8th Place - Super Mario 3D World

Tier: A
Played on: Switch



Oh, 3D World. How much I love you. I’ve talked a lot about “comfort food” games on this list, but 3D World is the uncontested champion of that. I totally see the appeal of safer, comfortable Mario games, but this is the only one that perfects the concept for me. That is especially true for the Switch version, but I’m solely judging the base game without the changes the Switch version made. It has been a while since I played the original, as I no longer have access to my Wii U. But it’s all good, we can go from memory.

As you might expect, very few of the levels in this game are breathtaking. They aren’t going to blow you away. But unlike the other bland Mario games, I don’t have an issue with that here. That’s because the game is just so… so… SO fun. It combines all the best elements of every style of linear Mario. It balances the comfortable feel of a New Super Mario Bros. game with the creativity you’d find in a classic Mario game like 3 or World, all while having wonderfully smooth controls akin to 3D Land but WAY better. But more importantly, it combines all of these elements perfectly. It’s a seamless experience design-wise, and it’s equally as seamless to play.

The level design here is basically flawless, but the levels never feel like mush. This is one of the most consistently great Mario experiences, yet it’s a bit subtle. Few levels in this game are memorable like a Galaxy game, but no levels are necessarily unmemorable like a New Super Mario Bros. game. It’s hard to describe, but I feel like every time I enter a level, I think “oh sweet, this one! I like this one”. They’re always exciting to play, even if I couldn’t name most of them after putting the game down. They’re unmemorable yet substantial, if that makes any sense. The only level in this game that I would call bad is Sprawling Savannah, which takes the game too far out of its comfort zone. The other levels are just consistent fun that never stops.

One reason why this game is so fun to play are the power-ups. This is the best Mario game when it comes to power-ups, hands down. Cat, Boomerang, Fire, and Tanooki work wonderfully in a 3D environment and are all a blast to use. And unlike Galaxy’s power-ups, they aren’t context-sensitive. You can use these power-ups in any level, and that encourages mixing-and-matching. And remember, we’re in 3D now. Movement is more complex, so power-ups in this game are more impactful than those in a 2D game. Cat in particular is one of the absolute best power-ups in the series. It’s slightly overpowered, but not game-breaking. But there are certainly context-sensitive power-ups, and they are utilized very well. Double and Cannon are stupid and that’s why I love them. You can also wear a goomba hat because this is 3D World, it does what it wants. It even goes all the way to what character you want to play as! There are five characters, and they all have different abilities and stats. It’s not as well implemented as it is in Super Mario USA, but you can still warrant using all of them. They appeal to different types of players, even going as far as making Peach a sort of easy mode and Toad a hard mode. Though I see it as more of a punishment for picking Toad. You can tell a lot about a person by what character they pick in 3D World. Stay away from Toad mains.

And if that wasn’t enough, this is the best Mario game for multiplayer. Because you have three-dimensions to run around in, it’s not as likely that you’ll run into other players by accident. At least not intentionally, because one of my favorite things to do in this game is just be a jerk and bully the idiot who picked Toad. You can cause some chaos in this game, especially since the player who gets the most points in a level gets a crown that can be stolen. On one hand, there is zero reason for this and it just exists to cause chaos. So it is kind of pointless. But on the other hand, there is zero reason for this and it just exists to cause chaos. The pointlessness is why I love it so much. I cannot tell you how much fun this game is to play in multiplayer. The only issue I have is the lack of additional modes like in NSMBWii that recontextualize the levels in ways that are more approachable for short sessions. That’s a bit of a bummer, but it’s also just a nitpick. It’s really hard to find negatives with this game. It’s just that good.

What else can I really say? It’s Super Mario 3D World! It’s just a great time with no real downsides. It’s so hard to criticize this game because of just how simple and fun it is. I replay this game all the time, and it’s one that I can always rely on for some good fun. But Nintendo wasn’t happy with leaving it there, as in 2021, they crafted the best rerelease they have ever made. But we’ll talk about that one in due time…

7th Place - Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros. 3

Tier: A+
Played on: VisualBoyAdvance emulator



Now THIS is a game. Advance 1 was little more than a rerelease of the Super Mario All-Stars version of Mario USA. Advance 2 was a watered-down port. Advance 3 (which wasn’t covered in this ranking) was similar to Advance 2 but with a handful of new levels. But Advance 4 goes the extra mile, truly earning its status as the definitive version of an already great game. So let’s start with the negatives. The controls are slightly stiffer. And that’s it, now for the positives!

The main game is fairly unchanged from the Mario All-Stars version of Mario 3, but it does add portability. And let me tell you, portability fits Mario 3 exceptionally well. The levels are bite-sized and very replayable. Mario 3 was one of the easiest Mario games to just pop in and pop out, but the game being portable just enhances that feeling. The game is also much more colorful than Advance 2, as the GBA SP was out by this point and it had a backlit screen. You get the full suite of colors and adorable spritework. I never played this one as a kid, but I always LOVED how it looked. It’s just so cute, I can’t describe it. There are also some quality of life changes to bring this game up to the modern Mario standards. And that’s just it, with how good this game looks and how well designed most of its levels are, it doesn’t feel like an old game. It feels like you could pass it off as a completely new game and nobody would bat an eye, at least at the time. Add on Mario Bros. Classic and you’ve got this ultimate Mario game for GBA. I mean it when I say that this is one of the most at-home feeling GBA games, and it’s a strong contender for the one of the best on the console. And that’s just half of the story!

The e-Reader was an obscure accessory for the GBA that would read cards to unlock more content in games and let you play some old NES games. It flopped pretty badly, as it was expensive for what it was. And what it was was awkward at best and stupid at worst. But the one game that actually used it well was Super Mario Advance 4. You could buy cards that could be scanned to unlock new levels in the game! That’s such an incredible idea, and it basically means that there’s a completely new Mario game here. You could even share cards with your friends, adding a social element to it all! But the catch is that you had to buy an e-Reader AND the cards for that, which is expensive for what you’re getting. For the price of the e-Reader alone, you could buy a brand new game. And worse, only about a third of the cards ended up releasing in my neck of the woods. The e-Reader was such a flop that they couldn’t justify releasing any more cards in America. That was until the Wii U Virtual Console and the GBA Nintendo Classics app, where a version of the game was released with all 38 e-Reader levels built in! So how are they? Pretty great, actually!

These levels do some really funky stuff, including mixing and matching mechanics from other games. Like, you can throw turnips with Raccoon! That’s crazy! But despite that, they don’t feel out of place like the levels in New Super Luigi U do. They are given the same amount of care as the base game, if not more. Not all of them are winners, but many are. And they have collectables in them that allow replayability and exploration. There are also just a lot of them. 100%ing the e-Reader levels will give you about as much content than Super Mario Advance 1, if that counts for anything. But the most interesting thing for me is where they’re placed chronologically. These were the first new traditional 2D Mario levels in over 10 years, and it gives us a glimpse into what a new 2D Mario would have looked like post-64 but pre-NSMB. As someone who loves to analyze the progression of level design in Mario games, these levels are a dream for me.

All things considered, Super Mario Advance 4 is probably the definitive classic-style Mario game. It has a boatload of well designed levels that you can play on-and-off or really sink your teeth into on top of being an interesting game to analyze. From both a historical and gameplay perspective, this game is pretty special. I’d highly recommend trying it out if you have the NSO expansion pack.

6th Place - Super Mario Odyssey

Tier: S-
Played on: Switch 1 and Switch 2



I’ve been waiting for this one for a long time. When Odyssey came out, it was praised as one of, if not the best Mario game. But I don’t hear that as much anymore. It’s in a weird place right now with the Mario fanbase. Some find it to be the worst 3D Mario, some find it to be the best. As for me, I fell head-over-heels in love with this game on my first time playing. For a year or so, it was my favorite game of all time. But over time, my perception of it slipped more and more, and now it’s not even in my top 10. I still love this game to bits, don’t get me wrong. But I wince at the thought of replaying it again.

However, more and more people are starting to realize the truth about this game. Mario Odyssey is not comparable to any other Mario game. It is fundamentally and structurally different from all 2D and 3D Marios before it. Because unlike 64, Sunshine, and Galaxy, this game is not mission-based. Instead, it is a collectathon. And I don’t think people understand how different that makes Odyssey.

The difference comes from the way the content is presented and structured. While Odyssey does have its moons in large areas much like 64 and Sunshine, they aren’t treated as missions. Rather, they are collectables. The average moon has little to no content in it outside of merely finding it. And while there are “story” moons, there aren’t a ton of them, especially after beating the game. What this means is that moons are far less substantial than stars and shines. You will not be fulfilled after one, two, or even five moons in the same way that you will after even one shine. A great analogy I’ve heard is that prior games were a meal, but Odyssey is a bowl of snacks. When you are done, you won’t feel full, and your stomach might hurt.

Now, this all sounds like negatives, but anyone who has played Odyssey knows that this game is incredible. Few Nintendo games can match up to your first experience with Odyssey. It feels like there are just a billion moons to find, and you never know what kind of moon will be next. It feels specifically designed to give you the most fun first playthrough ever. The amount of moons, the creative locations, the capture mechanics, they’re just a ton of fun. But on a replay, there’s a part of me that craves that more substantial structure of a Galaxy game. I believe that this is why a lot of people are starting to become more critical of Odyssey. It’s a 3D Mario game, but it’s a different flavor of 3D Mario that isn’t designed to be replayed constantly. And this is why comparing it to prior games is just unfair in my opinion, and it’s also why I REALLY don’t want them to make an Odyssey 2. I don’t think this structure lends itself to a sequel unless it completely reinvents itself, and DK Bananza did exactly that. But that’s another can of worms.

The structure of this game is obviously different, but it lives or dies based on the areas you have to explore. And let me tell you, this game has some of the best sandbox Mario areas. Tostarena, Forgotten Isle, New Donk City, Mount Volbono, Bubblaine, and Peach’s Castle are some of the highlights of the entire series for me. Exploring them is just indescribably fun, and it brings back that playground feel of 64 and Sunshine. They work very, very well with this collectathon format. However, one thing I find odd is that the game has two moments where you can choose between two kingdoms, but you still have to do both. I feel like this was a mistake, as the game does overstay its welcome for me. By Mount Volbono, I was ready for the game to wrap up, and this wouldn’t be a problem if I could skip a kingdom or two.

Exploration is great in this game, but a huge part of the reason for that is Cappy. Cappy is one of the greatest ideas the Mario series has ever had, and it really surpasses the title of “gimmick”. It extends Mario’s moveset, allowing for some crazy movement tech. It encourages you to be aware of your surroundings and experiment with different captures that bring gameplay variety in both story and sandbox gameplay. And it has complete cohesion with the character of Mario in a way that F.L.U.D.D. does not. He’s a joy to use, and it’s made better by the controls. This is the best controlling Mario game. You know what, no, this is the best controlling game, or at least top 5. I will never be able to truly convey how fun the controls are here. They are buttery smooth with a very high skill ceiling. They are genuinely perfect, and I can’t even think of a single complaint. Okay, I don’t like some of the motion controls. But other than that, they’re perfect. They make the simple act of traversal a treat.

But my favorite thing about Odyssey is the amount of heart the game has. There’s something really special about a game where you can just feel the passion from the developers. And this game just has so much love, so much care, and so much attention to detail put into every facet. From the ridiculous costumes to the constant stream of new species of Mario characters, it feels like they cared immensely. And it all wraps up with a beautiful bow in one of the greatest finales to any game I have ever played. When you finish Odyssey, you feel like you experienced history. And I will never, ever, ever forget the emotions I felt after my first playthrough. It was like everything that my lifelong gaming passion had been leading up to, and I will always treasure that experience.

If I still need to spell it out, Odyssey is an exceptionally amazing game, but it’s amazing in unique ways that haven’t really been replicated by any other Mario game. And honestly, I don’t want them to try. Odyssey is a special experience, it’s one that is really, really important to me. But it’s just not one I need to relive anytime soon, and I don’t think it’s smart for Nintendo to replicate it, at least not in the Mario series. And as someone who replays games all the time, that’s a bit of a shame. So is Odyssey overrated? No. But is it misunderstood by even those who love it? Yes.

5th Place - Super Mario Bros. Wonder

Tier: S-
Played on: Switch



There’s a deep part of me that is frustrated by Wonder. Just… the fact that it took this long to come out. From 2013 to 2023, we didn’t get a new mainline 2D Mario, and we hadn’t gotten a truly special one since World in 1990. But as we talked about earlier, Nintendo knew what we wanted. They knew that Wonder was the game that Mario needed, yet they just… didn’t make it until 2023. It’s such a self-aware game, which is both amazing for Mario and frustrating for Exi who has been waiting for this game for so long. But these are silly complaints that really only exist to counterbalance the comical amount of praise I’m about to give it.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder is an absolutely stellar game. Through subtle and not-subtle means, this game subverts everything you knew about Mario while feeling like an extremely logical follow up to what came before it. It is the first time since 2006 that 2D Mario wanted to EARN its success.

What I appreciate about Wonder is that on a deeper level, very little about it is different than a New Super Mario Bros. game. It still uses blocky geometry in its level design, it uses similar design philosophies, and it follows the same structure of “get to the end of a level while finding the collectables”. It doesn’t try to reinvent the wheel. Rather, it flips the series on its head. It’s still the same old 2D Mario but presented in new ways that make it feel fresh. This is exemplified by the Wonder Flowers. When you start a level, it is usually very tame. Just what you’d expect from a new 2D Mario, albeit more creative. But then you touch the Wonder Flower and it goes absolutely bonkers. At any moment, the game can choose to re-contextualize the mechanics that you already know in new ways to make them feel fresh. Like, you know goombas. But what if you were the goomba? What if you could only move like a goomba, and you now have to traverse a normal platforming level from a goomba’s perspective? The game is filled with awesome ideas like that.

This also helps the level design. Mario levels are built around a certain formula. Introduce a concept, build upon it, add a twist, wrap it up. But Mario Wonder takes the twist part to new heights. It plays with your expectations in ways that no Mario game has done before. It always knows what you expect and how to subvert it, making for a consistently surprising experience. That’s not to say that it’s just the twists that are great. This game has the smartest level design in the series. Some of it is just genius, especially in the new concepts they introduce. The new enemies and gimmicks really force you to rethink your approach to gameplay, and they are designed with the wonder effects in mind.

The wonder effects are a ton of fun. Not all of them are great, as a good chunk of them boil down to “make the enemies big”. But most of them are, and the good ones are REALLY good. They play into the level design in smart ways despite being so disconnected from it, and that’s the best thing I could have possibly asked for. Power-ups in this game are also great. They could have reasonably skimped on these, as they aren’t as important compared to the wonder effects. But they didn’t because this game rules. Elephant is such a stupid idea but it is surprisingly effective, Bubble allows for some crazy movement, Fire is as good as always, and… it. Drill, which is my all-time favorite power-up. You are protected from enemies above you and can drill into the floor and ceiling and move across it without touching enemies. Like, what?! Who came up with this?! And why is it so fun to use?! I use Drill at every chance I get, and I always get a little sad when I lose it cause I suck. Anyways, these power-ups are great because you don’t use them just because they’re good. You WANT to use them. You WANT the awesome effects they come with. You WANT to become a cool elephant who can swipe away enemies. That’s something that some Mario games fail at, but this game really pulls it off without letting the Wonder Flower steal the show completely.

What I’m more mixed about are the badges. They’re amazing in concept. But the problem is that there is pretty much always an objectively correct badge to pick. When I get a new badge, Prince Florian is always like “Woah, that looks sick! Wanna test it out?” and I’m like, “No, boosting spin jump and parachute cap are so broken that I have no need for this”. Why would I want to use a badge that gives me a free mushroom at the start of the level when I could practically get a double-jump? I feel like the system could have used some restructuring, like maybe having an “active badge” and a “passive badge” which encourages experimentation with some of the less powerful badges.

The only element of this game that I truly dislike completely are the bosses. Wonder’s bosses are bad. Like, really bad. There are only three of them. Mecha Maker (which is so simple that it barely counts), Bowser Jr. (which is the same basic fight over and over again with different arenas), and Bowser (which is actually pretty fun). It’s not that the bosses are bad… I mean, they are, but the bigger problem is the missed potential. The game’s gimmick could have allowed for some unforgettably creative bosses. When the game first got announced, I thought to myself “this may be the first 2D Mario game with great bosses”. But… nope. Not even close. I can think of at least four dozen boss ideas that would have been substantially better than any of the Bowser Jr. fights in this game. Heck, they could have easily done the Yoshi’s Island thing where they just make the enemies big and call it a boss. I would have vastly preferred that to the nothing-burger of bosses we got in this game.

This complaint may be rectified in the upcoming Nintendo Switch 2 Edition, as it does appear to feature the Koopalings in some capacity. When it comes out, I will be updating this segment to account for Meetup in Bellabel Park.

Anyways… man, this game is great. It knows exactly what the player wants from a new 2D Mario game and delivers it with nearly everything it’s got. It does falter in a few areas, but those missteps are not enough to take away from just how fantastic this game is. You know that a game is great when a mere two years later, I’m already calling it a certified classic. And I truly believe that it is the best 2D Mario game, as surreal it is to say. It is truly wonderful.

4th Place - Super Mario 64

Tier: S
Played on: Switch (3D All-Stars release)



I find the content on this blog to be at its best when it offers different perspectives on things. I love to challenge myself and my readers to look at things from multiple angles, and I think differing takes accomplish that wonderfully. But I’m not a contrarian, and I can’t say anything about Super Mario 64 that hasn’t been said before.

This is the biggest leap forward that gaming has ever taken and likely will ever take. Other games may have redefined a genre, but this one redefined an entire medium of entertainment. It is and will always be the most revolutionary game of all time, full stop. Sure, 3D games existed before it. But it not only set the standard for 3D games going forward, it did so with finesse and confidence. It led the industry into the 3D revolution, proving that it wasn’t a fad or a gimmick. It was the next step for gaming. Now, is it the best Mario game? Nah. It hasn’t aged perfectly. But for being the first major example of true 3D in a game, it holds up remarkably well. Much better than most other games from this time period.

I don’t really want to spend much more time talking about how important this game is. I could go all day, but that doesn’t fit our current discussion. So instead, let’s talk about the game in a vacuum.

For one, the controls don’t feel dated. What really makes it feel so good is how much freedom you have in your movement. There’s quite a lot you can do in this game, making it the most speedran game of all time. And even if you don’t speedrun the game, jumping around and chaining together moves is just fun. It makes the entire game feel like a playground where you can complete the objective or just screw around and see what cool tricks you can pull off. That was actually an intentional design decision: to make the game fun to play even when you aren’t doing anything substantial. Very few games have accomplished this since, and it makes this game stand out. But what doesn’t hold up as well is the camera system. Revolutionary, yes. But remember that this is an N64 game. You don’t get dual analog sticks, so the camera is mostly automatic. And this is where most (if not all) of the control issues come into play. It’s quite janky, and it doesn’t always do what you want it to do, leading to frustrating moments or unfair deaths. It’s something you can get used to, but even after beating this game 5 or 6 times, I still find myself falling victim to this game’s camera nonsense from time to time.

Because of the limitations that came with the hardware, they moved away from the linear, level-based structure of prior games and went for an exploratory mission approach. There are only 15 main levels, but all of them have 7 missions to complete. You are almost never told what you need to do, so you kind of just explore and go where you think you should be. And that sounds like a bad thing, but it really isn’t. The levels are big enough to explore but small enough to not get lost in, making exploration feel very natural. Levels also don’t change in between missions, so your exploring may lead to new discoveries and you might accidentally complete an entirely different mission in the process. Don’t like a certain mission or level? Don’t worry, as you only need to complete 70 out of 120 missions to beat the game. Only a handful of missions are explicitly required, so you can just outright skip most missions that you dislike. Not only does that flexibility mean I don’t have to deal with Tiny Huge Island, it also means that repeat playthroughs are usually going to be different than the previous ones. It was only recently that I completed all the missions in one save file, and there were some missions that were completely new to me despite having played this game several times. And in between missions, you’ve got a wonderful hub-world with secret levels and collectables.

