Super Mario 64: Great or Not?

[Rev. Link]

However; I found Super Mario Sunshine to be a better game. Better control of the camera, better control of Mario, and just plain more fun. I loved SM64, but SMS was just a better game, imo, and I could never understand why so many people hated it. I chalk it up to the whole Nintendo-hating trend these days.


I went into SMS fully ready to love the living shit out of it, I had that game preordered a full year before release, and I absolutely LOVE Nintendo.

Why did I hate Super Mario Sunshine?

That damn Water Pack. I was managing fine up until around when I had to start using it as a cannon to launch myself up in the air. Frustrating just does not cut it, it was much more so than just that, unplayable more like it. If they removed the water pack, I'd have loved it so many times more.

Nintendo tried something different with the water pack. They tend to do that sometimes. It was a change, sure, but not so much of one that it changed the whole gameplay mechanic.

But hey, if they hadn't done that, and instead SMS played *exactly* like SM64, everyone would've complained about how it was just a rehash. Nintendo can't make the masses happy whatever they do anymore.

As for the game being unplayable, my ex-girlfriend had trouble playing SMS (she grew up with Sonic, SMS was her first real attempt at Mario). I used to always tease her that someone must have glued her fingers together if she had trouble controlling a Mario game. :)

[smokehouse]

Like has been touched on many times, if you did not witness the launch of this game, your opinion is limited. To see first hand the impact a game has when it originally first comes out is dramatically different than playing a game 5, 10, 15 years later and trying to compare it to everything else out there. Like the Beatles (who I personally believe are overrated---mind you I was not around to witness their "invasion") games like this were innovative and unique and have the ability to withstand the test of time.

(Stick with me, I know some of this is repeated but I’m giving a response to another post)

I think everyone’s personal experience is a bit different. I was completely aware of the N64 as I was a huge fan of the NES and SNES. I read about “Project Reality” for years and followed the Ultra64 info religiously. I caught some stray info that local K-Mart stores had broke the street date and I rushed at 90MPH to a local town just to buy a N64 and copy of Mario 64 3 days early.

I took that sucker home and fired it up. Within a few hours I started to have the gut feeling that I had made a mistake. Before purchasing the unit I had rented a Playstation many times and has secretly and slowly fallen in love with it. The N64, seemed like a step backwards. Mario 64 was sparse with lame music and sound effects and little to no action (and that controller….not even close to the Playstation’s). I felt as if I was running around aimlessly in this vast, slightly out of focus world.

My friends came over to see the next big thing from Nintendo and all commented on how lame they thought Mario 64 was. Within a few weeks (it could have been a week, I can’t remember) I returned the unit and bought a Playstation.

The point? Mario 64, at least in my world, had no impact what so ever. It didn’t seem revolutionary at the time nor did it seem like Nintendo was moving in the right direction. It came across as Nintendo trying to reinvent the wheel to me.

[jdc]

I think that if Mario 64 was launched today, it would go largely unnoticed....maybe so much so as to be a huge flop.

When the game was launched back in 1996, platformers were still palatable as a genre, especially those that featured cartoon characters and bright primary colored graphics. Hardcore gamers would play that kind of game. To be able to experience a familiar character running around in glorious 3D is what sold the game. People were curious....and it was "that Mario guy" being presented in a new way.

People don't put that genre of game at the top of their "gotta have" list any more. It's at the very bottom. Used to be a surefire top seller. Now it's seen as reasonable for a "nothing much else to play" rental.

[WanganRunner]

Super Mario 64 proudly sits atop at #1 my "Best games of all time" list.

If you've never played it before and decide to pick it up next week, you may feel different though. You have to have gotten it when the N64 was in.

^^
My sentiments exactly.

[scooterb23]

I got Mario 64 when it first came out...still don't like it at all. :P


If you've never played it before and decide to pick it up next week, you may feel different though. You have to have gotten it when the N64 was in.

I'm curious if this idea holds for other classic games. I've never heard people say "Well, you had to be there to understand why it was so great" for any other game.

[Famicoman]

I personally don't think it deserves number 3, maybe on the top ten, bute surely farther down.