Super Mario Galaxy has one flaw: it eventually ends
The formula was polished as time passed and it reached its best with Super Mario Bros 3, which is considered by many one of the best games ever produced. As the industry started developing 3-D games many famous franchises tried to take a huge leap and change completely. Sadly, many of them didn't manage to capture the essence of how a true 3-D adventure must be played.
Gamers desperately needed someone to guide all developers. A hero that would show the correct path, a path that had to be followed in order to produce an enjoyable game. Once again, Shigeru Miyamoto did it. Super Mario 64 became the definitive tridimensional game. Its huge worlds waiting to be explored were exhilarating.
Ever since the story has repeated itself, all games copied many Mario 64 features, some of them even managed to obtain a better result, but they were never able to produce the same reaction of surprise and astonishment.
Until November 12th, 2007 we naively thought that such a revolution would never be achieved again, after all as far as we are concerned the human eye is not able to see the fourth dimension, so we would be stuck on this 3-D environment for a while. Super Mario 64 was bound to retain its throne, but we should have learned that we must never disregard Nintendo's uncanny ability to reinvent their most famous franchises.
If you still have any doubts concerning Galaxy's novelty then I'll be as direct as possible, Super Mario Galaxy is the pure definition of revolution, it translates the Wii's intention into images, colors and gameplay.
The storyline is a huge cliché, however, there is no way you can dislike it. Princess Peach is once again kidnapped by Bowser the evil King of the Koopas and it is Mario's duty to save the damsel and put an end to Bowser's scheme. Many people complain on Nintendo's lack of creativity when creating a story for Mario's adventures but I would honestly feel bad if they changed it. I will never get tired of saving the Princess.
But since nobody buys Mario games because of their storyline, the most important thing to discuss is the gameplay. As I have already stated, there is no way you will feel like you have already played a similar game. Super Mario Galaxy is fresh and revolutionary. Once again there are 120 stars to be collected and in order to do so you need to guide Mario through outstanding colorful worlds that have been named Galaxies for this game.
There are around forty different Galaxies to be visited, while some of them just have one star to be collected and are nothing but classic platform stages, there are others who are huge and have up to seven stars to be gathered. Those huge galaxies can be divided in two distinct groups.
The first one would be Galaxies that are a big flat world, pretty much like Super Mario 64's stages. And the second one would be made of Galaxies that are huge groups of different planets. Needless to say, both groups are quite entertaining and all Galaxies are extremely fun. A very interesting detail is that in Galaxies that have more than one star change according to the star you are looking for, so you will never go through the same planets, or follow the same path on the same Galaxy twice.
The coolest feature of the game is the gravity. While floating on space Mario will be attracted by the closest planet. There are many awesome stages that use the gravity to their favor. Sometimes you will even find yourself simply jumping from one planet to another to see how the game behaves. The physics is perfect, Mario can walk sideways, upside-down and in all other imaginable positions.
With such a crazy gameplay Nintendo assumed the players would fumble with the camera, and to solve this problem they made it completely automatic, and to my surprise it works perfectly, it doesn't matter how unpredictable your move is, the camera will keep on following you. Yet, if you are not satisfied with the perspective Mario is being shown there is always the option to manually control it and adjust it. You can also automatically put it behind Mario by simply pressing the C-button.
The controls work very well. They feel slightly tighter than they were on the previous installments of the series, but they give you enough freedom. Mario remains with all his classic moves, so if you are already familiar with Sunshine or Mario 64 you will already know how to perform all his jumps when you start the game. The swimming levels are pretty nice too, and it is also done pretty much the same way as the previous games. Nintendo has added a multiplayer mode on which a friend can point the Wiimote at the screen to help you gather star bits and kill enemies.
Galaxy also presents two new ways to attack your enemies. You can shake wither the Wiimote or the Nunchuck to make Mario perform a spin attack or you can also point your Wiimote at the screen to aim and shoot star bits at Goombas and other famous stupid foes, when hit by star bits they will get dizzy and if you approach them Mario will automatically kick them.
Like Super Mario Sunshine, this game has a big group of bosses, and most battles are extremely innovative and make a good use of the gravity features of the game, the only problem is that they will be fairly easy to a more experienced player.
The most impressive characteristic of this game is its amazing gameplay variety. There are tons of different things to do, you will find racing levels, old-school platforming challenges, timed stages, big worlds, small worlds, obstacle courses and many others.
Besides, there are also seven incredible power-ups to be used. All of them, with no exception, are really fun and add a lot to the whole experience, it was about time Nintendo brought them back. You won't be able to put the controller down until you are finished with the game, and when you do you will still feel like you could have played it for another forty hours.
But don't think the game is short. It can actually be finished in fifteen hours, but if you are going for fully completion then you will probably spend around thirty hours figuring everything out.
Galaxy is the Wii's best looking title, every tiny detail on the background is flawless. All galaxies are colorful and enlivened, the Mario world has been brought to space and it never looked so amazing. From the cutscenes to the characters, Nintendo has done a great job on all aspects. The textures look good even when you check them closely, and the character models are bright and beautiful. Usually, this early through a console's lifespan, graphics tend not to use all of the system's hardware, but the developers managed to fully use the Wii's capacity, which is very impressive since the Wii has been released just one year ago. I seriously doubt we will see a Wii game surpass Galaxy's graphics.
The music is awesome. This is the first time Nintendo has completely orchestrated a game's soundtrack and as an obvious result the songs have never sounded better. The soundtrack is made of remixes of classic Mario themes and new songs that are surprisingly better than anything you have heard before. I thought that they wouldn't be able to create songs that are as catchy and as nice as the old Mario songs, but I was awfully wrong. Koji Kondo has outdid himself this time, if you think Zelda's songs are epic, just wait until you hear Galaxy's.
Super Mario Galaxy's replay value is a rarity when compared to most modern games. The main reason for that is because Galaxy plays similar to a classic platform game, while Super Mario 64 focused on exploring, Galaxy is much more linear. And this old-school characteristic enhances the replay value. After your first play through you will feel extremely compelled to do it all over again, you won't even think twice.
Finally, Super Mario Galaxy is by far the best game you can find on the Nintendo Wii and it is bound to be the best title of this entire generation. I can't emphasize it enough, you need to get this game. Nowadays we seldom see titles that can be considered big landmarks, but Nintendo has done it again. Super Mario Galaxy has a unique gameplay, cool power-ups, amazing graphics, touching soundtrack and some outstanding features. I don't have any doubts that for the next years we will see many games following on its footsteps, copying a few things and polishing others. And then on a not so distant future, when the Mario Galaxy quality will start to look unreachable, Mario will reappear and once again revolutionize the gaming world.
It is a never ending cycle.