Topic: User Impressions/Reviews Thread

Thanks for the comments and taking the time to read my thoughts.

@RogerRoger The N. Verted levels are really well designed. Other ones I didn't mention include a watercolour style design and one done like an old comic book with Adam West Batman type "BANG" graphics when you jump on enemies and crates. The ideas are clever but it drags a little when the same design is used for the five or six levels in that world.

I'm not normally one that notices soundtracks unless it really grabs me and that one track did. After the criticism I just made above, they really made an amazing effort to have so many levels so unique with music, art styles, and enemies that only appear once.

And as you and @Rudy_Manchego say, I think the game is pretty accessible. Levels gradually get longer and more difficult but fairly so. Although when I was doing runs just to get through with minimal deaths and ignoring the crates, they actually didn't feel that long at all. The trickiest bits come in the Flashback tapes and bonus levels which are completely optional. The end of the final level is a bit of a humdinger though as you use the mask powers back to back in clever ways. I was just surprised they hadn't used that sort of idea elsewhere.

@mookysam I got the game in a recent sale and was happy with what I paid. I read some things about the game "having 100 levels!" as a way of justifying the full price but presumably that included all the N. Verted levels etc. It is still a pretty meaty game though! And I did like some of the little nods to the other games like the Deja Vu screenshot.

@Ralizah The problem of repetition and side missions is a difficult one. As much as I enjoy the Yakuza games, the plethora of side content does distract from the main story, and I've suffered the same problem with other games too; I remember Wolfenstein: The New Colossus having a similar problem for me. As someone who wants to do everything in a game before I move on, it is a cross I have to bear though

As for the story, I mean plot isn't really a big thing for the Crash games really is it? I guess carrying on from Warped makes sense seeing as the remake was so recent but in the grand scheme of things it's a fairly trivial thing for me at least. To be honest, I wouldn't have really noticed without reading elsewhere that that's what had happened anyway. If you're being pedantic, Warped ends with Cortex and N. Tropy stuck in a time prison as infants and Crash and Coco don't look to have aged between Warped and 4

The Flashback tapes were a highlight though as it really let them experiment with the platforming but so that the main game can still be completed. It also adds funny little bits to the backstory with comments Cortex and N. Gin make while the trials are being completed.

And thanks for the comments on the screenshots. It's a great looking game and I liked catching cutscenes with the different skins on the characters too.

@RogerRoger The levels are certainly longer by the end but yes, when you’re not riding platforms into the foreground and taking every branch to get every crate you can certainly get through levels quickly!

The hardest thing in the game was obtaining some of the flashback tapes as you have to get to them without dying. As levels get longer and harder, the tapes also get put deeper into the level so the one in the last level is fiendish as one slip up and you have to reload the whole level.

I’m also interested to hear what our resident Crash aficionado @DerMeister has to say on the game as I don’t recall seeing him write much about it.

@Thrillho Well, I figured I'd make my own detailed write up on it at some point. I will say that there was plenty with in your review that I agreed with. Namely, I do think the game is does have too much for it's own good, and at times the difficulty is less "challenge" and more "Let's make this guy hate himself". I'm nowhere near completely finishing the game, but there are some parts I'm actively dreading.

All said, good review, and I hope I can do my thoughts on this game just as well as you did when I get to it.

@DerMeister From what you'd posted before, I thought you'd finished the game and gone back to try and get every single collectible. Good luck with the rest of the game then!

Some great reviews as of late, particularly the Crash 4 from @Thrillho, and the Bond reviews from @RogerRoger (as an aside, are you planning on reviewing the Wii Goldeneye, or it's port to the HD Twins?)

Meanwhile I'm currently working on my Xenoblade Chronicles: DE piece. It won't be as eloquently written as the reviews you guys post, but it'll probably be my biggest yet.

Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition (Switch)

The enhanced Switch remaster/remake of the now iconic Wii era JRPG. Although I've played XC2 (and it's Torna expansion), this was my first time with the original adventure. This release also includes the all new Future Connected adventure, but for the purpose of this review I'm going to focus on the core game.

Gameplay:

• In terms of structure it's actually pretty standard fare for a JRPG, as you'll traipse across towns, field areas, & dungeons on your way to your next story destination, tackling optional quests along the way (I will say I found this preferable to XC2, which I don't remember having bespoke dungeons, just many open areas, followed by a series of more linear areas near the back end. While this game does have a series of more linear zones in the back half as well, I think in general it does a good job of mixing up it's open & more focused areas). Where it stands out is in the expansive scope of it's environments, which is so impressive I could honestly believe this was built ground up for Switch if I wasn't aware of it's Wii origins (it's not open world, but many of it's areas are large enough to invoke that feeling of wondering if you can get to that distant location in the distance). I can honestly see why it would have been viewed as a revelation of sorts on Wii.
• The world comes to life with monsters that have different "triggers" when it comes to attacking your party (if they have an eye logo above them they'll attack on sight, a vibration logo means they'll attack if you're moving quickly, a nuclear looking symbol means they'll attack if you use an ether based ability around them, and no symbol means they'll only attack when you make the first move), and you'll come to terms with avoiding powerful enemies levelled in the 70's & 80's that can prowl around even early areas, which helps to establish the world as a living environment with apex predators (while there is lore mentioned in the occasional side quest that mentions some groups of monsters being enemies with others, monsters don't actually react to each other in practice however). Enemies also have color coded icons above them that let you guage their strength relative to yours from afar (Red is too strong, Yellow tough but doable, Brown equal, Blue weaker, & No Icon no threat), and if they have no color coded icon they won't attack you even if you set off their trigger. Of course you can always target an enemy to get it's exact level as well.
• Exploration is very encouraged and you'll earn experience for arriving at new locations & landmarks (the latter of which act as warp points once you reach them), and you don't lose anything when you die (you're just sent back to the last landmark you passed, though you keep all experience, money, etc.), so you don't need to fret over getting bodied by a powerful enemy around the bend when you want to explore. It really cultivates a sort of relaxing vibe, and while the size of some areas may seem intimidating at first, if you keep up on side quests they generally send off to every nook & cranny over time. One other thing I'll briefly mention is that there are blue dots scattered over the landscape that are material harvest points (each area has it's own set of materials to collect, and while there is some randomness to what spawns where in an area, some materials will have a higher chance to spawn at night, during bad weather, etc. It's largely up to luck of the draw though, and a few materials are very rare to spawn regardless. This is definitely inferior to the system in XC2, where specifically marked harvest points will only spawn bugs, flowers, etc). You'll often need these materials for sidequests, and you can also fill out a "Collectipedia", which earns you rewards for filling out an area's material list.
• As for the side quests themselves they don't tend to be anything fancy, usually just stuff like Kill "X" number of this enemy or collect this number of items, though the basic gameplay loop was fun enough that I found doing them preferable to grinding, plus there were a few interesting ones from a lore perspective (though I thought the whole Giants' Treasure questline ended up being pretty anticlimactic). While it is true that doing all you can will over level you for the early areas, quest opportunities generally shrivel up into the second half & I felt things kind of evened out (not counting the endgame quests that pop up right at the end. Those are tough, however doing them will let you plow through the final boss). I'll also mention that whenever you have a quest selected as your main one there'll be a blue "!" marking exactly where you need to go, so there's no running around guessing where you need to go, which is especially helpful whenever you need to collect materials that spawn randomly (you can just open up the map and see exactly where the materials you need have spawned). Environmental designs aren't as intricate as those in XC2, so I never had the issue I had in that game where I'd seemingly go to the right location for a quest only for it to be at a different elevation. It definitely made things a bit easier.
• One issue I had with quests though is the whole affinity chart. You see, by talking to named NPCs & completing quests you're reputation in that area of the game world will increase, and when it increases more quests will open up, however that's not all there is to it. You see there is an affinity chart that displays how every named NPC is connected to those around them, and sometimes you need to talk to one NPC in order for some other NPC to give you a quest, and it's not often apparent that you need to do this, so if you want to attempt to do all the quests you can, you'll spend a lot of time talking to random NPCs to see if the affinity chart will update. This is slightly compounded by the fact that certain NPCs will only be active at certain times (though you can freely change the in-game clock to your heart's desire, and after you talk to an NPC once you can check their active times in the affinity chart), and of course certain quests are missable due to story progression (these quests are marked with a clock icon, so at least you know to prioritize those).
• Early on in the game you'll run across a settlement that has been destroyed and you'll be given the optional game long task of rebuilding it by gathering materials (and paying lots of money). While the character in charge of the rebuilding program will give you hints where you need to find certain items, the game is never quite as open as it is when it comes to pointing you in the right direction with normal quests, but I found it worthwhile to tackle though as I liked seeing the city being rebuilt, plus doing so grants you access to even more side quests, shops, & more.
  
