which level it's in. Walking to that level to go do it. Then revisiting the npc at the front of the observatory to find the next one. Loop this about 16 times or so. The setup of these is already basically intentionally a complete waste of time, and the missions themselves are almost all entirely devoid of anything interesting. There's a couple decent ones like the 8bit Mario map one, but what's essentially the replacement for 100 coin missions from the previous 2 games, doesn't really work in a game with levels not designed around exploration. They just tend to be really slow and mindless. And this is to say nothing of all the redundant missions that also feel like padding. Beat this level, now beat it again except free Luigi at the end. And of course it doesn't have the high skill ceiling or expressive moveset that made redundant missions generally still enjoyable in sm64. And to top it all off, to get your reward for 100% you have to beat the final level and sit through the ending again. And your reward is to replay the game as luigi. If you do the entire game a second time as luigi your reward is to replay the beginning of the game but as a very short purple coin mission that sends a postcard to your Wii system. Sunshines postcard reward is mocked but it's rarely brought up galaxy does the same thing and if you ask me 100% here is way worse than sunshine. That said, being able to replay the game with a different character with slightly different properties IS one of the better rewards for 100% as far as 3d platformers go. Id be a lot more receptive to that in pretty much any other 3d platformer.
Extremely basic platforming at best, style over substance bosses, wasted ideas at almost every corner, horrible late game padding. Maybe they wouldn't have had to pad the game out so hard if they just made a few more levels expanding their genuinely good ideas. Love the space aesthetic though, hopefully the sequel doesn't completely drop it @_@. Like I said though, I think I'm just not the target audience for this game. If you're either a beginner, or even just not as critical of platformer level design, you'll likely enjoy the game like most people. I certainly liked it a bit more when I was a small lad. Just found the surface level appeal that they absolutely nail, is let down by basically everything else once you have a more critical eye. Very style over substance. Though even then the game's style is a little confused considering it presents itself like an open world sandbox mario despite not being that kind of game at all, leading to pointless bloat. (Doesn't help that the way this game is designed was replicated in every Mario game for a full decade, making it really hard not to see certain patterns and habits and get thoroughly sick of it)
-Galaxy 2 Review Next-
2002
My favorite mainline Mario game to this day. The structure of this game is more flawed than SM64 in ways. Mostly in that shine count doesn't actually matter, making a majority of the content fundamentally pointless beyond the fact that I just love playing this game. And now that I think of it, Mario Odyssey is practically designed entirely around that same design philosophy of just give them stuff to do 'cuz playing it is inherently fun. Even given that admittedly large flaw, the content it requires you to engage with, does feel substantial. You need to finish 7 out of 8 missions in every single level. Feels meaty enough, and a lot of the game's more infamous missions you flat out have no reason to do if you don't want to. (Though besides the pachinko machine I really wouldn't call any of them jank or even frustrating)
It's got the best, free flowing controls in the series and dare I say entire 3D platformer genre. No clue how anyone could have problems with the camera from my experience. Just like the movement, it gives the player complete freedom over its control. Gameplay is heavily varied without losing the core appeal. I love blooper surfing. Love that bit where they take away fludd and fill the world with lava that's got a very open ended problem solving nature. Everyone I see play that stage does it diffrently. Love chasing shadow mario, love the II Piantissimo races. Love the world building both large scale Mario universe and smaller scale single level stuff. The voice acting is pure goofy joy. The piantas leave a huge impression with their debut here.
Even the blue coins are great imo. I know people tend to dislike them but I never found them hard to find. Their true issue lies in the fact that they're all entirely pointless as shine count doesn't really matter. But, I really like all the different ways of finding them. I never found it hard to infer which chapters had blue coins unique to them. A proper counter saying "X coins left in this mission" would be appreciated sure...But it's pretty logical anyway. Like hey you go to this sub area in mission 8 only. Stands to reason it's got some blue coins you can only get in 8. Regardless it's a self inflicted issue if you ask me. Nothing about the game even implies it wants you to 100% it. If it genuinely ruins the game for you, it's ok to stop at 80 shines instead of getting all 120. Or heck it's ok to just get the bare minimum of 50. I love going for 100% on collectathons as much as the next classic platformer fan but don't let it ruin such a great game for you. That said I personally like even most of the optional stuff. I always enjoy trying to get as many shines as possible before entering the first world.
