Super Mario 64

it speaks to the quality of this game that it can have all of these flaws (level design could be better, camera being shitty etc, non existent story) and still be comfortably one of the best games of all time (if we're being real probably top 10-20).

the kicker here is just the sheer expression in movement. super mario 64 is almost immersive sim-like in its approach to design, in that it throws all of the tools you would ever need at you from the beginning and lets you loose in its 'sandbox', i.e. you are able to use all forms of movement (triple jump, backflips, high jumps, long jumps, running etc) from the beginning, and then just throws levels at you and tells you to master them by collecting stuff and solving puzzles. that's literally it. that's all it needs to do and the depth created is just immense. from the very beginning of the game it's almost overwhelming the number of different jumps you can pull off, and over time you're jumping all over the place like its second nature without even thinking about what buttons you need to press. this controller being an extension of yourself feeling is something very few games can say they achieve, and the subsequent flow state you find yourself in after mastering them.

i also love the more precision platforming approach compared to something like super mario odyssey. these worlds are goofy and treacherous and you're not running around huge sprawling levels here so much as you are slowly learning their tricks as you go. obviously the whole camera being incredibly clunky and borderline unusable criticism is fair enough considering this more precise style of platforming, but honestly this shit is so good i can look past any of this game's flaws.

i wasn't sure on the whole collect one star -> get kicked out of level -> go and find the next one game loop at first, but honestly it's one of the most unique and interesting parts of this game and is done as well here as it is in something like galaxy, in fact it's probably better here than in any other mario game. some stars are downright tricky to figure out how to get and i seriously don't understand how people would've found some of them back before the internet lol. but each star is like a little puzzle and getting kicked out almost forces you to reset, and meditate on every single one of the star titles before actually going into the level. it's as much an exploration/puzzle as it is a platforming game and it requires the player to be so comfortable in each of these worlds and so articulate with its controls. the devs of this really figured out how to squeeze out every ounce of goodness from this game as possible.

all in all this game was so ahead of its time and probably the only mario game that can hold up to the likes of odyssey (which is insane to say). there is no other game like this and nothing has ever, and maybe ever will come close to this.

I adore every second of this game (except for the gay rainbow carpet, I flipping hate that level!!! Will speak on this later on in the review) and wish to play forever but my little fingers will get tired by the 48th hour. The level designs are cooky and crazy and show what a true 3d game should be. Mario is a silly man collecting stars for a woman that hates him. Back to the levels, they’re really fun to explore and collecting stars can be a pain in the bottom such as the one on top of the roof in the ghost mansion. Bomb om battlefield is lovely with lovely music and it’s nice how THERE ARE WATER CANNONS THAT SHOOT AT YOU🤬🤬🤬🤬 music is stellar and the rainbow carpet world sucks, I kept falling off the damn carpet to avoid being burnt by the fire beams. I was listening to Björk (Volta) at the time of playing the world so it made me feel better since I was getting mad at how many times I kept falling off and getting burnt. Overall, this game was
ahead of it’s time showing game developers how NOT to make a 3d game (just kidding loool, I mean the opposite of not) and really got nice stuff.🙏

Além da revolução que inspirou, esse jogo tem uma magia única difícil de exemplificar.

Talvez seja a trilha sonora do Koji Kondo, o design de fases expansivo, a direção de arte deliciosamente experimental, ou tudo isso junto.

I hate using the phrase “for its time” when talking about any critical piece of art or entertainment across all mediums. I’m of the opinion that art does not age out of its point of quality, but our perceptions become jaded over time as trends change along with our sensibilities. Many people are deterred from ever experiencing something “before their time” based on some arbitrary time span they’ve limited to themselves. Do they consider something to be “old and irrelevant” after the initial hype of its release year, or is it after the genre or movement the piece of media belongs to overstays its welcome? I have never subscribed to this notion of relegating the past to obscurity due to personal constraints. Many of my favorite albums and films were released far before I was an iota of dust spread across the astral plane of existence, and this goes for a few of my favorite video games as well. My perspective on this matter is that an experience that may have a conspicuous number of years is still fresh to the uninitiated. Any renowned piece of art should retain its most essential qualities, and those qualities should persist past the cruel mistress of time. It seems to work for most lauded works of art, and sometimes I wish people would be more open to exploring the past to form the mold of their present. With that being said, I cannot fathom why anyone would continue to give the same amount of praise to Super Mario 64 in this day and age.