  Sorry if this drags... on.
• When it comes to the game's combat (it's about time I got to this, lol!) it has a real time system where your character performs basic attacks automatically, though there are a series of special abilities (known as arts) displayed at the bottom of the screen, and it's the player's job to activate them at the right moment (you can't spam them as they have cool down gagues that must refill before you can use one again). For example Shulk has an art called "Back Slash" which, as you can imagine, deals extra damage when you're positioned behind the enemy you're targeting. There is a gauge with three bars that fills up as you fight, and when fully filled it allows you to pull off a powerful chain attack (the action stops, and you're free to chain together a series of arts, one from each of your party members, into a powerful combo), based on your party's affinity (more on this later) you may get extra chances to string even more arts into the combo. Doing so is a gamble however, as expending one bar of the guage is the only way to revive a fallen ally (there are no usable items like potions & such as there are in other JRPGs).
  Certainly seems to be a lot to take in.
• As briefly mentioned before there are no usable items in the game. This means that in order to heal yourself (or perform other buffs) in battle you'll have to make sure you have a character in your party with healing arts. Shulk has one that restores a small amount of HP to one character, but you'll largely be relying on Sharla once she joins the party a few hours in. I'll admit I was worried at first about leaving the health of my party largely up to an AI character (you can control characters other than Shulk in battle, but for reasons I'll get to in a bit, it's not something you'll likely choose to do often), but in practice it never presented any problems.
• A key aspect of the game's combat that's unique are Shulk's visions of the future. Part of the game's narrative is that lead character Shulk can see the future, and this is worked into the battle system in a neat way. Whenever an enemy is going to hit a party member with a special attack that'll really wreck them (usually resulting in death, but not always), the action will be interrupted with a monotone colored vision playing out the attack. Once you're back in control you'll have a few seconds to keep the scenerio from coming true. While you can warn a fellow party member by walking up to them & pressing "B", letting you choose one of their arts to activate & potentially nerf the impact of the attack, your strongest course of action is to use one of Shulk's special Monado arts. The Monado being the game's sword of legend so to speak, Shulk has access to a special selection of powerful arts that can turn the tide of battle in these scenarios. If effective a Monado art will be highlighted with a "!", and if you select it in time the enemy attack will effectively be neutralized alltogether.
• Another wrinkle to the combat are Mechon enemies. Robotic foes from Mechonis (more on this when it comes to the story) that are invulnerable to all attacks except those from Shulk's Monado. While other party members gain effectiveness against them as the story goes on, early on Shulk is really the only one that can harm them (one Monado art temporarily makes everyone effective against them, but activating it means you may not have another Monado art charged in time to stop a big attack if one is coming, so it's a bit of a gamble). Otherwise everyone can damage them if they are toppled or dazed. This is a mechanic that can be used against all enemies, but is particularly useful against Mechon early on (probably as a way to seamlessly train you to use it). Certain arts will have a chance to "Break" an enemy (arts with a pink icon can do so), which causes a gauge to appear above the enemy. They will then be "Toppled" if hit with a green colored art before the guage depletes, this causes the guage to be refilled and they can then be "Dazed" if hit with a yellow colored art before it depletes. An enemy will be immobilized with one of the latter two effects inflicted, and will take more damage as well (Mechon foes can be damaged by everyone as well while one is active). On top of this there are a couple early bosses that can only be damaged while "Toppled" or "Dazed" too. Also, your own party members can fall victim to "Topple" & "Daze", though similar to warning them about a future attack, if you are unaffected you can walk up to an affected ally and press "B" to get them back into the fight early (similarly, you can do the same thing to an ally suffering certain stat reducing status ailments, returning them to normal).
• Being a JRPG there are many ways to strengthen your characters. Of course they can level up by gaining enough EXP (earned by beating enemies, discovering new locations/landmarks, rewarded after completing some side quests, and unlocking in-game achievements), and by equipping new weapons & armor (bought in shops, dropped by enemies, awarded for completing side quests). Equipment also has Gem slots (0-3 slots on weapons & 0-1 slot on armor pieces), which act a lot like Materia from FFVII Remake. New arts ARE NOT tied to Gems like magic is to Materia in FFVII, however they offer all kinds of various buffs (or debuffs to attacked enemies) for battle & exploration. Gems can be earned as side quest rewards or crafted from ether crystals (dropped by enemies or harvested from ether deposits in the environment). Also, it's important to note that the strength of your arts DOES NOT increase upon character level up like base attack/stats (rather you have to level up each art independently by spending from a pool of accured Art Points, which you also earn from defeating enemies. This is especially important for Shulk's Monado arts, as vision or not, you're not going to be able stop an upcoming onslaught if you don't keep these properly upgraded as you move forward). Of course with so many systems in play there's bound to be one or two you won't bother with, and for me it was the Skill Trees. Each character has three different Skill Tree paths (plus 2 extra ones earned after certain side quests, resulting for a total of 5 each), each containing 5 skills, and when you have a path selected you slowly unlock it's skills (which tend to be passive buffs) as you aquire SP (which earned alongside EXP & AP). You can also spend Affinity Coins (earned upon levelling up) to give the effects of an unlocked skill to another party member as well. This is something I rarely bothered with, mostly leaving everyone on their default Skill path & it never resulted in any noticeable trouble for me.
• Outside of the Skill Trees I also never really bothered with Party Affinity. Party members gain affinity with each other by fighting alongside each other in combat (you can also have them give gifts to each other to build affinity), and if your party has a high affinity it earns you extra moves to add to chain attack combos (there's probably some other benefits as well). I really only ever used the same 3 characters, so their affinity was high with each other, but I never bothered to build affinity with anyone else outside of a certain side quest that required two female party members to have high affinity. This means I never got to see many of the Heart-To-Hearts (these are certain locations in the game world where two of your characters will have a personal chat, revealing more about themselves), which earn characters big affinity gains, but they usually have to have a pretty high affinity with each other to access them in the first place, kinda defeating the purpose, IMO.
• Oh, there's also these little dimensional tear things you'll run across that'll take you to a psuedo dimension where you can take on timed challenges to earn rewards. I think there are different challenges for different characters, but I honestly never once bothered with it.
• Another thing I never bothered with are the different difficulty modes. I played "Standard/Normal/Whatever it's called", however I know there's a "Casual" mode that at least weakens enemies, but probably has other effects too (being a Nintendo game, if you die 2 or 3 times in relatively quick succession it'll ask if you want to switch to the easier mode, which I ignored). At the other end of the spectrum is the "Expert" mode, in which EXP earned from exploration isn't automatically applied (it goes into a pool you can pull from at a later time if you feel like you need it), and you can actively de-level yourself if you think you over leveled & want a challenge (whether this mode actually makes enemies harder than normal I don't know).
• In comparison to XC2, it seems like there's a bit of a step back with every step forward, but I think I actually slightly prefer XC:DE in terms of gameplay. While the moment to moment combat here has a good flow to it (and the vision mechanic is cool) I think I prefer the much more rhythmic flow of XC2's battle system, plus the second game has more intuitive material harvesting & I LOVED getting new rare Blades to add to my party. However XC2 also added one to many excessive systems, such as the Gacha mechanic to acquire new Blades (which was a grind), and the dreadful Field Skill system (you needed Blades in your party with certain adventuring skills to access certain areas, which hindered exploration & interfered with story progression occasionally), and I think XC:DE is better off without all that. At the end of the day I guess those two issues I had with XC2 were a bigger nuisance than the niggles I had with XC:DE.
  That was a lot to take in, but let's move on shall we?

Story/Characters:

• When the world was young two titans (the organic lifeform Bionis & the mechanical Mechonis) did battle in a vast ocean. While it's said that Bionis won the day, the battle was exhaustive and both titans have long since been immobile. Bionic life (including Homs, fantasy speak for Humans) were born from the flesh of Bionis, and have lived on it's body relatively peacefully until one day they came under attack from the Mechon, robotic lifeforms from Mechonis. Powerless against their assailants, the number of Homs has diminished, and only a few of their colonies remain...
• There was hope however, as the Homs found themselves in possession of the Monado. Said to be the sword used by the Bionis itself, one warrior was strong enough to weild it's power and singlehandedly drove off the Mechon, seemingly winning the war. This was a year before the start of the game's events proper, where we join up with Shulk, a young scientist in Colony 9 who is studying the fabled sword. After the Mechon suddenly show up and shatter the fragile peace of the colony, lead by a new kind of Mechon immune to the Monado (during the events of which it's discovered that Shulk can weild the Monado & see visions of the future with it in hand), Shulk & his friend Reyn go off on a quest to reach Fort Galahad (the Mechon stronghold from the last war) to seek out revenge. Of course being a JRPG there are many detours & narrative twists along the way, providing for a grand adventure.
  
