Super Mario 3D All-Stars (2020)

Ok, blasted through 64 and Sunshine this weekend in about 4 hours each. Going to tackle Galaxy now. I've never played it, so I'm excited for that.

Beating both 64 and Sunshine for the third time each, and doing both as fast as I could with the bare minimum stars and sprites, made me reposition both games on my lists. I think I actually like Sunshine more than 64...

I beat Bowser with the absolute minimum number of Stars this weekend, and had a great time revisiting this game. It has some of the most memorable and imaginative level designs I've ever seen and, even though the controls are wonky sometimes, I still feel like it holds up as a lot of fun.

I'll probably come back and get 120 Stars for the first time later, but for now I'm moving on to Sunshine.

Last year, immediately after beating Super Mario Odyssey I went and played some Mario 64 on my crt tv on original hardware. I was surprised to see that Mario 64 felt so much better to control! It felt like there was a lot more momentum and snappiness to his movement on 64 (I'd deffo be happier with a bit uglier graphics, if it meant less input lag on Odyssey btw. Also I was tired of doing that hat combo by the end).

Curious to see how well will Mario 64 play on the Switch, seeing that the N64 controller was actually designed around it. Seeing some people complaining that if feels clunky on the switch got me a bit worried that Nintendo didn't bother to emulate the very specific N64 analog stick sensitivity on the new collection. Would be a shame if newcomers couldn't properly appreciate the magic of this masterpiece!!

To people who already got it, how does it feel to play? Has anyone compared it to playing on original hardware with minimal input lag?

Let me start by saying that I am loving this collection. I just played Galaxy recently (of course), and I grew up on 64, so I went straight for Sunshine.

Now, I have a very checkered history with Super Mario Sunshine, in short: I bought it when Gamecube was current gen, sold it after it annoyed the shit out of me, then re-bought it used a few years later, sold it again, then when I got into collecting retro stuff (and Gamecube was at that point considered retro) I bought it a third time, convinced I was going to finally get through it, then sold it a third time.

Then last year, my buddy donated his collection to me. Among it was Super Mario Sunshine. You can probably figure out how that attempt went - but I didn't actually sell it. Just stopped after an hour or two of gameplay.

Here's the thing - something about the control scheme is just terrible in this game. Mario's moveset has so many contextual variables, ex. speed at which you're moving, direction you suddenly move to, if you are around something you can slip on, or grip to, etc. I find this game INSANELY difficult to control. Mario Galaxy, a game based in 3D (literal) space, with freaken multiple gravitational sources in close proximity, is somehow easier to control than this nightmare. Now, add imprecision with the Joycons and I pretty much need an anti-anxiety prescription to get through this. (Instead, I only play it with the Pro controllers)

I played Mario 64 probably 50 times in my life; it's one of the greatest games ever made IMO and I grew up with SNES, then N64, so let's just say 3D platforming is what I grew up on in the same way other kids grew up on breast milk or formula, but I feel like I'm a hundred years old when I play Sunshine.

I've fallen off every ledge probably a dozen times in the first level, in just several hours of gameplay. There are shadows, so projecting where I'm going to land should be easy, and yet I miss time and time again. The camera fights me, and it does this thing when you're floating around with the water jet, it zooms out which screws with your perception of where you are in 3D space. What results is constantly falling off of things.

I'm sure I'll get used to these slippery controls, and I've already gotten farther in this playthrough than the preceding four attempts spanning nearly two decades, but there's no way in hell I'm attempting anything resembling completion.

What prompted me to write up this rant was this article on Nintendo Life which basically reaffirms my position that Sunshine was and still is a glitchy mess at times. It's great fun, and I'm trying to channel my inner peace when I fall off a platform or miss a jump and land in the water for the 400th time, but I cannot be alone in this.

No, I cannot be alone in this.