Game Review: Super Mario Odyssey
2017-Dec-30, Saturday 19:26![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dorchadas
The thing that Nintendo almost never forgets, the reason why I'm glad they exist and have their own way of making games, is that games are fun. Games can also tell stories or comment on life, of course. I played Night in the Woods last month and loved it. But games can be interactive fun in a way that passive media like movies or books are simply incapable of, and that is one Nintendo's great strengths.
I feel kind of bad for Microsoft, honestly, and the reasons why are summed up in this tweet:
Not that all their games are fun, of course. Metroid: Other M exists. But Super Mario Odyssey's fun is not in question.
Bowser, politely, doesn't want to stare.
The plot and structure are pretty much "a Mario game." Bowser has kidnapped Princess Peach and plans to marry her, and Mario obviously wants to stop him. But Bowser isn't just planning quick trip down to the courthouse. He wants a royal wedding, as befits the King of the Koopa, and hires a group of deformed rabbit monsters to be his wedding planners. These Broodals go from kingdom to kingdom, terrorizing the local inhabitants and stealing the local specialty, from sparkling water to a fantastic-looking dress, and Mario chases after them in the Odyssey, a hat-shaped airship.
The innovation is the lack of structure. Each kingdom has dozens of Power Moons hidden within, and a few of them are pointed out as goals by the game, generally because they're held by bosses. But simple collecting those Moons isn't enough to power the Odyssey, so you're forced to explore the levels and look for additional Moons. Behind walls, through hidden doors, appearing after completing timer challenges or jumping puzzles, or accessible using the hat to posses the local inhabitants and reach out-of-the-way places.
Super Mario 64 is a great game, but it's structured into discrete challenges. Each level has several stars and changes are made to the level depending on which star is the current goal, making it impossible to really explore and stumble on a secret. Super Mario Odyssey lays the whole level out right from the beginning, and one of the reasons it took me so long to play through is that I always spent more time in a level than necessary hunting down Moons. Only when I was stumped did I move on to the next Kingdom where I knew more discoveries awaited me.
Insert "manhole" joke here.
Obviously, that's not the only innovation. There's also Cappy, which Mario can throw on the frog and be the frog.
The memes are true--in New Donk City it's possible topossesscapture humans. But sinful humanity is the least of the beings that Mario can use in his quest to vacuum up all the Power Moons in the world. There's the T-Rex, of course, and standard monsters like the goombas and koopas. But it's also possible to capture Bullet Bills (Bullets Bill?) and cross long gaps, or Lava Bubbles to swim through acid or lava unimpeded. There are tanks and rockets and power lines, and even truly bizarre options like a giant slab of meat or a taxi cab. It's always worth it to try throwing Cappy around and see what the result is.
The one downside is that it's never clear at first whether throwing Cappy at something will possess it, defeat it, or simply do nothing. When playing withschoolpsychnerd--there's a two-player mode where the second player controls Cappy--it would sometimes lead to confusion because she'd be trying to break bricks and accidentally capture something nearby. Sometimes this led to Mario dying. But it was always just a momentary setback, because Super Mario Odyssey doesn't have lives.
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!
Lives have been pretty vestigial in the Mario series for a long time. Even by the time of Super Mario Bros. 3, it was trivial to get dozens of lives and never really have to worry about dying. Later Mario games would use lives as a kind of hidden treasure, a reward for completing difficult platforming sections or finding a way into a hidden area, but they had long stopped being an actual limitation on gameplay. So Super Mario Odyssey got rid of them, because Power Moons provide their own incentive for exploration.
Instead, dying costs money. Rather than coins simply being a percentage counter for new lives, coins are actually used as currency. There are shops in each kingdom that sell Power Moons, souvenirs for the Odyssey, and new outfits for Mario. Leftover money is used when Mario dies at ten coins for each death. This is basically free--coins carry over from level to level and respawn in each level after death, so by the time I beat Bowser for the final time I had thousands of them even after buying everything available in every shop. Often, there were plenty of coins available on the way to a tricky sequence, so dying was basically free. All I lost was a couple minutes of my time. And, since each level has warp points scattered throughout that double as respawn points, often not even that much.
There are also kingdom-specific coins in each kingdom that buy further items and provide more reason to explore.
Captain Toad is the Toad for the job.