  Let's do this.
• While it does have it's more lighthearted moments, it definitely strikes a generally more serious tone than XC2, which wasn't afraid to go out of it's way for a laugh at times. While I think I actually preferred XC2 in this regard, the story on offer here is still really gripping, and I can understand why fans who started with the Wii original may have not jived with the second game's tone.
• It has a pretty solid cast of characters, and while it's not as prevalent a theme as it is in something like XC2 or FFX, I think the romance elements worked into the narrative were done really well. After nearly 120 hours of play time it was kinda sad to let go.
• I really liked the lore they worked into the game world like the Giant's ruins, and other vestages of civilization that show life was once more prevalent on Bionis. I also really like that some groups of monsters seem to have some level of intelligence (like the Turkin/Chillken & Ignas) as they fight with basic weaponry & make small camps or reside in the ruins of abandoned civilizations. This was similar to how they were presented in XC2 as well, and I'd be really be interested if they expanded on it in a future title, like having them have cultures at least on par with the Nopon (cuddly little round bird creatures that have appeared in every Xenoblade game, and one usually ends up in your party), just in a hostile role.
• On a side note, while it's pretty clear at points that it's connection to XC2 was probably only fully realized during the second game's production (who knows how much of that was actually pre-planned), by the end I was pretty satisfied with how well it does connect (how much they changed for this remake to retroactively make it fit better, other than a slight alteration to one character's design, I do not know as I've never played the Wii version).

Graphics/Audio:

• As mentioned before the sense of scale in the game can be absolutely awe inspiring & hard to believe it started life as a Wii game. Cleaned up in the XC2 engine, aside from a rough edge here & there it could totally pass for a ground up Switch title. It has a wide variety of biomes in a unique enough world where even the standard grassland & jungle areas feel anything but generic, and many areas, particularly on Bionis, take the Avatar approach of making everything glow in the night (of particular beauty are Satorl Marsh at night & Eryth Sea during a meteor shower). There is an additional sense of scale as in many places you can see were other parts of the titan you're currently on are in relation to you (and the other titan as well), which is a really cool piece of world building. My only little bit of disappointment in this regard is unfortunately many of the Mechonis locations. Granted, they still have an awe inspiring sense of scale & some really cool set-pieces in spots, but whereas the Bionis' locales (even it's sci-fi ones) feel like a living, breathing part of a coherent world, many of Mechonis' locales kind of blend together in a kind of series of brownish rust gold, generic militaristic sci-fi hallways & lifts. Still cool in general though.
  
  
  
  
  
  Shots from various Bionis locales.
• In a neat touch every different piece of armor changes your characters' appearance where it's worn (there is armor for your head, torso, arms, legs, & feet), and new to this version is the ability to set your appearance to a different set of armor compared what you're actually wearing for stat purposes (as long as you actually have the corresponding armor), so if you want the benefits of wearing the best armor in the game but want to see Shulk running around in his undies you can do that (if you payed close attention to my environment shots you can see I briefly did that with Sharla 😏).
• The British voice work is absolutely wonderful & helps to set the fantasy tone (coming from an American yokel in the Midwest).
• Great soundtrack too. I'm not one to usually notice music in games, and won't be tracking down individual pieces for my review, but it has a wide variety of tracks for various purposes & can be suitably sombre, upbeat, ready for action, relaxing & much more when it needs to be.

Conclusion:

• I'm not quite sure it's my favorite Switch title, but at nearly 120 hours of playtime it's certainly the one I've spent the most time with (and that's not counting the Future Connected bonus story, which I'll be reviewing on it's own!). Whatever the case, if your one of those people who've played BotW, Odyssey, and a few other Switch titles, complain that it doesn't have enough "big" exclusives and haven't yet played the Xenoblade titles (this or XC2), so so now.
  
  Hold on guys, I think we're finally done!

@RogerRoger I like these multi-platform reviews for older games, considering how wildly different bespoke versions often were. The way you describe the HD version of Blood Stone does indeed recall some of my experience with the older Uncharted games, where they felt thrilling, with pacing like a rocket blasting off into the atmosphere, but, by the time I had finished, it ended up feeling like more of an amusement park ride: the thrill wound down, and I wasn't left with a lot of memories. Such is the fate of the thrill ride, I think.

It's interesting how well the NDS version fared. Proof enough, I think, that weaker hardware is no excuse for turning out an inferior product.

And yeah, releasing two Bond games at the same time is dumb. Especially when one has a lot of nostalgia attached to it.

Is this based on one of the books or something? Usually the games seem to be adaptations of the films, but I don't remember a "Blood Stone" movie.

@RR529 Nice piece on Xenoblade DE. The affinity requirements were indeed the worst aspect of the original, IMO. The best change XC2 made was to not make it where there has to be a certain level of affinity built up between characters to see one of their heart-to-hearts, given those were often a pain to return to (in the 3DS version, at least), and building affinity between specific characters could take hours of grinding. Also, I admit, the affinity chart has always made me scratch my head in this game: it's inscrutable.

It is, indeed, a very pretty game on Switch (in docked mode, at least; I've heard mixed things about handheld mode performance, although hopefully nothing as awful as XC2's handheld performance at times). The new character models make this feel a LOT less like a PS2 game, but the environments are also pretty stunning this go around (the Wii version was a fuzzy nightmare on my HDTV, and the 3DS version is, well, low-res by default).

BTW, if the glut of systems in XC2 was bad for you (I was pretty okay with it outside of, as you mentioned, the insanely annoying field skill requirements; especially for side-quests), then you're going to have a bad time with Xenoblade Chronicles X if that ever gets ported to Switch. I played that game for 35 hours or so, and I still don't quite feel like I have a grasp on half of nightmarish pile of systems in that game.

@Ralizah, yeah, the looser restrictions on Heart-To-Hearts were definitely an improvement to XC2, and as a bit of a sneak peek I'm glad to report that this extends to XC:DE's Future Connected (which has a lot in common with Torna in that it streamlines a lot of the main game's mechanics, resulting in a gameplay loop that feels better, IMO).

Otherwise I did play it in portable mode once when the power was out, and it was definitely sub HD, but not blurry (it wasn't a huge open area though, so I can't give a definitive answer on that). I was really excited about Xenoblade X back when it was new & the talk of the town (I just never had a Wii U), but the more I hear about it the less interested I am, which is a shame as I love the mech idea (From what I understand it's one of the few Wii U games that'd probably have to be graphically compressed if it released on Switch as it was over 32 GBs, and they probably wouldn't shell out for a 64GB cart. Apparently XC2's graphics & textures were scaled back compared to the Wii U game, and even BotW in final form looks less impressive than the early Wii U only footage due to memory constraints. I've only ever heard this from a couple of Wii U die hards who complained about Switch holding things back though, so who knows how true it is).

As for the other conversation, sorry for butting in @RogerRoger, while I'm not a Bond specialist, from what I understand the Blood Stone movie was cancelled and the game(s) is the only thing that went ahead. That's what I remember hearing at the time at least.

@RR529 Oh, nice! Torna is currently my favorite Xenoblade game. If Future Connected manages to one-up the first Xenoblade for me as well, I'm fully on-board the "Monolith Soft needs to release smaller, more tightly-designed JRPGs from now on" train.

Yeah, XC2 was ok in smaller areas, but the resolution bottomed out in large open area like Gormott Province. I have no idea why Monolith Soft won't make use of higher GPU clock speeds in their games when they're in portable mode like Breath of the Wild does. XC2's battery life was great, but what does it matter if the game looks like crap half of the time?

BTW, it's actually not true that XC2's visuals were scaled back compared to XCX. Digital Foundry did a technical analysis of the game and discussed the numerous advanced visual effects that weren't present at all in XCX. There's also almost no collision detection in XCX with anything other than large structures and enemies, leading to ridiculous situations like cars being able to drive through your characters like they're ghosts or something. People saying XCX is the more visually advanced game are probably just reacting to the change in art style.

Also worth mentioning that XCX would probably work fine on the Switch. Switch ports tend to use up less space overall, and it was under 25GB on disc. XCX also actually made use of downloadable data packs on the eshop to install certain data to the hard drive and get around the speed limitations of running the game from the disc, which would have been what bumped up the file size of the game.

