Super Mario Galaxy

[starfinger]

Clearly, I am not on the cutting edge of anything, but I finally started really playing this. I don't remember the last time I played a game that made me say (aloud) "wow" so many times. It is very fun.

Anyway, that's the whole report, for those of you as behind the times as I am!

-craig

[GlennCase]

We're in the same boat, Craig. I rented the game yesterday and created a game save right away so I could unlock Rosalina on Mario Kart Wii.

Now I only need to actually play the game!

ROCK!

Glenn Case

[Reist]

It's a good game. I beat it.

[starfinger]

just got the 120'th star. woo hoo!

-craig

[Reist]

just got the 120'th star. woo hoo!

-craig

As luigi? That's the real question.

[starfinger]

i didn't realize that was even a question (let alone *the* question) until this morning. i doubt that I will tackle these stars with the same enthusiasm as the first 120!

-craig

[Reist]

i didn't realize that was even a question (let alone *the* question) until this morning. i doubt that I will tackle these stars with the same enthusiasm as the first 120!

-craig

Yeah, it's tough. I got kinda bored of it after getting another 20 or so stars. I stopped playing it after that until yesterday when I started again. It really is an awesome game.

[starfinger]

is it harder with luigi?

[fluffy]

I kind of lost interest in this game after the second Bowser encounter. I found the controls too frustrating, and the main antagonist seemed to be the camera rather than any of the enemies per se.

[Reist]

is it harder with luigi?

He jumps higher ... but if I remember right, he has terrible traction. It makes some things easier and some harder.

I kind of lost interest in this game after the second Bowser encounter. I found the controls too frustrating, and the main antagonist seemed to be the camera rather than any of the enemies per se.

I thought the controls and camera were solid. Strange things, man.

[starfinger]

yeah.. i got 30 or so stars with luigi today. the extra jump height makes me feel powerful... the traction thing has been only a minor problem.

anyway, i have no issue with the camera either.. definitely better than Sunshine. the controls throw me off occasionally when I am running around a planet with a fixed camera angle, but it's definitely no deal breaker.

-craig

[fluffy]

Sunshine was certainly worse but Mario 64 was quite a bit better.

Also, for as big as Galaxy's universe is, things feel very small, because while the levels are huge you only see little bits of them at once.

[HeuristicsInc]

okay, so this came with my bundle (today!). and it is actually way cool. i loved the level where the gravity kept switching sides. i've only finished the good egg galaxy, so i'm way behind the rest of you.
-bill

[ujnhunter]

I'm really behind... I think I haven't even finished that galaxy... and I've had this game since Christmas... I'm not sure I like the walking on the ceiling feeling of this game tho... kinda disoriantates (?) me... then again, I'd rather be chopping limbs off of fiends in Ninja Gaiden...

[JonPorobil]

I finally picked this one up with a Best Buy card left over from the holidays. Wonderful graphics, innovative gameplay, etc. etc....

But why, I find myself wondering with many next-gen games, and especially with Super Mario Galaxy, would a developer ever want the camera no not work at any point in the game? It feels like the camera won't let me move it for well more than half of the game. The inability to control the camera gets particularly annoying when you're on a small planet and the game insists on forcing you to watch Mario run upside-down on the planet's "underside." Except there is not top and bottom, it's a freaking planet!

I still like this game a lot, though. Can't play it for long stretches, because I get dizzy from all the wacky angles. Worth it.

[The Weakest Suit]

i liked sunshine a lot.
galaxy was fun too, but the sunshine levels feel more like real places to me and i guess that makes it a more nostalgic experience on some level.
i'm getting seriously sick of the wiimote.

[JonPorobil]

The Wiimote works pretty well as a navigational device and a pointer, but for a game as big and epic as Super Mario Galaxy, keeping the thing pointed straight at the TV for long stretches can be exhausting on the wrist. The use of star chunks as a weapon feels a little bit tacked-on, too. You can shoot them at bad guys, but it just has the same effect as the spin attack (except in those instances where it does nothing at all). Other than that, they're only good for feeding the Lumas anyway.

I'm just saying, though. The game is still worth it. I'll let you know if and when these faults tire me to the point of not wanting to play the game anymore. I'm quite prone to giving up on games over stuff like this (see also Spider-Man: Web of Shadows), so that's how good this game is.

[JonPorobil]

This evening, I finally beat this game. Kind of an anticlimactic final Bowser battle, but the sheer amount of new stuff that just opened up ensures that I'll keep coming back. It's still difficult to play in long stretches though. I'll be lucky if I get all 120 before the sequel comes out.

[HeuristicsInc]

congrats! i had a lot of trouble with that final level... never actually got to bowser, then got distracted with other games. i should go back to it sometime.
i did beat super paper mario in the meantime, though.
-bill

[JonPorobil]

Yeah, the last level was amazingly frustrating, though there were enough 1ups sprinkled through it that I never got a game over (in fact, my total lives kept going up the longer I played). But that final Bowser battle was... disappointing.

Oh well. Upon beating the game, I realized that there's a whole other room of the observatory that I hadn't even touched. Should be worth a few more hours of extra fun.

[ujnhunter]

So after seeing this thread popup again, I tried playing this again... I was on a level where you jump on top of a ball and control the rolling Super Monkey Ball style... I kept falling off the edge of the level... Not fun... I gave up... If only you could control it normally and not with a gimmicky tilt control, maybe I could get past that level. :\

[fluffy]

Wasn't that one of the non-required "challenge" levels?