Retro|Spective 075R: Super Mario

[wakka]

Yeah, one of the greatest of all time without a doubt. I played it through properly for the first time just a couple of years ago, and it's stunningly brilliant to play to this day. I played it shortly after I played Crash Bandicoot 4, and the comparison was not kind to Crash.

What they achieved, with no blueprint on how to make this type of game, is one of the greatest achievements in the history of the medium. It could have been half the length it is, too, and I don't think anything less would have been thought of it. But it's an incredibly generous game, packed with ideas, and made with such care. Even the 'Collect all 100 coins' challenge in each level is a fiendish and varied challenge, not the simple collect-a-thon it could have been.

I think one of the most remarkable aspects of it is its ambition and then the delivery on that ambition. When you consider the logical evolution of a 2D platformer into 3D, the concept that springs most readily to mind is basically Crash Bandicoot - the camera rotated behind the player instead of side-on, but with fundamentally the same A to B gameplay.

They could have made Mario 64 like that. I've no doubt it was discussed at the planning stages. It seems, to me at least, the obvious path to take. But instead they totally rethought how a platformer could function in 3D, creating free roaming playgrounds which could play host to a variety of objectives.

It must have been tremendously, ridiculously hard to make that work, I think. But they did it. They mastered the format on their very first go. And 26 years on it is a better play than 99.99% of titles ever released.

The Mona Lisa of gaming.

[Asura]

I think one of the most remarkable aspects of it is its ambition and then the delivery on that ambition. When you consider the logical evolution of a 2D platformer into 3D, the concept that springs most readily to mind is basically Crash Bandicoot - the camera rotated behind the player instead of side-on, but with fundamentally the same A to B gameplay.

A fun aside here, as you may know this but it's not so widely known - Crash Bandicoot's original prototype was called the "Sonic's Ass Game", because it was originally going to be a Sonic game where you would watch the character from behind.

[wakka]

I did not know that!

[Mayhem]

And look how some later Sonic games went anyhow...

Mario64 was just something else at the time, and still is mostly today. Still cursing a couple of the stars from all that time ago, but got the fabled 120 soon enough and the meeting with Yoshi.

[QualityChimp]

I played Mario64 yeeeears after release and it still held up as a solid platformer.

It really was a joy to control his leaps in 3D, but it was such a charming game with cute locations, upbeat tunes and an endearing Mario whooping and grunting as he tackles the challenges.

[Cassius_Smoke]

Yep another masterpiece. Honestly the main line Mario games are just hit after hit.

[Neon Ignition]

Game 32 - Mario Kart 64
The sequel racer came along and with it the shift to 3D barring rendered character models for the racers. With shortcuts and a new range of tracks and weapons, the sequel was well received out of the gate and helped to cement Kart as one of the most successful racer series on the market.






Pedal forward or putting the brakes on its predecessor?

[Nu-Eclipse]

Not much to say about SM64 that hasn't already been said above. One of the true all-time greats in any era of gaming. Laid brilliant foundations for 3D Mario gaming and 3D platforming in general.

My relationship with MK64 is complicated. I played a lot of it as an early N64 adopter BITD. To all intents and purposes, a lot of everything bad about modern Mario Kart stems from MK64 - cheating AI, glitches and shortcuts, the gradual shift of emphasis from racing skill to luck and reliance on gimmicky power-up and the absolute death of a Battle Mode that Super Mario Kart had perfected.

That said, MK64 was always highly enjoyable for multiplayer racing. It may also be the MK game that has the best time-trial mode.

[Asura]

Game 32 - Mario Kart 64
The sequel racer came along and with it the shift to 3D barring rendered character models for the racers. With shortcuts and a new range of tracks and weapons, the sequel was well received out of the gate and helped to cement Kart as one of the most successful racer series on the market.
Pedal forward or putting the brakes on its predecessor?

As someone who nearly always comes out the woodwork to defend Mario Kart 64, I'll throw in my two cents.

This is, by far, my favourite MK game. I appreciate it's not objectively the best; like I can list plenty of reasons the others could be better, but subjectively, this sits at the top of the pile.

I got the N64 in September 1997, after selling my Saturn, and for quite a while the only game I had was Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire, though I was later able to get Mario 64. But for Christmas that year, I got Mario Kart 64, and thereafter, while I traded in various different games over the next couple of years, I only sold that game when I eventually sold the entire setup. Additionally, worth noting alongside this was that the teletext and magazines used to print top 10 charts for all the major formats, and from the moment it came out up until the moment they stopped listing them, Mario Kart 64 was always in the N64 top 10 in the UK; maybe 6th, maybe 9th, but it never fell out of the chart. It just soldiered on, quietly selling copies from month-to-month, for literally years. Very few games reach that level of staying power, never mind back then.