And interesting to hear about a canceled Bond movie! I didn't know that was a thing. I wonder if it was supposed to release before or instead of Skyfall?

@RR529 I’ve played about 10 hours now of Xenoblade and haven’t even made it out of Colony 9! There are just so many sidequests but it’s definitely a fun game. It’s good to see that it mostly stands up as a classic.

@Ralizah I can confirm that Xenoblade in handheld is rather blurry, especially in the character model side of things. It’s playable and actually maintains a decent frame rate but yeah, it’s interesting going from my Vita and seeing how crisp some of those games looked and then Nintendo’s hazy approach to handheld fidelity.

@nessisonett Interestingly, a lot of PS Vita games were subnative as well (which I'd have never realized before looking into it), but I guess it's less noticeable on the smaller screen. Which makes sense, because subnative games on Switch can look crispier on the Switch Lite than on the base model (TW3, in particular, looks pretty damn good on a Lite with the right combination of settings). Although it doesn't help in the case of a game like Xenoblade Chronicles 2, where the drops were SO severe in some sections.

90% of my Switch library looks awesome in handheld mode. 9% looks rougher, but serviceable. It's that last 1% that's the trouble, and that, unfortunately, is where XC2 resides half the time.

Torna was still pretty rough on the eyes, but it avoided the worst drops of the base game. I'm guessing XC:DE is the same way.

Oh well. It'll still look better than that 3DS port in handheld mode.

@RogerRoger OK, cool. I figured the neighborhood Bond expert would have the answer. I'm not surprised that the game was Bond's last handheld outing, considering the practice of developing bespoke portable versions of big games for handhelds really started to die out with the 3DS/Vita, and is all but dead with Switch.

A GBA game, huh? You're really digging into the portable library lately. I'd love to get one of those original GBA models one day modded with a backlight. I currently have a couple of GBA SPs, but it really was a terrible hardware revision: no headphone jack, cramped controls, etc. Your hands have to adopt a claw shape to even use it. I used to use a DS Lite as my GBA, but that broke, so I sold off my games for the system and have been hoping Nintendo would be smart enough to bring the library to the Switch. Alas, no beans.

One of the better developments with ND in recent years has been their shift toward games with more actual substance. Neil Druckmann might be a pariah to some angry right-wing types who don't like the inclusion of gay or black characters, but Uncharted 4 is legitimately a far more interesting games than previous Uncharteds, with better character development, much wider level design, etc., and, while I have no desire to play it, The Last of Us Part II seems to have taken even larger steps in that direction.

@RR529 Thank you for the Xenoblade review! Glad you enjoyed it. It's become my favorite Switch game, and warts and all one of my favorite RPGs. The review was very well written and detailed, and I appreciated the comparisons to XC2 despite not playing it, though I have a decent idea of what I'm in for when I do.

There weren't too many gripes I had with the game aside from the quest variety and how tedious building affinity can be, so it definitely one of the better RPGs I've touched.

Xenoblade Chronicles: Future Connected (Switch).

An all new adventure bundled with Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition. While you can jump straight into it, for narrative reasons it's recommended you play through the main game first (I'll try writing this as spoiler free as possible).

Gameplay:

• Like XC2's Torna expansion, Future Connected is a shorter adventure (I'd guess 10 - 15 hours, which is even shorter than Torna's 30 - 40 runtime) that features a completely new area, plus a returning area from the main game. The new area in question is the Bionis' Shoulder, which was a nearly complete area developed for the original game but cut due to thematic redundancy with a few of the game's earlier locales such as Colony 9 & Bionis' Leg (in short, it's a grasslands area). Gussie it up a bit and you've got yourself a brand new area for a story expansion. For spoiler purposes I won't reveal the returning location, though I will say it's one of the game's smaller locales, and you really don't spend a whole lot of time with it here.
• Returning party members include Shulk & Melia, and they're joined by two new Nopon characters in Nene & Kino (two children of Riki, the main game's Nopon party member). Basic combat is the same as the main game, with Nene & Kino even taking the abilities/roles of Reyn (tank) & Sharla (healer) respectively (sorry Melia, I'm putting you on the side lines again, lol). Fitting that it takes place shortly after the events of the main game, you don't start out at level 1, but instead level 60 (with all your arts already at level 4 or 5). Of course the area's enemies are levelled accordingly.
• There are 4 big changes to combat.
  1. There is no more future vision mechanic in place to counter killer blows, with nothing to replace it. This means you really don't have a need for most of the special Monado arts, though I did find a use for a couple. I never particularly found this to be a problem however, so enemy special attacks must have been relatively nerfed to sort of balance it out.
  2. Across your journey you'll run across a group of Nopon adventurers known as "Ponspectors" who'll join up with your party. There are 12 in total and mention this here as they ever presently follow your party of 3 while out adventuring & in combat (like active Blades do in XC2). During battle they'll randomly heal or buff party members & attack & debuff enemies (4 carry blue flags and have restorative effects, 4 more have red flags and attack enemies, and 4 others have yellow flags & debuff enemies). This is all AI controlled & involves no input from the player.
     
     I hope you're not tired of Nopon.
  3. The Chain Attack mechanic has been removed (where you expend your whole talent gauge to chain an art from each party member into a combo). It is replaced with a mechanic where you instead call upon all Ponspectors to strike in unison. Performed under the same conditions as a Chain Attack, you'll have the option to have them heal all party members & provide a litany of buffs, do massive damage to an enemy, or automatically Daze & debuff the enemy. The effectiveness of the strike depends on the total number of Ponspectors you've joined with as well as a little 3 prompt QTE (I think it's the same one used when performing certain arts in XC2). You'll occasionally get an "Extra Chance", which lets you immediately choose another strike (though you can't pick the one you've already used again).
  4. Another new aspect is the presence of "Fog Beasts". These are regular monsters who have fallen under the influence of the "Fog King" (the big bad of the expansion who is brought up in the first hour, so not really a spoiler). They have a black aura around them & when engaged send out a shockwave that attracts the attention of all nearby monsters (& levels them up). They sound annoying, but in practice I never had any particular issue with them (all other enemies return to their regular level if the Fog Beast is killed beforehand).
     
     There's something not quite right with these guys.
• Adventuring is largely the same as it is in the main game (you gain EXP from discovering new locations & landmarks, the latter act as warp points, harvest points are random blue dots everywhere, etc), though there are a few nagging issues. First off, given that they've had to cram an entire adventure into this one location, it's entirely possible to take a few steps off the beaten path (particularly early on) and wind up in a space with enemies too strong for you (& I don't mean the occasional random super strong enemy you're supposed to tip toe around you'll get in the main game, just a space with enemies generally too strong for you early on). Secondly, the landscape can be quite "layered" in spots, and yet the map is depicted as one "floor". This means you'll probably run into the issue where you'll go to a quest marker only to look around and see it's on a plane above or below you (a problem with XC2 occasionally, but not one I had with XC:DE proper). Granted, these are small problems in the grand scheme of things (death is just as un-punishing as ever, and you'll know the entire area by the back of your hand before too long), but they are there.
• Otherwise the game is streamlined in many aspects.
  1. The Skill Tree & all Affinity related systems (including all the charts) have been completely wiped. The "Heart-To-Heart" conversations scattered around the map (previously locked off by affinity requirements) have been replaced with "Quiet Moments". These are fully voice acted interactions between party members that are only ever locked off by story progression. Honestly this is a big load off your back as you don't have to worry about some obscure affinity requirement locking off a side quest or some such.
  2. While they can drop better weapons, enemies no longer drop armor (and the armor you obtain from quests is largely cosmetic). Better armor is exclusively obtained by buying it from one of the two shops in the game.
  3. There is no more Gem crafting system. An upgrade to your Ether Deposit mining gear near the start of the game means you harvest ready to go equipment Gems from Ether Deposits instead of crystals (enemies no longer drop crystals either). At some point you can do a side quest that improves the quality of Gems you mine as well (you start out mining level II & III Gems, and get level IV Gems afterwards) You still get a few Gems from side quests or treasure chests too, though.
• 3 - 4 NPC side quests usually open up after every other story event, and while (almost) none of them reward EXP, they all reward large amounts of money (which is important, since you can only buy better armor as previously stated). Each Ponspector also requires you to complete a side quest before they join you, and while (almost) none of them reward money, they all reward large amounts of EXP. You run across the first Ponspector as part of a scripted event, and after that he'll give you the locations of a few others. Ideally after you get more to join they'll reveal the location of a couple others, so on so forth, but it's important to note they all load in after you meet the first one, so it's entirely possible to get them out of order (I got a few this way), though be aware one may give you a quest you're not ready for if you're not "supposed" to meet them yet. Unlike the main game none of the quests get locked off due to story progression, and unless I somehow completely missed it during my entire playthrough of the main game, another new aspect is that it'll tell you what level they recommend you be at to take them on.
  