Moving on to more praise...Every song adds a lot to the atmosphere and mood while being very catchy. The graphics and animation hold up extremely well. The detail of the sun coming back with every shine you get is great. The UI is stylish and unique in a way you never see anymore. Lovely sound effects. Delfino Plaza is one of the best hub worlds out there. The fully realized open ended areas full of NPC's are done so well that the more linear gamey platforming sections are a very welcome change of pace. Great level of challenge and a high skill ceiling just like SM64. Boss fights are sick. No other mario game's gonna put you in a theme park roller coaster, firing rockets at a giant mechanical Bowser. Or delving deep into poisonous water to clean the rotting teeth of a giant eel, who's teeth are so nasty they're what's poisoning the water.
And the game absolutely oozes with that gamecube era Nintendo weirdness. Back before they really cleaned up their brand image to take less risks. Like has there ever been a character less represented than II Piantissimo? The dude hasn't gotten so much as a spirit in smash bros. They really dropped in a normal human dude with a bucket mask, boxer shorts, and mascot gloves/shoes and said race him to a Mcdonalds straw or he kills you, made him a post credits cliff-hanger...and then proceeded to pretend they never made this character.
But yeah I can gush over everything about this game. Best Mario~
-Galaxy Review Next-
It's got the best, free flowing controls in the series and dare I say entire 3D platformer genre. No clue how anyone could have problems with the camera from my experience. Just like the movement, it gives the player complete freedom over its control. Gameplay is heavily varied without losing the core appeal. I love blooper surfing. Love that bit where they take away fludd and fill the world with lava that's got a very open ended problem solving nature. Everyone I see play that stage does it diffrently. Love chasing shadow mario, love the II Piantissimo races. Love the world building both large scale Mario universe and smaller scale single level stuff. The voice acting is pure goofy joy. The piantas leave a huge impression with their debut here.
Even the blue coins are great imo. I know people tend to dislike them but I never found them hard to find. Their true issue lies in the fact that they're all entirely pointless as shine count doesn't really matter. But, I really like all the different ways of finding them. I never found it hard to infer which chapters had blue coins unique to them. A proper counter saying "X coins left in this mission" would be appreciated sure...But it's pretty logical anyway. Like hey you go to this sub area in mission 8 only. Stands to reason it's got some blue coins you can only get in 8. Regardless it's a self inflicted issue if you ask me. Nothing about the game even implies it wants you to 100% it. If it genuinely ruins the game for you, it's ok to stop at 80 shines instead of getting all 120. Or heck it's ok to just get the bare minimum of 50. I love going for 100% on collectathons as much as the next classic platformer fan but don't let it ruin such a great game for you. That said I personally like even most of the optional stuff. I always enjoy trying to get as many shines as possible before entering the first world.
Moving on to more praise...Every song adds a lot to the atmosphere and mood while being very catchy. The graphics and animation hold up extremely well. The detail of the sun coming back with every shine you get is great. The UI is stylish and unique in a way you never see anymore. Lovely sound effects. Delfino Plaza is one of the best hub worlds out there. The fully realized open ended areas full of NPC's are done so well that the more linear gamey platforming sections are a very welcome change of pace. Great level of challenge and a high skill ceiling just like SM64. Boss fights are sick. No other mario game's gonna put you in a theme park roller coaster, firing rockets at a giant mechanical Bowser. Or delving deep into poisonous water to clean the rotting teeth of a giant eel, who's teeth are so nasty they're what's poisoning the water.
And the game absolutely oozes with that gamecube era Nintendo weirdness. Back before they really cleaned up their brand image to take less risks. Like has there ever been a character less represented than II Piantissimo? The dude hasn't gotten so much as a spirit in smash bros. They really dropped in a normal human dude with a bucket mask, boxer shorts, and mascot gloves/shoes and said race him to a Mcdonalds straw or he kills you, made him a post credits cliff-hanger...and then proceeded to pretend they never made this character.