I almost feel guilty criticizing Super Mario 64 as vocally as I do. It’s like denouncing your grandfather, who was once a star athlete, for not having the same impressive physical prowess he once did when he was in his twenties. I have a certain level of respect for Super Mario 64 as one has for their grandfather, for it is the originator of the 3D platformer genre. Super Mario 64 was Mario’s first foray into the third dimension. Nintendo had to rework the entire Super Mario formula that they built upon for two generations to fit Mario into a 3D environment. What Nintendo created was unparalleled by any game before it and ushered in the everlasting 3D era. Suppose someone wants to make a case for both Jumping Flash games on the PS1 predating Super Mario 64. In that case, it’s at least the primary influence for most of the 3D platformers that followed (Banjo-Kazooie, Jak & Daxter, Battle for Bikini Bottom, etc.) Growing up, most of my favorite games owed so much to Super Mario 64 that not recognizing its impact on gaming feels borderline ungrateful. My main contention with Super Mario 64 stems from everyone’s collective inability to point out its obvious flaws. Since the early 3D era, Super Mario had somehow retained the same reputation it once had when it was released in 1996. The subsequent 3D Mario releases and many 3D platformers inspired by Super Mario 64 have taken the rough foundation that their inspiration established and made something objectively better. Yet, people still rank Super Mario 64 on top among all of the other 3D platformers to this day. I can only rationalize the lack of honest criticism for Super Mario 64 is due to the powerful opiate of nostalgia. I have little to no nostalgia bias for Super Mario 64, so I can efficiently see this game for what it is. Even if this was my first 3D platformer, not even the most rose-tinted nostalgia glasses could sustain Super Mario 64’s reputation.

The most obvious of Super Mario 64’s glaring blemishes are the graphics. Early 3D graphics across all games of the fifth generation of consoles have not aged well in the slightest, and Super Mario 64’s status as a launch title for one of these systems means that the game has the most rudimentary of rudimentary 3D graphics. 3D models of familiar characters and enemies resemble globular chunks of graphical flesh as if someone made them out of modeling clay and had them colored. The physical attributes of these characters are simplified to a fundamental degree. Mario’s hands look swollen to highlight their presence on his body. His mouth is covered entirely by his iconic mustache to work around the graphical incapabilities of fluid mouth movement. The elements of the foreground are also stripped down to their core traits. For example, Peach’s castle’s trees are skinny brown trunks with a green glob of color on top to resemble the leaves. Levels like Bob-omb Battlefield use the most elementary of color schemes to signify the grassy and mountainous terrain of the level, using a simple green and brown, respectively. Snowy levels like Cool Cool Mountain and Snowman’s Land are caked with a grayish-white color that is supposed to represent snow, with a flurry for an added effect. All of this color can only do so much to mask the growing pains of 64-bit graphics as the rough pixels tend to bleed through every rendered model and background. It’s a shame that the stunning pixel art of Super Mario World 1 & 2 had to be compromised in the early 3D era because it was a vast aesthetic improvement over the Mario games on the NES. In terms of presentation, Super Mario 64 is a total regression. Nintendo was no longer building on the foundation they established but started anew. The saving grace of the crude visuals is that the color pallets compensate to make the overall presentation look bright and accessible. They retain the vivacious nature of the Mario series despite the amateurish-looking 3D graphics.

While Mario’s look isn’t as expressive as it once was in 2D, Mario’s presence had never been so lively and charismatic. The extra dimensions of 3D gaming led to a new possibility that could not have been possible with 2D sprites and pixels: full-fledged voice acting. Super Mario 64 marks the second time Mario is voiced by Charles Martinet, the first in a mainline Mario game. He voiced Mario in a spinoff variety game called Mario’s FUNdamentals and provides Mario with the same jolly persona, complete with a stereotypical Italian accent. Mario, however, doesn’t utter complete sentences in Super Mario 64. He instead makes noises along with the occasional interjection like “mamma mia!” Babbling these quips and yelping sounds may diminish Mario as a character of substance, but Nintendo never intended their mascot to be complicated in the first place. Mario’s role is to jump onto numerous platforms and dodge enemies and obstacles along his way, so emitting these noises serve well to accentuate Mario’s robust status as a platformer protagonist. These vocal noises are also used consistently as there is a different sound for each of Mario’s moves and a smattering of scenarios. Mario grunts whenever he bashes his head on a platform, yelps a long-winded scream when he plummets to his death, gurgles when drowning, and yells in agony if he touches something hot like lava. While these noises are constant, they never grated on me. They make Mario a much more dynamic character that is more involved with his surroundings. Mario expressing his actions and reactions vocally is more entertaining than the jumping sounds and various death jingles throughout the 3D Mario games.

