Super Mario general topic

[The Kid]

Mario has it's own completely dedicated teams these days.  Mario not being made would not suddenly make half-dead franchises less of a marketing risk for the company.

 

Don't get me wrong, I want new Starfox (and uhh... sure F-Zero I guess I know people love it), but the fact is these are quite cult franchises.  You have to be realistic.  If they're pushing back Pikmin 3 it's because it's not finished yet, not because they decided to make a Mario game instead.

 

As you've said, it isn't that they want to just make NSMB (what most people are complaining about these days) for the rest of time, it's just that it is a safe title in that it makes them a ton of money. Iwata has said that they try to only make one NSMB per game system, so we shouldn't see another one until the next Nintendo handheld comes out. It was just bad timing that they came out so close together.

 

I will defend 3D Land until the end of time as one of the best Mario games ever created. It's the first Mario game to combine 3D and 2D into one package while at the same time refresh the old formula. I'd take this any day over another Super Mario 64 type of game.

Edited December 27, 2012 by Rigbone the Kid

[Skyward Sword]

For me, the Mario series is in a terrible state.

 

To put it bluntly, there are too many flipping Mario games released every year. There were a total of 6 Mario games, and none of them were above average.

 

In a desperate attempt to be retro, Mario has fallen quite far this year. Nintendo thinks that cutting out the storyline and instead going for a more accessible route is a good idea, but it couldn't be further from reality. Mario games nowadays feature too much hand holding and lack innovation.

 

Also, Super Mario 3D Land is possibly the dullest, most by-the-numbers mario game I've played. It had no interesting ideas other than "lol we are going to try and make a 2d mario game in 3d and recycle stuff from old games. see you in out tub of green paper!!1!!". 

[-Mark-]

As you've said, it isn't that they want to just make NSMB (what most people are complaining about these days) for the rest of time, it's just that it is a safe title in that it makes them a ton of money. Iwata has said that they try to only make one NSMB per game system, so we shouldn't see another one until the next Nintendo handheld comes out. It was just bad timing that they came out so close together.

 

I will defend 3D Land until the end of time as one of the best Mario games ever created. It's the first Mario game to combine 3D and 2D into one package while at the same time refresh the old formula. I'd take this any day over another Super Mario 64 type of game.

 

3D Land is basically the only 3D Mario game that actually plays like a classic Mario game in 3D. 

[JezMM]

I don't understand how people can't think 3D Land is original.  Like did you pay attention to the level design at all beyond noting that it used the old health system and there was a flagpole at the end of each one?

 

 

EVERY original stage had a unique gimmick, many of which had never been done in a 3D Mario game, even if the gimmick was simply a style of moving through the terrain over an actual physical tangible entity.  This applies to NSMB and NSMBU as well (NSMBWii and NSMB2 slightly less so, they tended to reuse gimmicks or mix-and-match existing ones together a little more often).

 

Hell even the classic favourites, Mario 3 and Mario World, reused level tropes and obstacles and simply "recombined them into new layouts" more often than modern Mario games.

 

 

 

It really ticks me off when people still say the Mario series is stagnant and never does anything new or that they never have any new aesthetics when 3D Land and NSMBU literally just happened.  Some of you guys are no better than the Sonic reviewers who keep harping on about 2006, just saying.  (Also "they need a plot that isn't just Peach being kidnapped by Bowser is the Mario equivelant of "Sonic should just be Sonic vs Eggman and all the games' problems will be solved!").

 

 

We're literally hot off the heels of three releases of main series games very close together.  I'd be legit surprised if we get another main series game before 2014 at the earliest.

Edited December 27, 2012 by JezMM

[Ducktor Naldush]

I used to be a fan, but I stopped caring after Mario Galaxy. Nowadays, I'm only hyped for the RPG games, like the Paper Mario Series or the Mario&Luigi saga. The reason? To me, they don't look copy-paste like the main series. Don't get me wrong, I know that they didn't just reuse the same backgrounds and animations in NSMBU, but it still fells uninspired and stale at this point.