All of this combined means that Super Mario Odyssey encourages and rewards exploration and risk-taking. Can Mario make that jump? Might as well try, since it only costs ten coins and a bit of time. What's behind that hill? If you rotate the camera, is there something hidden below the lip of the cliff? What's through that door? Every little puzzle area has two moons, so where is that other one? Can Cappy capture that weird octopus, and where will its water jet take you? Is it possible to use a combination of long jumping, cap jumping, diving, and wall jumping to reach that distant platform? Want to try it?
"Want to try it?" is the game's overarching theme. It's all about the joy of discovery, of going to new kingdoms and seeing what's there. Of trying increasing elaborate jumps just to see what's on the far side. Of finding all the places that Captain Toad has gotten himself to. Seriously, I want a Captain Toad's Odyssey game.
Dressed for exploration.
It's also a celebration of the Mario franchise over the years. Throughout the game, there are pipes that lead into smaller areas done in 2D, with 8-bit versions of that kingdom's theme song and pixelated versions of Mario's costumes, all done in the style of Super Mario Bros. These areas are painted onto walls, hidden under floors, and otherwise part of the level geography, and they were delightful. I smiled every time I found one, and every time I heard another bit of chiptune music quietly playing in the background.
And there's New Donk City. I remember when the first screenshots of it were released, with Mario running alongside a normally-proportioned human in a pinstripe suit, and the internet was skeptical. Mario with ordinary humans? But Mario is human, isn't he? Isn't he a plumber from New York? What's going on? And then the images of Pauline were released, and we all realized that the "Donk" referred to Donkey King, a part of Mario's legacy that's been almost ignored over the years, and the skepticism turned to eager anticipation. And New Donk City is one of the best levels in the game, especially the celebratory sequence after finding all the quest-based Power Moons, so the anticipation was 100% deserved.
There are even more homages, in the post-game sequence after the credits roll, but that would be spoiling, and Super Mario Odyssey is all about the joy of discovery.
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.
I haven't gotten too far into the post-game, but I appreciate the way it's structured. Someone who just wants to beat Bowser and see the ending sequence only has to find around a hundred Power Moons and won't have to spend very long or do much scouring of each level. When I beat the game I had just over three hundred Power Moons, and that's still only a third of the total number. Some moons are only available after the credits, or in kingdoms that the main story doesn't touch on. When I appeared after the ending, I got a notice that a kingdom had been unlocked because I hit a certain threshold of Power Moons. There's still more out there to find.
I wanted to beat Super Mario Odyssey before the end of the year, and I did. But I'm far from done with the game. There are Power Moons I haven't found, souvenirs I haven't bought, and kingdoms still to discover. I have a feeling that I'll be playing Super Mario Odyssey well into the new year.
I feel kind of bad for Microsoft, honestly, and the reasons why are summed up in this tweet:
Microsoft : Xbox One X has an 8 core processor & 12 GB of
— AJ Jefferies (@moonjam) June 13, 2017
[Nintendo bursts in]
'u throw ur hat on a frog & ur the frog'
*crowd explodes* #e3
Not that all their games are fun, of course. Metroid: Other M exists. But Super Mario Odyssey's fun is not in question.
Bowser, politely, doesn't want to stare.
The plot and structure are pretty much "a Mario game." Bowser has kidnapped Princess Peach and plans to marry her, and Mario obviously wants to stop him. But Bowser isn't just planning quick trip down to the courthouse. He wants a royal wedding, as befits the King of the Koopa, and hires a group of deformed rabbit monsters to be his wedding planners. These Broodals go from kingdom to kingdom, terrorizing the local inhabitants and stealing the local specialty, from sparkling water to a fantastic-looking dress, and Mario chases after them in the Odyssey, a hat-shaped airship.
The innovation is the lack of structure. Each kingdom has dozens of Power Moons hidden within, and a few of them are pointed out as goals by the game, generally because they're held by bosses. But simple collecting those Moons isn't enough to power the Odyssey, so you're forced to explore the levels and look for additional Moons. Behind walls, through hidden doors, appearing after completing timer challenges or jumping puzzles, or accessible using the hat to posses the local inhabitants and reach out-of-the-way places.
Super Mario 64 is a great game, but it's structured into discrete challenges. Each level has several stars and changes are made to the level depending on which star is the current goal, making it impossible to really explore and stumble on a secret. Super Mario Odyssey lays the whole level out right from the beginning, and one of the reasons it took me so long to play through is that I always spent more time in a level than necessary hunting down Moons. Only when I was stumped did I move on to the next Kingdom where I knew more discoveries awaited me.
Insert "manhole" joke here.