But yeah I can gush over everything about this game. Best Mario~
-Galaxy Review Next-
1996
One of the many games on this system that show the n64 has aged way better than some want to admit. My only real complaint is that certain stars do feel a bit redundant. Pretty frequently there's a star for say, climbing a mountain, and the next star is for climbing the same mountain but this time there's something else at the top. Or climb 90% of the mountain and get a star placed slightly below the top. Some of the more linear levels don't quite fit with the appeal of the game quite as well due to this. BUT the redundant missions aren't always bad, especially in the more open ended levels. As the skill ceiling is so high it encourages finding short cuts and getting better.
It's got some of the most solid no frills 3d platforming out there, and still feels very unique in its level design. They did a great job making a lot of these levels feel like actual places. Like every corner of every level is unique and not a bunch of gamey assets that make levels look like they're put together entirely in a level editor. This aspect allows even the more linear levels to stand out above the average platformer.
Also usually repeating bosses are lame but the 3 Bowser fights are great. They're all only slightly different but the core mechanics of grabbing and throwing Bowser are so good it makes the fights satisfying to nail even for the highest level players. Always great to see mechanics that are simple enough for a child to understand and enjoy, but will still get the world record holders sweating and worrying they'll miss the throw.
Side note, I've never agreed with the common complaint of a "bad camera" in just about any old 3d platformer let alone this one. There's like one bit in wet dry land that actually fights you for a good angle, otherwise it's beyond perfectly functional. And the controls have a satisfying weight to them that feels grounded yet not at all limiting. Bad controls complaints I find come from playing newer entries for a while and coming back to an old game. Which is something many different series suffer from. Old game controls may not have all their edges sanded down, but they often have more nuance because of that.
Great music, love peach's castle, lovable graphics. Timeless game.
It's got some of the most solid no frills 3d platforming out there, and still feels very unique in its level design. They did a great job making a lot of these levels feel like actual places. Like every corner of every level is unique and not a bunch of gamey assets that make levels look like they're put together entirely in a level editor. This aspect allows even the more linear levels to stand out above the average platformer.
Also usually repeating bosses are lame but the 3 Bowser fights are great. They're all only slightly different but the core mechanics of grabbing and throwing Bowser are so good it makes the fights satisfying to nail even for the highest level players. Always great to see mechanics that are simple enough for a child to understand and enjoy, but will still get the world record holders sweating and worrying they'll miss the throw.
Side note, I've never agreed with the common complaint of a "bad camera" in just about any old 3d platformer let alone this one. There's like one bit in wet dry land that actually fights you for a good angle, otherwise it's beyond perfectly functional. And the controls have a satisfying weight to them that feels grounded yet not at all limiting. Bad controls complaints I find come from playing newer entries for a while and coming back to an old game. Which is something many different series suffer from. Old game controls may not have all their edges sanded down, but they often have more nuance because of that.
Great music, love peach's castle, lovable graphics. Timeless game.
2006
This borderline unplayable mess may be a 2/10 objectively speaking, but it's a 10/10 in my heart. I miss the flash era man.
1991
Very painless. And for this series, that makes it above average in my eyes. Nothing to really praise or anything but the hour I took to beat this game left me feeling more positive than I usually am after playing a Mega Man game not gonna lie. It's a very easy game but to be fair NES MM2 is also one of the easier games in the series to begin with. I can definitely see my 7 year old self getting pretty into this one if I played it back in the day. If you love hearing the Gameboy squeal in agony you'll love the soundtrack. Lucky for this game, I'm a 100 gecs fan and I'm into that sort of thing. (But seriously the compositions are great, the soundfont choice is baffling, even if I do get a kick out of it anyway)
Overall a nice palette cleanser if you're doing a bit of a Mega Man marathon. For a series that at the time was getting 2-3 games a year you'd think the Gameboy version would be a LOT worse. I suppose it helps that the games its based on are very simple to begin with.
Overall a nice palette cleanser if you're doing a bit of a Mega Man marathon. For a series that at the time was getting 2-3 games a year you'd think the Gameboy version would be a LOT worse. I suppose it helps that the games its based on are very simple to begin with.
