Topic: Super Mario Galaxy 2

[Stratos]

Hey, I see a winged goomba

Your right. When was the last time we saw one of those in a Mario game? Crazy. Almost as crazt as pigs flying.

[IceCold]

The 120 stars have always been an optional thing and nothing else.

They're not optional if you actually want to get the enjoyment the designers intend from the game, because usually those first 50-60 required stars are the least interesting in the entire game to collect.  The "A" material tends to come with the last 30 or so stars, so you still have to slog through a large portion of unnecessary collecting just to get to the good parts of game.  At least that's what I've gotten from the last 3 3D Mario games.

Psh. I'd hardly say getting stars in a 3D Mario game is "collecting".

[Mop it up]

The stars are pretty much the same as the end-level goals of the 2D games.

[broodwars]

The stars are pretty much the same as the end-level goals of the 2D games.

You don't have to keep jumping back into the same world over and over again to collect the end-level goals in the 2D games.  Once is enough, and then you move on to the next level.  The stars in Mario Galaxy do have branching tracks, but you're still covering a lot of old ground for most of them.

[NovaQ]

Some level concepts I'd like to see:

* Planets that move.

What could be really neat is if there's a galaxy modeled after our own - but in relatively miniature form. All of the planets to traverse are actively orbiting around a large sun. As Mario gets to planets closer to the sun, accurate jumping becomes more of a necessity in order to avoid getting sucked into the fiery hot-hot gas-ball.

-Slides like in SM64

I never thought of this before, but some crazy new space-age slide levels/challenges could be pretty wicked.

Ooh, another idea: What if on these new slide levels, you had to guide Mario toward nearby planets so you could take advantage of their gravitational pull for sharp turns? It would be kinda like some of the maneuvering in Orbital.

[ThomasO]

I'd like to see slide levels that operate like roller coasters, with curves that move upward, with the gravity holding Mario on. Although that might create nausea after a while.

[EasyCure]

The stars are pretty much the same as the end-level goals of the 2D games.

You don't have to keep jumping back into the same world over and over again to collect the end-level goals in the 2D games.  Once is enough, and then you move on to the next level.  The stars in Mario Galaxy do have branching tracks, but you're still covering a lot of old ground for most of them.

What Mop_it_up said is what i've been saying in my last few posts. If in Galaxy 2 they vary things up a bit more, it will truley go back to the feeling of moving across the map in SMB3; You're in World 1 and theres a certain look to everything but by Stage 3 things are changed up a bit. Again, this feeling of nostalgia while experiencing new things as Mario is why i love Galaxy so much!

[broodwars]

Ooh, another idea: What if on these new slide levels, you had to guide Mario toward nearby planets so you could take advantage of their gravitational pull for sharp turns? It would be kinda like some of the maneuvering in Orbital.

That would be pretty cool: devote an entire level to do nothing more than jumping out into space and manuvering Mario so that the gravitatational pull of the planets flings him forward into moons or other small things he can use as checkpoints/places to change trajectory.

Hell, I'd settle in general for more areas of the game that actually use gravity as their hook.  The first galaxy had a fairly complicated gravity mechanica that rarely ever was actually used for anything interesting.

[Mop it up]

The stars are pretty much the same as the end-level goals of the 2D games.

You don't have to keep jumping back into the same world over and over again to collect the end-level goals in the 2D games.  Once is enough, and then you move on to the next level.  The stars in Mario Galaxy do have branching tracks, but you're still covering a lot of old ground for most of them.

You have to revisit levels to find the secret exits, and in New Super Mario Brothers you have to collect special coins to open secret areas so you'd probably be revisiting them to doiscover them all.

[Peachylala]

The stars are pretty much the same as the end-level goals of the 2D games.

You don't have to keep jumping back into the same world over and over again to collect the end-level goals in the 2D games.  Once is enough, and then you move on to the next level.  The stars in Mario Galaxy do have branching tracks, but you're still covering a lot of old ground for most of them.

You have to revisit levels to find the secret exits, and in New Super Mario Brothers you have to collect special coins to open secret areas so you'd probably be revisiting them to doiscover them all.

Not really, I found secret areas on the first star course in some of the galaxies. Most of them, however, just rely on getting Star Bits.

I wonder if I'm the only one glad to see the 100 coin star objective gone?

[Mop it up]

Not really, I found secret areas on the first star course in some of the galaxies. Most of them, however, just rely on getting Star Bits.

I was talking about the 2D games, specifically Super Mario World. You have to revisit some levels to find the secret exit. My point was that the 3D Mario games aren't the only ones where you have to revisit levels.

I wonder if I'm the only one glad to see the 100 coin star objective gone?

I didn't like those either. Galaxy has the 100 purple coin stars but most of them are set up in a way where you don't have to seek them out, you just follow a certain path. The few where you do have to search for them are very tedious and boring.

[Stratos]

I wonder if I'm the only one glad to see the 100 coin star objective gone?