Although the game is as visually appealing as an old man’s taint, I can’t sincerely criticize Super Mario 64 too harshly because of its primitive 3D graphics. However, I can lambaste the horrid controls of the game to my heart’s content. The new 3D environment allows Nintendo to rework Mario’s movements and make him more acrobatic than he ever was on a 2D axis. Mario’s former “Jumpman” persona is on full display here as a well-timed triple jump combination will send Mario to soaring heights like a superhuman gymnast. When crouching, Mario can execute a backflip so impressive that Mario will bow after each one. Quick, accurate pressing of the same button will have Mario leaping forward, launching himself across wide gaps. Along with using his body weight and brown loafers to stomp enemies into the dirt, Mario can now punch and kick to defend himself from Bowser’s minions. His regular jump move can also be supplemented by a ground pound move that involves Mario flattening enemies with the crushing force of his ass. Standard powerups like the mushroom and fire flower that used to aid Mario on his quest to recover the princess have been omitted from Super Mario 64 because Mario no longer needs them. His entire body is now a force to be reckoned with in combat and traversing the world.

In theory, Mario’s more expansive movement should make it easier for the player to reach each level’s goals. In practice, Mario has never been harder to control, thanks to primitive 3D development. The leap to 3D has forced the usually smooth and aerodynamic Mario to take an inordinate amount of precision to execute any of his moves. On top of the backflip, Mario can also complete a side cartwheel with the same button to make Mario leap to the same heights. The player will find themselves attempting this move over the backflip because it doesn’t break Mario’s pacing when moving. However, executing this move proves to be finicky due to needing a certain amount of momentum. This momentum is difficult to discern, which is frustrating considering this move is the more practical of the two on the field. Mario can use the wall jump move taken straight from Super Metroid to bounce from high, parallel walls to reach a greater height, but each hop from one wall to another requires pinpoint accuracy. Most of the time, Mario bonks his head and hurts himself from falling on the way down. The wall jump from Super Metroid was an exploit in the game’s mechanics that was never intended to be used by the developers, and wall jumping in that game felt more natural than it does in Super Mario 64. The controls even falter with the most fundamental of physics. The basic function of turning Mario’s body around will often result in falling from a ledge or narrow platform because he turns himself as rigidly as a robot. The simple task of turning Mario around on an airborne platform resulted in more premature deaths than I could count, and the lack of fluidity in the controls is so egregious that I can’t justify making excuses for its already primitive nature. Since the first Super Mario Bros., Nintendo has made great strides in improving Mario’s inflexible movement from the first game, and Super Mario 64 is an apparent regression in this department. A Mario game with controls that take a significant amount of time to master goes against the accessible nature of the series.

It doesn’t help that the horrid controls coincide with the most primeval of camera controls. Before Mario sets foot in Peach’s castle, a Lakitu hoisting a video camera by a fishing rod halts Mario and explains that he’ll be the one to film Mario’s adventure. It gives the player an explanation to something the developers thought would confuse the player, like the guy who explains Norman’s incentives at the end of Psycho. While I find the premise of setting up a Lakitu to ease the player into the frightening new concept of camera controls amusing, I have to remind myself that gamers in the mid-’90s hadn’t fathomed anything that would require camera controls. Super Mario 64 was the first major title in gaming to feature interactive camera controls, and it was an ambitious undertaking that was the cutting edge of gaming innovation. Unfortunately, like most things Super Mario 64 pioneered, one can expect the camera controls to be as primitive and underdeveloped as humanly possible. Analog control may have become the norm in the new age of 3D gaming thanks to the N64 controller, but the same advancements with controlling the characters were not put into the camera control. The player operates the camera, with the four yellow buttons on the controller's right side, simultaneously playing as the Lakitu as well as Mario. Because Mario’s range of movement requires all control of the analog stick, it would be more fitting more the camera controls to act as free-flowing as Mario. Sadly, the developers most likely hadn’t anticipated that restricting the camera to four measly directions would result in a stiff, frustrating experience for the player. The camera controls don’t even utilize the full extent of the limited range of directions. For some reason, the camera confines the degree of depth and width that the player can see, and it’s quite impractical in several scenarios. There is no good reason why the player is prohibited from looking in front of them while balancing Mario on a thin, narrow platform. The camera will often warp behind a concrete wall and obscure Mario from the player’s view, resulting in unintentional mistakes made by the player. Each camera movement is also languid and accompanied by a peculiar noise that sounds like the camera is expanding (who the fuck thought that was a good idea?). As we all know, the spirit of the sound does not match the execution. I suppose this is what Mario gets trusting one of Bowser’s minions to man the camera on his adventure. If the objective was to kill Mario with the camera, then mission accomplished; it’s the most clever thing the Koopa King has ever devised.

