I picked this up for about a fiver PAL before grabbing my wii as I played it at Cube launch on my Jap Cube but never understood the dialogue etc and (as with Sonic Adventure) had to play it through a combination of trying everything on everything and gamefaqs (boo). My son Max (5) loves Super Mario and all things Mario Bros. so I figured he'd get some fun from this.
So here we are some 5-6 (Jesus Christ) years later and what have we got ?
Fire it up, that fab "evil" Nintendo logo/voice and onto the title screen complete with "horror letters" (that is copyright Max 2007) and "blinking I's" (same as before). There's a small, very quaint intro showing Luigi making his way to the mansion through a forest using a basic map which allows the game in about 10 seconds to lay the whole premise for the story (you've won a haunted mansion and have come to check it out).
Start game up and you're kind of plonked in the main hall with a torch and not much else from here it's on to intro and tutorial land before you head back to the lab and have the premise explained in a bit more detail by Professor GADD (Nintendo characterisation is at it's best here).
He equips you with your Poltergust 3000 (a hoover which operates not unlike the ghostbusters equipment in the movie of the same name) and off you go back to the mansion to begin your quest. What do you know ? Mario has been here and has now been imprisoned and in a shocking role reversal it's up to you as Luigi to rescue him.
What follows is just pure Nintendo magic - Everything about this game from graphics, audio, gameplay mechanics, the layout of the mansion has been crafted to (imo) perfection - The level of characterisation on Luigi himself (I never tire of pressing A and hearing him shout for Mario) is astounding (having him whistle nervously along to the music is borderline design GENIUS), the ghosts are excellent, the little Gameboy Horror you use as a map/inventory/investigative device, the music, the interaction between the poltergust and incidental environmental objects (i.e tablecloths), the physics - It's all absolutely spot on.
Criticisms - Not many - It's a bit too short maybe and some might say a bit too easy but as a launch title of yesteryear it still stands up today as a cracking bit of software and I can't think of another title quite like it (sure, some will argue Sunshine was the natural successor and LM was a testbed for the mechanics but I disagree entirely).
There's no real point to this I've just been enjoying it far too much and wanted to coax some of you into a replay
In fact, I'm off to see if this can't be one of the "Replay/Appreciate" games !!!!
Also, via component on an HDTV this game looks STUNNING - the "Star Road" in particular looks incredible.
If this was new and a wii launch title I'd have scored it at least 7 or 8 out of ten - It's still THAT good !
So here we are some 5-6 (Jesus Christ) years later and what have we got ?
Fire it up, that fab "evil" Nintendo logo/voice and onto the title screen complete with "horror letters" (that is copyright Max 2007) and "blinking I's" (same as before). There's a small, very quaint intro showing Luigi making his way to the mansion through a forest using a basic map which allows the game in about 10 seconds to lay the whole premise for the story (you've won a haunted mansion and have come to check it out).
Start game up and you're kind of plonked in the main hall with a torch and not much else from here it's on to intro and tutorial land before you head back to the lab and have the premise explained in a bit more detail by Professor GADD (Nintendo characterisation is at it's best here).
He equips you with your Poltergust 3000 (a hoover which operates not unlike the ghostbusters equipment in the movie of the same name) and off you go back to the mansion to begin your quest. What do you know ? Mario has been here and has now been imprisoned and in a shocking role reversal it's up to you as Luigi to rescue him.
What follows is just pure Nintendo magic - Everything about this game from graphics, audio, gameplay mechanics, the layout of the mansion has been crafted to (imo) perfection - The level of characterisation on Luigi himself (I never tire of pressing A and hearing him shout for Mario) is astounding (having him whistle nervously along to the music is borderline design GENIUS), the ghosts are excellent, the little Gameboy Horror you use as a map/inventory/investigative device, the music, the interaction between the poltergust and incidental environmental objects (i.e tablecloths), the physics - It's all absolutely spot on.
Criticisms - Not many - It's a bit too short maybe and some might say a bit too easy but as a launch title of yesteryear it still stands up today as a cracking bit of software and I can't think of another title quite like it (sure, some will argue Sunshine was the natural successor and LM was a testbed for the mechanics but I disagree entirely).
There's no real point to this I've just been enjoying it far too much and wanted to coax some of you into a replay
In fact, I'm off to see if this can't be one of the "Replay/Appreciate" games !!!!
Also, via component on an HDTV this game looks STUNNING - the "Star Road" in particular looks incredible.
If this was new and a wii launch title I'd have scored it at least 7 or 8 out of ten - It's still THAT good !
Comment