I'm very sad it is gone. I worked so hard on some levels to get 100 coins in a level of Galaxy and was devastated to see I only got a 1-up for my trouble. Star bits give you 1-ups! Coins have been relegated to health items. :/

[KnowsNothing]

I loved getting 100 coins in every level.  It's exploration AND platforming!

It's the BEEEEEST OF BOTH WORRRRRLDSSSS

[Peachylala]

To one his/her own.

I just want to play as Yoshi. YOSHI.

Now.

[Mop it up]

But you don't get to play as Yoshi. You don't control him directly.

Unless that's how they're going to implement co-op...

[Peachylala]

But you don't get to play as Yoshi. You don't control him directly.

You do, when Mario is riding him.

I just want Yoshi to be in an awesome game. Yoshi's Island DS pretty much drained that awesomeness out of Yoshi. EAD Tokyo needs to make a Yoshi game, NOW.

Or in the next couple of years, I can wait.

[Caterkiller]

Im surprised we never saw some sort of 3D yoshis island after sunshine. Hopefully yohis role is much bigger here to fill that void.

[Khushrenada]

But you don't get to play as Yoshi. You don't control him directly.

You do, when Mario is riding him.

I just want Yoshi to be in an awesome game. Yoshi's Island DS pretty much drained that awesomeness out of Yoshi. EAD Tokyo needs to make a Yoshi game, NOW.

Or in the next couple of years, I can wait.

That's a lie and you should be ashamed of yourself for saying it. Yoshi's Island DS is the best Yoshi game besides Super Mario World 2. It wasn't perfect but at least they finally went back to some of the basics of what made Super Mario World 2 so awesome. Now that they have the basics in place, I'm hoping they get a shot to expand on it. Yes, they sometimes over-relied on previous elements from Super Mario World 2 but the bigger problem is that they exposed some of the flaws of the original SMW 2. That said, it makes one for one (here's that bloody word) hardcore platformer. And I love the challenge.

You want a game that drains awesomeness. It's Super Mario Galaxy. I've never found it as hard to complete a Mario game as this one. I've had it now for at least a year and I still don't have the stars. I'm sitting at 119. I just need to go and beat the Ray surfing in the trial universe but I'm just so uninterested in doing so.

Here's my problem with Mario Galaxy. The game starts off great. The setting, the kidnapping, meeting Rosalina are all fine. And then you play your first couple galaxies and you are getting hit with new stuff constantly. The gravity mechanic, classic foes, different powers, different comets. There's the find Luigi missions. But after awhile, the game starts to sag. The bowser fights are pretty much all the same. Every boss is about 3 hits. You still have to collect 100 coins in some levels although this time they are purple. Collect 5 peices of an item in a small contained area. Repeat. But fortunately, you have other stuff to distract you. Like collecting all the chapters of the story which ends up being a bit lackluster. Getting a red star and flying which turns out to also be limited. Suddenly, you are whisked away to your final fight with Bowser. The music is good but unbelievably it's the same Bowser fight as all the rest except a bit faster. Then you get the ending where they tried to make the scope seem so incredible and a big sacrifice. Game over except to collect the stars you missed. Normally not a problem. Except the galaxies seem to be repeating themselves a few times and quite a few aren't even that interesting. The bosses begin to repeat themselves. The galaxies aren't even that difficult. These are the last galaxies. Shouldn't they be a greater challenge? The objectives begin to repeat more. And by the end, the awesomeness the game once had when you first started is gone by the end. That's draining the awesomeness out of something. It's a Mario game and playing it has become a chore. You are just collecting stars for the sake collecting stars and because it is a Mario game and you feel you should fully complete it.

People complain about New Super Mario Bros DS being lackluster and I agreed with that at first. But, I've come to appreciate that game a lot more than SMG. Plus, getting all the Giant coins and finding all the different paths never felt like a chore even when I knew I wasn't going to get anything special for them except wallpaper. I've played NSMB much more than SMG. With other Mario games, as soon as I've collected everything, I want to start a new game and do it over again. I didn't get that feeling right away with NSMB but I've never had it with SMG.

After having the freedom to explore in SM64 and SMS, SMG feels like a real letdown. It's way to linear for my tastes. Leave the 2d games linear. When I play 3d I want free-roaming. Then again, maybe it's because I'm a huge fan of Sunshine. Give me sequels to that please. I love that game even with it's camera and 100 coins and blue coins and red coin collecting. I've completed multiple times and just thinking about has me wanting to pop it in right now and play it. A classic.

[Stratos]

I agre with your Sunshine comments whole heartedly. Sunshine was a great sequel to Mario 64.

I haven't even gotten far enough in Galaxy since I only borrowed it and beat Bowser so I can't really comment on the later parts of the game.

[that Baby guy]

See, to me, I disagree and agree.  I like linear, as long as each linear place isn't the same.  When galaxies started using the same planets but with different shades of colors, or at night, or similar things like that, it was draining.  I had been there already, I had played it, just with different light.  I enjoyed the linearity of each star.  What I didn't enjoy was that so many of those ships were all nearly the same thing.  Several bosses were repeated, with little, if any changes made.  That's not an issue with linearity or exploration, that's an issue with design.  Rather than calling a night-time version of a galaxy a new galaxy, if you're really going to re-use it, then just do what SM64 did, and make it a star collection difference between the different appearances.