And I'm still upset by their decision to use Toads instead of actual characters like Wario. A game where gold coins are the gimmick? Sure, let's use a Yellow Toad no one gives a shit about.

[JezMM]

And I'm still upset by their decision to use Toads instead of actual characters like Wario. A game where gold coins are the gimmick? Sure, let's use a Yellow Toad no one gives a shit about.

 

Yellow Toad did not appear in NSMB2.

[Ducktor Naldush]

Yellow Toad did not appear in NSMB2.

Well, bugger.

I actually mixed NSMB2 with NSMBWii. My mistake.

[Solkia]

The Toads were used to match the color of the Super Famicom logo.

 

 

Also using Wario wouldn't make the least bit of sense.

 

 

 

Anyways, Mario has kind of a weird past with me. The very first game I ever played was Super Mario Land 2 on the original Gameboy, and I fucking love it.

 

However Mario 64 was kind of a letdown for me, and Sunshine... Well, lets just say I get a headache whever someone calls the design genius, but you probably already knew that.

 

I haven't played a 3D Mario title since, I've mostly stuck with the wonderful RPGs and the NSMB games.

 

So yeah, Mario is pretty cool.

[Mangoaxe5]

Luigi's mansion is a fantastic Spin off.

Yes Luigi's Mansion is a great game but sadly it felt more like a tech demo then a real game. The beta for Luigi's Mansion looks better then the final version that we got.

 

 

 

 

Hopefully Dark Moon will improve on everything that was in the Gamecube game.

Edited December 28, 2012 by Vampfox

[Sean]

I still like Mario, because even though I've become personally bored with the series, I can still have fun with them if I ignore my reservations about them for a few minutes. I don't think there are that many, if any, outright terrible games in the main platformer series, either - I definitely don't think the NSMB games are comparable to the Sonic 4 episodes, for instance. I guess SMB2J kinda sucks, I prefer the US version by a wide margin.

But I love the spin-offs far more. The Mario RPGs are my favorite JRPGs of all time, Wario has some pitch-perfect platformers in his resumé, Donkey Kong ain't too shabby either, and the sports games are pretty damn fun with other people. My favorite Mario platformers tend to be the ones that do something different, like Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Land 2.

[Mangoaxe5]

 Also "they need a plot that isn't just Peach being kidnapped by Bowser is the Mario equivelant of "Sonic should just be Sonic vs Eggman and all the games' problems will be solved!"

There's a huge difference though between Bowser kidnapping Peach for the 100 time and Sonic vs Robotnik for the 100 time.

 

Robotnik unlike Bowser comes up with new plans to try to take over the world. Bowser on the other hand just uses the same plan over and over again. Each Mario game is the same fucking thing. You go through eight worlds starting with Grass Land and ending with Dark Land.

 

By the way what does everyone think about the Mario cartoons? Personally I love The Adventures of Super Mario Bros 3.

[Conando]

>Bowser doesn't come up with new plans.

 

>Super Mario Sunshine: Bowser uses his son to get Mario thrown in jail and kidnap Peach.

>Super Mario Galaxy: Bowser uses a giant space fleet to rip the Castle out of the planet and fly it off INTO SPACE.

>Super Mario Galaxy 2: Bowser uses the power of the stars to become giant, destroying the Mushroom Kingdom and taking Peach with him.

>New Super Mario Brothers U: Bowser, instead of taking Peach away from the castle, invades the castle and throws Mario and his friends out of the castle, and turns Peach's castle into his new castle.

Edited December 28, 2012 by Kringle Of Awesome

[Tails spin]

>Bowser doesn't come up with new plans.

 

>Super Mario Sunshine: Bowser uses his son to get Mario thrown in jail and kidnap Peach.

>Super Mario Galaxy: Bowser uses a giant space fleet to rip the Castle out of the planet and fly it off INTO SPACE.

>Super Mario Galaxy 2: Bowser uses the power of the stars to become giant, destroying the Mushroom Kingdom and taking Peach with him.

>New Super Mario Brothers U: Bowser, instead of taking Peach away from the castle, invades the castle and throws Mario and his friends out of the castle, and turns Peach's castle into his new castle.