MK64 has a fantastic set of tracks. In that regard, I think Nintendo did a fantastic job. It has long tracks like Wario Stadium and Rainbow Road, short and simple tracks like Moo Moo Farm and Luigi Raceway, concept tracks like Yoshi Valley and Koopa Troopa Beach, gimmick tracks like Toad's Turnpike... And playing the game's GP's, the variety on display just kept it fresh every time you came back to it.

And the difficulty seemed really well pitched, along with the weapon gameplay. You never had the problems of the DS/Wii games which pushed that too far, where being in front yields blue shell hits so often that you spend most of the game intentionally racing in 2nd place, and also, it didn't have problems like the snaking in the DS version (though admittedly, corner boosting would be improved further in later entries).

In multiplayer or solo, the game's performance was good, and it was visually sharp by the N64's standards (where some games were really quite blurry). And it had really memorable music too.

I know some people dislike it because it put more of a focus on combat compared to the original game, and they see that as the start of a directional move away from what they wanted, which only became amplified as the series went on. I can see that; though as someone who never owned a SNES and only played the original sparingly at the time (more, years later) I didn't have that perspective to draw upon.

But for me, this is one of those childhood games which is wrapped up in memories of playing it on Christmas day with my family, and that, rather unfairly, makes it unimpeachable as my number one.

[wakka]

That's a good summary. I never had a 64 (in fact I have never in my life owned a 64 - one of the few major machines I haven't), but my nephew, who is the same age as me, did. I used to go round there with my Mum all the time as a kid to see my sister and nephew and he and I would immediately pile upstairs to his bedroom with his mates to play this.

It was the first MK I'd ever played, and I reckon I got to experience the platonic ideal of MK64 - four kids, gathered round a 14" CRT in a bedroom, endlessly battling. It's a great game. He had a few other multiplayer games too, but MK was always the default. Great memories.

[Asura]

It was the first MK I'd ever played, and I reckon I got to experience the platonic ideal of MK64 - four kids, gathered round a 14" CRT in a bedroom, endlessly battling. It's a great game. He had a few other multiplayer games too, but MK was always the default. Great memories.

Yeah, and this is one of the great things about the N64 which is easily forgotten - how, due to Nintendo giving it 4 ports, that there were many more 4-player games on the machine than usual (or, if someone wants to statistically disprove that's true instead of, I dunno, going to a fun Christmas party - that I suspect most of us got to play them more due to this).

When I think about the N64, 4-player sessions are very strong in the memory - Mario Kart 64, Goldeneye, and, an outlier but a surprisingly good one - WCW vs NWO Revenge.

[Nu-Eclipse]

And the difficulty seemed really well pitched, along with the weapon gameplay. You never had the problems of the DS/Wii games which pushed that too far, where being in front yields blue shell hits so often that you spend most of the game intentionally racing in 2nd place, and also, it didn't have problems like the snaking in the DS version (though admittedly, corner boosting would be improved further in later entries).

Rubber-banding AI and the gaming of item selection (Purple Shell being regular for players at the back, crappy green shells and bananas for defence for players leading) literally started in MK64, so I don't think I can agree about MK64 having well-pitched difficulty. Everything problematic about modern Mario Kart started here in that respect.

And again, a lot of MK64's tracks are broken with glitches and shortcuts.

MK64 was ultimately fun but very flawed.

Will give you kudos for shouting out WCW vs. NWO: Revenge though. The AKI/THQ wrestling games on N64 were fantastic - up there with the all-time best wrestling videogames in my opinion.

[wakka]

Yeah, and this is one of the great things about the N64 which is easily forgotten - how, due to Nintendo giving it 4 ports, that there were many more 4-player games on the machine than usual (or, if someone wants to statistically disprove that's true instead of, I dunno, going to a fun Christmas party - that I suspect most of us got to play them more due to this).

When I think about the N64, 4-player sessions are very strong in the memory - Mario Kart 64, Goldeneye, and, an outlier but a surprisingly good one - WCW vs NWO Revenge.

Oh yeah, we played tons of Goldeneye too. Facility. No Oddjob. Dunno how that one slipped my mind.

And yes, definitely there was much more meaningful 4-player material than on PS1.

[Asura]

the gaming of item selection (Purple Shell being regular for players at the back, crappy green shells and bananas for defence for players leading) literally started in MK64,

I assume you mean figuratively? Because SMK on SNES has divergent item probabilities based on player position in the field too.

[wakka]