  Ready for duty!

Story/Characters:

• A year after the main game ends, Shulk & Melia are taking a trip to [insert returning location here] to see how things are going, when a big laser fires upon their ship & they crash land on the Bionis' Shoulder. Joined up by Nene & Kino (children of the previous game's Riki) who had stowed away on board, they soon meet up with refugees from [insert returning location here] who were driven out by a foe they've dubbed the "Fog King", an etheral being who seems immune to all physical & ether (magic) attacks, which phase through it. To make matters worse is that racial tension has caused the military class to leave the civilian camp unguarded, meaning Shulk & Co. have their work cut out for them.
• Despite the serious nature of the narrative, the game is a lot like XC2 in that it seemingly always balances out the more sombre moments with something a bit more light hearted, and that's largely where Nene & Kino join in. Yes, they're Nopon with all the speach & personality quirks that come with that, but they're also actual children, so the whole schtick comes off as much more genuine from them & they never fail to bring a smile. Despite the short run time of Future Connected, I probably care more about them than some party members from the main game.
  
  A surprisingly heartfelt duo.
• By and large this is Melia's story though (kinda ironic considering I sidelined her, lol), as she was the party member with the most baggage left over at the end of the main game, and it provides a nice conclusion for her (and some expanded roles for characters around her narrative).
• However, a lot (read: practically all) of the phenomena surrounding the sudden appearance of the Fog King is left unanswered, and I can't help but think that in that regard, this is as much prologue for where they want to take the series next as it is epilogue for where it's been. Unfortunately, unless some eagle eyed fan has noticed something that flew over me, there was nothing here that seemed to tie things back into XC2 (which I assumed there might be). Whatever the case, while the main game had a satisfying end & I shouldn't be itching for more after playing this cart for nearly 140 hours, that's exactly where Future Connected left me, wanting more.

Graphics/Audio:

• While you'll largely be spending your time in one location, I think they did a pretty good job of bringing the Bionis' Shoulder to life, and there's just enough diversity to keep it feeling fresh (though in terms of native monsters, it kinda feels like they jammed a bit of everything in there, feeling a bit more of an ecological mishmash than the locations in the main game).
  
  
  
  
• While you can't carry over any equipment from the main game (for practical gameplay purposes), you can still use the appearance of armor you collected in the main game for cosmetic reasons (once you clear it you can set the appearance of Shulk's weapon too).
• When you first load into an area (after warping or some such) or when things get really, really busy, I noticed the occasional dropped frame, which I imagine had to do with your little Ponspector army flailing their little flags about everywhere. It's not something that bothered me, but I figured I should mention it for transparency.

Conclusion:

• It's brief enough that it's probably not worth buying XC:DE just for this, but if you've never played the original game (or are looking to re-experience it) this is definitely a nice bonus that sweetens the deal.
  
  A dessert worth digging into.

@RR529 You're a machine! Great piece on Future Connected. Sad to hear it's so short (Torna's 30+ hour length was basically perfect, IMO), but it's nice to hear that at least some of the streamlining and QoL improvements from that made their way here as well. All the screenshots certainly look vivid and pleasant, and I'll admit to being a little too pleased about being able to build a minor army of Nopons, like it's Pikmin or something.

@Ralizah, @RogerRoger (and everyone else who commented on my original review that I haven't yet mentioned), thanks!

I actually slowly wrote out the main Xenoblade piece over the course of about a week, which just happened to be about the length of time it took me to complete Future Connected (so I was close to finishing that up when I posted the first review). After that the Future Connected write up took only a couple days, as it was more "here's what's different", rather than a comprehensive detail of every little gameplay system.

I've told myself in the past that these pieces would be so much easier to write if I'd just do a paragraph or so each night for a week or two while I'm nearing the end of the game.

Invariably, though, I put off everything until the last possible minute and wind up with a couple of stressful writing sessions that last until the wee hours of the morning, and involve a lot of typing, deleting, over-eating, chair-spinning, getting distracted by youtube videos, randomly falling asleep, and, when I'm lucky, long stretches of time where I'm in the 'zone' and am incredibly productive, putting my words to text document exactly as I wished to phrase them.

That's basically how I got through college, too.

Super Mario Galaxy HD Remaster (via the Super Mario 3D All-Stars package)

Platform: Nintendo Switch

Completion status: 200% completion across two separate playthroughs; roughly 35 - 40 hours playtime total

Yasss Space Queen!

The third game in the Super Mario 3D All-Stars collection, Super Mario Galaxy ("SMG" or "Galaxy" henceforth), is the one I was most eager to revisit when it was first announced. I've mentioned this before, but it's a game I have a special history with, because I attribute my current love of Nintendo and video games in general to my experience with that game. I'd been a moderately-engaged gamer as a youth, but, as time wore on, I found myself becoming less and less enchanted with the hobby, and that interest bottomed-out in the dreadful seventh console generation. Nintendo games were gimmicky and cheap, and the HD twins at the time felt like they were filled with boorish Western AAA blockbusters that mostly didn't appeal to me. That all changed one sleepy Sunday when I chanced to finally play Galaxy and was, frankly, blown away by it. The incredible orchestral soundtrack! The playful platforming mechanics! The gorgeous art design! Afterward, I pulled out my long dormant GameCube, started playing on my PS2 and NDS more, and, a few years later, ponied up the money for a Nintendo 3DS, and the rest is history. I'd fallen deeply in love with the medium again, and particularly with Nintendo, who I'd fallen out with after the NES in favor of Sega and Sony's consoles. Anyway, you can imagine my enthusiasm when I found out one of my all-time favorite games was getting an HD re-release on my favorite platform of the generation, the Nintendo Switch.

Galaxy's release on the Wii in 2007 mirrored my own experience with it, in some ways, because after the explosive entrance of Super Mario 64 in 1996, the plumber went into a bit of a dormancy period when it came to hype new mainline releases. Super Mario Sunshine released on the GameCube, of course, but it wasn't the sort of universally acclaimed, blow-out success that SM64 had been. It wasn't until Galaxy released that the gaming masses fell fully back in love with our titular hero again. As with SM64 on the N64, his new adventure was a streak of brilliance that used exciting new hardware to tremendously successful effect. I've long contended that Galaxy's controls were one of the few almost fully perfect utilizations of the odd Wiimote & Nunchuk controller combination.

The challenge with its re-release, then, was adapting a game heavily reliant on pointer controls and motion gestures to entirely new hardware can could be played on the TV like a home console or off the TV like a Game Boy. I'll admit that, until this point, I never would have thought Super Mario Galaxy could work in portable form, but I had to try it out and judge for myself. The good news there, spoiler alert, is that, yes, it does work fairly well as a portable game in most regards (more on that in a bit). The bigger question, then, was if the game was still as wonderful in 2020 as it was in 2008 or so when I got around to playing it. And it... mostly is. It's still an absolutely wonderful experience. There are some flaws, though, that had been papered over in my memory. This is also the first time I've fully, 100% completed the game, and I'm going to talk about that as well, because the "post-game" content in Galaxy is extensive, but perhaps not in the way one might wish for.

When the game first begins, right at the title screen, it is immediately apparent to the player that the atmosphere and music in this title are going to be significantly different from what you might have encountered in your daddy's Mario game in the past. As mentioned previously, Super Mario Galaxy was the first game in the series to deliver a fully orchestral score, and good lord did Nintendo go all out with it! Galaxy's soundtrack is one of the most unique in the series, as it ditches the reliance on happy-go-lucky tunes and catchy ditties to deliver something more complex, varied, and emotional. A large part of the game's by turns melancholy, adventurous, and playful mood draws from this score. Throughout the review, I'm going to be linking and alluding to various pieces of music that crop up throughout the game, starting with the promised title screen theme above. Music is a big part of this game's identity, and I think it makes good backing audio to my discussion of it.

SMG transitions to a charming introduction where we learn about a Star Festival that takes place once every hundred years when a particular comet passes over the planet. Much as with Mario 64, Princess Peach has invited Mario to the festival, because she has "something she wants to give him." More of the same, er, "cake" that required an intimate trip to the Princess' castle back in '96, perhaps? Either way, the action picks up immediately with Mario arriving in the midst of the enchanting Star Festival, where the music immediately above begins to play. It's an interesting way to begin the game, although the carefree, magical atmosphere doesn't last for long.

