Super Princess Peach is slow. It's so slow. Peach crawls across the screen and there's nothing you can do about it, short of using occasional slides and extra energy for the crying vibe power to make it a little more bearable. 2D Mario games can do a lot wrong, but they typically make up for it by at least being smooth and snappy enough that the simple act of moving through levels is fun, and they fuck that up here. I like this game and I'm nostalgic for it, but playing through it to the ending as an adult, I can't say it's nearly as good as it is in my memories.
The vibes feel incredibly under-utilized and like they figured cool levels would flow out of them in a way that just never happened. You never feel creative or like you've solved a puzzle, you just stop and press the button on the touch screen that lets you get past the obstacle. It's really a shame, because with this game's slower and more deliberate pace along with more fleshed-out moves...what else are those for, if not new and creative kinds of encounters that require a little more thought? I'm likely going to write another short review if I get around to do the harder levels that unlock in the post-game, but I've seen no real indication that they had any fleshed-out ideas for what to do with Peach's (very cool!) unique abilities. Often it's as if the levels contain doors of four different colors and the player has the incredibly difficult task of tapping on the corresponding color on the second screen.
The feminist objections to Super Princess Peach are maybe what the game is most remembered for nowadays, and though the vibes don't bother me much, the criticism is plenty valid. It's a tone-deaf choice that makes it occupy a strange place in history. It sucks that this whole special game dedicated to Peach is based around extreme emotions. What bothers me more than that, though, is the insulting ease and spoodfeeding that go far beyond Mario norms, even beyond NSMB norms. Every single obstacle has a tutorial block telling the player exactly what to do over and over. These are optional, thank god, but they allow NO room for ambiguous goals or really thought of any kind. This includes bosses, where every single one is preceded by a message describing in-detail how to defeat them. I'm not sure if Nintendo is deliberately talking down to and expecting nothing of the young girls this game was meant for or if their level design was so bad at signalling what to do that they had to stick signs everywhere pointing you around. Either way, it sucks.
Why didn't you tell me I needed to collect every toad? I sped through thinking they were just another collectible but you need every single one, so I ended up having to go back through half the levels in the game just to finish. Painfully easy levels are one thing, but going through them again really soured me on this right at the end. It doesn't help that the bowser fight fucking sucks and doesn't require even the little bits of problem-solving that did exist in the rest of the game.
Obviously I'm frustrated as hell with Super Princess Peach and it's not as good as I remembered, but there still is a lot to like! It looks so cheery and Peach's animations are gorgeous and fluid. Bowser's bi! Peach is a badass, woo! It's a lot of fun seeing her still be a very traditionally feminine princess-type and also whipping everyone's asses with an umbrella. The floating feels good! The little dream sequences between worlds are adorable! This one is still solid, but it's far from the best Mario platformer. But it's another nostalgic childhood game beaten, and that always feels great.
The vibes feel incredibly under-utilized and like they figured cool levels would flow out of them in a way that just never happened. You never feel creative or like you've solved a puzzle, you just stop and press the button on the touch screen that lets you get past the obstacle. It's really a shame, because with this game's slower and more deliberate pace along with more fleshed-out moves...what else are those for, if not new and creative kinds of encounters that require a little more thought? I'm likely going to write another short review if I get around to do the harder levels that unlock in the post-game, but I've seen no real indication that they had any fleshed-out ideas for what to do with Peach's (very cool!) unique abilities. Often it's as if the levels contain doors of four different colors and the player has the incredibly difficult task of tapping on the corresponding color on the second screen.
The feminist objections to Super Princess Peach are maybe what the game is most remembered for nowadays, and though the vibes don't bother me much, the criticism is plenty valid. It's a tone-deaf choice that makes it occupy a strange place in history. It sucks that this whole special game dedicated to Peach is based around extreme emotions. What bothers me more than that, though, is the insulting ease and spoodfeeding that go far beyond Mario norms, even beyond NSMB norms. Every single obstacle has a tutorial block telling the player exactly what to do over and over. These are optional, thank god, but they allow NO room for ambiguous goals or really thought of any kind. This includes bosses, where every single one is preceded by a message describing in-detail how to defeat them. I'm not sure if Nintendo is deliberately talking down to and expecting nothing of the young girls this game was meant for or if their level design was so bad at signalling what to do that they had to stick signs everywhere pointing you around. Either way, it sucks.
Why didn't you tell me I needed to collect every toad? I sped through thinking they were just another collectible but you need every single one, so I ended up having to go back through half the levels in the game just to finish. Painfully easy levels are one thing, but going through them again really soured me on this right at the end. It doesn't help that the bowser fight fucking sucks and doesn't require even the little bits of problem-solving that did exist in the rest of the game.
Obviously I'm frustrated as hell with Super Princess Peach and it's not as good as I remembered, but there still is a lot to like! It looks so cheery and Peach's animations are gorgeous and fluid. Bowser's bi! Peach is a badass, woo! It's a lot of fun seeing her still be a very traditionally feminine princess-type and also whipping everyone's asses with an umbrella. The floating feels good! The little dream sequences between worlds are adorable! This one is still solid, but it's far from the best Mario platformer. But it's another nostalgic childhood game beaten, and that always feels great.