My gratefulness for Super Mario 64 doesn’t just pertain to tolerating elements that have aged like moldy cheese due to their ingenuity. There are still plenty of things about Super Mario 64 that I legitimately enjoy. One of the most appealing aspects of the 3D platformer is the dichotomy between the chaotic levels and the peaceful hub world, and Peach’s castle is a splendid first hub to illustrate this contrast. Peach’s regal home that she seems to be away from most of the time is one of the only structures in this game that is rendered masterfully with the rough 3D graphics. This towering stonewall fortress is a marvel of architecture, and its tranquil outside setting with chirping birds and sunny skies are matched with the spacious walls on the inside to make the player feel safe. The walls of Peach’s castle also feature the first of a brilliant design philosophy that became a platformer trope: a free-flowing level select option in the hub world. Super Mario Bros. 3 may have given the player some freedom in deciding the trajectory of levels, but Super Mario 64 loosens the chains of linearity to the point of breaking completely. In the foyer of Peach’s castle, there are doors with stars on them, and the rooms behind those doors house the levels. The level’s location still isn’t pronounced as the rooms tend to be empty, with a giant painting being the only notable object. One leap of faith and curiosity into the painting will plunge Mario into that level. Some level entrances aren’t displayed as paintings and require the player to test their perception to reach the later levels. Levels like Big Boo’s Haunt are unlocked by defeating a Boo with a cage inside it in an outdoor grove, Hazy Maze Cave is a dark portal at the bottom of a floor, and Shifting Sand Land is an inconspicuous wall in the corners of the castle’s basement. Unlocking each of these levels is an ambitious and engrossing method of level selection when gamers were used to games providing a simple level select menu or linear progression.

This sense of freedom translates wonderfully in Super Mario 64’s level design. The primary goal of Super Mario 64 is to collect several golden stars, six per level, with the secret objective of collecting 100 coins as an extra star for each level. A certain number of stars will unlock more of the castle after fighting Bowser for a key. While the white level select menu may give the illusion of linear progression, the level layouts are spacious playgrounds where the player can roam around and find the level’s stars in any order they please. The persuasion to explore that the player gets a taste of in the hub of Peach’s castle is on full display with each level and exploring the crevices for all six stars of their own volition. The number of stars the player has to achieve to unlock the next area of the castle is lenient, so the player can choose which stars they get to reach that amount. The more cryptic stars or infuriating levels can be bypassed entirely to achieve this goal, a relieving aspect that the collectathon subgenre of 3D platformer has adopted for its groundwork. My only grievance with this ethos of level progression is that the player leaves the level once a star is collected. For the smaller areas like Bob-omb Battlefield and Cool Cool Mountain, exiting the level is reasonable because the levels are smaller and tightly contained. On the other hand, levels designed for Mario to ascend upward, like Tick Tock Clock and Tall Tall Mountain, restart the player from square one and expect them to make the trek back up. I wish I could collect each star at my leisure without being interrupted by Mario exiting the level. Still, the developers most likely implemented this feature to pad the game because each level is limited in size.

Booting Mario out of a level is also a penalty if Mario dies. Instead of triumphantly jumping from the level with a star in hand, the level will violently eject Mario, bruising both his ego and his noggin. Expelling Mario from a level for succeeding feels a bit harsh, but it makes sense in the context of failure. The new 3D space of Super Mario 64 forced the developers to rethink an effective way of implementing difficulty in a Mario game. Difficulty in the 2D Mario titles relied heavily on the placement of enemies and avoiding getting hit by them with only a few chances to make a mistake. In a 3D environment, enemies can be avoided entirely thanks to the vaster space a 3D landscape provides. The powerups that once aided Mario have been omitted in favor of ones that Mario uses to traverse the level in specific circumstances. He could’ve died in one hit like in his 2D sidescrollers, but throwing the player out of the level with this implemented would’ve proven to be sadistic. Mario has been given a health bar divided into eight pieces. Various hazards deal a varying amount of damage to Mario, and the scattered coins rejuvenate his health.