Listening to the music above, you might be forgiven for expecting Darth Vader to appear, but it's just a far more menacing iteration of the Bowser airship theme that was first introduced back in Super Mario Bros. 3. Bowser's fleet of airships surrounds Peach's castle and chaos ensues as cannon fire rains down on the terrified crowd. Bowser boasts about creating a new galaxy before a UFO under his control cuts the ground out from under the castle, and the castle, along with the chunk of land immediately under it is literally lifted away. The koopa king's kidnapping game just went up a few notches! Mario attempts to hitch a ride and rescue the princess as Peach's castle is dragged off to space, but, after leaving Earth's orbit, he's hit by enemy fire and goes blasting off into space, unconscious.

It's actually all a fairly quick sequence, but it's incredibly cinematic for a Mario game. Mario awakens on tiny planetoid in the Gateway Galaxy (levels are called "galaxies" in this game, whether they're entire planets or small collections of platforms and space debris), surrounded by strange, rabbit-like creatures, who challenge him to catch them. This is when the game first introduces the player to the spherical level design that go on to define many of the game's levels. As Mario, the player will run around the tiny sphere in all directions, and, if he long jumps at the right points, can even start swirling around entire sections of the environment as the gravity well generated by the cosmic body draws Mario back to land. It's a largely danger-less playground that allows the player to start becoming accustomed to the controls and feel of the game. After catching the star bunnies, they are revealed to be small, star-shaped entities called "lumas," who tell you to go talk to their "mama" at the top of the level. This is where we first meet the mystical, possibly immortal Rosalina, who informs Mario that he will need to travel through the universe to save his "special one." She gives Mario a luma to keep with him, who enables him to use an invaluable technique Mario will need throughout the game.

Perhaps this is a good time to discuss Mario's moveset in this game. Super Mario Galaxy foregoes the complex assortment of movements of its 3D predecessors and offers players a smaller but perfectly balanced moveset. The long jump, somersault, side jump, triple jump, and ground pound all return in this iteration, alongside one new but extremely useful addition: the spin attack. Thanks to the luma who accompanies him on his journey, Mario is able to engage in a dynamic spin attack to knock back and/or defeat enemies, as well as break fragile objects in his environment, and it works out brilliantly. Even as someone who thought the punching and kicking in Super Mario 64 was pointless, I simply couldn't imagine playing this game without a melee attack. It feels great, and, to be honest, it makes controlling the italian plumber in any of his other 3D adventures (other than Galaxy 2) feel just a little bit worse.

In the Wii original, the spin attack was triggered by making a flicking motion with the remote. As someone who isn't typically a fan of waggle, I still found it to be reliable control-wise. Thanks to the gyrometer in the Switch, that functionality remains viable here, but, in one of the biggest control alterations in the Switch port, the spin attack is also now mapped to a face button, which makes precision movements much more viable with the Pro Controller, or especially in handheld mode, where the player would be forced to shake their entire machine.

The other primary alteration comes with regard to the game's ever-present use of pointer controls. In the Wii original, the wiimote pointer would create a cursor on the screen. This cursor was used to both interact with certain on-screen objects (more on this in a bit) as well as to scoop up "star bits," which are tiny, crystal-like objects that rain down from the heavens, explode out of enemies, and generally litter the game's various levels. These star bits are collected throughout the game and can be used both as a form of currency to unlock new levels (specific lumas will eat them, and when satisfied, will generate new, optional galaxies for the player to find) as well as a defensive tool that can be used to stun enemies by shooting at them.

Anyhow, this cursor long struck me as the almost sole reason SMG wouldn't work on future Nintendo consoles, but where there's a will, there is a way. Nintendo found two new ways to replace the wiimote pointer cursor in this HD re-release. The first method, in docked mode, is using the Switch's gyro functionality to emulate pointer controls, and it works... surprisingly well. Granted, the on-screen cursor will often become de-synchronized and wander across the screen after a period of time, but, as with Nintendo's own Splatoon series, one of the shoulder bumpers on the player's controller is a dedicated re-centering button, which realigns the gyro cursor with however the player happens to be holding the controller at that moment. While it's not as immediately intuitive as the Wii's pointer cursor solution, it quickly became instinctual for me to re-center the gyro right before gently shifting my controller to collect star bits. If anything, it avoids both the literally tiresome activity of pointing a remote directly at a sensor bar in front of the player and the issues that would crop up at times where I would have a hard time finding my cursor on-screen because the remote was pointed too high or too low, making this workaround my preferred control method.

In handheld mode, the game forces an entirely different method for collecting star bits. Gyro is abandoned in favor of touch controls! It's so rarely utilized that sometimes it's hard to remember, but the Nintendo Switch features a fully-functional capacitive touch screen. In place of shifting one's hands around, then, the player will literally use their finger to swipe across the screen. It can take some getting used to, given that it requires moving one's hands away from sticks and buttons temporarily, but it works about as well as one could possibly imagine, and even made certain levels easier to complete. I do wish, though, that the player was given an option to opt for gyro or touch controls in handheld mode, as this design choice will be alienating or uncomfortable to some.

Anyway, after initially meeting Rosalina, Mario encounters his first launch star, which, when triggered by a spin, will send him flying to the first real challenge in the game. This initial area, where Mario will have to rescue a Grand Star that is being used to power some enormous and presumably space-bound machine, functions as a sort of extended tutorial for the larger game, as the player will encounter various new mechanics that will keep popping up later in the game, such as collecting star chips that, when all collected, will form new launch stars, freeing lumas frozen in crystal, and triggering flip-switches (panels that alternate between binary states when stepped on; all the flip switches in a given area need to be activated simultaneously to trigger something in the environment, but obstacles, shifting platforms, and variances in gravity will all stand as challenges in these sections).

After freeing the first Grand Star, Mario is taken by Rosalina to the Comet Observatory, Rosalina's starship and what becomes the main hub area of the game, equivalent to Peach's Castle in Mario 64 and Delfino Plaza in Mario Sunshine. We learn that Bowser attacked the Observatory during the Star Festival, causing its power sources (Power Stars and Grand Stars) to spill out across the universe. With the returned Grand Star, a small portion of the Observatory regains power, allowing Mario to teleport to a small number of nearby galaxies to retrieve missing power stars.

This very basic piece is what greets the player when they first start the game proper and explore the small chunk of the Observatory available to them after collecting the first Grand Star. This piece changes and grows in complexity over the course of the game as the player finds more Grand Stars and unlocks more of the starship until, finally, the multi-tiered complexity of the game's hub level is unlocked in full, and the piece full evolves into something more complex and grand.

Super Mario Galaxy is reminiscent of Mario 64 in terms of how its levels are wildly diverse and thematically distinct zones disconnected from the hub area. It's worth talking about the increased focus on linearity at this point. Let's start with the hub area. While atmospheric and lovely, the Comet Observatory is probably the shallowest hub area in the series to date, as there are only a few (very significant) 'secrets' to find, versus the much more multi-faceted complexity of Peach's Castle, which hid all sorts of hidden areas, secret stars, shortcuts to different sections of the castle, and so on. In general, there's rarely much of a reason to explore Rosalina's starship, and it primarily functions as a bit of window-dressing when going between different galaxies.

This focus on straightforward area design and lack of exploration extends also to the game's levels as well. Outside of a few particular levels, where the player will be able to find hidden lumas who will be able to unlock alternative power star challenges, each star mission in a galaxy is an incredibly straightforward affair, reminiscent of 2D Mario games in that there's usually an unambiguous path toward a Power Star at the end of the level. This has disappointed some, who had to wait until 2017 to get another sandbox Mario game. It's pretty much unquestionable that Galaxy's approach to progression and level design, and especially its even more linear and streamlined sequel, anticipated the direction of the 3D games in the Wii U era with Super Mario 3D World.

This focus on linearity isn't really a bad thing, though. What Mario Galaxy lacks in exploration it makes up for with incredibly creative level design, unique platforming mechanics, and fantastic set-pieces. One that struck me immediately about Galaxy is how varied and its level themes are. Nintendo has been pilloried in some quarters in the past for not really experimenting with the types of levels that show up in these games, but the standard fire, ice, field, etc. levels that even littered Mario 64 aren't really present here, or, when they are, see massive twists or alterations. There are ice-themed galaxies, for example, but they are usually built around Mario manipulating both fire and ice to progress through the levels, and, with the ice flower power-up, Mario often ends up skating like a gymnastic professional across larger sections of the levels, or using his ice powers to selectively freeze spouts of water in order to get where he needs to go. There are levels themed entirely around gigantic space toys, or raids on Bowser's airships, or even interacting with a race of massive, sentient bees. It's a creative streak that has largely been absent in the series since Super Mario World.