In my opinion, Mario 64 best represents the spirit of Mario and Nintendo as a whole. It’s whimsy, it’s approachable, it’s innovative, it appeals to everyone, it has a low skill floor and a non-existent skill ceiling with a sense of wonder to it all, it’s a phenomenal Mario game. But even more than that, it’s just a phenomenal game all around. It took the limitations of the N64 and made something special with it, turning a linear series into a magical sandbox that remains replayable almost 30 years later. It has not held up perfectly from a technical perspective, I won’t lie. But it is still everything I love about Mario in one legendary game that is just as fun now as it was in 1996. And somehow, this isn’t my favorite Mario game. Not even in the top 3. That should prove how special this series is.

3rd Place - Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury

Tier: S
Played on: Switch



This is the definitive Mario game. Like, full stop. This is THE Mario game. If you can only play one Mario game, you should play this one. I don’t think it’s the absolute best, but it appeals to every type of Mario fan. I can comfortably recommend it to literally any person whether they are a hardcore gamer or if they’ve never picked up a controller. It is, to me, one of the greatest games of all time. Don’t believe me? I got the evidence to back it up.

3D World was a great game. I made that point clear when I covered it a little bit ago. But as a reminder, I find it to be a wonderful mix of every type of linear-style Mario game. It perfectly encapsulates everything I love about linear Mario. It is seamless in its design and can be enjoyed by anyone. But they went above and beyond to improve it in all the right ways without changing anything about what I love about it. The biggest change is the 25%~ increase to movement speed. It doesn’t seem like much of a change, but it is. It makes the game even more fun, even more chaotic, even more fluid, even more smooth. It's a seemingly arbitrary yet secretly brilliant change to the game and it makes the original feel slow by comparison. It also makes repeat playthroughs even more fun since you can just blaze through the entire game in a day or two and do the whole thing over again the next day without any fatigue. And no, that’s not an exaggeration. I have actually done that, and I regretted none of it.

But they didn’t stop. They wanted to make it even more definitive. Online play? Sure. A photo mode to use the (now-colored) stamps? Of course. Improved performance and graphics on Switch 2? Can’t live without it. GameShare, Amiibo support, improved UI, changes to make the game work without a Wii U Gamepad, multiplayer in the Captain Toad stages, the list never ends. Few of these changes really impact the game heavily, but combined together, it makes an already great game even better. The running speed alone would have been enough to make this the definitive edition, but they added so much to this game that it makes all other Nintendo rereleases look inferior. And that’s because they are.

And that’s not even the biggest addition. Bowser’s Fury is one of the most interesting Mario experiences you can have. It’s hard to really review, since it’s not really a full game. So I will keep it brief.

I wouldn’t put it on the same level as 3D World, but it is still a great time. Much like how 3D World combines all forms of linear Mario, Bowser’s Fury does the same for 3D Mario. It mixes the gameplay of 3D World, the moons of Odyssey, the vibes of Sunshine, and adds new elements wholly new to it, such as a more open-ended world and some unique but amazing music. It’s part linear platformer, part collectathon, part sandbox, it just mixes together so many elements that seem like they wouldn’t work. But it pulls it off very well. It’s a very dense game design-wise but it’s not forced in the slightest.

The game is very short. You can beat it in 3 hours and 100% it in 6. When I first picked up the game, I thought this would be a negative. But I find it to be one of its greatest strengths. This formula isn’t as refined as other 3D Mario games, so if it was even 1 or 2 hours longer, it would get very repetitive. The game relies on traveling large distances and backtracking. It already overstays its welcome for some people, and while it doesn’t for me, it may have if it was any longer than it was. I really don’t think it would be better off for it. Now, that’s not to say that this structure couldn’t work in a full game. It absolutely could, but this seems to be a test run for a future game in this style. If they can refine it like how they refined 3D Land into 3D World, I think we’re looking at something really special.

But what Bowser’s Fury does best is compliment 3D World. In one package, you get a definitive linear Mario game and a definitive open Mario game. They both combine so many elements from so many games, then you combine both of them together in one package to make what I consider to be the definitive Mario game. Heck, I’d go as far to call it one of the definitive platformer games. It has everything for everyone. No matter who you are, you will enjoy this game. And it’s one of the few Nintendo games that actually goes on sale, so you have zero reason to pass on it.

And still. Despite the juggernaut this game is, there are still two games that surpass it. That’s genuinely unbelievable to me. But it goes to show just how phenomenal 3D World + Bowser's Fury is.

2nd and 1st Place - Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2

Tier: S+
Played on: Switch and Wii

If you expected some contrarian take about how these games don’t hold up, you’re dead wrong. I am aware that saying that either Galaxy game is the best in the series is like saying your favorite song is Bohemian Rhapsody. It’s a lame answer, but it’s beloved for a reason. And just like Bohemian Rhapsody, the Galaxy duology is a masterpiece in the truest, purest sense of the word.



But let’s take it one at a time. The original Super Mario Galaxy isn’t just a game - it’s an experience. And a major part of that is because of its tone. I’ve heard it described as “intense” or “cinematic”. And while it is definitely those things, I think that the perfect word to describe the tone of this game is “grand.” And I find the very beginning of the game to be a perfect example. Because when you boil it down, the game opens just like any other Mario game. Mario goes to see Peach but Bowser kidnaps her. It’s hardly more complex than any other Mario plot. Rather, it’s about the beautiful music, the way Bowser is animated, the emphasized shading, the cinematography, the subtitles, it’s the exact same plot but amplified in subtle ways that create a completely different feel. And that sentiment applies to the entire game. It doesn’t need to use loads of cutscenes to make you feel a certain way. It’s able to accomplish that through tonal differences without feeling overplayed. And that’s just it, nothing in Gusty Garden Galaxy or Buoy Base Galaxy is very different from other Mario games, but what you’re doing feels important. It feels special. It feels impactful. Every mission, every cutscene, even just exploring the observatory, it feels… grand.

But it’s not just the tone. It’s also about the gameplay. When you hear “Mario in space!”, it may sound like a cheap gimmick meant to appeal to kids who like space. And it very easily could have dipped into that territory, but the team behind this game put their all into taking advantage of the space theming. Because the setting is not grounded to the basic Mario theming, it’s allowed to go wild with its level ideas. Heck, it’s barely tied to the space theme! A boss where you use giant sticky balls to fling yourself into a giant spider? A powerup that turns you into a spring so you can ricochet off walls and destroy a giant toy robot? A level where you float on giant dandelions across the sky and play tag with bunnies? Only the Galaxy games can ever and will ever reach this level of absolute insanity because of how unrestrained the setting allows it to be. It doesn’t have to adhere to any rules. It isn’t tied down to the already wacky world of Mario. It can do whatever it wants and it doesn’t feel out of place in the slightest.

The space setting also affects gameplay. I’ve seen a good number of complaints towards the gravity mechanic, but I can’t see it. The gravity mechanic impacts level design a whole lot in many positive ways, but it rarely gets in the way of my enjoyment. Being able to walk across an entire planet and loop back around just feels so weird yet so natural. And it also allows for some weird ideas that only a Galaxy game could pull off. And let me tell you, this game never runs out of ideas. When it comes to the core missions, you never know what to expect. From one of 15 bosses to the many unique mechanics, it almost never disappoints. It offers up a feast of great ideas, but none of them feel underexplored. They end at the perfect moment to make way for yet another brilliant idea. And despite the sheer amount of ideas this game has, I remember each and every one of them vividly. This is the most memorable Mario game by a wide margin because of just how perfectly its ideas are executed.

And the presentation is absolutely sublime. When played on Switch or on an emulator with a higher resolution, it looks just as good as a Switch game. It’s definitely a bit dated, but a lack of polygons does not translate to a lack of style. The real star of the show is the lighting. It really does wonders to enhance the feel of the game, giving it a dark or whimsy tone when it needs to. And I’m sure you knew this, but it is genuinely impossible to talk about either Galaxy game without bringing up the soundtrack. This is one of the greatest soundtracks in any piece of media. Ever. Full stop. While I don’t think it’s as consistently great as something like Bowser’s Fury or even Galaxy 2, it has some truly stunning pieces that take advantage of the grand tone of the game to make you feel real emotions. Buoy Base Galaxy, Overture, Final Bowser Battle, all three Comet Observatory themes, Good Egg Galaxy, Power to the Observatory, Battlerock Galaxy, Space Junk Galaxy, Staff Credits, and the legendary Gusty Garden Galaxy are some the highlights of not only the game, not only the series, not only Nintendo’s entire library, but gaming as a medium. And of course, Family, which is so simple yet so great that I genuinely have no words to describe its excellence.

But that’s not to say that the game is perfect. This is because not all missions are created equally. The major galaxies have three main missions each, and those are practically perfect. But they also have one remix (or “comet”) mission, a purple coin mission, and a secret star. These are definitely the weakest missions in the game, as they are the only ones without constant new ideas. Rather, they remix old ones. They’re still fun, don’t get me wrong. But I’m never that excited to do them, with a few notable exceptions. And even the good ones are, at the end of the day, filler. They aren’t given the same attention as the main stars and just end up feeling empty. It creates a contrast between different mission types that tend to make the game feel awkward, especially when attempting to 100% complete the game. But funnily enough, these issues are actually where the second game soars.



Galaxy 1 is a masterpiece that will forever be just as great as the day it was released. I could genuinely talk about it for hours. It truly is one of the greatest games of all time, and it deserves to be played by every gamer for as long as gaming exists as a medium. But that’s a very commonly known fact. The game’s legacy speaks for itself. This is why I want to talk for a bit longer about Galaxy 2, as it is the less remembered and less rereleased game. And that’s a real shame. Because if you ask me, Galaxy 2 is every bit as brilliant as Galaxy 1, but it places an emphasis on different areas.

The biggest change is that it strips away the grandness, feeling less like an epic spacefaring adventure and feeling more like a typical Mario game. After collecting 120 stars, it is revealed that the sequel was more-or-less a retelling of the first game told by Rosalina to some luma babies, which is an adorable way to recontextualize the story. Because of this, it’s a whole lot more straightforward, exemplified by a level-by-level world map (or universe map, I should say). You don’t need an elaborate scene showing Bowser taking over the castle using a UFO, he just turns big and steals Peach. You don’t need an explanation as to why Mario befriended the luma, he just does. And coming hot off the heels of Galaxy 1, it’s a bit jarring. While I do love imagining how Rosalina would describe the wacky hijinx Mario and friends get up to, it can never replace how cinematic the original was. And that was a big problem for me. I mean, they took away one of Galaxy’s defining characteristics! That’s a huge issue. But then I actually played the game. And it occurred to me that this was an intentional trade-off for pure fun, creativity, and brilliance.

If Galaxy 1 was a feast of great ideas, Galaxy 2 is an all you can eat buffet, and it’s happy hour. All of the insanity from the first game is back in full force and it’s even more prevalent. It constantly finds new ways to reinvent its mechanics and present new surprises without overwhelming the player. And I do mean it. This game goes full stupid-mode with some of its ideas, but it makes it a consistently exciting experience. Every planet is a new idea, and it adds a sense of exploration and surprise despite how linear this game is. I don’t know who came up with the idea to turn Mario into a boulder that rolls into bowling pins to win a bet from a chimpanzee with sunglasses, but I want to meet them and shake their hand. That’s just one example on an endless list of insane ideas. And I do mean endless, because although the game has a similar amount of Galaxies to Galaxy 1, the stars are more spread out. Every galaxy has at least two stars but no more than three. This means less filler and more concepts to go absolutely nuts with. And even the filler stars are significantly more creative and fun! No idea feels underexplored. And I did say that about the first game, too. But it’s even more impressive here because of just how many galaxies there are. No joke, it would be faster to list the galaxies that aren’t amazing. They’re masterfully designed, presented, and executed in some of the greatest and most densely packed platforming levels out there. And that is the heart of what makes Galaxy 2 so great, but it also improves upon the core formula in many ways.

The game also addresses a problem that many had with Galaxy 1, and that’s the power-ups. In prior Mario games, power-ups were ways to augment the core experience. They changed the way you went about playing the game by giving you new moves to pull off. But Galaxy’s power-ups didn’t fit that bill. In fact, they’re barely power-ups. I prefer to call them “transformations” as they are only used in select levels designed specifically around those power-ups. But even by those standards, they weren’t great because of how infrequently they appeared. And while Galaxy 2 uses the same system with most of the old power-ups intact, it adds a handful of new power-ups that are significantly more interesting. Cloud in particular is just so fun. It strikes a great balance between overpowered and balanced. I would love for it to make a return in a future game. And Drill is a seemingly simple yet genius idea that takes full advantage of the planet-based level design. Yoshi is also here, acting a lot more like the Yoshi you’d expect when compared to Sunshine and 64 DS’s take on the character. While I was a bit iffy on it going in, Yoshi works extremely well in this game. The key reason for this is that you don’t have to line up your tongue like you do in other games. The Wii Remote’s pointer allows for Yoshi’s tongue and spit moves to be completely separate from Mario’s movement, on top of a lock-on function to make aiming easier. This all makes a massive difference, I assure you. The game also has loads of mechanics and objects that take advantage of his abilities, making Yoshi levels feel very involved and intuitive. He’s even got power-ups of his own! I mean, this game brought us Blimp Yoshi, and that alone earns it a spot so high in the list.

And the fun doesn’t stop, because this game has so much content. After beating the game, you unlock a special world featuring levels that reference prior games. And that’s cool enough on its own, but once you collect all 120 stars, you unlock 120 MORE stars. They act as a giant scavenger hunt across the game to track them all down. Filler? 100%. Time consuming? Of course it is. Extremely fun? Absolutely. It’s Super Mario Galaxy 2, after all! Right when you think it’s out of ideas, it keeps the good times rolling by recontextualizing the ENTIRE GAME as a giant match of hide-and-seek. None of it is required, you can skip it if you want to. I decided to skip it this time, as I have many other games to play for this marathon. But I did it as a kid, and it earned me a super-secret final challenge that is, to this day, the hardest traditional level in any mainline Mario game. PSYCHE, THERE’S AN EVEN FINAL-ER LEVEL WHERE YOU DO THE WHOLE THING WITHOUT TAKING DAMAGE. It just. Keeps. Going. It’s a constant stream of pure fun.

Now, you likely knew all of that. But what you may not know is that it improves upon Galaxy 1 in other ways that a lot of people don’t realize. Now, this is a more subjective topic. But as great as Galaxy 1’s bosses are, I think that Galaxy 2 has the better boss lineup. Sure, the Bowser fight isn’t as good. But it still has Glamdozer, Prince Picante, Sorbetti, Megahammer, Gobblegut, and the iconic Squizzard. I find these fights to be more involved than Galaxy 1’s fights, and they take advantage of their galaxy’s unique mechanics in more creative ways. The music is still phenomenal, too. Very few tracks in this game made it into the mainstream in the same way that the last game’s music did, but I think many people confuse that with this soundtrack being worse. And yes, the lack of the epic feel does mean that the music doesn’t stick with you in the way Galaxy 1’s music did. And yes, the increased galaxy count does mean more repeated tracks. But there are still so many great tracks here that it’s really unfair to call this soundtrack worse. Fluffy Bluff Galaxy, Sky Station Galaxy, Starship Mario, World 3, Puzzle Plank Galaxy, the main theme, Melty Monster Galaxy, Freezy Flake Galaxy, Credits, Bowser’s Galaxy Generator, and one of my all-time favorites, World S. There are also some great remixes of older tracks, such as Slider and Bob-omb Battlefield. None of these songs can replace the intense emotions that the heights of Galaxy 1’s music evoke, but I’d call this soundtrack a more consistent one that doesn’t really have any real misses. And if you still don’t agree with me, I have to ask if you truly think this soundtrack is worse or if it’s just because you haven’t been exposed to it in other media like with Galaxy 1’s music. Because there are still tracks here that do make you feel! But they just aren’t given the same attention, which is a shame. Anyways, let’s not go on that tangent now. The visuals are a lot more colorful, but they look just as good as Galaxy 1’s. It goes to show how flexible this style is. It works in a darker, serious setting or a whimsical, bright one. In fact, I prefer the visuals of this game in many ways. However, one of the few complaints I have toward this game is that the space theme is de-emphasized, and it has the dreaded “colorful blocks in the sky” syndrome that I’ve complained about before. It doesn’t have the same sense of place that Galaxy 1 had, but that simplicity let the team put their efforts into making the game as fun as possible.

And that’s the thing. Galaxy 2 isn’t an art piece like Galaxy 1 is. But it doesn’t want to be. It’s more concerned with being the most consistently fun Mario experience possible. It knows that you want some of the most enjoyable platforming levels created by mankind, and it gives them to you without wasting any time. It’s masterfully crafted to just be nonstop fun. It’s to the point where when I play it, I don’t care about the level design! I don’t care how smart of a sequel it is! I’m just having a great time jumping through space, and very few games can make me feel that. It really does make you feel like a kid, constantly awestruck by whatever new cool thing is happening. And on a personal note, I grew up with this game. It was one of - no, it was my childhood game. And after all this time, I didn’t know if it would hold up in comparison to the original, which I had become very fond of since then. But it not only exceeded my expectations, it made me realize how grateful I was that the game I grew up with happened to be not only one of the greatest Mario games of all time, but one of the greatest video games of all time.

But they’re both in the same slot in the ranking! So which do I think deserves the number one slot more? That’s actually a really complicated question. They’re a two-game package, you really can’t have one without the other. And that’s why it mostly comes down to what you personally want in a Mario game. Do you value the artistic brilliance of 1 or the mechanical brilliance of 2? For me, it could really change on a day-to-day basis. Asking me to pick between these two games is like asking a parent who their favorite child is, and I might have a completely different answer in a week. But I’ve decided on Galaxy 1 taking the number one slot. Galaxy 2 is a near-perfect game. One that always knows exactly what the player wants and how to give it to them. Because of this, one could very easily say that Galaxy 2 is the better game and I would totally get it. But Galaxy 1 is an experience that sticks with you. It may be a more flawed game, but it reaches highs that most games - including Galaxy 2 - can’t dream of reaching. And when I strip away my nostalgia and ask myself what game I will remember after more playing, the answer is clear. It’s Galaxy 1 by a lightyear, and that’s why I placed it at number one. But, again, you can’t have one without the other. They’re two sides of the same coin. Two masterpieces that appeal to different types of gamers. They are truly, without a doubt, the greatest Mario games of all time. And with the upcoming rereleases, there has never been a better time to try them out and experience what I consider to be masterclasses in the art of video games.

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And… That’s my ranking! After many months working on this, I’ve finally put it out there. And I’m beyond proud of it. Not only of the work itself, but of the sheer time and effort it took to make this. I’ve basically written a novella’s worth of reviews, and it’s time to celebrate. And by celebrate, I mean play literally anything other than Mario.

If you’ve read this far (or even just part of it), thank you. I really, truly, genuinely, honestly appreciate you from the bottom of my heart. I love making these reviews, and having even one reader is enough to make this whole process completely worth it. I hope to see you again soon!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

18th Place - New Super Mario Bros.



Tier: B-
Played on: DesMuMe Emulator

I am aware that it is pretty unanimously considered the best NSMB game, but this really isn’t my thing. I respect it immensely, but I honestly respect it more than I enjoy playing it.

The most important thing this game tries to do is modernize 2D Mario, and it does a pretty good job. Because nowadays, the term “New Super Mario Bros.” signals a lame 2D platformer. But back then, it was literally a new Super Mario Bros. game. That was very important. Remember, at the time this game came out, 2D games were seen as lesser than 3D ones. This game made a huge splash, as it proved that 2D games still had their place. After this, we saw a lot of franchises that had gone 3D go back to their 2D roots, and “retro revivals” like Mega Man 9. Both of these trends were very prominent in the seventh generation of consoles, and their origins can be traced back to this game. The impact of this game can still be felt in the gaming space today. Because of that, I am genuinely going to make the claim that this is one of the most influential and important games of all time. Not even a joke.

But let’s roll it back a bit. As I said previously, this game tried to modernize 2D Mario. And under that context, it succeeds. It does feel like a modern take on the classics in a way that later NSMB games don’t. But it doesn’t do a lot to push it forward beyond some level gimmicks that were probably not possible on NES or SNES. Very little this game introduces is genuinely new. Now, I didn’t expect it to be. Again, the new-ness of this game comes from what it stood for at the time. But these days, there isn’t much this game offers that U and Wonder don’t.