2014
Pretty wild they turned Sonic 2 into a fishing game. It's very simple and rather repetitive but has just enough depth to not overstay its welcome in its short playtime. The arcade mode boss is kinda cool though can be a bit annoying if RNG decides you don't deserve an attack item. It's cool seeing how many locations from other Sonic games they put in. Love the details some levels have like when they show a character in the background having a major story moment. Big obliviously fishing during these events is faithful to how he's used in SA1's story. Would love to see more of this version of the character as opposed to whatever the h*eck he was in Prime.
Nothing too wild but I had a good time with this little hack.
+1 Genuine Big the Cat fan
Nothing too wild but I had a good time with this little hack.
+1 Genuine Big the Cat fan
Got quite a lot of playtime out of me considering how small of a game it is. Excellent music and style. Easy to play hard to master. I will say, never had my thumb cramp up so bad playing a game before, though admittedly I was definitely trying way too hard. Very short main story with some optional challenges if you want more, which is perfect for the kind of game it is.
Perhaps some of the UI could have been a tad more readable without having to take your eyes off the action. It's only a problem when really pushing a speedrun far past what the game would ever ask of you even for an S rank...But in that context even just flicking your eyes over to the right side of the screen is enough to get you killed. Perhaps the boost bar could have been above your head instead of the dash counter. Keeping track of 3 dashes that refill every time you hop is easy enough without a visual, but having the boost bar you use all the time be off to the side is perhaps sub optimal. And knowing when you're approaching the end of the level is important since you can actually miss the end portal and die that way. I'd probably prefer if the end portal was much bigger at least, how it is feels just a tad speedrun unfriendly.
Though these complaints like I said come from me pushing the game to its limits. The Retroachievements set made for this game is pretty brutal. I still think they're valid to bring up considering it's a very short arcadey kind of experience that does feel great to master otherwise.
Perhaps some of the UI could have been a tad more readable without having to take your eyes off the action. It's only a problem when really pushing a speedrun far past what the game would ever ask of you even for an S rank...But in that context even just flicking your eyes over to the right side of the screen is enough to get you killed. Perhaps the boost bar could have been above your head instead of the dash counter. Keeping track of 3 dashes that refill every time you hop is easy enough without a visual, but having the boost bar you use all the time be off to the side is perhaps sub optimal. And knowing when you're approaching the end of the level is important since you can actually miss the end portal and die that way. I'd probably prefer if the end portal was much bigger at least, how it is feels just a tad speedrun unfriendly.
Though these complaints like I said come from me pushing the game to its limits. The Retroachievements set made for this game is pretty brutal. I still think they're valid to bring up considering it's a very short arcadey kind of experience that does feel great to master otherwise.
One of the most unfairly despized games ever made. I get it, I grew up waiting for a Banjo Threeie and was beyond hyped to see the initial reveal trailer, not expecting it to turn out to be a car game. But I genuinely believe this game still follows up on the spirit of the BK franchise. From the personality present in the writing, worlds, characters, and another excellent Grant Kirkhope soundtrack...To the overall high quality of the game in its polish, graphics, and ambition. Banjo was not just slapped on mindlessly for brand recognition, this was always a BK game at its heart.
There's nothing genuinely wrong with the game, and it being a Banjo game isn't even a problem. If there were traditional Banjo games released before and after this, I guarantee this game's rep would be better. But unfortunately the higher ups in the industry somehow got the idea that 3D platformers are unwanted. And that misguided belief is where the distain for this game comes from. Believe me I was very disgruntled and disappointed with the direction the industry took in that era, and what this game stands for is rather depressing. But it's not fair to write off just how good this game is due to that baggage.
The cars themselves work extremely well, and are very well integrated into the game. And just as important, the vehicle creator is incredibly intuitive. I've yet to see a game made before or after this with a more user friendly vehicle creator, let alone one this expansive. There's a lot of variety in what you can make, and the missions themselves generally encourage being as creative as possible. Or at the very least offer a nice sense of risk vs reward with your car designs. For people who don't want to spend the time creating their own cars, you can use your notes to buy pre-built blueprints which can then be edited if you wish.
