Having made our way through the GameCube title Mario Sunshine, we approached the franchise’s next-gen iteration, Super Mario Galaxy, with a sense of trepidation. For starters, we didn’t know whether the magic had somehow left Mario, or if Sunshine was just a fluke, and we weren’t sure how well the Wii motion-sensitive remote would work on the next-gen platformer. Fortunately the levels we played at E3 didn’t cause any nasty flashbacks, even if they failed to wash the Sunshine taste completely out of our mouths.
In Super Mario Galaxy, Mario finds himself on a host of different worlds, each with variable gravity. The nunchuk configuration, as in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, is again used to great effect, with the thumbstick used to move and the wand used in certain areas to target objects or to hit certain items by shaking the controller. For example, in one instance we approached a bridge while a targeting reticule/star circled around Mario. Using the wand, we were able to aim the star and target the bridge controls, and by shaking the controller we released the bridge and were able to cross it. In another wand-waving scenario, Mario was inundated by bubbly beasts that hopped on Mario’s back. Although they did no harm, they were annoying, so we shook the wand to have our on-screen hero shake them off his back.
The game includes a handful of other features that involved the wand, such as tracing shapes upon Mario himself and double-jumping, but some of these were difficult to coordinate. The tracing, for example, exposed the learning curve of the Wii remote, as we struggled to draw a consistent line. The double-jump, though, was incredibly intuitive, as we simply jumped with the B button and flicked the wand in the direction we wished to double-jump. By chaining these together, it was even possible to double-jump to certain small planetoids.
The planetoids aren’t the only levels in the game, however, as we traversed environments that ranged from a pirate ship and a Mario-type grassy land (ala Mario 64) to small asteroids in which Mario could navigate the surface in seconds. In each case, the environments seemed larger in scale than those in Mario Sunshine.
The bosses, too, are entertaining, two of which we encountered in our time with the game at E3. One boss, a spider on a web, required us to use the wand to target Mario, then (using the wand again) to pluck a strand of the web like a guitar, thus launching Mario toward the spider. This was a bit tricky to master, although it was probably just the newness of the Wii controller. Another boss, a lava-dwelling octopus, repeatedly belched fire and coconuts (who knew?) in alternating patterns. After dodging the balls of fire, we used the thumbstick to run toward the coconuts and, while they were still in the air, we shook the remote to make Mario “spin attack” the shells and smack them back at the boss.
Between the new environments and creative boss battles, Super Mario Galaxy was fun at E3, and it sure didn’t bring back memories of Mario Sunshine. That’s a good thing. In spite of the Wii being a beefed-up GameCube, the graphics also seemed improved over Mario Sunshine, and there seemed to be hints that this might be the long-rumored “Mario 128.” Although it’s not expected to be a launch title, we expect Super Mario Galaxy to have as short a wait as that for Mario Sunshine, which will surely be just long enough for fans to go crazy over the game, even if the E3 demo didn’t exactly leave us grinning from ear to ear.
— Phil Vollmer
