Sometimes, Nintendo's amazing knack for creating stellar games is its own worst enemy. Just look at Super Mario Sunshine, which had the distinctly unenviable privilege of following Super Mario 64 - one of the most beloved games of all time. Needless to say, its troubling reliance on its predecessor for gameplay ideas, alongside a distinct lack of polish and occasional moments where the game practically stood up and shouted "Oh my god! Somebody forgot to finish me!" had Mario fans frothing at Nintendo's door.
In fact, Sunshine (for all of its charms) lacked so much of the indefinable magic that coursed through Mario's earlier iterations, we were starting to get pretty apprehensive when we learned that Super Mario Galaxy - the plumber's first run-in with the Wii and its new-fangled remote - would be playable on the show floor at this year's E3.
Truth be told though, it took us approximately, ooh, four seconds to get over our initial doubts. You see, Nintendoids everywhere can breathe a sigh of relief, safe in the knowledge that Mario is back and - if the E3 demo is anything to go by - better than ever. Now, here comes the difficult bit - explaining what the hell's going in Super Mario Galaxy.
Despite superficial similarities with both Mario 64 and Sunshine, Galaxy is really a whole new sack of skittles. If you played either two earlier games, you'll feel right at home with the basic control set-up - Mario's movements are controlled using the nunchuck stick and his jumps are performed with a simple tap of the main remote button. As far as we could tell, all of Mario's usual 3D moves are still intact, with us managing to pull off the infamous triple-jump and back flip with the new set-up within seconds.
In fact, the very first part of the demo was deliberately reminiscent of Mario's classic adventures. You'll traipse through distinctly Mushroom Kingdom-style greenery, chatting to various Toad cohorts under bright blue skies and generally re-familiarising yourself with those Mario controls. It's a neat trick, and probably wise, given the surprising tangent the game shoots off at within seconds.
You see, this time around, all the action appears to be space-based, with Mario flying from one planet to the next throughout the level. Each "planet" is essentially a self-contained sphere featuring some puzzle or task that needs to be solved to progress onto the next section. There's something slightly mind-boggling about Mario's interplanetary hijinx as he tears over and around each sphere, with the entire screen spinning relentlessly to follow - however, it's testament to Nintendo's development prowess that the action never gets confusing, thanks to a gracefully implemented and largely flawless camera system which stays pretty firmly locked into the optimum viewing angle at all times.
To facilitate all this fancy hoopla, there're a couple of neat remote-powered tricks at your disposal - thankfully all intuitive and beautifully implemented. The most useful of these is Mario's classic spin attack - this time performed by shaking the remote back and forth. While it's definitely handy for immobilising enemies (then finishing them off with the time-honoured head stomp), you'll also need it to blast from one section of the level to the next.
Placed at strategic locations, you'll find star-shaped rings (if that's not an oxymoron). By jumping in then waggling your wand, you'll pirouette through them, gaining enough momentum to blast you into space. You'll find a variety of other obstacles around the place, but these are largely manipulated using the remote's pointer functions. As with both the Wii Zelda and Metroid demos, there's a target reticule on screen at all times - by holding down the remote trigger and jiggling the cross-hair over your target, you'll kickstart it into action.
Using this method, you can grab pocket-sized stars dotted around the level (although we're not quite sure why you'd want to, unless they're the Galaxy equivalent of Mario's classic coins) or send different rings into a spiralling frenzy. One part of the demo required us to jump into the air and quickly activate nearby hoops in this manner, causing Mario to be sucked from one to the next - react too slowly and you'll lose speed, plummeting back to the ground.
Despite all this fancy new technology beefing up proceedings, what really made Galaxy shine were the superb levels of design finesse and imagination on display throughout the demo. By concentrating the action on one planet - and one task - at a time, there's no need for any particular cohesion between sections, meaning its always a surprise to see what's coming next. For example, the demo contained at least one branching path, perched pleasingly on a wholly incongruous mini-planet looking suspiciously like Peach's castle. Following a Mario 64 rabbit in one direction led to an orgy of sci-fi inspired areas, culminating in a massive showdown with a gigantic planet-hugging robo-boss, while the other inexplicably launched us toward a space-bound pirate's galleon. Can you say 'varied'?
What with the sheer mass of things to do in the demo, we're struggling to remember them all. However, alongside the time-honoured platform antics, there was the opportunity to dodge Bullet Bills (on a sphere faintly reminiscent of the early tower level in Mario 64) in a bid to take out a force field and release the next jump-hoop, run hell-for-leather away from giant rolling Chain Chomps, spin wildly to sling fruit at Pokey the cactus and, finally, fight a beautifully rendered lava boss, frothing from his pit of undulating molten matter.
If you haven't twigged yet, we were pretty bowled over by what hopefully will prove to be a stunning return to form for Nintendo's number one mascot. We're a little disappointed that Galaxy isn't going to be ready for launch - which might be an error on the company's part if it doesn't manage to spruce Zelda up in time. However, if that extended development period means the final game is every bit as good as the demo, we can wait.
this looks like a great game , but enough of the sunshine bashing! im worried about the appearance of stars instead of coins, as coins are classic mario heritage! :? :mrgreen:
As far as I can remember stars have been in every Mario ive played (and ive played em all). They were used in a different form (invincibility) of course. Red coins wern't introduced until later on in the Mario series.
But youre right about Mario Galaxy looking like a great game. I cant wait to play this and New Super Mario Bros on the DS (which got a tasty 95% on IGN)!!
It sounding alright, but after how disappointed i was with mario sunshine, and nintendo's tendency to try and fix what isnt broken im not gonna get my hopes up about it yet. Plus. that stick, it wouldnt be right playing a mario game with a stick.
someone told me this is Mario 128, it sounds possible and what was the 128 for anyways? When I first saw this game i didnt want it but now i do really bad!
I doubt that it is Mario 128. But still, it looks and 'sounds' quite cool. The concept seems interesting as well. Crap that we have to wait 'til next year to get it...
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