The truth is, if you know your objective, the games aren't all that different.  In SM64, you can do things out of order, but you really move in a line to the star.  In Galaxy, the difference is that more unnecessary pathways are closed off, where in SM64, they wouldn't be, and you'd be left to figure out where to go on your own.  For me, I feel that over-complicates things, makes finding your way confusing.  The game is about discovery, yes, and experiencing amazing places, but I think that a large map can make things difficult to find the way, that it wasn't clear enough in some missions.  The issue is that Galaxy, while fixing that, regurgitated things far too many times.

Then, at the end, you unlock a new character, and are told to do the entire game over, again, with Luigi.  At that point, you've cleared the game, a long game, at that.  What's the point of playing it again with Luigi, other than new control feeling and one more galaxy?

[Mop it up]

I was disappointed in Super Mario Sunshine because I wanted it to be too much like Super Mario 64. From that perspective the game seems a bit "watered-down" (HA!). But, I've played though it only once, collecting not much more shines than what's needed to reach Bowser largely because of the blue coins. That was years ago. I've been meaning to play it again for a while now but other games keep getting in the way. I think I would like it a lot better the second time around, since I could enjoy it for what it is instead of wishing it were something else.

As far as the linearity of Super Mario Galaxy goes then I stand by that it's the best design for a 3D platformer, which isn't supposed to focus on exploration as far as I'm concerned.

What's the point of playing it again with Luigi, other than new control feeling and one more galaxy?

Perhaps because it is Luigi, the green wonder who has gone from sprite-mirror to superstar?
Maybe you won't want to play the game again right away, but you very likely will eventually and then you can use Luigi for some subtle differences. Don't forget that some of the comet stars are also slightly more difficult.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Basically, Mario64 was pratice for Zelda.  But it's not like Nintendo knew where to take Mario64 entire generations down the road.  It was simply the starting point for LOTS OF THINGS in Nintendo's future.

[Peachylala]

[quote name=Khushrenada]snip[/quote]
So I should be ashamed of myself for having a personal opinion? Yoshi Island DS was just good. Not great, as Yoshi's SmexyNES game, but good. Kind of like what Sunshine was, just good, not great. But since you made a long post on your opinion...

Super Mario Galaxy is the only 3-D Mario game I can’t resist to play again, from start to finish. It breaks all boundaries of imagination that Nintendo’s development team is sometimes withheld in due to: budget, Shiggy’s supervision (mileage on this may vary from person to person, depending on who you ask), and time. Being set in space allowed the creative team to create levels out of different themes outside the usual Mario normality, which is: grass plains, ghost houses, ice and fire levels, water levels, and Bowser’s trap-laden castle/hell hole whatever-it-is stages. Of course, the themes mentioned were in Galaxy, but they were created with a sense of style and creativity that no other 3-D Mario game managed to capture. Galaxy is 3-D SMB3.

Yet, there is no freedom? While I will acknowledge the game has liner stages, that doesn’t mean you’re not given freedom. Some stages have multiple paths, secret areas, different ways of tackling a challenge. SM64 has freedom, but a lot of the objectives/stars, even when replaying them, don’t change in the way you tackle them. Wander of the beaten path, and you may reach a different star within the same stage. You’re basically in the same stage going down the same path 80-95% of the time. Galaxy’s stars (minus a couple of stages here and there) are like a completely different levels within the galaxy you selected.

And I should be ashamed of myself for stating my own personal opinion? While Artoon got some things right with YI DS (nice difficulty, levels, the baby abilities), it just felt blah. As IGN put it, it lacked the surprises and wonder that made SMW2: YI a masterpiece.

To each his own though. Some like it, others weren't amazed by it. If anything, Good Feel should make the next Yoshi/*insert Nintendo franchise here* game. Wario Land: Shake It was amazing.

[Khushrenada]

There is a big difference between a good game, not great game and a game that drains the awesomeness out of a character. Nowhere in your original post did you say that Yoshi's Island DS was a good game. But when you talked about Yoshi, you seemed to imply that Yoshi's Island DS was a terrible game for Yoshi and seemed to wreck the character. Thus, they need to put Yoshi in the game to make up for his last outing. Therefore, the answer to your question is yes, you should be ashamed at having a personal opinion since you had to correct it.


Actually, though, let's get some more thought on this matter. You mention different ways of tackling a challenge. It would honestly help if you gave me some examples of this since I can not think of any of the top of my head. I'm trying to think about various galaxies I played and I can not remember anywhere there were different ways to get a star.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

TB means that each star is a unique challenge, not different ways to get one star.  So the stage procedure was different each time.

Whereas in Mario64, you could trip over a star and get one you weren't originally looking for.  But in which case you end up treading the same path as other stars, cuz they're just sprinkled about a sandbox of a stage.  These stars aren't all that unique until the very end mechanic, with most of the time spent repeating the same platforms, footsteps, and directions as other star objectives.