The levels themselves are… fine, I guess. I don’t find them to be as fun as later NSMB games, maybe because of the smaller screen and the controls. About that last one, controlling Mario in this game is somewhat awkward. It’s hard to put a pin on what about it irks me, but it has never felt right to me. Like it’s too floaty and weird. The new power-ups are also just not it. Mini is, as always, not fun to use. The day I enjoy using Mini is the day that we find a unicorn. It’s never gonna happen. Mega is terrible. It’s a marketing gimmick with the gameplay purpose of literally destroying the level design. It’s cool for kids who like it when characters grow big, but I always pass it up. Shell is fun, but it actively makes the game harder to play. And it’s so rare that it barely counts. And on that note, it baffles me as to why the only traditional power-up in this game that isn’t rare and // or context sensitive is Fire. This game could have really benefited from some cool new power-ups, but we’re stuck with basically just Fire.

The best thing this game does is offer a whole lot of content. The main game has 6 worlds, but there are two full-sized bonus worlds that can be unlocked if you beat the world 2 and 5 castles with Mini. Each world also has multiple unlockable levels and toad houses. The levels themselves all have three hidden star coins, and some have secret exits to optimize speedruns. You also get many returning mini-games from Super Mario 64 DS and a multiplayer mode. And with how replayable 2D Mario games are and being a portable game that you can play literally anywhere, you can get some serious mileage out of this game. It was and is one of the best DS games. But I wouldn’t call it one of the best Mario games. It doesn’t offer enough to choose it over other 2D Mario games both before and after it. And with how inaccessible this game is right now without emulation, it’s straight up not worth your time. But if you do play it, you’ll find a good Mario experience and very little else.

17th Place - New Super Mario Bros. U

Played on: Switch
Tier: B-



This entry only accounts for New Super Mario Bros. U, not the DLC. I’ll cover that later.

New Super Mario Bros. U is a good video game. There’s very little wrong with it at surface level. It offers a quality Mario experience that appeals to basically everyone. I may be a grumpy scrooge, but I actually had an alright time playing through it for 100% completion. I actually find it to be a bit misunderstood. But to me, this is the most infuriating Mario game to look at critically because it doesn’t know what it wants to be.

Of the unholy trilogy - that being NSMB Wii, 2, and U - this is the most creative and memorable by a landslide. It definitely has the best level design of the three, being one of the most perfect examples of level design in the series. Even the most forgettable levels are masterfully crafted, and I genuinely believe that this game has the smartest level design of the 2D Mario games, at least prior to Wonder. And the level backgrounds can be surprisingly detailed and occasionally beautiful. It offers new power ups, such as Flying Squirrel and Baby Yoshis with different abilities depending on their color. And there are some cool level gimmicks, too! And that’s the wonder of U. It actually tries, unlike Wii and 2. It is not devoid of creativity. But it’s not necessarily brimming with it, either.

This is a New Super Mario Bros. game, alright. The gameplay is exactly what you expect. And while I do find the levels to be extremely well designed, they falter in some areas. Particularly when it comes to their secrets. Not only are lives extremely common in this game to a point where I maxed out by world 4, they also hide many star coins behind invisible walls. That’s no fun! And some new aspects that it introduces feel underbaked. They brought back the interconnected world map, that’s great! But it’s not anything close to the one found in Super Mario World. That map was cohesive. In this game, there are distinct lines where each area begins and ends. Like, you’re in the desert now, but three steps later, you’re in the snowy mountains. They’re just stitched together without much care. Baby Yoshis are woefully underutilized, too. You barely get them at all and there are only three colors (one of which does nothing but light up dark areas, and it can’t even be brought to other levels). And Flying Squirrel is great, but it’s unambiguously the best power up by a wide margin in an already pretty short list of power ups. You always want Flying Squirrel no matter what. But the weird thing is that these issues aren’t where my frustrations lie. It’s about this weird middle ground this game is in.

New Super Mario Bros. U has glimpses of creative genius in there, not only in its handful of new mechanics, but in its level design. As an example, a level based on Van Gogh’s Starry Night that could rival a Mario Wonder level with its creativity. Or a level where you use giant stars as platforms under an aurora-lit sky. These are great ideas! But it’s in a sea of… bleh. When I play this game, I occasionally come across a level with breathtaking backgrounds and unique ideas where I say “yes, THIS is what I want from a 2D Mario game!” but then it proceeds to go back to generic Mario mush. It’s fun mush, but it’s still mush. I see this game get so close to what we all want, but those moments are fleeting. They’re over before you know it.

And this is what frustrates me about this game. 95% of the game is just the same old same old, but when I come across a genuinely unique idea or level, it feels out of place! It stands out not because it's a good level (even if it is one), but because the rest of the game is so generic and sanitized. And you may be saying, “Exi, relax! Enjoy the good levels for what they are”. But I can’t because this all impacts my experience. I feel like I'm playing two different games, both at war with each other. Or like if I opened a bag of greasy potato chips and there were like, four chips that were made with gourmet truffles and rosemary. It’s an awkward gaming experience. So that leads me to my question: why? The developers clearly have some great ideas and are willing to implement them. But if they had the capability and will to inject more creativity into this game, why didn’t they? Why would they make a few phenomenal levels but stop there? And if they wanted the game to be so simple and basic, why make these levels at all?!

I’ll tell you why. This game launched right alongside the Wii U. And in terms of Nintendo games, there wasn’t much to play on launch day. So the only logical explanation that I can think of for why the game is like this is that it was supposed to be a more creative game but suddenly, the team was told that the game needed to come out sooner than expected. So they pumped out a bunch of super generic levels and plopped in a couple great ideas left over from the original vision that they didn’t want to leave unused. That could also explain why this game came out just a couple months after New Super Mario Bros. 2. It probably wasn’t supposed to, but the Wii U launch just happened to be that close to 2’s release, and U had to be a launch title no matter what. Then they proceeded to not make the next traditional 2D Mario until 2023. You know, Super Mario Wonder! The game they probably KNEW we wanted!

I genuinely mean this: New Super Mario Bros. U is one of the very few games that make me question why I’m playing it in the first place. It’s not really a simple comfort food, at least not compared to 2 or Wii. But it’s also not a creative game on the same level as Wonder or even something like 3D World. It leaves this game as an odd-one-out that doesn’t know what it is. And It’s outdone in every aspect by other games not only in the same series, but on the same system. All because Nintendo needed a launch title for the Wii U.

16th Place - Super Mario Run

Tier: B
Played on: iPhone



Whenever I tell people that I like Super Mario Run, they often go “how can you possibly like Mario Run? It’s a cash grab! Just some mobile slop for 4 year olds to play on their crusty iPads and nothing more.” And to that I say… what? Mario Run is like… really fun, actually. I only bought it for this ranking, but even now, I frequently come back to it. It is the only mobile game I play, and I really don’t see that changing anytime soon. Because of that, this segment is half review, half recommendation. An argument as to why Mario Run is more than you think it is.

The absolute best and worst thing about this game is the pricing. For one flat rate, you get everything. No microtransactions, no ads, no nothing. You can’t even buy any extra currency! It’s a real, honest to Hylia video game. And those are very rare on mobile devices. But the problem is how much it costs. 10 USD is… well, the game is definitely worth 10 USD, at least to me. But Nintendo expected this to be one of the biggest mobile games ever. And what they failed to realize is that for most people, mobile games aren’t meant to be that engrossing. You just play it while you’re waiting for your doctor’s appointment or something. Rarely do mobile gamers really care about what they are playing. So charging any amount of money is just a big ask for them, especially for 10 USD. And worse, the game had a demo which was just too small. I remember so many people (myself included) playing through the first world and liking it. But then they were asked to pay 10 USD. And what they just played didn’t justify that price tag when there was no free version and there were other games of a similar quality like Rayman: Jungle Run and Rayman: Fiesta Run which, to my knowledge, were free with ads (though I may be wrong). If there was no demo or if the game was 5 USD, it would have absolutely been a huge success. But through such a simple mistake, this game was doomed for failure. They tried to be the good guys of the mobile space but their failure led to the actual cashgrab, Mario Kart Tour. This was a bit of a long explanation, but I needed to make it clear that this game, while it made mistakes with its pricing, was absolutely not a cashgrab. And in my opinion, the content of this game is absolutely worth the price.

The gameplay is brilliant. I am aware that Nintendo was not the inventor of this style of autorunner, but that doesn’t take away from how great this game feels to play. It takes the assets of New Super Mario Bros. U but simplifies the controls down to just one button. However, there’s a lot you can do with that button. You can get real flashy in this game, especially in the Toad Rally mode which rewards total understanding of the crazy tricks you can pull off. There are even some levels where you basically never have to touch the ground. You can also get creative, using the limitations of the one button to your advantage and pulling off tricks that you can’t even do in a mainline game. And while not every level takes advantage of this, some do, and they are a joy to play.

There are three modes to mess with here, and they all fill different niches. They use the same gameplay and controls, but they change the objective in clever ways that make this game very flexible for the kind of content you enjoy most (which is another reason why this is the only mobile game I play. It has it all!). World Tour is just a campaign of 24 levels, nothing special. But what makes this mode so cool is that every level has 15 hidden color coins. And every 5 you collect unlocks 5 more. It gives you incentive to replay the levels, especially with how tough some of the hardest coins are to get. There are also 13 bonus levels that can be unlocked by completing certain objectives. Unfortunately, the campaign is short. You can beat it in an hour or so. But despite that, there’s a lot to sink your teeth into if you feel inclined. And that makes it a mode that I do quite enjoy.

In an update to the game, they added Remix 10. Not the Rhythm Heaven song. It fills the void of that mindless mobile game that we all crave sometimes. You play 10 snippets from the Story Mode in succession and collect medals to get new stuff for your town. That’s it. It’s really simple but I cannot tell you how often I boot up the game for this mode alone. You don’t have to focus on tricks, you can really just relax and put on a youtube video as you collect coins. That’s all I need.

But the best mode is Toad Rally. This is where your skills are tested. You play a level alongside a ghost and pull off as many tricks and flashy moves as possible to convince toads to join your town. It actually can get pretty tough, and a lot of the players with more toads mean business. This is a mode that I will actually sit down to play when I’m at home. It’s definitely repetitive, as there are only so many levels. But despite that, it still remains engaging for me. You may wonder why I don’t play other mobile games. Well, that’s because they can’t match the feeling of nailing a level in Toad Rally. It’s just such a fun mode.

If I haven’t made it clear, this game has quite a lot to it for being a “simple mobile game”. And if you think you’ll like it, then the odds are high that you will. I really enjoy this game, and not just as a once-in-a-while “why not?.” It’s a genuine video game, and it deserves to be respected as one. It won’t blow you away, but it will offer an incredibly solid mobile game, especially if you don’t otherwise enjoy mobile games.

15th Place - New Super Mario Bros. 2

Tier: B
Played on: 3DS



This is the absolute bottom of the barrel in terms of creativity. I know that everyone says that the other NSMB games have zero creativity, but that’s a bit of an exaggeration. Not for this game. There is genuinely no creativity here. The absolute most is turning some enemies gold. That’s it. There are barely any new mechanics or enemies, not a single new music track, the visuals feel ripped straight out of Wii outside of a brighter color palette, and the only interesting power-up in this game is the Tanooki Leaf (which was taken from Super Mario Bros. 3). This game transcends lazy. It borders on unacceptable. I genuinely mean it when I say that if I worked at Nintendo, I would be embarrassed to release this game.

But like… who cares?

This game is absolute junk food and it knows it. It doesn’t try to be creative in the slightest, but that’s honestly what I love about it so much. You know exactly what you get when you pop this game in, and that makes it so much easier to play over even the best Mario games like Wonder or Galaxy. It is the most Mario feeling Mario game. But that’s kind of what I want sometimes, and this game delivers. And being lazy doesn’t inherently make it bad. It controls well, the levels are very well designed, the graphics are beautifully crunchy, and the game is very replayable (which is heightened by the fact that you will forget everything you just played within minutes, so every playthrough feels freshly not fresh). This is a good game. It may be a lazy one, but it is a good game.

The gimmick of this game is just how many coins there are. So many coins. Oodles and oodles, coins everywhere the eye can see. Now, there is no reason for this other than giving the game some kind of identity. But I can’t lie and say that I don’t love collecting coins in this game. They balanced it in just the right way so that you are constantly collecting coins but it’s never so much that they lose all meaning. It is simply fun to collect tons of coins. You just get hit with constant dopamine that you didn’t earn which makes this game more fun than it really deserves to be.

Much like NSMB on DS, this game also has a good amount of content. 6 main worlds with 3 bonus worlds. Though unlike the bonus worlds in DS, the ones here don’t have a theme. That’s kind of strange, but whatever. 3 star coins in each level (except for world 9 which replaces them with moon coins for some reason) that you can spend to get more levels, all standard stuff. What isn’t standard is the coin rush mode. Now, I have not played this mode beyond some dabbling when I was 14. But I don’t really need to. It’s basically just short levels to play where you get a ton of coins. There are 3 packs of 3 in the base game, but there were 10 bonus packs released as DLC. This would be awesome if it weren’t for the fact that there exists no official way to play them anymore unless you already bought them or if you buy select 3DS bundles that happen to have all the DLC preinstalled. From what I’ve been told, they aren’t particularly special for their 2.50 USD price tag per pack which is frankly ridiculous. But they did give us the impossible pack which consists of the hardest 2D Mario levels ever seen. I love when Mario games offer a “final test” like this. If only you could still play it.

And that’s about all I have to say on this game. It is a video game that was released on a console and little else. But like… that’s kind of why I like it. It’s so basic and so lazy but so fun to play and so approachable. I totally get why many people hate this game but I love this game the same way I love Jalapeno kettle chips. I really shouldn’t be eating them but I honestly couldn’t care less.

14th Place - Super Mario 64 DS

Tier: B
Played on: DesMuMe emulator



Flat out, this game is absolutely ruined by the controls. This could have been S-tier if the game controlled tolerably. But don’t take my word for it, because this is the only mainline Mario game that I have not finished. I genuinely can’t play it with my current controllers, as it causes me physical pain.

The best thing about this game is the mere existence of it. You’re telling me that you can play THE 3D game on a device that can fit in your pocket? That was, is, and will always be unbelievable. We may take this for granted these days, but we’ve never had such a huge leap in the quality of portable games. If you went back to 1996 and told someone they’d be playing this game on a portable device in under a decade, there’s a good chance that they would have laughed in your face. But it was released in 2004, absolutely blowing everyone away. And for the time, it absolutely sufficed.

Super Mario 64 is a huge game, but DS made it even bigger. It added 30 new stars (most of which were very simple but still more content), new boss fights, three more playable characters, a multiplayer battle mode, and some awesome minigames. The new content isn’t as natural, it almost feels like it doesn’t belong. And it makes some odd choices regarding how power-ups are found. But it’s still Super Mario 64! One of the greatest games of all time, now playable on the go with more content. But have you ever played Super Mario 64?

My absolute favorite thing about the original was the controls. They can feel a bit dated in certain areas, but they’re still great even now. They can be chained together in crazy ways that make screwing around just as fun as trying to complete the objectives. But the controls were also designed around the analog stick of the N64 controller. The DS doesn’t have an analog stick, just an 8-way directional pad. 8 directions. That would have been tolerable (I’ve played 64 on a keyboard), but they also made other changes that make the controls straight up bad.

Turning is so sluggish in this game, and movement is slowed down to compensate. You have to hold a run button to move even somewhat fast, but it’s still slower than the original. And you do not know what pain is like until you’ve tried controlling a 3D game with a d-pad. It’s not impossible, but it’s certainly not fun. And depending on the controller, it can be even worse. The only controller I have that can play this game is my Switch 1 Pro Controller. And if you’ve ever used one, you’d know how rough the d-pad is. It works fine for 2D games, but don’t even think about using it in games where you move in four or more directions. Missed inputs are constant, and the uncomfortable edges made this game unbearable. Now, I don’t really hold that against this game, as it was not supposed to be played with a Switch Pro Controller. But I can’t see this game working much better on an official DS model. Especially the original model, which this game was designed around. And no, playing this game with a circle pad or a joystick does not make it better. The game was only programmed with 8 directions in mind, so it honestly feels worse in some ways.

And the new content just doesn’t justify dealing with the controls. It’s neat, but that’s about all it is. You can live without it. It’s not like I’m gonna go back to the original saying “where the heck is Wario?” Especially when half of the new missions are silver stars that are functionally no different than red coins. And let me be clear: Super Mario 64 DS is a good game, and you could absolutely get by with this. I would love a port of this game with better controls, or even an official rom hack of the original that adds the DS content. But unless one of those things happens, I don’t see myself finishing this game. My thumb can’t take it.

13th Place - New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe

Tier: B
Played on: Switch 2



This covers the Switch rerelease of New Super Mario Bros. U and its standalone DLC, New Super Luigi U. I was torn between reviewing Luigi U as its own game and reviewing it as a rerelease akin to 3D World + Bowser’s Fury. I ended up going with the latter. But If I was reviewing Luigi U separately, it would go right above New Super Mario Bros. DS in the ranking.

Let’s start with Luigi U. This one is interesting, as although it’s DLC, it is basically its own game. It is a separate campaign with no ties to your Mario U save files. However, it doesn’t fit the bill of a completely new game to me. Unlike Xenoblade 2’s Torna DLC, this game doesn’t offer new mechanics. It’s less of a new game and more of a “remix” of the original. Now with shorter, harder levels and slipperier controls.

Now, I’ve heard a lot of people compliment the shorter, harder levels. But what less people compliment are the level designs themselves. Not only are they designed around Luigi’s slippery physics, but they assume that you have already beaten the main game. Because of this, they’re allowed to go wild with whatever level concepts they want with no regards to difficulty progression and new players. Many levels here feel like Mario Maker levels in the sense that they use ideas that no other Mario game has touched. And while that does mean that the levels feel far less natural than the base game, it does make it a very engaging and interesting experience. You never know what to expect in a Luigi U level. But unlike the base game which has some levels that kind of drag, this game has short levels that are designed to be blazed through at top speeds. That makes the levels quite fun, especially to replay while going for all 3 star coins.

That’s great, but another thing I appreciate about this game is the power-ups. The base game had the exact same list of power-ups, but for some reason, Propeller and Penguin were locked to the postgame. I really don’t understand why, as it meant that there were only three major power-ups, one of which being inarguably better than the other two. In this game, you get all five, plus Mini if you hate yourself. That ensures that there is quite a lot of variety in power-ups, and it also makes toad houses very valuable, as certain power-ups may be better in certain levels that don’t offer them.

My problem with Luigi U is one that I briefly touched on earlier. It doesn’t really feel very natural. Luigi U, to me, feels like the developers were giving themselves a chance to use some weird mechanics that they couldn’t fit into the base game lest they mess up the difficulty progression. But it’s not like Wonder, which was a full game. This is a DLC pack. They weren’t allowed to make new objects for the game, nor were they allowed to go crazy with making levels as fleshed out as they could have been, both visually and mechanically. They didn’t even make a new world map! So while that makes Luigi U a great addition that compliments an already solid game extremely well, it also feels disconnected in this strange way that’s hard to understand unless you’ve played the game. And that’s my opinion on the entire thing, really. A really solid time that compliments the base game well, but it feels somewhat out of place for both good and bad.

Oh, and the base game got some changes in this rerelease, too, but it honestly makes it a lesser version. Toadette is here, but they added her at the cost of Blue Toad. This is great on paper, as Blue Toad is a scourge on humanity who must be eradicated, and Yellow Toad is much cooler. But removing Blue Toad means that in a four player game, someone always has to play as Toadette. And she has unfair advantages in the form of triple the lives from 1-ups and a special power-up, Crown. And for some reason that only Hylia knows, you can still get Crown from toad houses even if you aren’t playing as Toadette. All that does is waste inventory slots. And it’s even worse in Luigi U! Because they removed Mario, there are only two traditional characters. In a four player game, two players have to play as Toadette or Nabbit (who is completely invincible to most damage and can’t collect power-ups). There’s no reason for this other than wiping the game clean of Blue Toad’s hideous face. And after researching, they didn’t even do that, as he’s still accessible through a cheat code. But all he does is replace Yellow Toad, so literally nothing changes! This game is the worst! (Oh, and they changed how spins are performed which leads to unfair deaths. You can get used to it but it’s kind of a pointless change).