Which brings up the collectathon aspects that are still present. I love exploring the hub world looking for crates to turn in to Mumbo which gives you new vehicle parts. Notes are still scattered around levels, and are quite fun to find in the hub world especially. Jinjos are still around for bonus optional challenges though given its still got the collectathon formula, technically most of the game is optional. If you don't want to do a mission you can always just do a different one. I like the extra trophies you get if you excell in a mission, doing better than it asked to simply win the Jiggy. 4 of these trophies = 1 jiggy. There's even some hidden jiggys you can find by exploring the hub. I wish each main level had at least one of these hidden jiggy's. The hub world is definitely my favorite level as odd as that may sound. It feels the most fully realized as a real place, and the only one that encourages on-foot gameplay. Whereas the actual levels themselves are for the most part simply designed for vehicle challenges. The hub even brings back some move-based progression. For example when you beat the first boss you gain access to wheels that let you drive up steep slopes. Pretty reminiscent of learning talon trot to reach the next floor of Grunty's Lair in the original game.
And the story even follows up on the originals nicely. It's cool seeing what all the characters are up to. After beating Klungo in Tooie he says he's quitting being a bad guy and going to become a game developer. Well in this game you can find him and he'll have you play the game he's made. It's got MSpaint graphics and more levels open up as you progress through the main game. Super charming.
Not every mission is a winner, there's a couple slow races especially early on. And sometimes it makes you use a pre-built car that's just tied to the mission, which doesn't tie into the appeal of making your own cars. Though sometimes provides a challenge in making you drive an awkward car, your mileage may vary on whether that's annoying or not. Other times it makes for a unique mission that's a welcome change of pace. And while I love the soundtrack and how ambitious a lot of the music is, I'd have liked more variety in the actual mission music. Sometimes a mission feels like it warrants a song that's more than just the same as an average race. But thankfully most of the game does lean into its strengths. And honestly, a Banjo game being more mission based isn't even completely out of left field. Tooie was already MUCH bigger than the first game, and featured a lot more missions and minigames from NPC's over pure platforming and exploration. It would be disingenuous to imply this game ISN'T a dramatic departure sure, but I also don't find this game unrecognizable as a Banjo-Kazooie game.
I really think people who are getting a kick out of Tears of the Kingdom's vehicle freedom should give this game a try, it's quite literally a game built entirely around that level of freedom and more I'd argue. Stuff like an early mission wanting you to defend an NPC as he goes out jogging. You can try to actually take care of the enemies, which can be somewhat difficult at this point in the game. But I've also seen people make a helicopter with a protective cage and landing the cage around the NPC as he takes a breather, so enemies can't touch him. The speedrun builds a car that captures the NPC, and flies him to the end of his route. Idk if Zelda fans would vibe with all the races but this game was quite ahead of its time as far as physics-based, player creativity driven gameplay. And some of the bosses feel like those master Kohga battles except you can't just walk behind him and slap him with an arrow, stunning him. Grunty will make her own vehicles using pieces you don't have access to until you beat that fight, and you have to find a way to dismantle her car. Would have liked a few more of these boss type missions, sometimes it's just a race and that's not quite as fun for a boss. But it still makes you do some problem solving considering she's using car parts you don't have yet. The graphics were also ahead of its time, being one of the select few games of its generation that doesn't look horrendously ugly/bland.
Also playing this on modern Xbox systems is amazing. On the 360 loading into the hub could take at LEAST 30-40 seconds. But on the Series consoles, load times are often so fast the loading screen can't even fully start. Meaning they somehow got this game to have load times on par with the N64 games.
Just like the other Banjo games, this is among Rare's best work. A very unique experience that stands out from the crowd.
There's nothing genuinely wrong with the game, and it being a Banjo game isn't even a problem. If there were traditional Banjo games released before and after this, I guarantee this game's rep would be better. But unfortunately the higher ups in the industry somehow got the idea that 3D platformers are unwanted. And that misguided belief is where the distain for this game comes from. Believe me I was very disgruntled and disappointed with the direction the industry took in that era, and what this game stands for is rather depressing. But it's not fair to write off just how good this game is due to that baggage.
