Listen, I Haven't Reviewed A Game In a Long While, And Genuinely Speaking, I'm Not Gonna Do This Like my past Reviews, Because It's Not a Game As Much As It's More of a Collection of Games, Great Ones To Be Exact, And I Don't Think It Would Be Fair To Sum Them Up As One and Say "Wow This Game Is Great" as If It Is Just One Big Game, That Would Be Unfair To Those Who Spent Hours Working On Each One. So To Sum It Up I'll Do a Section For Each One.
Also If For Some Reason You Don't Know What The Main Plot of a Mario Game Is, It's Really Simple, a Big Dragon/Dinosaur Thing, Named Bowser, Kidnaps The Princess of The Mushroom Kingdom, Princess Peach, And an Italian Plumber, named Mario, Must Go Save Her And Put a Stop To Bowser's Plans (Whatever That May Be).
Super Mario 64 (Released on The Nintendo 64 in 1996):
The Plot of The Game Is Kinda Explained in The Tiny Plot Synopsis From The Last Sentence, This Is Technically Laying Down The Foundation For Future Mario Games, So Plot Would Not Be As Important As Getting People On Board of The Idea of a 3D Mario Game.
Super Mario 64 Is Such a Weird One For Me, I Didn't Play This Verison of The Game Growing Up, I Played The DS Remake "Super Mario 64 DS", for Which I Am Nostalgic For, and Genuinely Speaking, Going Into This Game, There Was Stuff I Loved That I Remembered From The Remake, and Stuff I Was Hoping Would Be Here But Actually Wasn't Cause it only Existed On Said DS Remake, I Didn't Let That Change My Vision Of How I Viewed The Game Though.
Super Mario 64 Is a Great Game, With It Being Mario's First-Ever Jump Into 3D, it Was Revolutionary At The Time Because There Weren't Many Things Like It Back in 1996, That's Really All That Can Be Said About That Because Everyone Else Has Already Said How Revolutionary It Is, it is a 25-Year-Old Game Now, So You Can Imagine How Praised it Was Back In The Day.
You Can Also Earn These Stars, Which Act As The Goal Pole Would In A 2D Mario Game, you touch It, The Stage Ends, They're Scattered All Over The Place And Can Be Really Hard To Find or Get, Or Both Even.
The Platforming is So Much Fun To Do, Mario Feels Great To Control, And The Stages (For As Shallow As They Are In Comparison To Today's Mario Stages), Are Very Creative Considering The Tools That Were Available To Make Them. This Game Also Has a Very Cool Stage Jumping Into Thingy, Basically, Mario Jumps into Paintings And Those Paintings Are Stage Selections, As In You Jump Into One and That Stage Is Selected, it Also Spawned a Bunch of Those "Guy or Girl Runs Disappears Into Wall or Floor" Memes Incase Anyone Is Wondering.
Again, Going Back To The Foundations Thing, I Think It's Safe To Say Mario 64 Laid Down The Ground Work For A Lot of The Games That Are Loved by Tons Today, Including Those of The Other 2 Games In This Collection "Super Mario Sunshine" and "Super Mario Galaxy", Speaking of Which.
Super Mario Sunshine (Released On the GameCube In 2004):
The Plot of Super Mario Sunshine is a Little bit More Complicated Than 64, Mario, Peach, and Toadstool Are Going on a Vacation, When All of a Sudden, Mario is Framed By The Police For Deliberately Vandelising The Entire Island of "Isle Delfino", And Now He Has to Go Around The Entire Island Cleaning Everything Up Using a Robotic Water Sprayer Called "Fludd".
Unlike the 1996 Verison of Super Mario 64, I did Play Super Mario Sunshine When I Was a Kid, and Although I Played it From Backwards Compatibility On The OG Wii, I Am Nostalgic For This Game Despite Having not Played it For about 13 Years Prior To The Collections Release Last September.