Combined together, this is easily the definitive New Super Mario Bros. game. It has the most content and appeals to the widest spectrum of players. So yeah, this is the best NSMB game. But what does that really mean at the end of the day? It’s the definitive version among a bunch of games that are near-identical. That title means nothing. If you want to buy a New Super Mario Bros. game, buy this one. But you’d be much better off picking up Wonder or even an NSO subscription to play the classics.

12th Place - Super Mario Bros. 3

Tier: B+
Played on: Nintendo Classics NES



This might be a bit lower than you were expecting, and I wouldn’t blame you if the lower placement of this game caught you off guard. But the reasoning for this placement is simple. It just has been outdone. The innovations of Mario 3 are remarkable, and it makes this game something really special. But that was at the time it was released. I’m judging these games based on how fun they are today. Innovation plays a factor, but I don’t think this game holds up in the same way as World and 64 which were also huge leaps in quality for platformers. The controls feel pretty awkward to me, the unique power-ups are barely utilized, and the level quality is inconsistent. And with all that in mind, I do think that placing it any higher than this is just a bit dishonest.

But that’s me speaking from the brain. Time to speak from the heart.

Super Mario Bros. 3 is an absolutely legendary game. But oddly enough, that didn’t register to me until very recently. I want you to put yourself in the shoes of someone in 1991 in America. If you played this game back then, it would have absolutely blown you away. It was far and above any platformer that had ever come out. You can choose levels on a world map! You can fly! There are unique bosses in every world! There are nearly a hundred levels! You can turn into a frog! This game looks at Mario 1 and laughs in the face of it. The size and scope of this game was just unbelievable for the time! So many innovations in Mario and platformers as a whole that we take for granted these days started here.

One major innovation was power-ups. Plural! It’s hard to believe, but the original didn’t really have power-ups in the same way we view them today. Only two, and one is strictly better than the other. They acted less like “power-ups” and more like a health bar. But this game has Mushroom and Fire as expected, but it also has the god-tier Raccoon which is one of the greatest power-ups in any platformer ever. Frog was more scarce, but every level where you can use it was a treat. And Hammer is stupid rare and you can only use it once or twice per playthrough but it makes you feel wickedly powerful. Now, the amount of power-ups doesn’t matter too much considering the fact that you can barely use two of them. But need I remind you that YOU CAN FLY IN THIS GAME?! Raccoon alone was just awesome, but it still has disadvantages when compared to Fire. You don’t always want one or the other, adding a layer of strategy to it. And do you want even more strategy? Thanks to the world map, you can now collect power-ups at toad houses and store them for future use. So if you come across a level and think “huh, Fire would be really useful here”, then you can use it! Simple as that. This allows for a new layer of complexity BEFORE YOU EVEN START A LEVEL, on top of items that make overworld traversal much easier. But be sure to complete as many levels as you can, as they unlock toad houses for more power-ups and spade houses for bonus lives.

And how about those levels? Well, as I said previously, I don’t think that this game has a top-tier selection of levels. But where it shines is the amount and variety of them. Levels are short in this game, but this allows them to be played at a fast rate. And playing so many levels in a short time means that you experience so many ideas one after another. I wouldn’t put the level variety of this game on the same level as 3D World or Galaxy 2, not even close. But it’s nothing to scoff at here. You get some really unique ideas here. But they’re not just unique, they’re memorable. I loved this game as a kid, and many of the levels in the first three worlds really stuck with me. Like the one where you’re chased by a giant fish who can eat you whole in one bite, that one is great.

With levels being so short, they had to make a lot of them. But they just went overboard. This game has 88 levels, which sounds standard today, especially since levels are so short. But this is an NES game. This game is 222 kilobytes, yet it has nearly as many levels as the original, The Lost Levels, and USA COMBINED. That is absolutely unbelievable, especially for a game on the same console as those. Now, a big problem I have with this game is the difficulty. Not necessarily how hard the levels are. They’re tough, but not impossible. No, my issue comes from the lives system. Getting a game over in this game can be devastating, as it forces you to replay all the levels prior to the last fortress you cleared. The lives system is antiquated, I think everyone knows this. But this game got hit hard by its inclusion. There are so many levels and you start out with such a small amount of lives. And with how hard this game can be at times, you’re forced to replay levels constantly. This wouldn’t be as much of an issue if the game had a save feature, but it does not. And that’s honestly a real shame. I remember as a kid, I got pretty frustrated with it. I knew that there were so many levels in this game that I just couldn’t play because I had to replay the first couple worlds over and over again. I think I got to world 4 once but that was it. I understand that this was done to extend the play time, but I still find it to be a massive problem, especially these days.

The other problem I have with this game is the consistency of these levels. Usually, my playthroughs start fine enough. In World 1, I’m feeling optimistic. By World 3, I’m starting to get into a groove. By World 5, I’m really into it! And in World 7, I start remembering why I’m somewhat critical of this game compared to others. Worlds 7 and 8 are flat out not fun. There are a handful of decent levels, but about half of them are straight up bad. And there are a couple that are just incoherently designed. That’s actually a problem I have with a lot of older Nintendo games. There is a very sharp difficulty spike in the last third of the game. They assume that anyone who has gotten that far is a gamer god who can handle anything, but the problem is that the challenges they pose are rarely challenging. Rather, they’re frustrating. And this game is a prime example of that. World 7’s first fortress and the final level are both contenders for my least favorite Mario levels, they’re that bad.

But that doesn’t change my opinion of just how great this game is. And just because other games have surpassed it in my eyes, that doesn’t mean I don’t love this game. Mario 3 is such an important game despite its flaws. And while some of its issues were fixed in the excellent remake (which we’ll touch on later), the original is still a game that deserves to be played by literally everyone. And odds are that you can already play it with Nintendo Classics, so you’ve really got no excuse. Go play it!

11th Place - Super Mario World: Super Mario Advance 2

Tier: B+
Played on: Visual Boy Advance Emulator



This is definitely the weirdest Super Mario Advance game. The other advance games add new content and features. But literally all this one does is change the graphics, give Luigi the slippery physics he had in the All-Stars Release and give you an extra cutscene for collecting every Dragon Coin. So why did I include this for the ranking? Well, it has Mario Bros. Classic. Yeah.

So I have to cover this game by a technicality. But I'd honestly call this the only Mario Advance game that is notably worse than the original (and that does include Mario Advance 3 which was not included in this ranking).

Obvious thing out of the way first. Mario Bros. Classic is good. I don’t think anyone can debate that. Any game with Mario Bros. Classic is an instant 11/10. But if you know one thing about this game, it’s most likely that the colors in the graphics are washed out as if Nintendo left your cartridge in the sun. They did this because the Game Boy Advance had a pretty bad screen before the SP came out. I guess I can understand that logic, but I think they took it a little too far. I’ve never seen this game on an original screen, however. And besides, it can never be as bad as the GBA ports of the Donkey Kong Country trilogy.

Another issue: Screen crunch. Super Mario World was not designed for this aspect ratio. You will frequently have moments where you have to make a leap of faith and hope you survive. It’s not the worst thing in the world but it’s not ideal. There are some levels that are hit harder than most but other than that, I can live with it.

This game just suffers from the issue that many portable conversions of console games have to deal with today. The entire reason this game exists is so that you can play Super Mario World on the go. But nowadays, you’ve got loads of options. The Switch and New 3DS, Laptops, Phones, even something like a modded PSP. And the other Mario Advance games offer something that the home console versions don’t, but this game really is just Super Mario World but slightly worse and it has Mario Bros. Classic. But like… it’s still Super Mario World. You can get by with this. I beat the whole thing in a day when I was only planning on playing a couple levels before bed, so there you go. It’s a competent way to play a great game but for the love of god, play the original.

10th Place - Super Mario Sunshine

Tier: A-
Played on: Switch (3D All-Stars)



Mario Sunshine is an… interesting game. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what it is. Someone will say “why do you think about Mario Sunshine” and all I can really respond with is… I dunno. And I’m definitely not alone in this. Not only is it an experimental game that is hard to comprehend without playing it, it is also one of the least accessible Mario games. It has only been rereleased once in a limited-release collection, though it will soon be added to a Switch 2 exclusive NSO app. But my point is that not a ton of people have access to this game. I mean, I always wanted it so badly as a kid, but it was just impossible to get my hands on. So I’ve finally played it. I even 100% completed it! And now that I’ve played it, what do I think about Mario Sunshine? I dunno.

A lot of segments in this ranking could be considered their own mini-reviews of the games they cover, but Sunshine is a game that you really need to play more than once to understand completely. And as I’ve only played it once, I don’t think I know enough to really speak with much authority here. Do not consider this a review. Instead, consider it half-review, half-rant.

Sunshine does a lot of things exceptionally well and a lot of things horribly wrong. So let’s take them one at a time. The best thing this game does is its vibe and theming. To be more specific, Isle Delfino as a setting is wonderful. Sunshine has a real sense of place that no other Mario game has matched. Every location is a natural part of this giant Island resort. Like the luxurious hotel, the tribal village, or the tourist-y theme park. These areas aren’t connected together in any mechanical way, but they are tightly knit together from a thematic perspective. Honestly, I just wish there were more areas. I want to see more of this awesome island! But what we’ve got is great. And it’s all complimented by catchy, tropical music and colorful visuals that are a huge step up from 64.

Exploring Isle Delfino is great, but what makes it even better is the movement. It feels like a new version of 64’s movement in a sense that you can still combine lots of different moves together. However, it’s not as feel-y as 64’s movement. Mario has less weight to him, and you can pull off some crazy cool moves with far more precision. On top of making Sunshine a great game for speedruns, it also evokes some of that “playground” feel that 64 had. It’s definitely harder to get a hold of and the movement doesn’t feel as natural as 64, but it’s still a whole lot of fun to jump around the levels and see what cool stuff you can do. Delfino Plaza in specific is a perfect playground for this, as it is very open with a lot of verticality to test out F.L.U.D.D. And speaking of which…

F.L.U.D.D. is another big reason as to why this game is so hard to figure out. I get that they wanted to up the ante from 64, but a water jetpack is not how I expected them to do it. And I’m mixed on this one. On one hand, it has zero thematic cohesion with the character of Mario in the same way that Cappy does. It is also pretty hard to get used to, making this the worst 3D Mario game for young kids and even adults who can’t get used to the weird F.L.U.D.D. controls. And using F.L.U.D.D. slows down movement in a game where I usually just like jumping around and exploring with precision. But on the other hand, it is similar to Luigi’s Poltergust in the sense that it is so weird, so unique, and so out-there that it allows for gameplay mechanics and level designs unlike anything gaming has ever seen. Like, there’s a mission where you shoot rockets from F.L.U.D.D.’s nozzle on a rollercoaster to destroy a giant mechanical bowser. That’s not an idea that would have worked in any other Mario game, only this one. And it does not let that opportunity slip by, as this game has some wickedly creative uses for F.L.U.D.D. I think that I like F.L.U.D.D. overall, but it is not nearly as great of a gimmick as Cappy. It expands Mario’s moveset in great ways that just don’t feel very natural or cohesive.

Now, I don’t know if this is controversial, but a lot of this game’s missions are not my favorite. They can be pretty frustrating and not as fun as a Galaxy mission. But what these missions do that no other Mario game can is the absurdity of it all. If someone asks what you are doing in this game, the answer is almost always out-there. Like “pushing a giant watermelon down a mountainside into a giant blender” or “spraying water on a giant shadow manta ray that splits in half when it gets wet”. Even if some missions aren’t the most fun, they are frequently memorable in ways that 64’s missions aren’t. A lot of my enjoyment of these missions just come from the “huh?” factor that comes from giving a giant eel a dentist appointment.

But here is where we get to the biggest problem with Sunshine. The structure. Sunshine has my least favorite structure of any Mario game. It doesn’t ruin it for me, but I can see why it might for some people. It’s very similar to 64’s on the surface, but the difference is that Shines aren’t treated like collectables in this game. They are more true to the term “mission”. You don’t explore to find them. Rather, they are treated as “episodes” that unlock in a set order. You must complete the first 7 in each area to unlock the final boss. To put it bluntly, I do not like this at all.

The problem is the fact that you HAVE to do them in a certain order and you HAVE to get all 49 story shines. You don’t have much of a choice, and I just don’t see a purpose in this. A huge part of why people love the star system in 64 and the Galaxy games was that it was flexible. If there was a mission you didn’t want to do, you could skip it so long as you had a certain number of stars by the end of the game. It made every playthrough unique, as you would get different stars each time and maybe experience missions that you had never played before. But not in Sunshine! Every playthrough is the same now. And linearity isn’t always a bad thing, but this is a sequel to 64 that strips a huge part of that game’s design. That being the freedom to play how and what you want. It makes no sense to me as to why they’d still use the star structure if they were going to simplify it to this degree. And yes, the individual missions may not be as linear as Galaxy 1, but the structure is even MORE linear than that of Galaxy 1 and even Galaxy 2. This is especially bad since Sunshine has a handful of famously frustrating missions. Most are fine, but there are some shines that I would KILL to skip. These controls were made for exploration, not gimmicky nonsense like the King Boo fight or the Pachinko Machine.

And let’s talk about that last one. If you’ve only played the 49 main shines, you may not recognize it. Sunshine has 120 shines. But the thing is that ONLY the story shines are required to beat the game. The other shines do absolutely nothing. But you can find these shines before beating the final boss, meaning they’re obviously not postgame content. So what the heck are they? Because if you have no intention to go for 100%, they serve no purpose. They do nothing other than give you a stupid postcard once you beat the game if you got all 120 shines. All of the time spent making pointless bonus shines could have been spent making actual missions and more areas. Galaxy 1 had a lot of bonus missions, too. But they were there to allow for a more flexible structure. SO WHY DOESN’T THAT ALSO APPLY TO SUNSHINE?!?!?!?!?

I think all of this frustrates me because Sunshine is a great game. An amazing one, even. It is simultaneously an extremely weird yet extremely logical follow up to what came before it, and I mean that in the best way possible. But it has all of these little things that hold it back from being an all-time classic beloved by all. And with how much cut content this game has, it becomes clear that it could have been so much more. There is a world where an alternate Exi puts this game in S-tier, and it becomes one of their favorite games ever! But in this one, it’s an A-. But more than that, it’s a confused, amazing, frustrating, beautiful, underdeveloped, perfect mess of a game.

9th Place - Super Mario World

Tier: A
Played on: Nintendo Classics



Super Mario World is an absolutely iconic game. You didn’t need me to tell you that. When I was a kid, I played the demo in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and fell in love with it. And when I got my hands on the full version, I played it to death before getting stuck at the Forest of Illusion (I know for a fact that I’m not alone there). I love this game, it’s one of my favorites. But I've noticed that its notoriety has kind of slipped over time. Maybe it’s just me, or maybe it’s the fact that Fourth Generation nostalgia isn’t as prevalent as it used to be. But I don’t hear as many people talk about this game as I did when I was younger. So here’s my scorching hot take: this game is still great.

First off, this game is unique in the Super Mario series for its controls. Most Mario games are floaty and they make use of momentum. You’ve really gotta feel the jump. And that’s all fine and good, but this game, along with Sunshine, have the most precise controls in the series. I wasn’t a huge fan of them as a kid, and I know that lots of people still don’t like them. But I love love LOVE the controls in this game. They’re buttery smooth and responsive as heck. It feels so good to just run around and jump, I love them. And you’ve got new ways to enjoy them with additions like Yoshi and the Feather which are both amazing. I’d go as far as to call this game my favorite in the series when it comes to controls, at least in the 2D side of things.

But that’s not really what makes this game so impressive for its time. What sold people was the innovative world map (there’s a reason this game is called Mario World and not Mario 4). Mario 3 had world maps, yes. But they weren’t really maps as much as they were a fancy way to pick which level you want to play. No, this game kicks it up to 11. It’s a literal world map where every area blends into the last seamlessly. You don’t just run through obstacle courses, you’re crossing a bridge to the next area or making a daring trek through the Valley of Bowser. It’s so easy to take the world map for granted these days and it’s just as easy to make the assumption that it’s just a world map, it doesn’t matter. But it does matter! It made the game so much more real, like it was a genuine world at a time when we were used to 8-bit games. It showcased the power of the new generation of Nintendo. And it was just a freebie included with the SNES! Even today, I'd argue that no Mario game has really outdone it in this aspect (except for maybe Wonder). It adds this level of cohesion that you don’t often get in Mario games, made all the better by the bold graphics and wildly catchy soundtrack.

The world map also affects gameplay as it allows for tons and tons of secret exits. About a third of this game’s levels have secret exits that lead to more levels, sometimes with secret exits of their own. A lot of them are quite hard to find, but they reward you with more levels, hidden switches that make future levels easier, and even routes to skip entire worlds! (Any% speedrun routes only consist of 15 levels which is absolutely insane). Maybe you’ll find the hidden ninth world… or even a hidden tenth world for the most skilled players! But the cool thing about all these secret exits is that there are just so many of them. Every playthrough of this game feels a little bit different. It adds so much variety to the game and encourages replays and exploration. I mean it, this game is infinitely replayable. World and 64 are the two Mario games that I could probably replay until the end of time without getting bored.

This game is not perfect, though. I think that this game’s biggest problem is a lack of consistency in the level design. There are some levels here that are just flat out bad or confusing. In addition, some of the secret exits are not my favorite to find. I guess that makes them well hidden but some of them require quite a lot of effort that I don’t always want to put in. And why does the Forest of Illusion require you to get a secret exit? That’s just an unnecessary barrier that doesn’t accomplish much, especially for kids who don’t know how to find secret exits. These aren’t dealbreakers, though. So why is this game not talked about as much? Probably waning nostalgia, I won’t lie. But if you need a second reason, I think it’s because this game is very subtle. There’s not a level I can point at and call a true showcase in the same vein as Odyssey’s Metro Kingdom or Wonder’s Piranha Plants on Parade. It’s not a glamorous game, especially compared to the Sonic games that it competed with at the time of its release or even Mario 3. It’s not a game that will blow your mind the second you pick up the controller. But it IS a game that deserves to be played by any retro gamer for generations to come. It’s brilliant in its design, even if a lot of its best features are subtle. Even if people don’t talk about it as much these days, I'd still consider it to be one of the best Mario games and potentially my favorite SNES game. It holds up remarkably well. If you like retro games, you’d be a fool for not playing this. And even if you don’t, there’s still a lot of fun to be had here.

Super Mario Series Ranking - MSR1

Hi! Exi here. I’m a Nintendo fan, and I think you might have deduced that. Nintendo games have captured my heart in a way that no other developer has ever done. Their games have a certain level of charm and love that few major studios are able to match, if any, and they keep up a very consistent pace of releases as well. They appeal to the imagination and youth of a kid but they still provide in-depth experiences for older players. And even better, they aren’t bogged down by modern trends. I’d argue that Nintendo games are some of the most pure games in the entire medium. And no other series shows that off better than Super Mario.



I mean, come on. Mario is basically the face of video gaming as a whole. Your Grandmother probably knows him! When you picture video games, you picture a plumber with a big mustache who jumps to the end of a level. Along the way, he’ll probably stomp on a turtle or two and nab tons of shiny coins. Mario IS video games. It was Super Mario Bros. that saved the industry from collapse back in the 80’s, it was Super Mario 64 that introduced gamers to third dimension in their games, it was New Super Mario Bros. that revitalized 2D gaming in the mid-2000’s. They’re extremely important games. But more than that, Mario games appeal to literally everyone and are understood by literally everyone. They’re so simple, what’s there not to get? But despite how simple they are, there is a lot of room for exploration, speedruns and advanced movement techniques. Anyone, regardless of skill, gaming know-how, or experience, can pick up a Mario game and have fun. They don’t just know Mario, they understand Mario.

The Super Mario series means a whole lot to a whole lot of people, and I’m certainly a part of that crowd. As I said previously, Mario games are just pure. They are truly the most video game-y video games you can possibly play. Because of that fact, they have never and will never lose their appeal to me. For as long as I’ve played games, Mario has been there. Super Mario Galaxy 2 was my childhood game. I wanted it so badly, and it did not disappoint. New Super Mario Bros. Wii is a game that my family and friends could understand and play with me. Those were great memories. And Super Mario Odyssey was one of those special games that truly blew me away when I first played it. I will never forget the moment I first beat it, that was magical. Despite how simple they are, Mario games just stick with people. And I genuinely mean it when I say that the Mario series helped mold me into the person I am today. That’s the power of this series. They single-handedly created my love of gaming and have always been there no matter what.