The cars themselves work extremely well, and are very well integrated into the game. And just as important, the vehicle creator is incredibly intuitive. I've yet to see a game made before or after this with a more user friendly vehicle creator, let alone one this expansive. There's a lot of variety in what you can make, and the missions themselves generally encourage being as creative as possible. Or at the very least offer a nice sense of risk vs reward with your car designs. For people who don't want to spend the time creating their own cars, you can use your notes to buy pre-built blueprints which can then be edited if you wish.
Which brings up the collectathon aspects that are still present. I love exploring the hub world looking for crates to turn in to Mumbo which gives you new vehicle parts. Notes are still scattered around levels, and are quite fun to find in the hub world especially. Jinjos are still around for bonus optional challenges though given its still got the collectathon formula, technically most of the game is optional. If you don't want to do a mission you can always just do a different one. I like the extra trophies you get if you excell in a mission, doing better than it asked to simply win the Jiggy. 4 of these trophies = 1 jiggy. There's even some hidden jiggys you can find by exploring the hub. I wish each main level had at least one of these hidden jiggy's. The hub world is definitely my favorite level as odd as that may sound. It feels the most fully realized as a real place, and the only one that encourages on-foot gameplay. Whereas the actual levels themselves are for the most part simply designed for vehicle challenges. The hub even brings back some move-based progression. For example when you beat the first boss you gain access to wheels that let you drive up steep slopes. Pretty reminiscent of learning talon trot to reach the next floor of Grunty's Lair in the original game.
And the story even follows up on the originals nicely. It's cool seeing what all the characters are up to. After beating Klungo in Tooie he says he's quitting being a bad guy and going to become a game developer. Well in this game you can find him and he'll have you play the game he's made. It's got MSpaint graphics and more levels open up as you progress through the main game. Super charming.
Not every mission is a winner, there's a couple slow races especially early on. And sometimes it makes you use a pre-built car that's just tied to the mission, which doesn't tie into the appeal of making your own cars. Though sometimes provides a challenge in making you drive an awkward car, your mileage may vary on whether that's annoying or not. Other times it makes for a unique mission that's a welcome change of pace. And while I love the soundtrack and how ambitious a lot of the music is, I'd have liked more variety in the actual mission music. Sometimes a mission feels like it warrants a song that's more than just the same as an average race. But thankfully most of the game does lean into its strengths. And honestly, a Banjo game being more mission based isn't even completely out of left field. Tooie was already MUCH bigger than the first game, and featured a lot more missions and minigames from NPC's over pure platforming and exploration. It would be disingenuous to imply this game ISN'T a dramatic departure sure, but I also don't find this game unrecognizable as a Banjo-Kazooie game.
I really think people who are getting a kick out of Tears of the Kingdom's vehicle freedom should give this game a try, it's quite literally a game built entirely around that level of freedom and more I'd argue. Stuff like an early mission wanting you to defend an NPC as he goes out jogging. You can try to actually take care of the enemies, which can be somewhat difficult at this point in the game. But I've also seen people make a helicopter with a protective cage and landing the cage around the NPC as he takes a breather, so enemies can't touch him. The speedrun builds a car that captures the NPC, and flies him to the end of his route. Idk if Zelda fans would vibe with all the races but this game was quite ahead of its time as far as physics-based, player creativity driven gameplay. And some of the bosses feel like those master Kohga battles except you can't just walk behind him and slap him with an arrow, stunning him. Grunty will make her own vehicles using pieces you don't have access to until you beat that fight, and you have to find a way to dismantle her car. Would have liked a few more of these boss type missions, sometimes it's just a race and that's not quite as fun for a boss. But it still makes you do some problem solving considering she's using car parts you don't have yet. The graphics were also ahead of its time, being one of the select few games of its generation that doesn't look horrendously ugly/bland.
Also playing this on modern Xbox systems is amazing. On the 360 loading into the hub could take at LEAST 30-40 seconds. But on the Series consoles, load times are often so fast the loading screen can't even fully start. Meaning they somehow got this game to have load times on par with the N64 games.
Just like the other Banjo games, this is among Rare's best work. A very unique experience that stands out from the crowd.