If enemies aren’t the focal point of difficulty in Super Mario 64, what is? Apparently, the developers have made the 3D Mushroom Kingdom a frictionless land where most structures have been lathered up in soap. Most of the levels in Super Mario 64 are playgrounds situated in the sky, totally remote from any rational geography to the point where it’s borderline surreal. The rationale for this is almost excusable under the pretense that they match the ethereal world in a painting. However, this is not why the levels are designed like this. Slipping and falling off the level is the crux of Super Mario 64’s difficulty, and it happens pretty often. It’s a difficulty mechanism that coincides with the game’s needlessly pinpoint precision with Mario’s controls that feel unfair to the player. One slip will send Mario down potentially a series of lubricious structures to his death. It’s a sequence that occurs so often with many steps towards Mario’s doom that it’s a borderline Chaplin-esque slapstick routine. The player can’t help but laugh at their series of blunders as much as they might also anger them. The level variety in terms of settings and design is exquisitely varied in Super Mario 64. Still, the developers have found ways to implement the falling hazard into each level regardless of if they aren’t perched high in the sky. Hazy Maze Cave has deep pits of darkness, and Shifting Sand Land has inescapable quicksand pits. An appalling example of this is the level Tiny-Huge island, a level that takes my favorite concept from Super Mario Bros. 3 and makes it unbearable. The miniature version of this level is too small to support Mario, making the challenge of staying on the level an aggravatingly wary experience. If the controls weren’t as unyielding, this design might be excused, but the two create a perfect formula to piss off the player.

Something that most likely won’t piss off the player like in most Mario games is the bosses. The preceding mainline Mario games offered boss encounters underwhelming in both difficulty and character variety. This negative aspect is the only mainstay that has been retained from the 2D games, but at least the bosses here are more varied than fighting Bowser’s bastard children. There are only a handful of boss fights in Super Mario 64, and they all come as a surprise while scoping out the levels. As I’ve said before, combat is not a focal point of Super Mario 64’s design, which is still apparent with the few bosses. Mario fights King Bob-omb on top of the mountain in Bob-omb’s Battlefield, but his glacial speed makes him too vulnerable, and it takes only three throws to dismantle the rotund ruler of the walking explosives. Eyerok and Whomp King both have facile attack patterns and obvious weak points, and the Wiggler boss is laughably unthreatening. These bosses mainly serve as surprises to mix up the gameplay more than anything else, but the one boss in a Mario game that players expect is the biggest disappointment. Bowser fights serve as the pivotal point of progression between unlocking more areas of Peach’s castle. The treks up to Bowser are daunting, linear paths on an epic scale. The duels with Bowser at the end of these paths are the exact same fight with Mario launching him into a bomb off the arena, swinging him by his tail to gain momentum. Each of these gets progressively harder, but you’ll excuse me if I wasn’t swayed by the developers' minimal effort into these battles. Not even the immortal quip of “so long, gay Bowser” could mitigate my disappointment.

Critiquing Super Mario 64 in this day and age seems all too easy. Its primitive wrinkles are ubiquitous and have not aged gracefully in the slightest. I’d even make the argument that some aspects like the taut controls, the uncooperative camera, and the game’s strict margin of error in the levels were never acceptable. Despite all of its glaring flaws, it was the prime architect that set the foundation for one of my favorite genres in gaming. Hell, one could make an argument that 3D gaming would’ve never caught on if not for the success of Super Mario 64, and the entire landscape of the medium would be radically different. Like with the first Super Mario Bros., I respect Super Mario 64 for its innovation and impact, but I cannot fall in love with this octogenarian 3D platformer like most people who experienced it first hand. Its flaws are too blatant to place it among its higher-quality successors earnestly.

Like a hot knife going through a bread of butter, nothing will ever feel as natural to my hands as playing this game, letting my fingers fly all over the buttons. No other 3D platformer game in the nineties controlled so good. Maybe, perhaps, Banjo-Kazooie. Several times I've stated how playing this as a 5 year old kid in Christmas 1998 changed my perspective in life just as much as listening to Radiohead from that young age. I can distinctly remember how comming off the Sega Genesis the best experience in videogames I could ever get was Sonic The Hedgehog 2, and while it is one of the best 2D platformers and it did wonders for my 3 year old brain showing me a colorful world of possibilities, and now Super Mario 64 came to me, smashed my old preconceptions and told me "The world as you think it is is just a parcial, incomplete understanding of it. Now this is what the {new} world can look like". A complete overhaul of my metaphysical understanding of what could be videogames, of what art could be like, of what life could be lke. I felt like a scientist in the misdt of a scientific revolution, witnessing in real time how their old beliefs crumble as the new foundations of understanding emerge from the revolution. No wonder so many of the greatest game directors ostensibly point to this place in time and space as when they realized videogames could be the medium to tell their stories, and that they could be told good, like nothing ever before. A sine qua non for too many things I hold dear to my heart. Few things are as human to me as playing Super Mario 64

Simply put, a sublime experience.

A seminal 3D platformer that now feels like a bit of a relic.

It's not regarded as a classic for nothing, there's some nice game design creativity here, but mainline Mario games are all about how they play, and here it's so mechanically and technically unpolished that I just don't find it much fun compared to its more refined successors.