But I’m a fairly analytical person, and that obviously applies to games. The pureness of Mario is what makes it so fun to analyze for me. How the levels are designed, how the power-ups change the experience, or even down to the height and distance that Mario jumps. And despite how similar many of these games are, they are structured and designed in different ways that make for great discussion. And that’s why I played through every mainline Super Mario game. I want to compare all of them and see how they stack up in the pantheon of games this series has churned out. This not only means that I’m judging them by how fun they are, but also how they are designed and where they fit in the Super Mario series.

Let’s talk about what counts as a mainline Super Mario game. The definition is… very vague. I had a hard time deciding what counts and what doesn’t, and even now as I write this, I’m confused. There is no official source that tells you what counts and what doesn’t. Not even the Mario wiki is helpful. This seems minimal, I know. But it’s very important to me… and probably me only. So I've decided on the following criteria. A mainline Super Mario game is a platformer (2D or 3D) with a single player campaign where the main playable character is either Mario or Luigi. It MUST have the exact wording of “Super Mario” or “Super Luigi” in the name. Remakes, remasters and rereleases ONLY count if they add substantial new content in the form of new levels or modes. That means that the following platformers do not count, even if they are technically considered sequels or prequels.

- Mario vs. Donkey Kong games
- Donkey Kong games
- Yoshi’s Island, Super Mario Advance 3, and other Yoshi games
- Wario Land and other Wario games
- Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker
- Super Paper Mario (though it is a platformer, the title wording is different and stars Paper Mario, not Mario)
- Super Princess Peach
- Super Mario 35 (doesn’t have a campaign)

The only exception to this definition are the Mario Maker games. While 3DS and 2 do technically pass these criteria, it would be incredibly unfair to judge them as mainline Mario games. They rely on user created content as a selling point and the campaigns are bonuses, not the main event. And the sheer amount of content would place them high by default. Infinite levels means infinite content, and that makes them extremely hard to compare to the main series. However, just for fun (and because a friend of mine really wanted me to), I still wrote segments for them and will post them in a future update post.

Last thing: I don't expect you or anyone to read through every single one of these reviews. Just read the ones that you are personally interested in. To find one, use Control + F and search up the name of the game you want to read the review for. I'm sure you'll find it!

That’s a lot, I know. But I’ve been working on this ranking since the very start of this blog. If I’m gonna do it, I’m gonna do it right. This has been in the works for a long time, and I’m jumping for joy at the thought of you finally seeing the finished product. I really hope that you enjoy!

27th Place - Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels

Tier: F
Played on: Nintendo Classics



This is one of the worst designed platformers I have ever played. It isn’t Sonic 4 Episode 1 levels of unplayable, but this is the only mainline Mario game that I’d call objectively terrible. I don’t care who you are or what kinds of games you like, you will hate this game and everything it does to you and your increasingly worsening mental health.

This game laughs in the face of “level design”. I’m convinced that the creators of the game couldn’t spell level design. They are mediocre at best and incoherent at worst. And the reason for this is that the developers wanted to make a difficult game for those who had already mastered the first game. And listen, I understand that thought process. But they forgot that there is a difference between “challenging” and “hard”. A challenging game should… you know, challenge the player to really learn the ins and outs of a game and its mechanics. But a hard game just spits in your face and calls you ugly. It doesn’t want you to learn, it wants you to suffer. And that’s not how you design a game.

It’s commonly said but it’s true: This game is designed like a bad Mario Maker troll world. The level designs aren’t meant to be experienced, they’re meant to be… You know, I’m not sure what the initial intentions were. I guess the developers thought that all of these hidden blocks and warp zones that reset the game would be considered “epic pranks” but all they do is waste your time. As a sequel, this game also fails horribly. It doesn’t try to develop on the concepts in the first game in any meaningful way. It has zero meaningful additions to the game, the graphics have barely changed, and it doesn’t tweak the physics to work even slightly better in the context of tighter platforming. There is, no exaggeration, zero reason to play this outside of a historical perspective, and even that can only take you so far. Just… play the first two levels and stop there. I promise that you aren’t missing anything.

The only notable thing about this game is that it was released in the same year as the first chapter of Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure. I am only bringing this up to tell you that somewhere in this behemoth of a ranking, I hid a Jojo’s reference. If you find it, you win. You don’t win anything, you just win, and I will congratulate you.

26th Place - Super Mario Land

Tier: D-
Played on: Nintendo Classics



I’m gonna be frank with you, It’s really hard to write about this game. Not because I don’t have anything to say about it, but because I’m not sure what to judge it as. Keep in mind that this was a launch title for the Game Boy, and the Game Boy runs on two wads of gum and a dream. It’s obvious that this game was always meant to just be “good enough.” A short game to satisfy that Mario itch on the go. So in many ways, it’s nothing more than a demake of Mario 1 and 3. But in just as many ways, it’s an original game that was meant to stand on its own. Advertisements really honed in on the “weird and unfamiliar” aspect of the game, and rarely did they ever mention its portability. There are tons of new enemies, many of which haven’t been seen since. New mechanics, characters, and even fresh takes on old ones. Bowser, Luigi, Toad, and Peach aren’t even in the game! It’s clearly not just a demake. So what the heck is this game?

And the hardest part of all of this is that no matter what I judge it as, it feels wrong. If I judge it as a full Mario game, it feels unfair. If I judge it as a demake, it feels like I’m ignoring its creativity and charm. And even worse is that literally none of it matters. Do you really care about whether or not Mario Land is good? Basically everyone knows that this game isn’t that great, but it was exactly what it needed to be. It’s a portable Mario game. Doesn't matter if it succeeded at it or not, it just needed to be good enough. So instead, I’ll judge it like that. Is it good enough?

The biggest thing you’ll notice when playing is the controls. This is the worst controlling Mario game and it’s not even close. You fall like a brick and your horizontal distance while jumping is inconsistent. Enemies and moving platforms often have unpredictable movement patterns, so it can be hard to time jumps properly. Hitboxes decide to be weird sometimes, too. But you know what? I’d be fine with this all. In 1989, we were all way more used to games that controlled like this. Especially on portable systems. No, my problem comes from the console this game is on. The original Game Boy screen is notoriously terrible, and this game is very hard to play on it because of the small sprite size, blurry movement, and tiny screen. I’ve played my fair share of NES games, I can handle jank. And when I played this game on a big screen, it was pretty bearable. Not good at all, but bearable. However, I used to own this game on the actual Game Boy console, and it was horrible. It’s so hard to play on original hardware to the point where, to this day, I have never beaten this game on a cartridge. And this game is like 30 minutes long!

As for the creativity, this game is actually really interesting from a visual perspective. The four worlds of the game are themed around real world locations. Egypt, Bermuda, Easter Island, and China. And it works surprisingly well. You can really tell that there was cultural inspiration, whether it be from the backgrounds, enemies, or music. Obviously it’s not very impressive by today’s standards, as they couldn’t fit too many crazy visuals in a tiny Game Boy cartridge. But for a Game Boy launch title, this is pretty darn cool. And this is helped by the fact that every single song in this game is an earworm, especially Birabuto and Chai Kingdom’s theme. This all adds up to an experience that genuinely does feel unfamiliar, but not in a bad way at all.

So the question was is Super Mario Land good enough? And to that, I’d say that it depends on who you ask. Personally, I think that it was good enough back then. But these days, it’s more of a novelty. However, it’s a really awesome novelty. It’s so unique and charming! Not only is it creatively unique, it’s also just an interesting facet of Nintendo history. The problems this game has kind of makes it cooler, and it puts you in the shoes of someone from the Game Boy generation. You just don’t get these kinds of games anymore, the games that are still playable despite their uncountable compromises. It’s just really neat, and I think most people would agree. It’s just kind of hard to hate this game, but even the biggest Super Mario Land fans are willing to admit that this game isn’t that great.

25th Place - Super Mario Bros. Deluxe

Tier: D
Played on: VisualBoyAdvance emulator



In 2017, when I was 9 years old, I was hospitalized due to struggles relating to my mental health. It was an extremely scary time. It was an unfamiliar place that made every moment tense, every night sleepless, and every day grueling. But one night, the nurse was kind enough to let me play with her Game Boy Color. It was an unexpected surprise, but a welcome one. She had Tetris DX which was nice, but she also had Super Mario Bros. Deluxe. And the moment I realized that this game had a calendar was the moment my depression was cured.

This is one of the most adorably stupid games that has ever existed. It has no reason to be as charming as it is and I love it like a son. But that son is unfortunately outclassed by other sons that are smarter, stronger, and have a 4:3 aspect ratio.

The reason I love this game so much is just how much they put into it. This is a remaster of Mario 1 and The Lost Levels, but it has so many toys and bonuses that I rarely played the main games as a kid. It was just fun to see what cool stuff was here! You can get achievements, you can play some neat challenge modes, you can print silly pictures using the Game Boy Printer, you can read your fortune, you can type “butt” as your name in the leaderboard, there’s a calendar that goes up to the year 2999, the possibilities are endless. It makes this game feel like a toy box that you can just mess around in. It really captured me as a kid! And the best part is that none of this needed to be here. There is absolutely zero need for any of this. Even the substantial stuff like the challenge modes didn’t need to exist. They could have easily sold Mario 1 and TLL by themselves and made bank. Heck, they did that on the Game Boy Advance with the Classic NES line! But they didn’t. They went the extra mile to turn what could have been a simple rerelease into something filled with heart, charm, and fun. This is up there as one of the best Mario games for a young kid. But even an adult could get a kick out of some of the silly stuff here, and that’s what makes it so special to me. With that being said, holy Hylia, the main game is bad.

Mario 1 and TLL were both designed for a 256-pixel wide, 240-pixel tall screen. The Game Boy Color is puny by comparison at 160 wide, 144 tall. And unlike some Namco games that came out on the GBA, this game does not shrink its sprites. Rather, it just zooms in on Mario. That goes about as well as you’d expect. It arguably goes worse.

The second half of this game is a chore. It feels like every 3 times you jump, you hit an enemy or fall down a cliff that you had no way of predicting the location of. You straight up cannot see some things, so you have to either make leaps of faith or play the game very, very slowly. And this game was not designed to be played slowly. The second half of the game encourages you to time your jumps using physics that are very dependent on momentum. You can’t do that anymore because of the screen size, so you have to play a game designed around momentum without building momentum. Sound fun? Of course not, but that’s just how this game is. They did change the physics slightly, and yeah! Movement feels better than in the original, and it’s not as reliant on momentum. But it’s just not enough. Precise movements are still hard, and you build momentum very fast, causing unfair deaths when moving slow. This is all especially bad since this game doesn’t have a lot of blocks with power-ups. Unless you take a lot of time to explore or you know where everything is ahead of time, you will be small Mario for most of the game. So you have no choice but to just deal with it all and hope that the hammer bros. don’t one-shot you with their awful hitboxes and hammers that move across the entire screen. And this is only talking about the first game. I didn’t go anywhere near The Lost Levels, but I can imagine that it’s even worse.

My theory is that this game was designed for younger kids who don’t have the skills to go fast, so the whole momentum thing doesn’t bother them. They wouldn’t even get far enough in the game to the point where the screen crunch becomes a huge issue. They’d probably be too busy replaying the first world and messing with the bonus content to really care. And besides, we were more used to screen crunch when this game came out. So a kid (such as myself when I first played this) may not even register it as an issue. Under that context, it makes a lot of sense. But it unfortunately turns what could have been the definitive edition of a classic into a novelty that I can’t comfortably recommend to anyone. However, if you’re a 9 year old in a hospital who is just dying to use your Game Boy Printer to print off your calendar for July of 2837, then this game is for you.

24th Place - Super Mario Bros 2. (USA)

Tier: D+
Played on: Nintendo Classics



The rumors are true: Super Mario Bros. 2 in America is actually a reskin of a Japanese game called Doki Doki Panic. The Lost Levels was deemed to be too difficult to succeed outside of Japan, so they reskinned Doki Doki Panic and called it Mario 2. And the thing is that many people think that the problem is laziness. I disagree. Both titles were led by the same people, including Miyamoto. The game was also inspired by Mario. But the thing is that it isn’t Mario, and that’s the real problem.

I don’t consider this Mario 2. Rather, I prefer to call it the Japanese name, Super Mario USA (though I’m calling it Mario 2 for simplicity). That’s because… Well, it isn’t a Mario game. It’s Doki Doki Panic. And Doki Doki Panic has many fundamental differences that make it unrecognizable as a Mario game outside of the now-iconic character designs. If you’re reading this, I’m assuming that you already know a lot of these changes. I’m sorry if you don’t know them, but if I explained all the ways this game is different from a Mario game, we’d be here for hours. The point is that it uses a bunch of weird new mechanics that are completely disjointed from the past and future of the series. So instead of judging it as a Mario game, I try to judge it as Doki Doki Panic. But then another problem arises: It’s hard to judge it as Doki Doki Panic. It’s not like it’s a long running series like Mario. We have nothing to compare it to. This also happens to be the only 2D Mario game that I did not play as a kid outside of NSMB2. I don’t have a ton of experience with this game. But I don’t need a lot of experience to know that this is just not my cup of tea.

I know that a lot of people don’t like this game because its mechanics are “too weird” but I don’t think it’s that. I think that the mechanics just don’t work even when removed from the context of Mario. I simply do not enjoy them. Grabbing a turnip requires all movement to stop for a moment, and pulling lots of turnips in succession is more of a chore than anything, and you might not even find any goodies. But you absolutely 100% need to find everything, because getting a game over sends you all the way back to the title screen. I hate that in any game, but it’s especially bad in a difficult game like this. You spend a big portion of the game looking for potions which just isn’t fun when 95% of the loot you find is turnips. And it’s not like you need turnips. When you see an enemy, there is almost always a patch of turnips nearby. Besides, I find going around the enemies to be a better way of handling them in lots of cases. That’s because health is scarce. Taking damage is absolutely devastating in this game. If you get hit, the only way to heal is to find a mushroom (which are rare) or defeat 8 enemies (and you’ll probably get hit again in the process). This all combines together to make for an experience that is annoying more than anything else.

A complaint I have about this game is one that you may disagree with, and that’s the controls. I love precise controls in a platformer, and that’s why I love World’s physics. And while this game does have precise controls, I wouldn’t call them tight or smooth. When playing as Mario, I tend to find myself moving back and forth, trying to pendulum swing myself to where I want to be. That’s when precise controls fail, in my opinion. The precision should benefit the player, not work against them. And in many ways, poor implementation of precise controls can make them feel imprecise. I should clarify, though. The controls aren’t terrible or anything, just not ideal. This is more of a nitpick but one worth bringing up.

There is one addition that is inarguably great, however. The ability to pick your character is an amazing idea that is great in any Mario game. Heck, any game in general. It provides nothing but more options for the player. While I do usually play as Mario, the other characters are very worthwhile and offer strengths and weaknesses to fit certain situations. I played through the remake of this game as well, and in that playthrough, I tried to use all the characters equally. And it wasn’t hard, as all of them have their place. Dare I say, the character mechanics of this game are implemented better than those in 3D World. Though that game had multiplayer going for it. You unfortunately cannot make fun of your friends for picking Toad in this game. Huge problem.

Yeah, I’m not sure what else I can say about this game. It’s just… not my favorite, I guess? I hesitate to call it bad, as there is a chance that I just don’t understand it well enough or there’s something I’m missing. And you’re totally valid for liking it, as there is definitely a lot to like here. But I personally don’t have that much fun when I play it, simple as that.

23rd Place - Super Mario Bros.

Tier: D+
Played on: Nintendo Classics



I feel bad putting this game so low, but the unfortunate truth is that by today’s standards, this is not a great game. And the worst part is that it’s hard to explain why without feeling at least a little bad. I mean, it’s Super Mario Bros.! You aren’t human if you’ve never played this game. It has been rereleased countless times and is officially playable on all but two major Nintendo consoles which is a testament to just how influential this game is. And that’s without mentioning this game - alongside Duck Hunt and R.O.B. the Robot - revitalized the industry from the infamous crash of 1983. If Super Mario Bros. did not exist, there is a genuine chance that video games as we know them would be completely different if they still existed at all. It is because of these facts that I don’t find criticizing this game to be very productive. But for the sake of this list, I’ll do it. But let’s keep it brief

The controls are just not very good. This game practically established platformers as a genre, so it’s no surprise that they aren’t perfect. One could argue that they’re far better than you might expect from a game of this era. But they aren’t good. When you jump, it is not very easy to change your direction. Because of this, the game is at its best when you are running at top speed constantly without changing directions. This is fine in the early levels, but it makes the later levels that aren’t designed around it a slog. Not that you’d get there thanks to the lives system. If you are not aware of the cheat code that gives you infinite continues, you only have a handful of lives to beat the entire game with. If you game over, it’s back to the start. You can’t even earn continues like you can in Sonic 1 and 2. To be clear, I hate this in basically any game it’s in, and it’s not as bad as it is in Super Mario Bros. 2 (USA) because of the shorter levels and the warp zones. But it’s still a terrible design decision that exists only to pad out playtime. Standards may have been different back then, but bad design is bad design.

Levels past the first world range from unmemorable to straight up bad. They didn’t really establish a level design structure until Mario 3, so the levels are less about introducing new concepts and more about being more levels to play. You likely won’t play most of them unless you use save states or warp zones thanks to the lives system, but I digress.

I don’t know what else I’m supposed to say. You know this game doesn’t hold up perfectly, and nobody expects it to. So reviewing it alongside the other games on this list is pretty pointless. But if I absolutely had to, all I could do is state the obvious. It’s an iconic but dated game. Moving on.

22nd Place - Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins

Tier: C-
Played on: Nintendo Classics



Listen, I love this game. Most people do. This is such a charming yet impressive game that stands tall as one of the best Game Boy games.

But let’s be honest with ourselves for a moment.

I’ve heard so many people talk about how great this game was, and I’ve heard multiple people say that this is one of the better Mario games, if not one of the best. And I just want to ask: Is it? Is it really one of the better Mario games? Because as much as I love this game, It’s not even in the same league as anything in the top half of this ranking.

There are two major things that people point to when talking about this game. The first is its creativity. Ditch those boring old Mario level themes, because this game goes nuts with them. You can go inside a whale, a pumpkin, a house, even a giant Mario doll. And if that’s not enough for you, how does literal outer space sound? And as a reminder, this is a Game Boy game. Which leads me to the second point: this is one of the most impressive Game Boy games. The system could handle NES style games quite well, but it struggled to keep up in the SNES generation. Yet somehow, Nintendo managed to make games that are almost comparable to SNES games without as many compromises as one would expect with a budget portable system from 1989. This game is no exception, as the sprites, music, and the overall game are just so bold for the system it was on. I won’t deny either of these points, as they’re both very valid ones that I agree with. But that’s kind of where my praise stops.

There are very few moments in the game where I’m genuinely engaged, and that kind of says it all. It’s not unfun, but I wouldn’t call it fun. And outside of its creativity and it being impressive for the hardware, there’s nothing I can really point to here and call great. Yes, it’s almost comparable to an SNES game. But there are still many compromises. The console can barely handle this game and its huge, chunky spritework. And to compensate for that, the game runs and plays very slowly. I may be biased because I dislike slow platforming, but I still can’t help but think that this game feels unengaging. Levels can often be straight lines without much going on. And you can also very easily skip over most levels with the most overpowered power-up in the series, Bunny. It makes many levels trivial. And even without Bunny, the game just isn’t that difficult. At least, up until the final level where the difficulty spikes like crazy. When I play this game, I’m kind of on autopilot. Just going through the motions because the gameplay just isn’t that interesting, flat out.

This game just doesn’t really do much at all, if I’m being honest. Despite its creative level themes, the whole experience kind of blends in to me. A really at-home feeling Game Boy game. One that I could very easily see myself popping in during a road trip. But I just don’t find it to be very remarkable outside of that context. And hey, I still love this game! I find it to be a very unique game with its creativity and adorable music. But I couldn’t reasonably recommend this game to most people.

Intermission - The New Super Mario Bros. Series

Looks like we’ve reached our first New Super Mario Bros. game on the list! So before we get to that, here’s a preamble.

