It's my first time playing this game. I knew about it's existence and that's pretty much it—nothing about it's story or mechanics. I really went blind for this one, and that's why I would have NEVER guessed it would be this challenging. But oh, it is.

Mario Sunshine just throws you into a really big playground of a stage and you have to know exactly what it wants you to do, most of the times giving you only a really vague dialogue as a hint on how to clear the episode. If you manage to get what you must do, prepare for the most unforgiving obstacles I've seen in a Mario game.

It's insane how the devs thought a child could finish this game, because I had to deal with so much backtracking, so many confusing goals, and so many rage-inducing traps that I don't think little Timmy would be able finish it that easily. I'm all for fun difficulty, but the game doesn't help when I accidentally clip or softlock myself so many times.

But for a really hard and unpolished experience, I somehow had a lot of fun! It's as charming as a Mario game can get, levels are pretty fun to explore (when you're not dying), and Mario and FLUDD feel so, SO GOOD to play. My analog stick started to drift a bit mid-playthrough but wasn't that much of a problem, as Mario can do so many moves to balance it I didn't notice that much. It really is a great moveset.

Overall it is a really fun game. People should at least try it once, and I doubt they won't finish it because it's really quick to do so. Now mastering it? Nahhh. I just don't think I have that much patience left to get more shines, specifically that one from the lilypad level, because I'm not a masochist.