The music also helps to make these galaxies feel distinct. Individual galaxies can lean hard on the 'epic space music' thing as well. For example, I love the sweeping theme that plays in the Battlerock Galaxy, linked above. Amazing music, but, again, VERY unusual for a Mario game. There is also a lot of music in this game that evokes a sense of adventurous grandeur, as with the deservedly famous theme that plays in the Gusty Garden Galaxy (linked below).

It's also worth mentioning that, while levels are broadly linear insofar as the land tends to direct you one way, many of the levels are very "wide linear." In that sense, Mario Galaxy is less Uncharted 2 than it is Uncharted 4: there's only one place to really go, but there's often a lot of space around you regardless, making it feel more like navigating actual terrain and less like being on rails.

The platforming itself is primarily about interacting with gravity. One common features in more futuristic levels where you're running around gigantic structures or machines in space, for example, is the use of artificial gravity zones, where Mario will be forced to up walls, across ceilings, riding platforms that move across a shifting spectrum of gravity zones while you're made to dodge obstacles, etc. I alluded to this before, but you will also bounce between different spherical bodies, where you'll need to jump high enough to get caught in the gravity wells generated by different platforms. The gravity manipulation gives the Galaxy games a feel that's unlike any other Mario game in the series.

In terms of how levels are distributed, Galaxy is, again, reminiscent of Mario 64. In Mario 64, you'd unlock rooms with power stars to access a variety of paintings, which you could tackle in semi-non-linear fashion. But to access later levels, you still needed to hit certain star thresholds, which helped to direct the flow of the game. Mario Galaxy does something sort of similar. Every time you unlock a new section of the Observatory with a Grand Star, a new set of galaxies will be made available to the player. As long as they hit the requisite number of Power Stars (presumably, the reasoning behind this is you need a certain number of stars to have the power to be teleported out to specific galaxies, which gives progression a nicely organic flavor missing in Mario 64), players can often play these galaxies in any order. Like in 64, though, the game will require the player to complete boss stages in order to unlock further sections of the game (bosses seem to be the ones who are holding the Grand Stars).

This is a good opportunity to talk about the bosses in this game. Mario games have a... rough history with bosses. The boss variety and difficulty in all of the 2D games, and in Super Mario 64 as well were pretty pathetic, honestly. Super Mario Sunshine went a bit further in terms of having more varied boss encounters, but Super Mario Galaxy does a particularly good job of regularly distributing these encounters and making them feel like proper setpieces, whether you're using rock hard boos to smash up a rock monster or pounding the ground at key moments to flush out an enemy that's hunting you from underneath the ground. They're still easy, mind you, and they don't possibly begin to compare to the bosses in series like Donkey Kong Country or The Legend of Zelda, but they still represent another area of clear improvement from preceding Mario titles.

In terms of improvements from previous 3D Mario games, it should be noted that Mario Galaxy features one of the widest range of power-ups in the series (before Mario Odyssey made every object and enemy in the game a potential power-up, at least!), including new additions like Ice Mario, Bee Mario (Mario dresses up in an adorable bee costume and can flitter around), Spring Mario (Mario turns into a spring and can bounce around), Boo Mario (Mario turns into a ghost, hovers around, and can even turn temporarily translucent), and even a form of Mario (unlocked via one of the Observatory's few secret stars) who can fly around. It's like the Wing Cap from Mario 64, except using it's actually fun and easy to use.

There's still a lot to be said about the levels in this game, though. I'll start with a discussion of Prankster Comet challenges. Specific levels in this game, once completed, will unlock the chance for comet challenges to appear. Prankster Comet challenges award power stars and remix aspects of galaxies you visited previously. Speedy comets will require the player to speedrun levels they previously completed, sometimes giving them only a couple of minutes to reach the end goal, which requires a familiarity with the level design. Daredevil Comets will require the player to complete levels, and sometimes even more challenging boss levels, while capped at one point of health (if you're hit even once, you die and have to start over from the beginning of the level, essentially). Fast Foe Comets are exactly what they sound like: you play through the level again, but this time with enemies that move super-fast. Often these comets appear in levels filled with giant enemies that will kill you in one hit.

Purple Comets unlock purple coin challenges, which function very much like red coin challenges in previous games, except now you have to run around some of the more expansive levels in the game collecting 100 purple coins. Some of these are just time consuming, but the timed purple coin challenges can be incredibly difficult, and there's at least one notoriously difficult comet challenge that tasks the player with collecting 100 of these coins in a level where the ground permanently disappears out from under Mario when he steps on it. The most interesting of the comet challenges, though, are the Cosmic Comet challenges. In these challenges, a shadowy clone of Mario very much like the one from Super Mario Sunshine will challenge you to a race to the end of a level. Whoever grabs the power star at the end of the level first is the victor.

That brings us to... sigh... the motion controlled levels. To start with this discussion, I'll link a piece of music. Listen to it, and I think you'll begin to get a sense of where we're going here.

Yes, it's this game's version of the slide theme, the wacky, infuriating, carnival-esque music that portends something terrible. Y'see, Nintendo can never just make a perfect masterpiece. They always, always, always find something annoying to introduce that drags it from the heights of excellence just that little bit. I guess Nintendo thought the price we pay for this game's fantastic platforming is pure game design trolling in the form of motion-controlled vehicle levels.

These were created, I suppose, to show off the capabilities of the Wiimote. The manta ray challenge races task the player with using gyro to control a manta ray as it races down a stream of water suspended over space. This is about as fun as it sounds. Interestingly enough, though, it's the most merciful of these level types, since you have to hold a button to accelerate, which allows you to kind of inch along at your own pace (although still fast enough to get to the goal in time to collect the power star), and it actually works as well or better in portable mode than it does with a Pro Controller on the TV. You, of course, twist your controller or game console to change the direction the manta ray is going.

Now listen to this theme. It's basically insanity in musical form. That's appropriate, given the levels it plays during.

The far more infuriating motion controlled levels are these ones where Mario is balancing on a ball. Holding the controller flat is the default position, and then angling it upwards or downwards sends Mario flying through the course on an unstable ball. Of course, in order to make it as painful as humanly possible, hitting enemies will make your ball elevate, which can easily send you flying off-course. There also aren't any checkpoints in these levels, so, ah, have fun with that. The motion control detection is wonkier here than it was on the Wii, where I believe you held the Wiimote upright when controlling it. There were points where I felt like I was having to turn my Pro Controller almost entirely upside down, and, in general. I must have looked like a tremendous idiot when I was attempting to get through these exercises in suffering.

While we're at it, there are also pointer cursor (or, in the case of the Switch version, gyro cursor) controlled levels, where you have to point at specific points on the screen with the cursor and have Mario navigate to them. Not a problem normally, but then you get these challenge levels where you're navigating obstacles with gyro cursor-controlled movement, and it's just kind of awkward. It works about as well, if not better than it did on the Wii, at least.

Thankfully, these terrible levels make up a very small number of the game's total level count. They stick out a zit on an otherwise clear and beautiful face.

I guess I should mention the in-game camera as well. It's very reminiscent of the camera in Super Mario 64 insofar as it often can't be adjusted, and the game just of positions the camera where it thinks it needs to be. In SM64, this was a nightmare because it would get stuck at odd angles/behind objects/etc. Super Mario Galaxy's camera is what Mario 64's camera wanted to be when it grew up. 95% of the time, despite not being adjustable, it gives you the perfect angle to see what needs to be seen and avoid obstacles. And, in fairness, a full 3D camera would work VERY poorly with this game's focus on smaller, spherical platforms. But 5% of the time, the camera works poorly, and it's what led to the bulk of my deaths in the game, whether through not being able to judge distance adequately, or just getting stuck on the scenery. It's still a mostly excellent in-game camera, but, while I'm complaining, I figured I'd address it.

Super Mario Galaxy is a game full of epic sweeps and adventure and quiet beauty, and a big reflection of that change in atmosphere can be attributed to Rosalina. I haven't had much to say about this game's now iconic new character, but she really was one of the best additions to the entire franchise, for a number of reasons. For one thing, in a series with frankly terrible female representation over the years, she really stands out, insofar as she is a powerful and (by Mario game standards) complex character who stands as Mario's partner in this game. What really made her stick in the memory, I imagine, is her backstory.