The New Super Mario Bros. series is made of five games, all infamous for being basically the exact same game. If you have played one, you have more or less played them all. The minor differences that are there don’t change the fact that these games are basically level packs. They’re more levels to mindlessly play through and not much more. And I’d like to give some shockingly out-there take to redefine our opinions on these games, but I’ve got nothing. They are the most simple Mario experiences you could possibly ask for. Sure, they’re extremely well designed, and there are definitely glimpses of creativity and brilliance in them. But for the most part, they’re just the same game five times in a row.

That paragraph could preface most, if not all of their entries on this ranking. So I wanted to say it now to avoid repetition.

21st Place - New Super Mario Bros. Wii



Tier: C
Played on: Dolphin Emulator

This was one of my childhood Mario games. This and Super Mario Galaxy 2. In fact, I 100%’d both as a kid! Or, at least I got close in the case of this one. So it should mean a lot when I say that this is the lamest of the five.

An important thing to remember is that this game came out at a time when people weren’t sick of the New Super Mario Bros. formula yet. It took until the announcement of 2 and U for that to happen. But at the time, it didn’t seem like many people were upset at this game. It had an excuse, after all! The DS one started the series but this one brought it to home consoles and added 4-player multiplayer! That was a huge deal, and it’s no wonder why this game sold so well. Because of that, everyone clowns on U and 2, but I think that this game holds up the least of the series. It didn’t feel like that at the time, but upon a revisit, it really became apparent to me how lame this game is.

This game almost feels dead in a way from a visual perspective. It’s hard to describe. DS has its own funky style and U has some pretty neat and colorful scenery. Even 2 had the abundance of coins and the wonderfully crunchy graphics. But this game has nothing. They are the absolute bare-bones zero creativity Mario graphics. Level designs are a lot simpler and the camera is very zoomed out to accommodate for multiplayer and Propeller, so there’s nothing going on there. Not only does it make the game visually uninteresting as there’s not a lot to see, it also harms the gameplay. Although it does make the levels pretty fun to just blast through at top-speed as you can always see what’s coming.

So the level design density is pitiful, the creativity is non-existent, the visuals are bland. Does this game have any saving graces? Well, the power ups this time are actually pretty good. One of the best in the series, I’d say. Propeller and Ice are really fun, Mini is boring as always but it’s tolerable, and you’ve still got the classic Mushroom and Fire. But the best one is Penguin, which is one of my favorite power ups in the series. Overpowered and unbalanced? Oh, absolutely. But it’s an absolute blast to use. It’s got the powers of Frog, Ice, and Shell combined together. It’s such a beautifully broken gift of a power up, and that alone is why Wii’s World 3 - the ice world - is my favorite in the New Super Mario Bros. series. What else… This game started the debate between Blue and Yellow Toads. But we all know that Yellow Toad is the better one, so no point in getting hung up on it. And that’s really about it.

Man, I remember this game being a lot cooler. And I suppose that it’s a perfectly fine Mario experience to blast through, but that’s not really enough. The best way I can describe this game is also one of the most depressing things that any game can be described as: It’s good for what it is, but it isn’t much.

20th Place - Super Mario 3D Land

Tier: C+
Played on: Citra Emulator



So to preface this, I played this game on an emulator as my 3DS is broken at the moment. I do not recommend playing this game on an emulator. I’m really not the kind of guy that won’t play games if it's not on the original hardware but wow, do not play this game on an emulator. It’s not very fun. The lack of a circle pad hurts this game quite a lot, especially on a controller with wide stick ranges like the Switch Pro Controller. It didn’t really impact my placement of the game overall because I’ve played it multiple times on official hardware, but I wanted to throw that out there so you’re aware of the less-than-stellar way that I played this game.

Let’s start with this: I love Super Mario 3D Land. I do. I grew up on the 3DS and this was a game that I could always come back to. I remember strategizing with my friend next door on how to find all of the Star Medals. In fact, I got quite close to 100% completion. This was one of my first 3DS games, and the 3DS is my favorite console of all time. I mean it when I say that I really do love this game. However, looking at it objectively, I really don’t think it’s anything special. It’s not a bad game, not at all. But compared to some of the other games on this list, it’s not amazing.

This game is a 2.5D Mario game. It has the linear structure of a 2D Mario game but with 3D controls. Basically, imagine if a New Super Mario Bros. game got 3D-ified. And I mean that in every sense. This game, much like the New Super Mario Bros. series, has no creativity. At all. There are zero levels that are both memorable and fun, maybe except for the final level. And I’d argue that it’s worse here because the levels aren’t really locations. Rather, they’re random blocks in the sky. I do not like this in any Mario game, and it’s at its worst here. There’s zero character to this game. The most you get is a bunch of enemies having tails. Speaking of tails, Tanooki is just Racoon’s lame uncle. It doesn’t have the flight of Racoon. And you know what, that makes sense. It could be pretty broken in a 3D game. But at that point, why include it at all?! If you wanna bring back an old power up, I think Yoshi would have made a whole lot of sense in this game. But my least favorite thing about Tanooki is that it caused a bunch of Mario games around this time to be tail themed. Why did they add the Super Leaf to Mario Kart 7?

Tangent aside, the game is famous for being the game to save the 3DS. Why? Well, on top of being a good fun Mario game that anyone can play, it’s also the game famous for validating the 3DS’ gimmick of glasses-free stereoscopic 3D! The game was designed around an isometric camera angle. You don’t really have control over it, and it’s sort of tilted. Because of that, jumping can be kind of tough. It’s hard to line up your jumps because your depth perception is all wacked out with this camera angle. Stereoscopy allows for more depth in the visuals, making it much easier to make precise jumps. Because of this, it’s often credited as the game to give the 3D a purpose. But here’s my question… does it?

Again, I played this game on an emulator, so I didn’t play in 3D. But I have played this game in 3D before, and yeah! 3D does help you make jumps, and it makes the isometric camera angle less of a problem. But did it ever need to be a problem to begin with? Playing the game in 3D is more fun than playing it in 2D, yes. But it’s not any better than any other 3D Mario game that doesn’t use a weird camera angle. When I play 64, Galaxy, or Sunshine, there are no moments when I think “I wish this game had stereoscopic 3D”. And stereoscopy is cool, it’s neat, it’s a fun gimmick. But it doesn’t do enough to justify an isometric camera angle. It really doesn’t suit Mario if you ask me. And it’s not like a normal camera angle was impossible on the 3DS. It could have very easily had a normal camera angle, but they included it anyway because they wanted to make the 3D capabilities of the 3DS more worthwhile, as it makes jumps easier. In other words, 3D Land doesn’t innovate. It fixes a problem that it created itself. Making your game less fun without 3D doesn’t give 3D more worth, especially if the 3D doesn’t accomplish anything that other Mario games can do just fine without it. And that’s not to mention the accessibility issues. Stereoscopy can cause strain on the eyes, and some eyes are more sensitive than others. In fact, some people physically can’t see stereoscopic 3D. It’s impossible for them. Even if you can see it and you don’t have sensitive eyes, it can give you headaches. So for people like me who can’t play this game for long sessions in 3D, all that the gimmick accomplishes is making jumps harder to pull off. And as a cherry on top, two 3DS models straight up don’t have 3D at all (although I don’t hold it against this game, as those models came out after it).

To make it all easier to stomach, the levels are really short, basic, and easy. I assume to add that pick-up-and-play aspect to it, which makes a lot of sense in a game that focuses on stereoscopic 3D. But if you play in 2D, you don’t have that context. The levels in this game, on top of being unmemorable, are so short that you’re likely to forget what you just played right after finishing it. Rarely does the game offer a challenge, and most of my deaths come from me lining up my jumps incorrectly. But it makes up for that with the sheer amount of levels. 16 worlds! That’s insane, and I believe that it’s the most worlds of any linear Mario game (even though the worlds are smaller). I really do appreciate this decision. If the levels are so short, you might as well give us a ton of them. In fact, because the levels are so unmemorable, I didn’t realize that the special worlds are actually remixed versions of the normal worlds until very recently, not new levels. That’s an odd way that a lack of memorability helps the experience. Weird, right?

Hi! Editing Exi here. I wrote this segment before having replayed Super Mario Galaxy 2. And one thing that I realized is that 3D Land is, in many ways, a diet Galaxy 2. It uses a lot of mechanics introduced in that game, but it trims the fat and focuses on being a more linear experience. But Galaxy 2 did the exact same thing for Galaxy 1, and the sacrifices it made paid off in the end. I don’t feel that with this game. The levels aren’t memorable, nothing even tries to push the series forward, the gameplay is mindless at times… It really is just a hybrid of Galaxy 2 and New Super Mario Bros. Wii. And while that makes for an awesome game to just plow through on a road trip or a lazy weekend, it also makes for a forgettable experience, especially when compared to Galaxy 2, 3D World, or even New Super Mario Bros. on DS. And after replaying Galaxy 2, I don’t feel much desire to go back to this game anytime soon. Anyways, time to get working on the Odyssey segment. Lots of love from Editing Exi!

There’s a lot more I could say about this game, such as the limited movement directions and stiffer controls. But I think I should leave it here. Again, I do like this game. Not only are my memories of this game better than most Mario games, it’s just a fun time all around. A lack of creativity doesn’t amount to a bad experience, neither do the basic level designs. In fact, they make this game one of the best “safe-bet” Mario games out there! This is a good 2.5D platformer. But I don’t see it as anything more, and I think it’s somewhat strange how many people see this game as some innovative masterpiece. It’s not that, it was never supposed to be that. A defining moment for the 3DS? Absolutely. But a defining moment for Mario? Absolutely not.

19th Place - Super Mario Advance

Tier: B-
Played on: VisualBoyAdvance Emulator



Out of all of the Mario games, this is the one I’m most confused by. Not even from a design or gameplay standpoint. I mean that I just don’t know why this game exists, or at least why it was a launch title for the Game Boy Advance. Apparently it was envisioned as a follow-up to Mario Bros. Deluxe, but like… as THE launch title to get for GBA, it’s pretty weak. And if you really wanted to have a Mario remaster as a launch title, why Mario 2? 3 would have made so much more sense, or even a straight port of World or Donkey Kong Country (good ones, that is). Those would have been significantly better launch titles! Konami brought the goods with Castlevania: Circle of the Moon, and Capcom was having a fever dream with Mega Man: Battle Network. So it confuses me as to why Nintendo didn’t bring their own must-have game to the table. But that’s me questioning the game from the standpoint of a gamer in 2001. As a gamer in 2025, Super Mario Advance is alright in my book.

I kind of went in expecting to dislike this game, as I’m not particularly fond of the original. But this game makes two changes that transform the game from a D+ to a B-. The first is the infinite continues. It is somewhat sad that I have to celebrate the ability to actually finish a game but I will take it. The second is how health is handled. It is now a whole lot easier to refill your health, which was a big problem with the original. I’ve actually heard some people complain about this change, but I see this as nothing but a good thing. It should not have been so hard to heal in the original, and easier healing makes the game far more playable. Especially as someone who does not know the level layouts and mushroom locations that well. The game also looks a lot better. I understand that the graphical overhaul was done in All-Stars, not this game. But there are still a lot of small differences that make the game look even better. I particularly like how zoomed in it is. It looks great, as there is little empty space. But when it comes to gameplay, It fits Mario 2 oddly well, making enemies bigger and easier to handle. They also put more enemies on the tiny screen to showcase the power of the GBA, and that makes level designs mesh better with the throwing mechanics. The only negative the remake has for me is that vertical levels become quite annoying, as the game has to stop to scroll the screen constantly. 1-2 in particular is basically ruined by this.

Other than these changes, there isn’t much. The only other notable detail is that there are new collectables, including 5 ace coins in each level which are fun and 2 Yoshi eggs that are stupid and mean and you should never try to get them all. Mario 2 is a fairly short game, especially with infinite continues. So even simple collectables like these make a huge difference. I really appreciate their inclusion. That’s it for the base game. But Super Mario Advance was advertised as two games in one. The other game is a full remake of Mario Bros. from the arcades called Mario Bros. Classic. I won’t go into much detail, as it speaks for itself. It’s just a great rendition of the original, as the controls actually function this time. It’s fluid and smooth, but it also looks great and is a ton of fun. It makes Super Mario Advance a perfect game for car rides, as you can swap back and forth from the games depending on your mood. They actually brought the game back 4 more times in later GBA Mario games, including two others on this list. I honestly have no problem with this. It would have been cool if we got more arcade-style remakes for the Mario Advance games (maybe one for Dr. Mario or Wario’s Woods?) but Mario Bros. Classic is still great fun. They should include it with every game. Bayonetta Origins could really use it.

That’s kind of a simple overview, but I’m honestly just happy that we can enjoy Mario 2 in a much more playable form. There really isn’t much reason to play the original when you’ve got this. It suffers from some of the pitfalls in the original, and I still don’t consider it to be a Mario game. But dang it, I had fun with this one. Through some very small but very important changes, Super Mario Advance turned one of the most frustrating games in the series into a pleasant and interesting game that I definitely see myself revisiting.

This will be my last update until the next time I actually post a review. Despite that, let's keep this one brief.

I'm on a pretty steep mental health decline right now, but I'm still writing stuff. A lot of stuff. I have multiple giant projects in the works. I know that I say that frequently, but the problem is that I have a hard time focusing on one at a time. I am taking steps to improving my focus problems. It is a slow proces, but I am committed to getting at least one of my many big projects out. When I post one of them, I want it to mean something. But I'm not putting any due dates on them, at least not yet. When it gets posted, it gets posted.

The problem I face is figuring out which one to focus on. If I can lock in and get one of them done, it would be amazing. The one I'm currently focusing on is the Mario ranking. I've finished a lot of big entries in the rankings, namely the galaxy duology which is over 20,000 characters alone. Most of the games that I have left to cover in that one are short, but there are a few big ones, such as Odyssey, 64 DS, and 3D World + Bowser's Fury. Those are big ones that need time to be completed. The Classic Mega Man ranking is about halfway done, and I have all the games played! But it has been hard to find motivation to finish writing that. And the Kirby // Sonic reviews are progressing slowly. There are also a couple other projects that I want to keep completely under wraps until they are finished, so that will take time as well.

I wanted to make this update so that it is clear that I'm still writing. I won't post any more updates until the next review of mine comes out. I want to take my time until then, and it's probably for the best that I pause the updates until I prove that this blog is still alive. But yeah, thanks for reading and I'll see you as soon as possible!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

Double post, whoopsies

As for DKC, that would explain why you enjoyed tropical freeze so much. I've heard many a tale of people who thought it was great the first or second time but by the third or fourth, they call it one of the greatest games of all time. If you ever feel like replaying a platformer, maybe give DKC another shot!

And as for Hollow Knight, I think you just haven't figured out what to do with your collectables. A lot of the relics can be sold for crazy amounts of geo in the City of Tears. And all those grubs you saved can be exchanged for frankly ABSURD amounts of geo in the Forgotten Crossroads. And that geo can be spent at plenty of places to get new charms, mask shards, vessel fragments, charm notches, and nail arts. But that's another reason why the game is far more fun to 100% than to any%. You don't really need to know where all of this stuff is on an any%, especially since some of it is somewhat obscure. But on a 100% run, everything has purpose. Even stuff like Hallownest Seals can be sold for a couple hundred geo which can make a big difference when you plan to buy everything. The only collectable that I'd classify as "worthless" are rancid eggs. You can trade one rancid egg to retrieve your geo once you die without killing your shade. But not only do you have to trek all the way back to Dirtmouth for that, you also have to use a simple key to even use them at all. They're worth 400 geo each in permadeath mode, but in a normal run, they are pretty pointless. Other than that, I think it's less of an issue of the collectables being worthless and more of an issue of the game not conveying what to do with them, especially if you don't plan to explore every nook and cranny of Hallownest.

Anyways, thanks for letting me rant. I'm waiting for your glowing, heartfelt review of Donkey Kong Jr. Math!

If you'll allow me a rant... DKC Returns and Tropical Freeze are interesting games to discuss and read about, because they kind of have to grow on you. They're designed in a very particular way. You make these big, exaggerated jumps and movements that only an ape like Donkey Kong would make. And the levels are designed around that flow, and that's why it has to grow on people. Many people approach it like a Mario game. You have to understand DK's movement and why the levels are designed the way they are to appreciate how great it is. I wouldn't recommend it since you're clearly burnt out of DK, but I think that if you ever go back to them, you might have a better appreciation for both games. If you ask me, they're both excellent games, some of the finest platformers you could possibly play. But you have to put in some work to understand why, and that's a big ask for some people.

Also, your opinions on Hollow Knight are very valid. I love Hollow Knight, but the first half of the game has some pretty bad progression issues on a first time playthrough. I think that the greatness of Hollow Knight, similarly to DKC, comes when you take the time to understand it. In particular, I'm not a fan of exploring Hallownest when I go for any% but in a 100% run, it's honestly one of the most expertly crafted maps I've seen in a metroidvania since... ever? Every location, every path, every secret feels masterfully designed. But it took me a while to realize that. Silksong is a lot better to any%, which I appreciate.

Sorry for the rant, I just figured I'd share some of my thoughts. I'm beyond excited to read your Donkey Kong Jr. Math review. I expect nothing less than an 11.5/10 at the very least. Keep up the great work!!!

I had a similar experience with DKC1. I played it and kind of felt like I was missing something. It's a very impressive SNES game, but I don't see the hype these days. The level design is just not great a lot of the time, the bosses are hardly bosses, it's just kind of a frustrating experience. Though it did introduce Funky Kong so all of our criticisms are invalid, it is the greatest game of all time.

Also, if you can, I'd highly recommend checking out some DK spinoffs. There are a lot of them, and some of them are quite interesting. Jungle Beat in particular. Can't wait for the review of Donkey Kong Jr. Math, by the way.

In the wise words of Pajama Sam 24, "go poggies" and keep up the great work!

This is a bit of a shorter update, but it's mostly just to let you know what my plans are.

Exi Update - August 23rd 2025

General Health and Wellbeing - It's late at night as I write this, but I'm doing alright. I'm mentally preparing for school to start up again, and I'm teetering on a mental health rut. But some good things have happened! I ordered a Sega Dreamcast, and it has been great so far. NFL2K1 is a blast, and Crazy Taxi on original hardware is a treat. Virtua Tennis is neat, too, though I am not very good at it.

Sonic Retrospective Act 2 - I am very proud of the first installment in the new retrospective. I feel that I covered everything that I needed to. But I think that the next step is a bit odd. Rather than reviewing Sonic 2, I have decided to do a two-for-one of Sonic 2 and Sonic CD as they are connected in many ways. Especially in the case of Sonic CD, which is completely inseparable from Sonic 2. This is a bit of a strange choice, but I think it will pan out in the end. I mostly just want to keep up the momentum I've got with my Sonic 1 review and give Sonic CD more of a thorough review than I gave it previously. As of now, I have written the intro and background sections. I'm just starting the Sonic 2 portion, so it may be a minute before it is finished.

Kirby Retrospective - My current priority is to finish the Sonic 2 and Sonic CD review, but I won't be posting it until I finish the Kirby 64 review. I'll post them both at once. This is because I want to keep the Kirby and Sonic retrospectives running simultaneously. I tend to hyperfocus on one thing at a time, and I'd like to practice working on two things at once more effectively. However, I'm not entirely sure if I will keep up this schedule up. I will see how this experiment goes and decide from there. I have also decided to remove Kirby Air Ride from the games I plan to review. At least until Kirby Air Riders comes out. I do want to review them, but it might just be a separate review that is free from the Kirby Retrospective.

Other Projects - I've done quite a lot of work on two projects in the background. Those being a Metroid ranking and a ranking of every Wii Sports and Wii Play minigame. I'm about halfway through both. The former won't be done for a while, as I'm taking the Prime trilogy at a slower pace. But the latter may be done somewhat soon depending on how motivated I am. I've been motion control-ed out, it's hard to pick the Wiimote back up. But I think that when I do pick it back up, I can push through to the end of the project. I'm actually quite happy with my progress so far, and I think it'll turn out nicely. The Metroid ranking on the other hand is a different beast. Not that I'm not proud of it, but I just haven't had much experience with Metroid prior to starting the ranking. I was not qualified to talk about the series, so I've had to really put in a lot of effort to understand it. And I think I've done a solid job with that, but it's not very easy. I'm taking a break from it to focus on some other projects.