Also Super Mario 3D Land has Bowser using the power of the super leaf to turn the majority of his troop into tail version of themselves.(still very similar plot but with a slight twist.)

[Conando]

Which is essentially what happens in Sonic. Eggman creates some new machine or finds some monster of the week in order to destroy Sonic and finally build Eggmanland.

[Emmett L. Brown]

Which is essentially what happens in Sonic. Eggman creates some new machine or finds some monster of the week in order to destroy Sonic and finally build Eggmanland.

It's good to have a consistent goal in mind.

[Kuzu]

I still like Mario games despite their sameyness because at the end of the day, it's still a damn good platformer to play with.

 

3D Land is one of my favorite games because like Jez said, almost every level had a gimmick never done in a Mario game prior to it, and it has by far one of the best final bosses in the series. I've never played either Galaxy title, due to financial reasons mostly, but I'll get around to playing it eventually. As for the "New" series...ok, that I'll admit is getting a bit stagnant, but the games at least try to add new elements within the levels themselves.

 

However, my love comes mainly from the RPG's, which have both amazing gameplay and pretty witty writing, and make me far more invested in what's going on. I dunno if that would work in a traditiona mario game tho considering Miyamoto's reservations on story.

 

 

 

Mario seems to have fallen into the same field as all long runners, that crossroad between changing the series to make it "fresh and new"(which usually leads to Shark Jumping) or reusing the same aspects with very minor changes. Depends on how you feel honestly.

[Gregzilla]

I guess I'll go through the main platformers and discuss what I think of them.

 

SMB1 - Kinda bland and uninteresting by today's standards, but I respect it for being such a revolution in the industry.

 

SMB2 JP - Just an expansion pack of the first.  Frustratingly hard.

 

SMB2 US - It may not be a true Mario game, but I find it really fun anyway.  It's aged much better than SMB1, has some great music, and the gameplay is very fun.  Its mechanics of plucking and throwing don't fit with the other Mario games, but they are an interesting alternative.

 

SMB3 - Definitely the best of the NES Mario games, and one of the best 2D titles.  The power ups are incredibly fun to use, the level design is creative, and the controls are vastly improved.  I really enjoy how the levels often required some clever thinking in addition to platforming skill.  A masterpiece.

 

Super Mario Land - I haven't played this one, but it looks alright.

 

Super Mario World - My personal favorite 2D Mario game.  The controls are perfect, Yoshi is a great addition, and the cape power up is one of the best in the series.  But what I love most about it is the amount of hidden goodies.  The levels encourage exploration with the various items you pick up, and with enough skill, you can discover tons of secret areas.  This really makes the experience feel much more like an adventure, and I love a good sense of adventure.  Also, it has some of the only water levels in the series that I enjoy.

 

Super Mario Land 2 - I played this for the first time once I got my 3DS.  I really love it.  It does a good job of creating a solid platforming experience that fits the handheld platform.  Plus the level themes are interesting and fresh for the series, ditching mainstays like the lava and ice worlds for levels that take place in treetops and a giant Mario robot.  Despite a ridiculously frustrating last level, this is a great game.

 

Yoshi's Island - I guess it counts, since it's SMW2.  This game is awesome.  As many have stated, it does a great job of constantly introducing new level mechanics, and I love it for that.  However, I don't like the enemy-eating, egg-throwing gameplay as much as Mario's classic hop-and-bop approach to platforming.  It's fun and unique, but I just prefer classic run-and-jump.  Still, this game is expertly crafted, with great aesthetics and level gimmicks.  Also, one of the best final bosses ever.

 

Super Mario 64 - Ah, this game really captures a sense of childlike wonder for games.  It doesn't really feel like a 2D Mario game in 3D, but I love it for what it is.  The levels have a really fun emphasis on exploration, which I always like when done well.  At times it is a bit too open, and it loses the feel of being a platformer, but it's enjoyable nonetheless.  Though the controls haven't aged too well; play Galaxy and come back to this, and it's apparent that they feel a bit off now.  Overall a great game.  Not without its flaws, but great for what it is.