Obviously, that's not the only innovation. There's also Cappy, which Mario can throw on the frog and be the frog.
The memes are true--in New Donk City it's possible to
The one downside is that it's never clear at first whether throwing Cappy at something will possess it, defeat it, or simply do nothing. When playing with
schoolpsychnerd--there's a two-player mode where the second player controls Cappy--it would sometimes lead to confusion because she'd be trying to break bricks and accidentally capture something nearby. Sometimes this led to Mario dying. But it was always just a momentary setback, because Super Mario Odyssey doesn't have lives. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!
Lives have been pretty vestigial in the Mario series for a long time. Even by the time of Super Mario Bros. 3, it was trivial to get dozens of lives and never really have to worry about dying. Later Mario games would use lives as a kind of hidden treasure, a reward for completing difficult platforming sections or finding a way into a hidden area, but they had long stopped being an actual limitation on gameplay. So Super Mario Odyssey got rid of them, because Power Moons provide their own incentive for exploration.
Instead, dying costs money. Rather than coins simply being a percentage counter for new lives, coins are actually used as currency. There are shops in each kingdom that sell Power Moons, souvenirs for the Odyssey, and new outfits for Mario. Leftover money is used when Mario dies at ten coins for each death. This is basically free--coins carry over from level to level and respawn in each level after death, so by the time I beat Bowser for the final time I had thousands of them even after buying everything available in every shop. Often, there were plenty of coins available on the way to a tricky sequence, so dying was basically free. All I lost was a couple minutes of my time. And, since each level has warp points scattered throughout that double as respawn points, often not even that much.
There are also kingdom-specific coins in each kingdom that buy further items and provide more reason to explore.
Captain Toad is the Toad for the job.
All of this combined means that Super Mario Odyssey encourages and rewards exploration and risk-taking. Can Mario make that jump? Might as well try, since it only costs ten coins and a bit of time. What's behind that hill? If you rotate the camera, is there something hidden below the lip of the cliff? What's through that door? Every little puzzle area has two moons, so where is that other one? Can Cappy capture that weird octopus, and where will its water jet take you? Is it possible to use a combination of long jumping, cap jumping, diving, and wall jumping to reach that distant platform? Want to try it?
"Want to try it?" is the game's overarching theme. It's all about the joy of discovery, of going to new kingdoms and seeing what's there. Of trying increasing elaborate jumps just to see what's on the far side. Of finding all the places that Captain Toad has gotten himself to. Seriously, I want a Captain Toad's Odyssey game.
Dressed for exploration.
It's also a celebration of the Mario franchise over the years. Throughout the game, there are pipes that lead into smaller areas done in 2D, with 8-bit versions of that kingdom's theme song and pixelated versions of Mario's costumes, all done in the style of Super Mario Bros. These areas are painted onto walls, hidden under floors, and otherwise part of the level geography, and they were delightful. I smiled every time I found one, and every time I heard another bit of chiptune music quietly playing in the background.
And there's New Donk City. I remember when the first screenshots of it were released, with Mario running alongside a normally-proportioned human in a pinstripe suit, and the internet was skeptical. Mario with ordinary humans? But Mario is human, isn't he? Isn't he a plumber from New York? What's going on? And then the images of Pauline were released, and we all realized that the "Donk" referred to Donkey King, a part of Mario's legacy that's been almost ignored over the years, and the skepticism turned to eager anticipation. And New Donk City is one of the best levels in the game, especially the celebratory sequence after finding all the quest-based Power Moons, so the anticipation was 100% deserved.
There are even more homages, in the post-game sequence after the credits roll, but that would be spoiling, and Super Mario Odyssey is all about the joy of discovery.
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.
I haven't gotten too far into the post-game, but I appreciate the way it's structured. Someone who just wants to beat Bowser and see the ending sequence only has to find around a hundred Power Moons and won't have to spend very long or do much scouring of each level. When I beat the game I had just over three hundred Power Moons, and that's still only a third of the total number. Some moons are only available after the credits, or in kingdoms that the main story doesn't touch on. When I appeared after the ending, I got a notice that a kingdom had been unlocked because I hit a certain threshold of Power Moons. There's still more out there to find.
I wanted to beat Super Mario Odyssey before the end of the year, and I did. But I'm far from done with the game. There are Power Moons I haven't found, souvenirs I haven't bought, and kingdoms still to discover. I have a feeling that I'll be playing Super Mario Odyssey well into the new year.