That's all for now. Pretty straight-forward update, but I wanted to get all of this out there. Thanks for reading as always!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

Sonic Retrospective Act 2 Part 1: Sonic the Hedgehog (16-Bit) - SRA1

Hi! Exi here. Nine months ago, I posted the first review on this blog and the first review in a wider Sonic Retrospective. I was still recovering from the effects of a toxic and traumatic friendship, and these Sonic reviews gave me an outlet to express myself through. I love games, it’s no secret. And reviewing them not only distracted me from bad parts of my life, but they gave me a new way to enjoy gaming. I value the late nights I spent playing and reviewing these games. They were some great memories! But in hindsight, I think my enthusiasm and lack of experience added up to a finished product that, while very important in my reviewing journey, doesn’t hold up to my current standards. They were too short yet too padded, they didn’t focus on the things they needed to focus on, they used a level-by-level format that doesn’t fit every game, they just weren’t great. They’re still very important to my progress as a reviewer, but I don’t think they’re worth reading anymore.

So today is my chance to make something I can really be proud of. I’m starting the Sonic Retrospective Act 2! With all that I’ve learned over my many projects both released and unreleased, I think I can do the Sonic series justice. So let’s talk about the series. From Sonic 1 in 1991 all the way to Sonic x Shadow Generations in 2024, we’re covering it all. But to do that, we need to start at the very beginning. That’s right, it’s time for a history lesson!

Our story starts in the 1980s. You see, Nintendo was the king of the video game industry at the time. Atari was quickly losing their influence in the market after the video game crash of 1983, so it’s not like Nintendo had much competition. They absolutely dominated the space, nobody could really top them. But then there was Sega, a company that primarily specialized in arcade games. But that success was fleeting. To keep themselves afloat, they decided to enter the home console market. Released on the same day as Nintendo’s Famicom (known stateside as the Nintendo Entertainment System), the SG-1000 burst onto the scene with graphics that were definitely better than the Famicom! How could this possibly fail?


- The SG-1000. The SG stands for "Sega Game". However, the name is a lie, as it does not have 1000 games. Only 80.

Well… the thing is that the Famicom had not only Nintendo games, but games from third-parties as well. That was something that the SG-1000 simply didn’t have since Sega was mostly in the arcade market. They didn’t feel comfortable paying their competitors to put games on their system. And thus, the SG-1000 faded into obscurity. How obscure? Well, I’m willing to bet that you had never heard of this console prior to now. That obscure. They tried again with the Mark-III, later rebranded to the Sega Master System. But unfortunately, it was a similar story. By this time, Nintendo had made deals with most of the biggest third-party developers. And their contracts stated that they couldn’t make games for anyone else but Nintendo. They had a monopoly, and Sega couldn’t compete. But, although it didn’t do too well in America or Japan, it refused to stop selling in Europe and Brazil WHERE IT HAS STILL NOT BEEN OFFICIALLY DISCONTINUED AS OF WRITING THIS. But that was more of a long-term deal.

So both of Sega’s consoles didn’t do too hot. One was a failure and the other became a success but, at the time, was seen as a failure. Nintendo was gaining more and more traction, too. Sega needed to do something big. Something drastic. Something that could compete with a monopoly.

Sega’s third home console was the Sega Genesis (or the Sega Mega Drive in Europe), and it didn’t start out all too well. To counterbalance the lack of third-parties, they made games starring celebrities like Michael Jackson. And they started a big marketing push about how “Genesis does what Nintendon’t”. But it just wasn’t enough. That was until 1991 with the release of a game called Sonic the Hedgehog. A game designed to compete with Nintendo that ultimately did exactly that. Its bold 16-bit graphics, its sense of speed, the amazing mascot… Sonic the Hedgehog was a revolution for gaming. Not because of the game itself, but because it proved that anyone could compete with the juggernaut that was Nintendo. It received 9 out of 10’s from all sorts of publications, it won awards, it created Sega’s mascot, it put them on the same level of notoriety as Nintendo, it helped create the very idea of a console war, it was everything Sega wanted it to be and it will always be considered one of the most important video games of all time.


- The Japanese box art. It's a lot more stylized than the American and especially the European box art, and this style became a recurring one in the franchise. I'm personally not a fan of this box art, but if it led to the masterpiece that is the Sonic Mania intro, it was worth it.

That’s the end of the history lesson. I understand that it was long, but I find it very important to understand this game’s significance and why it is so important to the history of gaming, as this game’s history is inseparable from the game itself. But all of that was a look at Sonic the Hedgehog from a historical perspective. But rarely do I hear people talk about this game from a critical one. So let’s focus on that from here on out. And just to clarify, I played the Sonic Origins classic mode for this playthrough.

Sonic the Hedgehog is a 2D platformer with an emphasis on momentum. What does that mean? Well, the titular Sonic has very peculiar physics. As you might expect, he can go really, really fast. That’s like… his whole thing. But he can’t just go fast for the fun of it. He has to build up his momentum by utilizing the level around him. For example, he can roll down a slope to build up speed that will let him blast through loop-de-loops and complete the level in record time. This is the very core of Sonic’s game design. Using the level design to build up speed, then maintaining that speed for as long as you can. By learning the ins-and-outs of a level, you can find the best places to build momentum and the best routes that will let you get through it as fast as possible. If you are confused, let me put it this way: Sonic’s game design is not about speed. Rather, it’s about momentum and earning your speed. That confused me as a kid, especially since I was so bad that I rarely got to go fast. But that’s the thing: Speed in Sonic is usually not arbitrary. It is a reward for good platforming and learning how to use the level design to your advantage. This is what makes Sonic so fun to play and master.

This is on full display in the first level, Green Hill Zone. And let me tell you, Green Hill Zone is the perfect showcase for everything Sonic is. It does an amazing job teaching you to build speed, instantly making it clear how Sonic is different from the likes of Mario. But it only gets more fun on replays as it becomes a sort of playground for your skills. I know Green Hill Zone like the back of my hand, and I know exactly where I can build momentum and how I can keep it going. By learning the level across many playthroughs, I am rewarded with blisteringly fast speeds. It makes the level just as engaging (if not more so) on repeat playthroughs. When you play Green Hill Zone, you aren’t just playing through it. You’re learning it. And that makes Sonic games not just a treat to play, but to play well.


- Some concept art for the Sonic Generations version of Green Hill. It is very green, but I do not see any hills. This greatly upsets me.

However, this is where our issues start rearing their heads. This is all wonderful in concept, and Green Hill Zone does a phenomenal job putting that concept into practice. But the issue is that Green Hill Zone and the rest of the game were not created equally. It never reaches the same heights, nor does it even try to. That’s because Green Hill Zone was designed as a Sonic level, but the other levels are designed as platforming levels. What do I mean by that? Let’s use the second level as a case study.

Marble Zone is notoriously terrible, and that’s because of how it directly contrasts with Green Hill Zone. As a reminder, Sonic is about using the level to gain speed, but Marble Zone is primarily blocky. Rather than sliding down slopes, you walk down stairs. And rather than having many branching paths designed for different speed levels, it has one, linear path with few alternatives. Worse, the level is littered with traps and autoscrolling segments that force any momentum you might have had to a halt. There are very few places to build up speed, if any, and there is certainly nowhere to maintain that speed. That’s not because the level was designed too poorly to utilize momentum, it’s because the level wasn’t designed with momentum in mind at all. And that sentiment applies to most of the game. Of the game’s six levels, three aren’t designed with speed in mind at all and two have some speed in mind but are primarily slow and linear. You can only go fast in any of these levels when the game lets you, and that’s no fun. They feel designed around someone like Mario or Kirby, not Sonic. The only level to reach the potential of the concept is Green Hill Zone. The rest of the game is so misguided and strange that most people (myself included) drop the game about halfway through Marble Zone. And that’s the biggest problem with this game. It starts the game with so much momentum, so many amazing concepts. But instead of maintaining that momentum, it hits a wall and doesn’t even try to build it back up until the sequel.

Here’s another concept that isn’t built upon: Rings and the Chaos Emeralds. First, some context. Throughout the game, you collect “rings” which are similar to coins in Mario. But they are far more important here, as they act as a health bar of sorts. Getting hit with rings makes them scatter around, and you’ve got to pick up as many as you can before despawning. And if you get hit without rings, you lose a life. This is totally fine and good, but a problem with the ring system that persists throughout much of the series is that of excess. If even one ring is enough to save you from death, what’s the point of having more than a handful? Well, Sonic Team accounted for that, as rings are your ticket to the good ending. If you have 50 or more rings at the end of the first two acts of a level, you get a chance to complete a special stage, which is a bonus challenge that will earn you one of six “Chaos Emeralds”. Collecting all six gets you a better ending. This means that by exploring the huge levels, you get more rings which gets you the good ending.


- A map of Starlight Zone from sonicretro.org. By the way, this is the shortest level in the game.

So what’s so wrong about this? It sounds like a great way to incentivize exploring. Well, the issues stem from not how you access the special stages, but where. The end of an act. I’m going to say it now, I hate this system so much because of that simple fact. Let’s say that you got 50 rings in a level. Well, you can’t enter the special stage until the very end of the level. Getting hit even once makes you lose nearly all of your rings, and there might not be enough rings left in the level to reach the required 50. So rather than exploring, you are now encouraged to go slow and play it safe. If you get 50 rings in a level, everything stops. You now need to cease exploring and going fast in favor of ensuring that you don’t lose rings. And forget about trying to build up momentum, as it’s very likely that you’ll accidentally go too fast and hit an offscreen enemy (which isn’t normally a big deal, but it is here). And to all of this, I say “why?” The current special stage system and the momentum-based platforming are two systems that are at odds with each other. One rewards playing carefully, one rewards playing fast. But you can’t play carefully AND fast unless you’re some kind of gamer god like me. And even I have never gotten the good ending in this game! But it’s not like I need to because the good ending is barely any different than the normal one. The only difference is that in the ending cutscene, there are flowers. Zero exaggeration, that’s it. So why would I even go for all six Chaos Emeralds? They actively harm my enjoyment of the game by forcing all of my already non-existent speed to stop, and there’s no substantial rewards for finding them all other than bragging rights. So what’s the point? What good does this system do? And none of this is mentioning how unpredictable and awkward the Special Stages by themselves are, but the system is so minimal in this game that I'm not even sure if covering them is worth it.

We’ve covered most of the core gameplay elements, so let’s briefly talk about all of the stages (or “zones”) individually. Each one is split up into three “acts”, but we’ll be covering the zones as a whole rather than on an act-by-act basis. This won’t be a full level analysis like in my previous Sonic reviews, nor will I cover the levels in the exact order they are played in. But I still find touching on each one to be very important. Remember, Sonic’s gameplay is contingent on the level designs. The controls and mechanics need properly designed levels to function at their fullest potential in a way that something like Mario isn’t (or at least not nearly as much). And as I already covered, the levels in this game don’t do that at all.

Green Hill Zone, as we already talked about, is amazing. That’s because, unlike the game’s other levels, it is a Sonic level. Not a platforming level, a Sonic level. It is designed with Sonic’s controls in mind and it allows the player to earn and maintain speed. But even by the standards of future games, it still soars. It is masterfully designed with a perfect balance of platforming and momentum, making for wickedly fun speedruns. It is, no joke, a perfect 2D Sonic level. The only issues I have with it are due to it being a Sonic 1 zone, as it is stuck with elements like poorly thought out Special Stages and the lack of certain moves that were introduced in later games. But barring those, we get a perfect level that stands toe-to-toe with the greats of later games. In fact, it was basically the blueprint for Sonic 2, as that game feels like it was designed with the question “what if the entire game was like Green Hill?” If Green Hill Zone wasn’t as good as it was and still is, there’s a good chance that Sonic as a series might not have taken off like it did. That’s the power of Green Hill Zone and first levels in gaming.


- The level select menu. Why are there so many options when I'm just going to replay Green Hill, though?

And then the game nosedives with Marble Zone. And unlike Green Hill, I think I already said everything I need to about it. It’s slow, it’s boring, it’s just not fun. It feels designed for Mario or Kirby, but it’s bad even by those standards. Marble Zone is where most playthroughs of Sonic 1 end. And skipping ahead a bit, Labyrinth Zone feels like Marble Zone but worse. Imagine Marble Zone but underwater. Whatever you think it is, it’s worse. Water levels in games are rarely fun, but some of the absolute worst examples are found in Sonic as water physics slows your momentum. And while there are good water levels in Sonic, Labyrinth Zone is certainly not one of them. It’s a miserable experience that just goes on and on, constantly throwing these nonsensical traps at you that do nothing but make you sad. And worst of all is that Labyrinth Zone essentially has four acts as opposed to the normal three. That’s because of Scrap Brain Zone, the final level. The first two acts are terrible and filled with traps as you might expect, but for some reason, act 3 is just more Labyrinth Zone right down to the backgrounds. The only thing changed are the colors. WHY?! WHY DOES THIS EXIST? WHY DOES ANY OF THIS EXIST? AND WHY AM I PLAYING IT?!?!

The other two zones aren’t horrible, they’re just forgettable. Spring Yard Zone and Starlight Zone are better for the sole fact that they remember that you are, in fact, playing as Sonic. Not Mario, Sonic. They actually let you go fast, which is awesome! But the problem is that you don’t earn your speed in these levels. Rather, they just hand it to you in what I like to call “speed segments”. A speed segment is a part of the level that just lets you go fast for the heck of it. And while there’s nothing inherently wrong with that, they need to be used in moderation. A speed segment can never replace the feeling of earning speed. Because when you get down to brass tacks, speed segments are just glorified cutscenes. Spring Yard and Starlight have these speed segments, but they don’t play into the level design. You can’t speedrun them, you can’t use the level design to your advantage. These levels are mostly just boring Sonic 1 slop. Especially Starlight Zone which has primarily unkillable enemies, making for a pretty annoying playthrough.

If you haven’t already figured it out, this set of levels is not good at all. Green Hill is a major highlight but the rest can barely be classified as Sonic levels. They just aren’t great, and I don’t think it’s worth my time to elaborate further on that point. However, they all do one thing right, and that’s in their music. Sonic music is absolutely exceptional, and although Sonic 1 has a weaker soundtrack in my opinion, it’s still nothing to scoff at. Green Hill Zone, Starlight Zone, Drowning, the credits music, I even like Marble Zone’s music! Though that one might be nostalgia. This soundtrack doesn’t really have the same style and catchiness of later games, but it’s definitely good. I mean, Green Hill Zone’s music was in the first Sonic movie. That’s like, one of the four Sonic references in that movie as a whole! But I’ll rip that movie a new one when time comes. As of now, know that this soundtrack is quite good. Not great, but good.

'
- Takahiro Nishikawa, a member of the J-pop band Dreams Come True. He made the soundtrack for Sonic 1 and 2, and that's just a neat fact to me. Contracting others to work on the soundtracks is oddly enough a common trend across the series... for better or for worse.

And while we’re covering some loose ends, let’s talk about the bosses. Because, in the wise words of Sojiro Persona, hoo boy. These bosses are BAD. And it’s not just Sonic 1, it’s the entire series. Very rarely do Sonic games have good bosses. But let’s focus on this game for now. The problem with them is that they’re nothing more than big enemies. Sonic’s only means of attacking is hitting an enemy while jumping or rolling. That’s totally fine, as it fits the momentum-based gameplay well. But that does not translate over to the bosses, as the gameplay boils down to “hit Robotnik until you win”. And it’s not like you can only hit him after surviving for long enough to find his weak point, you just… hit him like you would with any other enemy. Even worse is the fact that he never has more than one or two attacks. I will give credit where it’s due, however. Starlight Zone’s boss is decent. Yeah, that’s all the credit that’s due. But in a game with Labyrinth Zone’s boss which is one of the worst bosses in any game I’ve ever played, it stands out as it does the impossible. It doesn’t make me bored and//or frustrated out of my skull.

The only other thing I can really give this game is how it looks. Sonic 1 looks beautiful when it wants to. This is an early 16-bit game, and the 16-bit Sega Genesis was competing with the 8-bit NES at the time. But comparing Sonic 1 to Mario 3, it’s like night and day. You didn’t need to be one of the seven people in the world that actually knew what bits were, all you needed to know was that Sonic 1 looked incredible. Sometimes. Outside of Green Hill Zone, the game mostly uses a dreary, dark color palette. Even Sonic himself looks a bit more washed out and pale than in later games. But when the game chooses to look good, it looks GOOD. Big, bold sprites mixed with beautiful colors make for a treat for the eyes. It also enhances the speed. By giving the world a sense of place, you really feel how fast you’re going. Like, you’re zooming past trees and bridges without a care in the world, it’s amazing. But it doesn’t lean into it, and that’s emblematic of the entire game.


- A comparison of Sonic sprites across games courtesy of inspiredpencil.com. It appears that in between Sonic 1 and 2, he cured his iron deficiency.

This game sets up some absolutely incredible ideas. From its emphasis on momentum to its special stages and even its presentation, the game is filled to the brim with ideas that could carry a franchise. But those ideas are all it has. After the first level, the game doesn’t lean into it at all. It introduces concepts but abandons them with no replacements. It clearly knows what Sonic can and should be, Green Hill is proof of that. But by Marble Zone, all of that is thrown out the window in exchange for bland, sub-par platforming. It doesn’t misunderstand Sonic, not at all. It chooses to do its concepts injustice. And that’s really confusing to me. I have no idea why it’s like this, it just decides when it wants to be good. If it committed to its best ideas, we’d have a game that would truly deserve its legendary status. But what we got is genre-definingly amazing at best and agonizingly miserable at worst. And that’s Sonic the Hedgehog in a nutshell: A confusing mess that is only exceptional when it wants to be.

Hey, thanks for reading! This is a bit of a quick transition, but I just wanted to thank you for tuning into the start of my new Sonic Retrospective. I’m very proud of it so far, and I think it will grow into something special. I’d love to hear your thoughts and opinions, too. But with all of that being said, I hope that you enjoyed it as much as I did, and I’ll be back soon with Sonic 2.

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

Hey! This isn't a full update, but I just wanted to clarify a few things. I have been pretty silent recently, but I have not slowed down. In fact, I'm speeding up! I'm hard at work on multiple big projects that need some more time in the oven. I'm on a roll with playing many games that I want to cover. I'm about halfway through a ranking of every Metroid game, and I'm currently playing through the Prime trilogy. I'm also working on my review of the Cawthon era of Five Nights at Freddy's, which is its own can of worms. And the Super Mario Ranking, too! Don't forget the Kirby 64 review. And maybe even a video version of my Kirby Super Star review... I've got so many projects, and I'm writing with fire under my fingertips. But these are big projects, and I don't expect any of them to come out for at least a few weeks. Maybe even longer. I'm taking a break, but I'm certainly not on hiatus. Give me some time and I promise that I'll deliver something that I'm proud of!

Hey, hey! Welcome to the blog club. I'm quite interested to hear about your thoughts on Final Fantasy X! I'm considering doing a Final Fantasy marathon, and X is one that I'm most excited for. Not really sure why, just looks cool. I also find your thoughts on inside to be really interesting. I hear so many people rave about it, but I've never played it. Just doesn't interest me too much, I guess.

Hope to see more from you soon!

Kirby Retrospective Part 5: Kirby's Dream Land 3 - KBR5

Hi! Exi here. Last time on the Kirby retrospective, I reviewed Kirby Super Star and Kirby Super Star Ultra. And if you read that review, you’ll know that I love those games quite a lot, especially the latter. In fact, I grew up with them! But that was really the last Kirby game that I have much experience with. That’s right. I haven’t played a lot of Kirby games. So I was extremely excited to move into territory that I was unfamiliar with. And Kirby’s Dream Land 3 is not only a game I’m unfamiliar with, it’s probably the Kirby game that I knew the least about prior to playing it. But due to the circumstances in which this game was released, it's hard to be surprised at that fact.


- Special thanks to Wikirby, as always! If it weren't for Wikirby, I wouldn't have been able to write this review or 100% the game. More on that in a bit...