 

Super Mario Sunshine - I love this game for trying to be different.  I thought the water pump mechanic was integrated very well and made for some fun challenges.  Plus the level themes were a very nice change of pace, adopting a tropical island theme with beaches, hotels, amusement parks, and villages.  It does a great job of changing things up.  It is pretty unpolished when compared to some other Mario games, as glitchy level elements are a bit more common than in other games.  Other than that, I really love this game.

 

NSMB - I was really looking forward to this game.  When it came out, I was slightly disappointed.  I couldn't place it at the time, but something just felt a bit less fun than the other games.  It was nice to finally have a 2D Mario game again, but it didn't really wow me.  There were some things I enjoyed, like the blue shell suit, but overall it was just a good game and nothing more.  Which was acceptable, since it was the first time in a very long time that we got a new 2D Mario.  That doesn't apply these days.

 

Super Mario Galaxy - This game is too easy.  That's my only complaint.  Everything else is flawless.  An absolute masterpiece of game design.

 

NSMBWii - Better than NSMBDS, since the challenge level seemed slightly higher.  I really liked this one when it came out.  I was glad to see Yoshi and the Koopalings back, and the gameplay was solid.  However, Yoshi was underused when compared to World, and the boss fights were mostly underwhelming.  Multiplayer was really fun, but only for the sake of laughing with friends, not if you're trying to play seriously.  It was a fun addition.  Overall better than NSMBDS, but there was still room for improvement.

 

Galaxy 2 - This is my favorite 3D Mario.  Yeah, I know, some people think it's unoriginal, and I'd be lying if I said it was trying as hard as Galaxy 1.  But really, this is how I see it:  Galaxy 1 was too easy, and that was its only flaw.  Galaxy 2 is pretty much Galaxy 1 with that flaw addressed.  Plus it adds some more clever level design.  Therefore, it is my favorite.  I constantly go back and forth between this and SMW for being my favorite overall Mario game.

 

3D Land -  This game is great to play in short bursts.  It definitely feels like an old 2D Mario brought into the third dimension.  And that's perfectly fine, but I have one major problem with this: nothing about it seems new.  At all.  Almost every level uses gimmicks that have been done before, or variations of them, whether it was 2D or 3D.  I was rarely, if ever, genuinely surprised.  It was always "Hey, those things from Mario 3," or 'Hey, that was in Galaxy," or "Hey, that's just like NSMBWii."  The only difference was the tweaked perspective.  Some people thought the gimmicks were original, but I don't see it.  Granted, this game is incredibly polished and is fine on its own, but it's very unimpressive right after playing the Galaxy games.  Despite my complaints, it is still a very fun game.  And yeah, the final boss was pretty great.

 

NSMB2 - Don't have it, but I tried it at Best Buy once.  It's exactly the same as the others.  Exactly.  The coin gimmick is a neat idea, but it really doesn't change things up that much.  Not to mention the reward for collecting a million coins is utterly pathetic.

 

NSMBU - Just like NSMBWii, with slightly more fun level design.  The main story is nothing amazing, but it's a fun romp.  They still could have done more with it.  Then there's the challenge mode, which I must say, I absolutely love.  It is fun, fresh, addicting, and incredibly challenging.  It is exactly what the NSMB series needed.  I'd love to see DLC for it.

 

I do believe the series is getting kinda stale in recent years, unfortunately.  But I really love the franchise as a whole, as it contains some of the best games ever made.  Here's hoping the next main game knocks our socks off once more.

[krazystitch]

The Super Mario series is one that's okay in my book. The games are fun to play and they're just nice platformers to go ahead and spend some time on when you're bored and such. But, the one thing that's honestly bothering me the most about this series is the New Super Mario Bros. game. It just feels like they're lacking some kind of soul in them. They all feel the same, but that's not even the worst part, they're just..not very exciting at all, really. I really like Super Mario Galaxy, the first more than the second, and Super Mario Sunshine was amazing, I've played it many times. I think it's just more the 2D games that need a little more of something into them to spice things up.

 

All in all though, Mario is a good series, the RPG games are just tons of fun and very well done, and the sports games are really cool with friends, so I enjoy those too. It just has its ups and downs like everything else does, I suppose.

