Mario is the quintessential title character from gaming consoles of the past and present. Starring in 2d platformers and side-scrollers, Mario has seen his fair share of action over the years stomping goombas and koopa troopas and tracking down the vile Bowser. Mario continued his journeys into the 3d realm with Super Mario 64 for the Nintendo 64 and Super Mario Sunshine for the Game Cube, where he learned a few new tricks and made a few new enemies. Making his genre debut on the Wii, Mario finds himself in a new adventure with everything we’ve come to love and expect from a Mario title. Today, we’ll take a look at Super Mario Galaxy for the Nintendo Wii.

Story

Super Mario Galaxy follows the traditional Mario story with Mario on a quest to rescue Princess Peach from Bowser, and along the way find his ever so faithful brother Luigi, and meet a horde of star bit popping toadstools.

Every 100 years a huge comet flies over the mushroom kingdom. This year during the Great Star Festival for the event, Mario is invited to Peach’s castle to pick up a special gift. As he arrives, Bowser crashes the party in a squadron of airships and UFOs. As opposed to simply kidnapping Peach, he uses his air fleet to rip the entire castle from the ground and carries it into space.

Before Mario is able to get into the castle doors, a magikoopa shows up and shoots him with his wand, knocking Mario into free space. Mario is intercepted by floating star people called “lumas.” After giving Mario a short tutorial level, the lumas take Mario to their mother Rosalina who offers to help him save Peach and gives him special powers to allow him to fly through space!

To rescue Peach, Rosalina tells Mario that he needs to collect Power Stars, scattered throughout the universe, held by Bowser and his minions. Once enough Power Stars are collected, she will have enough power to send her observatory through a portal that will take them to Peach.

This introduction and tutorial are all really cool and exciting to play. They really get you pumped up to play the game!

Design

Rosalina’s Star Observatory is used as a navigation hub to allow Mario to choose where he wants to visit next and to replay previous levels. New levels can be accessed once you have collected enough Power Stars. The observatory contains a series of domes, each containing passage to several galaxies. Levels are represented by galaxies and are each broken down into several sub-levels. There is a wide variety of environments represented including grasslands, oceans, deserts, spaceships, and even a haunted house.

To add even more variety, each dome also contains a collection of mini-game galaxies. Every time I was able to access a new dome, the mini-games were the first galaxies I played. Some of the mini-games consist of racing a Manta Ray through a floating water track, running on tiles that fall into free space after you touch them, balancing on a giant ball as you navigate it through a narrow hole-filled track, and even blowing Mario around inside a giant bubble. The mini games get progressively more difficult throughout each dome, but never cease from being greatly enjoyable.

Sometimes, after passing a level one of five “prankster comets” may pass through orbit. When a prankster comet is in orbit, you replay a level with an additional challenge such as a time limit or limited health.

Aside from the great replayability options and challenges, Mario gets a variety of power-ups to help him along the way including the ability to turn into a flying Bee, a ghost who can pass through walls, and even an Ice Man capable of skating across water and climbing waterfalls.

As far as I’m concerned, Super Mario Galaxy is a single player game all the way through. Even though you are able to play the levels again as Luigi after you collect enough Power Stars, the only co-op game play consists of the second player pointing the Wii remote at the screen and collecting star bits and shooting them at enemies. Being that the star bits usually only stun the enemies for a short period of time, this just seems like a waste to me and I certainly don’t see it viable to anyone expecting anything more than a disappointment if you’re holding the second controller. That said, the lack of co-op certainly should not be a deciding factor as to whether or not you purchase this game.

Gameplay

Super Mario Galaxy is 3d platforming at its best. The game is taken it to the next level with its new physics system that allows Mario on the interior and exterior of spherical environments, as they have their own gravitational source. You’ll notice the new physics right away, as lots of the time you’ll be completely upside down and sideways. In some rooms, Mario can run straight up the walls and onto the ceiling while other levels have you constantly switching between inverted ceiling running and standard running on the floor. Other areas of the game even have the camera adjust on the fly to give the appearance of a traditional 2d side scroller.

The controls are similar to previous Mario titles where the analog stick and buttons of the nun chuck and Wii remote make Mario run, jump, and flip. Of course it wouldn’t be a Wii title if you didn’t have to fling the Wii remote around a little bit. Shaking the Wii remote throws Mario into a violent spinning move with his arms extended. This can be used to attack and stun enemies, destroy certain obstacles and interact with certain objects. Shaking the remote also is used to launch Mario up certain vines and to throw objects such as bomb. Pointing the remote at the screen brings up a light blue star icon that is used to shoot star bits at enemies, or target certain objects to propel and shoot you around the screen.

It wouldn’t be a Mario game without special moves. Mario can wall jump back and forth between two narrow walls to climb them and while in mid-jump, Mario can slam to the ground to break objects and kill enemies. These types of moves are sometimes required to solve certain puzzles.

I can’t remember having this much fun playing a Mario game since probably the first time I played Super Mario Brothers for the original Nintendo when I was 5 on a TV with half the colors not working. It’s really something special when a title released some 20 years later can bring you back to your childhood and still give you entertainment and, get this, even a challenge. That’s right; this is not your run of the mill easy video game. Some of these levels are actually pretty challenging. I actually had a couple game overs playing this game, and I’d like to think that after 20+ years of gaming, I’d be pretty dang good at Mario games!

Presentation

I think that by this point, it’s pretty safe to assume that I think the graphics and sound are great. The game’s soundtrack was recorded by the Mario Galaxy Orchestra and the music is fabulous and quite varied. The games first level has a soothing, yet inspiring fully orchestrated track.

The 3d engine used was developed in-house by Nintendo and is shared with super Mario sunshine. The camera is dynamic and adopts a nearly top down view to allow the player to see the surrounding area. There are no pre-rendered animated scenes. Everything is rendered on the fly with the in-game graphics engine which truly shows the graphical power of the Wii. In-game we see light reflection and refraction off of water and lighting effects everywhere. Frankly, this is the best looking Wii game I have played yet!

Summary

Mario games are the staple of a gamers’ collection. We’ve followed our protagonist through many adventures over the years and they have never disappointed. Mario’s transition to the Wii reminds us yet again why we all follow this series. This is the absolute best Mario title to date and every gamer should own their own copy. If for nothing else, Super Mario Galaxy should be the single reason to own a Wii.

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