Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Away Game Special: A recanting and a ranting

So it seems that each previous entry about Super Mario Galaxy 2 was wrong. Not entirely so, but major points of them. Not only can you do the air-getting jump from Yoshi's back while jumping, the game also still features the wildly swinging camera of the first game. That camera's just not so fully featured as it was.

The game's lack of the broader exploration of the first one is something to dwell on though. Since Mario's not jumping from planetoid to planetoid as he was in Super Mario Galaxy, the game feels flatter, and more linear. The level design feels more like that of Super Mario 64, where there was freedom to wander around large levels as there is in Super Mario Galaxy 2, but in a much more restricted way. This change makes it seem like Super Mario Galaxy  is going backwards, rather than forwards.

Mainline Super Mario games are hearkening back to the 2D platforming days of the NES and Super NES with each new iteration. With some three years between Super Mario Galaxy 2's release and this entry, each mainline Super Mario game released in between has been a tweaked version of the classic platformer. Some might complain about the similarity between the New Super Mario Bros. games or the DS and 3DS releases. But, the biggest change in those three years (and really, in something more like the last 15) is that Mario has branched out.

Super Mario RPG begot the Paper Marios and the handheld Super Mario RPGs; Mario Kart begot the subsequent iterations of the same, and, arguably, the other Super Mario sport titles. The straight-up adventure/platforming Super Mario games are their own thing as well now, and since this categorization's in place, none of them seem particularly innovative.

However, as Super Mario Galaxy 2 has shown so far, each Super Mario game does what its type and title suggest, and do it well.

No comments:

Post a Comment