[JezMM]

There's a huge difference though between Bowser kidnapping Peach for the 100 time and Sonic vs Robotnik for the 100 time.

 

Robotnik unlike Bowser comes up with new plans to try to take over the world. Bowser on the other hand just uses the same plan over and over again. Each Mario game is the same fucking thing. You go through eight worlds starting with Grass Land and ending with Dark Land.

 

The point is though it's still a superficial arguement that has very little to do with gameplay.  People say "Bowser should just stop kidnapping Peach" as if that's one of the BIG things wrong with the series and one of the reasons for it's decline, much in the same way people cry foul at the mere presence of Sonic's shitty friends, regardless of their role in the game.

 

At the end of the day it just doesn't matter as long as they give a new spin on it each game that somehow refreshes the experience for the gamer.

 

NSMB2 was not this, granted, but Mario 3D Land had the letters you recieve from Peach showing what she and Bowser is up to, along with her (temporary) escape half way through the game.  And of course, NSMBU puts the interesting spin of Bowser directly taking over Peach's Castle, and your journey being one back to where you started from.  Shame they didn't use the opportunity to majorly reshuffle the level trope order (still Grass Desert Beach Snow Jungle Mountain Sky Dark, regardless of how they prettied them all up).

 

 

Now don't get me wrong, if the next 3D Mario had a wildly different story I'd be all for it, but the fact is, Bowser kidnapping Peach is not a big deal at all.

[Salamander]

The point is though it's still a superficial arguement that has very little to do with gameplay.  People say "Bowser should just stop kidnapping Peach" as if that's one of the BIG things wrong with the series and one of the reasons for it's decline, much in the same way people cry foul at the mere presence of Sonic's shitty friends, regardless of their role in the game.

 

At the end of the day it just doesn't matter as long as they give a new spin on it each game that somehow refreshes the experience for the gamer.

 

I'm not quite sure I agree with this.  Whilst strictly speaking the flavouring of each game doesn't have anything to do with gameplay, the fact is that both are an important part of the package.  A lot of people feel that the presentation of recent Mario games has been very similar, unoriginal both in relation to each other and to the history of the series, and it is clearly having an impact on people's enjoyment of the series.  You have to get through the surface of a game before you can get to the gameplay, and if the surface looks unambitious and uninspired, then that sets a negative tone that quite often carries over to how you perceive the gameplay.  If you expect something to be bad, quite often you'll find it bad in practice even if it's actually fairly neutral.

 

The "stagnancy" of the Mario aesthetic is a criticism I agree with.  On the surface there's very little that's made recent Mario platformers appear particularly special or any visibly new changes to the world.  Yoshi, Koopalings, Bowser Jr. - they were all new ideas once which shook up our conception of the Mario universe.  Recycling old ideas is not the same as a new idea.  They are a known factor now.  And sure, you can bring them back after a number of years and it has the same kind of effect as something new, simply through new presentation and a dose of nostalgia, but then if you do it repeatedly, you get the situation we have now: Disappointment at seeing the Koopalings in both NSMBs 2 and U because we knew exactly what to expect.

 

I think mainly this is a problem with the NSMB series.  Nintendo have been pretty open about it being a conservative nostalgia series because there's a market for flavourless 2D "old-school" platformers, and back when NSMB came out then that was a niche that hadn't really been filled, lack of any particularly exciting new content notwithstanding.  But like I said, above, nostalgia only really works once.  The tradition is starting to look hollow.  Familiarity breeds contempt, as they say.  And it's all very well describing something as a new idea, like Bowser taking over Peach's castle, if the reality is that it looks exactly the same as the default.  We may recognise that the games are technically competent and can even be fun but the game in our imagination that's filled with actually new content looks a lot more enjoyable than the game we actually got.  And this is why there's fear for the fate of the RPGs in the face of Paper Mario: Sticker Star using standard Mario "characters" and being heavily story-light.  They were a big vehicle for the injection of new content and flavour and suddenly that seems to be rushing away from us.  Galaxy was fresh and original and then it got a sequel that was more or less openly described as "more of the same."  3D Land had some interesting gimmicks and flavouring that enlivened an old-school context, but it didn't bother to try and unify them into a single game, it just created a showcase.  (Not dissimilarly, NSMB2's coin gimmick had absolutely nothing to do with most of the game.)