On That Note, Super Mario Sunshine is Another Great Game, With Nice Mechanics And Pretty Decent Graphics for It's Time, I'm Actually Surprised The Graphics Hold up As Well As They Do In That Aspect, I Mean They are A Little Bit Ruined, Nintendo Zoomed The Game's Camera In a Tiny Bit Instead of Keeping It in It's Original Aspect Ratio, It's a Weird Decision Considering The Other 2 Games in This Collection Are In The Original Aspect Ratio They Released in (with The Exception of Mario Galaxy, That Game Released With Both 4:3 and 16:9 Options Cause of The Wii Console Allowing users To Do That In The Consoles Settings).
Also Surprisingly, This Game Is The Only Mario Game To Feature Characters Talking Like Us, As In Saying Full Blown Sentences And In English Too, It's Really Strange To See Considering This is The Only Mario Game to Have That, But My guess Is That Nintendo Was Still Testing Out What Worked And What Didn't, Obviously The Talking Didn't Work, And So It Didn't Stay Either, Part of the Charm of Games like Mario is The Fact That The Characters Basically Mumble The Words That They Say, Or Talk Complete Gibberish While They Do, Seriously, Search Up Mario and Luigi Talking Gibberish to Each Other on YouTube, It's so Great and Lovable.
Also on a Side note: Just Like Mario 64, There are These Things Called Shines You Have to Collect, They Act Pretty Much The Same As The Stars.
If There's One Thing That Hasn't Aged As Well In This Game, It's The Controls, Which Isn't Just An Issue With The Collection, I Think Overall Nintendo Did a Decent Enough Job Optimizing The Game's Controls For The Switch Despite 1 Issue (More on That Later). In General, I Do Think The controls Are Alright and definitely Not as Bad As Some fans Are Saying (Not to Attack Anyone's Opinions as Such) Even Before The 3D All-Stars Collection, There Were Times Where Certain Power-Ups Felt Stiff To Control, or Certain Moves Felt Slower Than They Should Be.
Aiming Fludd at Certain Ink Spots To Hit Certain Piles Of Ink On Buildings And Such, it Can Be a Pain To Do So, And I'd Imagine It Wouldn't Be That Different On The GameCube Controller Either, Especially Since There's Times It Looks On Point And just Barely Misses The Target, And Also, There's No Aiming Icon On Screen To Help Out.
Super Mario Galaxy (Released In 2007 on The Wii):
Just Gonna Come Out And Say This, Super Mario Galaxy Is the Best Looking of All The Games On This Collection, No Surprise Either, As Out of all 3, This the Most Recent Game, Being Released in 2007, And On The Wii (Which is Way More Powerful In Comparison To That of The GameCube and The Nintendo64 in All Do Respect.), It's Also My Favorite Out of All 3 Games,
I Love Super Mario Galaxy, It's in My Top 10 Platformers of All-Time And Genuinely Speaking, It's Well-Deserved, Everything in This Game Holds up So Well, Even 14 Years After It's Original Release,
Because of That and I'll Be Real With you guys When I Say This,
I Was Nervous For This One, Because While I Was Nostalgic For Both Mario Sunshine and Mario Galaxy Respectfully, Galaxy Played a Bigger Part in My Gaming Life Due To Things Like Me Being Too Young at The Time Sunshine Released to Genuinely Remember the Hype Around It As Well As Most of The GameCube's Lifespan, And When I got a Preowned Copy of Sunshine, I Didn’t Play it Much. This Was Due to Games like Mario Galaxy 1 and 2, and Then a Year after Galaxy 2, Skylanders Came Out and Drew Me Away For a Couple of Days. (I Will Review You One Day Skylanders... But Not Today!) And After all That, When I Finally Came Back to Sunshine, I Found That my Original Copy Had Disappeared.
The Plot of Super Mario Galaxy is That, Bowser Has Once Again Kidnapped Princess Peach, But This Time, He Takes Her To The Other Side of The Universe, So Mario, With Help of a Species Known as The Lumas, Embarks on a Quest To Rescue Princess Peach, And to Also Save the Universe.
