Platform: Wii
Dev: Nintendo
Pub: Nintendo
Players: 1
Online: No
Certificate: 3+
Once upon a time, a little plastic rectangle came along with Super Mario Bros written on the front. This plastic rectangle went into a hole in a big magic box people called the NES. And then, when you pressed a button called POWER, you got a little Italian bloke in dungarees running around. Once this magic had happened, people started to think “why isn’t everything like this?” And so the platforming genre was born. And with it, the rules that defined what makes a good one.
You see it was Nintendo who first drew up the rules by which platformers were developed. Throughout the years, since the original Super Mario Bros, Ninty have been trying to push their own boundaries as far as possible. They’ve had mixed success with it. Their best improvement was when 3D was introduced in Super Mario 64. Mario’s jump to an extra dimension was seamless, and made you wonder why all games hadn’t always been like this. And now, in 2007, they’ve done it again.
Rather than have multiple worlds inexplicably attatched to a castle, Mario now journeys from planet to planet across the galaxies. As you’d expect, being able to run around a planet means Nintendo have had to do stuff with the gravity. And they have. And that’s where the main advancement from 64 is.
You may think this would make jumps and such impossible, but it’s rare to misjudge one and fall to your death. When you do, you’ll feel hard done by, but that’s the only time you’ll ever have that feeling. Most of the game is simple, cute and just plain fun, with bright colours and penguins, but remember that this is Mario. So Bowser is here somewhere.
His levels are full of fire and brimstone, as you’d expect, and the planets are so diverse that many of these more violent ones feel out of place in a game which has little stars called Lumas. But it works. As does everything about Galaxy. Discovering the story of each different galaxy is like reading the scripts of 200 blockbuster Hollywood films.
Nintendo have outdone themselves again. It’s rare enough to find an astoundingly amazing game, but it’s even rarer to come across one as consistently brilliant as this. Every single second os astonishing. And it really makes you wonder, why aren’t all games like this?
Judgement:
As unique as it is superlative. So absolutely glorious, the Wii may never have another title like it. The best Mario game ever. And that says a hell of a lot. 97.