 

The misapprehension about fans of anything is that we're just into a series for "more of the same."  We want to see more from the same.  Evolution and new ideas that take the old into new territory, that make the old new again.  Mario's been on a very identikit streak lately.  I think it's fairly reasonable to say that if the repetition was toned down and balanced with breaths of fresh air, we'd be a lot happier.

 

Fortunately, Nintendo came up with this wizard wheeze lately about how they only make one NSMB game per console, so we're unlikely to be seeing another of those for quite some time...

[That Rucdose Guy.]

New Super Mario Bros. U director talks possibility of User created/shared levels in Mario's future

“I think the Coin Edit feature in Coin Battle is a step closer to that. There is a possibility of this happening in the future, but there’s no use just blindly making that feature available. We would need to carefully think about how to make such a system work. The important thing is that it has to be something that is uniquely Nintendo. Where a beginner can easily make something and have a good time, and simultaneously, someone who is really into Mario can delve into it deeper and make something more complex. So that is a challenge we will need to tackle in the future.” - Masataka Takemoto, director

Edited December 28, 2012 by DevilDiscord

[Solkia]

New Super Mario Bros. U director talks possibility of User created/shared levels in Mario's future

“I think the Coin Edit feature in Coin Battle is a step closer to that. There is a possibility of this happening in the future, but there’s no use just blindly making that feature available. We would need to carefully think about how to make such a system work. The important thing is that it has to be something that is uniquely Nintendo. Where a beginner can easily make something and have a good time, and simultaneously, someone who is really into Mario can delve into it deeper and make something more complex. So that is a challenge we will need to tackle in the future.” - Masataka Takemoto, director

 

New Kaizo Mario Bros. U?

[Emmett L. Brown]

One of the reasons I'm in such high-gush mode for Yoshi's Island is because I'm replaying it these days. I must have 100% that game (point-wise) four or five times already, yet I'm still finding new secret rooms and areas that I never knew about. That's why this is one game I will NEVER look up on gamefaqs of youtube for the complete list of secrets, because I want to keep that notion in my head that there's always just a few more secrets I haven't found. So far I haven't been disappointed.

 

Like a secret room with five Powerful Mario stars used to hit a special red egg block that spits out infinite coins as long as you keep hitting, like a classic coin block, with the catch being that it becomes intangible as soon as Powerful Mario runs out.

 

Because I have never looked this game up, I didn't know that it has a cheat code that lets you access all of the Yoshi vs Bandit minigames through the level select, including some 2-player modes for those games. So how did I find out about it? The game told me. An actual hint block in a very hard to find secret room told me "Shhhh! This is top secret..." and then went on to describe the code.

 

It's in Sluggy the Unshaven's Fort. That room right next to the start that only has a chain chomp in it? You kill that Chain Chomp to access a secret room with the hint block.

How do you kill a Chain Chomp? You can't. That is, unless you have something in your inventory from a Bonus minigame that can hurt it. I used a POW block to turn it into a star.

 

I freakin' love this game. It's got the Mario tradition of ridiculously many secret rooms that have coins, but almost all of them either include a platforming challenge, a stage-gimmick or a power-up to make those discoveries so much more fun than just gathering floating coins.

Edited December 28, 2012 by Grumpy Old Grinch

[Kuzu]

Yoshi's Island was one of my favorite games on the GBA, I played the shit out of it when I was 8 years old, and it was fucking HARD, holy shit. But I still beat it...twas fun. I don't think I've played a handheld for that much other than Pokemon

[JezMM]

I always actually preferred Yoshi's Story to Yoshi's Island.  Probably mostly because I played Story first, but also more objectively because I preferred the more traditional health system.

 

Both are fantastic games for very different reasons, though I consider neither part of the main Mario series, whether the american release added a "Super Mario World 2" subtitle or not.