With That All Said Though, Let's Talk About The Gameplay, Mario Galaxy Is One of the Best Platformers of All-Time, It's Genuinely a Pleasure Hopping From Planet to Planet And Looking For Power Stars, Again, These Are Essentially The Same As The Stars From Mario 64 In Which They Act As The Goal Pole That Finishes The Level.
According To Wikipedia: Nintendo Aimed to Make The Game Appeal to Players of All Ages, and The Team Had More Freedom in Designing it Compared to Other Super Mario Games Because of The Outer Space Setting.-
-It's Safe To Say That It Paid Off, This Game Was a Critical and Commercial Success, Selling Over 12.84 Million Copies Worldwide (Becoming The Ninth Bestselling Wii Game) As Well As Winning Multiple Game of The Year Titles, And Becoming The First Nintendo Game to Win The British Academy Games Award for Best Game.
The Thing About Mario Galaxy That Genuinely Pleases Me Is The Fact that everything Feels So Thought out, Stages Are At The Perfect Pace, The Soundtrack Is Amazing, The Graphics Are Also Really Great, and All 120 Power Stars Are So Fun To Collect, It's a Reason To Why I Genuinely Believe This To Be The Best Mario Game Ever Made.
This Is The Game So Many Franchises Try to Recreate The Magic of, And Fail Hard In Doing So, Like Sonic Lost World, And Nintendo's Own Super Mario Odyssey (though Mario Odyssey is Still Good, It's Just That it Focused Too Much on Trying to Be Like Mario Galaxy That I Felt it Failed At Trying To Be its Own Thing.).
The Controls Are Also Good, There Wasn't As Much To Do in This Controls-Wise As Their is Sunshine Which Gives It a Plus I Guess, Except One thing (which I'll talk about in a couple of sentences).
Collection Info:
That Thing I Mentioned About Controls, Depending On Whether Mario Is Going up a Hill or Not (or in Mario Galaxy's Place, Small Circular Planets) There is This Thing In Which Mario Will Start Walking Around in Circles, There Isn't a Really a Reason To Explain Why, I Just Know He Didn't Do It On The Original Consoles of Each Game, It Doesn't Happen a lot Though.
Another Cool Thing That Nintendo Did For All 3 Games, is That They Actually Remastered The Info That Appears on Screen That Tells You How Many Lives You Have, How Many Stars You've Collected, How Many Coins you Have etc.,
Also, Despite This Technically Being Run on an Emulator, Nintendo Also Added It So The Games Tell You What Button To Press On The Switch Controller.
There's Also A Thing on This in Which You Can Listen To The Soundtrack For Each Game.
I Don't Want To Spoil Much About The Games in This Collection, I Want People Who See This To Enjoy Them If They Decide To Pick It Up. Which I Really Recommend Doing if You Haven't Already,
Super Mario 3D All-Stars is Gonna Be Going Away At The End of this Month (March 31st 2021) and I'd Imagine Because of that Reason Alone, Retailers And Nintendo E'Shop Will Probably Have It on Sale, The Original Price of 59.99 Was not Worth It in No Way, BUT if you Can Find it For Cheaper, Even if It's 29.99, I Recommend It, After All, It is 3 Massive Entertaining Games That Will At Least Take Your Mind of Off Our Current World Situation.
Sure, You Can Buy a Wii U and Get The Games Separately, but Depending On The Seller, That Could Cost you More than the Original 59.99 Price of This Collection to Even Just Get The Wii U Console, Let Alone The Games.
Overall:
Super Mario 64 Gets A 10/10.
Super Mario Sunshine Gets an 8/10.
Super Mario Galaxy Gets a 10/10.
And Super Mario 3D All-Stars Is Recommended.
It's A Worthy Addition To Your Switch Library, And All 3 Games In The Collection Are Worthy Additions To Your Gaming Library.