Throughout the game after the library section of the Observatory is initially unlocked, Mario will be able to find Rosalina reading a story book to her star children. It quickly becomes apparent that this storybook is actually Rosalina's backstory, and it's... well, I won't dwell on it much, except to say that it's gorgeously illustrated and extremely emotional. It adds a surprising amount of depth to her character, and it's the closest a Mario game has ever come, and likely ever will come, to frankly exploring themes related to love, longing, loneliness, and death. It's a completely optional thing, and interestingly, was never originally planned to be in the game. One of the developers apparently wrote it on their own and just sort of smuggled it in without calling too much attention to it. I'm glad they did, though, as it adds a welcome layer of depth and emotional resonance to the game that simply don't exist in other Mario titles.

I'll link some of the music from the storybook sections below, which should give you a sense of their tone:

I should also mention that the game's climax, after the final boss, is surprisingly powerful and resonant as well. I won't describe it, but it's another very cinematic section of the game, and, while unusual for a Mario platformer, which are usually fairly low-stakes, it fits with the wider cosmic scope of the game. Needless to say, this is likely the only Mario game that will ever touch on ideas related to self-sacrifice or the origin and meaning of life.

Rosalina isn't the only new character introduced by the game, though! Super Mario Galaxy made another great contribution to the larger Mario franchise with the intrepid explorer, Captain Toad, who would play a larger role in Super Mario 3D World before finally getting his own (very cute) spinoff game on the Wii U. With that said, his role in Galaxy is pretty tiny; he primarily shows up in the background a finds a power star or two.

Luigi has a surprisingly large presence in the game, especially if you decide to 200% it. Throughout the game, Luigi will send letters to Mario showing him trapped somewhere in a level, and, to collect the relevant power star, the player will have to figure out what level he's hidden in and rescue him from whatever predicament he's in. Once the player has collected all 120 stars in their initial playthrough and beaten the final level twice (you have to beat it initially after collecting 60 stars to unlock some of the late-game content, and then beat it again to officially 100% a run), a small cutscene will play after the credits, and Luigi will be unlocked as a playable character.

So, if you want to see and do everything, you have to beat the entire game again as Luigi (which gets pretty weird when Luigi starts sending letters to a copy of himself, which is acknowledged but never really addressed in-game, lol). I was excited to see what would be different, but... it really isn't. Luigi is only the tiniest bit more slippery than Mario, so he doesn't really work as a hard mode. So, for all intents and purposes, you're just playing through the same game again.

For my second playthrough, I played entirely on my Switch Lite, which the game works surprisingly well with. It's not often I can play games that run at a locked 60fps on my Lite, and while I wish Nintendo had given me the option, only using the touchscreen to collect star bits still worked out well. I'm not much for replaying games, especially after beating them initially, but I do love this game, and having it on the Switch Lite meant it was easy to play through the game a second time while watching TV and/or listening to podcasts, which helped me to grind through it all again more easily.

And... what is the game's reward for going through this trouble? You get a secret unlockable level, but it's really lame. It's just the star festival, but this time you're running around collecting purple coins. That's it. No challenge whatsoever. It's a bit of a letdown considering how much goes into unlocking it. And it's in this one area where I will grant that the sequel, Super Mario Galaxy 2, is roundly superior: the Grandmaster Galaxy from that game is BRUTAL, and it started the great tradition of Mario games rewarding full completion with incredible gauntlets that test every skill players have learned in those respective games. Alas, the tradition didn't start here, and as much as I enjoy this game, I have to admit that it's not worth completing two full playthroughs. The ideal Super Mario Galaxy playthrough is one 120 star run. But it was fun to do absolutely everything in this game at least once in my life.

I noted that the perfect performance was a highlight of my experience with the game in portable form on my Switch Lite, and this is characteristic of the entire experience, frankly. Super Mario Galaxy was the first 3D Mario to run at 60fps, which set a new standard for the series (Galaxy 2, 3D World and Odyssey both run at this framerate as well). It really is difficult to go back from the locked, smooth framerate of Galaxy to the frame-y performance of previous games. This, of course, carries over perfectly from the Wii original, and performance is basically perfect in the Switch port of the game.

As with the other releases in the Super Mario 3D All-Stars collection, not a lot has been done to touch up this game, with the primary improvement being that it runs at a significantly higher resolution on Nintendo Switch, generally aiming for 1080p output when docked and a native 720p output in portable mode. This would be a pretty damning indictment for a port of virtually any other game released back in 2007, but the truly impressive thing is that Super Mario Galaxy, which was an absolute stunner on the Wii, still holds up extremely well on a modern system. It's the only games in the collection that doesn't look or feel old, and it wouldn't take much work at all for it to stand alongside Super Mario Odyssey visually. Most of that is likely down to the game's gorgeous art direction, but character models and environments are extremely clean and reasonably detailed as well.

For a lot of franchises, going to space is a last-ditch effort to revive flagging creative efforts and restore relevancy where it has all but disappeared. It turns out that sending Mario to space was exactly the thing Nintendo needed to do to give the series a new lease on life, though. I can't quite give it a perfect score due to some notable flaws that slightly damage the experience, but Super Mario Galaxy is still one of those touchstone games that remind people why they keep buying Nintendo consoles in the first place. It's a brilliant and creative 3D platformer filled with fun level design, perfectly balanced mechanics, gorgeous music, and ranks as one of the italian plumber's finest outings on any system. It was brilliant on the Nintendo Wii, and it's just as brilliant on the Nintendo Switch. It gets the strongest possible 9/10 from me.

@Ralizah, fantastic Galaxy review! It truly is a special game, and I'm glad I got to replay it on Switch.

Funnily enough, the Manta Ray levels (particularly the first one) were the motion controlled levels that gave me the worst trouble. I died so much on that first one. The "Ball" levels never felt good, but I somehow managed to stumble through them each on my first try (except for that little end stage segment, the one you screenshot with the lava, and even all of my deaths there had to do with me misjudging momentum/depth when it came to jumping on that little platform in the middle with the 1-UP mushroom. Once I managed that I don't think I had an issue with the rest of the segment).

@Ralizah Brilliant review of Galaxy! I honestly don’t have as many fond memories as I do of Sunshine as my Wii disc got covered in silly putty in about 2010 (don’t ask) but it really is a special game. I like the motion controls though, and do really miss motion controls in a lot of games as the Joy-Cons have the capabilities but haven’t had the same push.

@nessisonett Silly putty, huh?

I'm not reactively anti-motion controls (you've probably picked up on how pro-gyro aiming I am by now), but I feel like it's SO easy to integrate them into a game poorly. The motion controlled levels are gimmicky and distracting. When they're more natural, and designed to complement the overall game design, like using the pointer controls/gyro to collect star bits, or using waggle to spin attack, I feel like it works better.

It's one reason why I prefer the smaller 3DS library overall to what was on the NDS: by the time the 3DS came out, developers weren't fixated on putting weird, gimmicky control schemes into their games, and so the touch-screen was utilized when it made sense. Thus, instead of something frustrating like an entirely touch-controlled Zelda game, you got Zelda games with menu and item management integrated into the touch screen, making them easier to manage.

As to capabilities of the Switch that are underutilized... it AMAZES me that almost everyone forgets that the system has a touchscreen. Galaxy is pretty much one of the first major games on the system to use it in any sort of notable way.

@RR529 Yeah, Galaxy is awesome.

I think the primary reason the Manta Ray levels were so much less frustrating for me is that acceleration was controlled by holding a button, whereas the ball levels have you accelerate based on how much you're twisting the controller. Not only do I have more control over my own speed in the manta ray levels, but my only real concern with the motion controls is what direction my character is heading, whereas, in the ball levels, I have to factor in momentum as well.

Although the ball levels are definitely more forgiving in terms of the level design overall. Thank god! Ball rolling controls with manta racing level design would truly be a nightmare.

@RogerRoger I've talked to a lot of creatives, and some level of self-doubt is pretty universal among most of them. On some level, it's healthy, as it forces them to be more self-critical and perhaps more reflective of their actual weaknesses.

With that said, other than an editing pass to check grammar and sentence structure and whatnot, I generally don't make any major changes once I'm done writing a piece for this thread either. Editing is primarily down to making smart cuts that tighten up a piece and remove fluff, and I created this thread less for people to post super-polished final drafts (although they certainly can, if that's what they want to do) and more for people to fully explore their own feelings on games they've played. It's why I'm not terribly worried about how lengthy my posts frequently get in here.

Also, there's a belief I subscribe to that any type of structured writing is effective toward improving one's mastery of the craft overall. I don't mean that writing game reviews makes you good at writing fiction, or visa versa, but it certainly helps to find and establish your 'voice' and rehearse your command of the written form. It'd be interesting to know if there were larger cognitive benefits to this as well, although that'd require the sort of focused research I don't have the will to conduct. There's a reason I never did anything with that psych degree I earned.