In typical Kirby fashion, this game came out very late into the lifecycle of the SNES. In fact, it came out a year after the N64 released (a console with zero backwards compatibility) and was the last Nintendo published SNES game released in the United States. And with the N64 bringing gaming into the third dimension, it was hard to warrant a purchase of a new 2D Kirby game for the SNES. It wasn’t even released in Europe or Australia until 2009! Because of this, it sits at the very bottom of the list of best-selling mainline Kirby games, being the only one to sell under 1 million units. In fact, the most recent sales data indicates that it didn’t even sell 100,000 units in Japan. And worst of all, very few people talk about it because it was overshadowed by Kirby Super Star. However, I’ve always heard a rumor - nay, a legend - of people who actually really like this game. And I was inclined to believe them! I mean, the game looked great, and Kirby is a pretty consistent series. An average Kirby game is “fine” at the absolute least. But from the moment I picked up the controller, I knew I wasn’t going to like this game.

If I could describe Kirby’s Dream Land 3 in one word, it’s “unfun”. I simply do not have fun playing it. Are there things I like about it? Absolutely! But I do not enjoy playing it and I have no desire to ever play it again after this review. And I don’t have some bias towards games I’m unfamiliar with. I wasn’t expecting to like this game more than Super Star Ultra. But I did expect a solid Kirby title. Instead, I got a bad video game. I’m going to dig into this game, because it actively angers me. But let’s start with the positives first.

Let’s start with the undisputed best part about the game: The art style. And I’m not going to say anything here that anyone else hasn’t said before, because it’s true: The art style in this game is great. Amazing, even. It’s a much softer version of the art-style seen in Yoshi’s Island. It looks like it’s made out of pastel crayons and colored pencils! It’s just so… comfortable, you know? And it fits Kirby extraordinarily well. There’s not much to say, it just looks really nice. It’s a very unique style that very few games have replicated, and it stands out in a great way from the rest of the SNES library.


- Kirby and Kine in a forest. It's so atmospheric!

It’s not just the art style, either. The animations are great, too. They put a lot of care into how the characters are animated. And there’s a lot of characters in this game! Because the game carries over the Animal Friends from Dream Land 2, we get tons of animations to see. In fact, I mostly test out Animal Friends because I want to see all their adorable animations, not because I want to find the best combination (more on that later). I especially love how Nago rolls Kirby around, or how the Animal Friends get sad whenever you’re riding a different Animal Friend. It’s adorable! Animations are important to me in any game, but they’re especially important in a game like Kirby that has very simple character designs. I love seeing these little guys in action, it really breathes a lot of life into the game and makes the simplicity of the characters a lot easier to appreciate.

I’d talk about other things I like about this game, but I’m not sure how much I’ve got. The new Animal Friends are cute! I like Pitch, he’s such a stupid lil’ dude. The game has a lot of neat cameos, too, like a level where you have to freeze Metroids! And every level has a new one-off character to do errands for, so you get a lot of weirdos, including actual humans and pitch’s mother, who looks just as stupid as him. Dream Land 3 has tons of characters that only appeared in this game, so it really does feel very unique when compared to the rest of the series. And… that’s all. Time to tear this game to shreds. It deserves it.

Let’s get this out of the way now: The controls are terrible. This is one of the worst controlling Nintendo platformers I’ve ever played and they single handedly ruin the experience for me. It doesn’t matter if the rest of the game is good or bad if the controls feel like they’re actively working against you. Every single aspect of the controls feels designed specifically to make me hate them. When I first got into a level, I ran around for 30 seconds and let out the biggest sigh of my life, knowing that I had to deal with this for the whole game.

So why are they bad? Many reasons. So to illustrate it, I’m going to walk you through the experience.

So you enter the first level and naturally, your gut instinct is to walk forward. The first thing you notice is that Kirby walks unbearably slow. So you decide to try dashing, maybe that goes faster. Well dashing goes too fast. So you’re stuck with either too slow or too fast. You basically always want to be dashing, though. And dashing is not fun to pull off, either. When you walk, there’s a split-second where you’re barely moving at all, and dashing sometimes doesn’t register during that period, so you have to wait until you’re at full speed, THEN dash. Dash too soon and nothing will happen. But because dashing goes too fast, you’ll be hit by enemies all the time, ending your dash and forcing you to start the stiff dashing process again. And keep in mind that turning around can end your dash as well. This is fine in open levels, but when you need to make precision movements or you are in a vertical area, you need to be turning constantly. So you have to stop and start your dashes over and over again and it’s miserable. But it’s not like you’re just… not gonna dash! Walking is too slow to dodge enemies or make tough jumps, after all.


- Kirby has no room to start up a dash here, so he will have to deal with painfully slow walking.

So you’ve been faced with an enemy. They die pretty fast in this game, you usually only need to hit them once with your copy ability. But they brought back the lag from Dream Land 2. In fact, it’s even worse here! When you use a copy ability on the ground, it stops ALL of your momentum, meaning you have to start up the dash again. Because of that, I often find dashing past all the enemies to be a more comfortable method of playing. But you make an incorrect jump. Oh no! Looks like you’ll have to inhale some air to correct your jump. Well, inhaling and exhaling air also stops all of your momentum, so it’s very rarely a reliable means of correcting jumps or attacking enemies. Plus, it’s very slow, so that won’t work either. So you just dash past everything, but the camera doesn’t keep up with you since you’re going so fast, and you often have no idea what you’re dashing into. Get hit? Run into a wall? Inhale air? Looks like you’ve gotta do the uncomfortable dash again! Don’t even think about swimming, since you’ve got no dash and you’re moving as slow as a Waddle Dee. And Animal Friends? Forget it. They increase your hitbox and limit your already horrible movement options, making it more likely that you’ll be hit by enemies, which stops your dash.

In case you’re lost, let’s recap:

- Walking, swimming, or flying is horribly slow, and you will get hit by enemies if you’re walking.
- You always need to be dashing, but it's uncomfortable to start dashing. You also move so fast that the screen can’t keep up with you.
- Nearly everything stops your movement and your dash, including copy abilities and inhaling or exhaling air, forcing you to start dashing again, which is uncomfortable.
- Animal Friends increase your hitbox and limit your movement options in exchange for more copy abilities, but copy abilities are uncomfortable to use because of egregious start lag, so all they really do is limit your movement.
- Because turning can stop your momentum, tricky levels are unbearable. You have to start and stop dashing constantly. Again: it is uncomfortable.


- Rick looks just as bored as I am.

This all combines together to create a miserable play experience. Nothing about it feels good. It’s too slow and stiff. Everything stops your movement for no reason. It adds nothing to the experience and I hate it. I hate playing this game. Movement is just… not fun. Now, the silver lining here is that you can definitely get used to the movement. But by the time I actually got used to it, I was on world 4 of 5. The game was almost over! The controls and the game by proxy do get better over time, but if I have to devote a ton of time to simply getting used to the controls like this, it’s often not a game worth playing. But let’s pretend that this game had perfect movement. Flawless. It doesn’t change the fact that the game makes multiple design decisions that I simply do not like. Even after I got used to the controls, I still did not like this game.

The levels in this game are unmemorable. That was to be expected. But they’re not just unmemorable, they’re unfun. Levels in this game feel like they never end. They don’t introduce new ideas, they don’t ramp up in complexity. They just happen. They rarely justify their long length, as the level designs themselves are mush. They’re slop. Even a New Super Mario Bros. game does THINGS. They don’t just plop some goombas in a level and expect you to have fun. They design an obstacle course that the player is supposed to actually play through and experience. This game’s levels don’t feel like they have any rhyme or rhythm to them, they aren’t meticulously designed in any way. Even the most basic Kirby levels in something like Dream Land 2 feel like actual levels. And I think the most telling element about this game’s levels are how copy abilities are utilized. The problem isn’t that they’re utilized poorly, it’s that they aren’t utilized at all. The levels almost never take into account the copy ability that the player might have. The most that it does is add some blocks that can only be destroyed by a certain ability. That’s it. They don’t design the levels in clever ways to encourage experimentation. Sometimes, you’ll find a copy ability right before a tricky section, but that ability actively makes that section harder and less fun. And you don’t just get one Animal Friend at a time. You have to choose from up to four at once, so it makes it less likely that the levels will be properly designed around the Animal Friend that the player is likely to have, because the game has no idea which one they picked!


- Not only is 3-6 the worst stage in the game by a huge margin, it also has all six Animal Friends. But only Coo and Kine are required to get the heart star, so why include all of them?

The copy abilities themselves are lame, I’m sorry. None of them are particularly fun to use because of the start lag. Honestly, I usually play without a copy ability. Trying to use one will more often than not get me hit because of the lag. And they all feel the same, they don’t have multiple attacks like they do in Super Star. They’re not different ways to play the game like they were in past games. They’re just different attacks, most of which feel the same.

Let’s talk about the Animal Friends. In Dream Land 2, they brought variety and experimentation to the game. By mixing and matching your copy abilities and your Animal Friends, you would find new abilities that could often be pretty useful. Problem: Copy abilities are not very good in this game because of everything we’ve already talked about. I already don’t want to use copy abilities, so mixing and matching them is not very appealing to me. And much like in Dream Land 2, they limit your mobility by increasing your hitbox and often removing things like flying. But in that game, it was usually worth it. Not always, but usually. In this game, I almost never want an Animal Friend on me because all they do is hinder me. And did I mention that there are six of them? Yes, six. And of those six, the only ones I can warrant using are Coo and Pitch, but even then, I try to stay away from them if I can. The worst part of this is that I really want to use them! They're adorable, and I love seeing their animations and unique abilities. But I just... never do. And that's just sad to me.


- As much as I love Nago, I never use him. And worst of all, Kirby's Dream Land 3 is his only major appearance. #JusticeForNago!

No helpers this time, either. But you can use Gooey, who appeared in Dream Land 2. In that game, he did nothing but heal you. But this time, you can decrease your maximum health from 10 to 8 in exchange for Gooey, who acts exactly like the helpers did in Super Star. And much like in that game, a second player can control him. This is a neat idea, but I rarely use Gooey because I often just forget he exists. He simply doesn’t contribute enough to warrant using him, especially when you dash so fast that he often gets left behind. I’d wager that 80% of my Gooey summons are done on accident. I do like the idea of summoning helpers in exchange for health, I just straight up don’t care enough to do it.

And now we get to the most controversial part of the game… I actually don’t know if it is, I’m just assuming. But if it is, I’m not afraid to scream it to the world: HEART STARS ARE STUPID.

Each level has a goofy little guy who wants you to run an errand for him. That errand can be anything from rescuing another goofy little guy to not stepping on any flowers, or even playing little minigames. Let me be clear: I love this idea. They’re like little missions that vary from level to level, and they could bring variety to them. You could design the levels around these missions, too! It’s such a simple idea, yes. But done right, it could potentially make the game significantly more interesting. It was not done right, however, because this is Kirby’s Dream Land 3 and it hates me.


- Rick and his girlfriend, Pick. I would find this adorable if it weren't so frustrating to unite them.

For some baffling and incomprehensible reason, the game doesn’t tell you what the mission is. THIS IS NOT A JOKE. THE GAME DOES NOT TELL YOU WHAT THE MISSION IS. THERE IS ZERO REASON FOR THIS. ZERO!!!! There are no hints, you just have to figure it out. And these missions can be extremely obscure. You don’t even know if you failed or completed the mission until the end of the level! How am I supposed to know that I’m supposed to carve blocks in a specific shape, or to have a very specific Animal Friend and ability combination? How am I supposed to know that I’m supposed to look for hidden doors? How am I supposed to know that I’m supposed to attack some random guy with ChuChu? But not the second time you see him, only the first time?! HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO FIGURE THAT OUT?! HOW?! And there are thirty of them. THIRTY! They’re all like this. There’s no other opinion, you just have to use a guide.

But worst of all. The most inexcusable part of this whole thing. You have to collect all of them to beat the game. Let that sink in for a moment. To beat the game, you have to collect all - not some, ALL - of the heart stars. An obscure collectable that gives you zero hints towards finding them. A collectable that is so hard to find that a guide is basically required. In a game that was released before the internet became widespread. To beat the final boss, you need to find all of them, making the final boss inaccessible for basically anybody who wasn’t willing to buy a strategy guide. This is absolutely unacceptable. I do not understand why or how this was allowed. The whole point of Kirby games is to be understandable and playable by anybody. A game that even an unskilled gamer can beat. Well I promise that an unskilled gamer is not going to find more than five of these things, let alone thirty. Heck, I’m a skilled gamer! I’m pretty darn good at platformers. I know where to look for secrets. But if you told me to find all of them without a guide, I promise you that I couldn’t do it. It would be impossible. This is the exact same Rainbow Drop nonsense from Dream Land 2. But at least in that game, all you had to do was grab the collectable, not do some arbitrary sidequest with zero clues, zero hints, zero guidance. Just do it! You wanna fight the final boss, don’t you? You want a happy ending for Kirby and his pals? BETTER BUY A STRATEGY GUIDE!

I would keep going, but I’m not sure what else I could possibly say about this game. The bosses aren’t that fun, they’re more similar to Dream Land 1 bosses than they aren’t. The final one is a lot of fun, though. The music is once again not for me, but I like it even less than I do for most pre-2010’s Kirby music. And I think that’s it.


- Zero, the one and only genuinely fun part about this game. Fun fact, it was such a creepy fight that it earned Kirby's Dream Collection for Wii an E10+ rating, although the 02 fight in Kirby 64 also contributed.

So, to sum it all up, Kirby’s Dream Land 3 is not a good video game. Movement is not fun, the core Kirby gameplay is at its weakest here, it doesn’t add much to the overall series, its design is questionable at best, nothing really works here. But more than that, it just feels kind of pointless in the grand scheme of Kirby back then and especially now. It came out very, very late in the SNES’s life cycle. There was already a much better Kirby game on the console. The game was bad. I assumed that people don’t talk about this game because it sold poorly, but I understand it now. It’s not because it sold poorly, especially in today’s age where anyone can play it very easily on Switch. Nobody talks about this game because there isn’t much to talk about. Other than the art style, this game doesn’t do anything interesting. If someone were to ask me what my thoughts on Dream Land 3 were, the discussion to be had would be a shallow one: Kirby’s Dream Land 3 is a forgettable, poorly designed Kirby game, and that’s that. Full stop.

Thanks for reading! This was a weird one to write. I haven’t really been so negative about a game in quite a while, so I guess this review helped me get in touch with my negativity. Is that a good or bad thing? I’m not sure. Next up is Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards, which is another game that I haven’t played before, but I’m sure that my opinions on that game won’t be so negative. I’ll also be covering Kirby Air Ride soon enough, although I might cover it out of chronological order, as I may need some more time to plan a hangout with my friends where we can try Air Ride. I’m not about to play City Trial singleplayer, after all. I hope to see you again in the near future!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

Kirby Retrospective Part 4: Kirby Super Star and Kirby Super Star Ultra - KBR4

Hi! Exi here. We’ve talked about three Kirby games in this retrospective. Three! But they were all early Kirby. As a recap, Dream Land was a blueprint, not much more. Adventure expanded on that blueprint, but it was still a blueprint at the end of the day. Dream Land 2 was basically Adventure on Game Boy. So… still a blueprint. They were good blueprints, don’t get me wrong. But they were just blueprints. Kirby needed a game to push the series forward. A game that brought all of the ideas from those blueprints to life. A game to realize the true potential of the formula. And in 1996, we got a game that did exactly that and then some. That’s right, it’s finally time to talk about Kirby Super Star!


- As always, special thanks to Wikirby for images and information! They do truly amazing work, and I implore you to ditch Fandom and download an independent wiki redirector today!

I need you to understand how excited I am for this. Kirby Super Star is one of my favorite games ever. Not because it’s a 10/10 experience. Not because it tells some profound story. No, it’s just a flat out cool game. And I'm quite nostalgic for it, too. When I was 10, my 3DS broke and I was devastated. I had an old DS lite, but what was the point? None of my favorite 3DS games worked on it. So my mom picked up a few games for me that would suffice until I got my 3DS replaced. She got Scribblenauts, which was fun. But she also got Kirby Super Star Ultra. And let me tell you, 10 year old Exi loved this game to bits. Why wouldn’t they? It had EVERYTHING. It had swords, it had lasers, it had explosions, it had epic boss fights, all while being a game that was accessible and appropriate enough for kids like me who hadn’t fully developed their gaming skills. All the coolest stuff in a game that I could play at that age. If you asked 10 year old Exi to describe this game in one word, it would be “awesome.” And, as childish as it is to say, that’s still how I would describe this game as a 17 year old. It’s like my child-like imagination was manifested into a video game. It makes me feel like a kid playing with toys, effortlessly plowing through hordes of bad guys and saving the day from evil. And when I started this retrospective, I was brimming with excitement at the thought of being able to talk about this game, since it’s just so special to me.

I do want to preface this with a few disclaimers, as I often do. First, just because I'm nostalgic for this game, doesn’t mean it’s perfect. I’m not gonna lie about my thoughts on this game just because I played it as a kid. What’s the point of reviewing it, then? I can love a game and still think it isn’t perfect. Second, I’m covering the original on SNES, but we’ll still cover the DS remake later in the review. Until I say so, assume we’re talking about the SNES version. Thirdly, this game is called “Kirby’s Fun Pak” in Europe. I’m not calling it that because “Kirby Super Star” sounds like a video game. “Kirby’s Fun Pak” sounds like a PC minigame collection you’d get in a cereal box. Lastly, I wanted to go all out with this game. I tried my hardest to put a lot of heart and thought into this one. More than anything else I’ve posted, I’d love to hear some thoughts about my writing or its contents. How I can improve and if you agree with my opinions, that kind of stuff. I hope you like this one!


- Humanity's greatest achievement: Ogerpon in space!

Now, the first thing you’ll probably notice if you look at the box art is the tagline. “8 games in one!” But that seems too good to be true… right? Well, unlike every Kirby game before and after it, Super Star uses an omnibus format, or as I call it, the “corkboard format”. Consider this: The last two Kirby games had 7 worlds made up of lots of small levels. And that worked just fine! But Super Star wanted to do things a little different. So, hear me out… What if those worlds were treated as their own small games? Instead of a traditional world, it was a full game with unique themes and mechanics, ending on a final boss. Each game would be around an houg long, two hours max, so there would be little commitment. In that short time, you would get a full and complete experience as if you played a whole game. And there would be multiple games, so you definitely get your money’s worth. And if you played all of them, you’d unlock extra games! This is the corkboard format that defines Kirby Super Star. And that means… yeah! This technically is 8 games in one!

Well, that’s a bit of a stretch. Kirby Super Star is made up of 6 “main games”, plus 2 “sub-games” and a boss rush, “The Arena”. Calling the sub-games full fledged games is pretty nonsensical, as they’re basically just short distractions. But still, 6 main games! Most of them are around the length of Kirby’s Dream Land back on Game Boy, so it still has that pick-up-and-play element to it. But if you sat down and played all six games in one sitting, it would take you a good long while. You can treat this game as 6 short games or 1 long game, that’s up to you! It’s such a genius approach to Kirby that I’m surprised was never replicated. It adds to the flexibility we’ve talked about again and again in this retrospective.


- The Corkboard! It has the goofiest music ever. I adore it and it will be played on loop at my funeral.

This approach also fixes a major complaint of mine with the prior games. Kirby levels are fun but extremely unmemorable. The gameplay is so simple and levels aren’t mechanically distinct enough for me to remember them. For example, I can count the amount of memorable levels from Dream Land 2 on zero hands. But I don’t feel that way with this game. None of the main games blend in for me because they’re all so different and distinct. While I may not remember any level designs from Milky Way Wishes, I DO remember Milky Way Wishes as a whole because of how different it is. I remember the unique mechanics, I remember the detailed world map, I remember the amazing bosses. That same logic applies to every main game in the package. None of them blend in. They really feel like their own small games, and that makes them extremely memorable to me. This is one of the most memorable games in the series. And it's made all the better by the detailed 16-bit graphics and action packed gameplay.

We’ll touch on all of the main games a little later, don’t you worry. But for now, let’s talk about the action packed gameplay. What makes it so action packed? Simple: Kirby Super Star focuses less on platforming and more on beat-’em-up style combat. When I started analyzing this game, it genuinely shocked me with how many beat-’em-up elements are present here. At times, it feels more like a beat-’em-up than a platformer. Copy abilities aren’t just limited to one move that could consistently take out enemies in one or two hits. No, you’ve got to button mash your way to victory using large movesets. It’s not uncommon for a single copy ability to have 4 or 5 different moves. You can even chain them together for combos! There are directional attacks, aerial attacks, dash attacks, grab attacks… But crucially, all of your attacks can be done with only one button. Does that sound familiar? Well it probably does, as this system was the direct inspiration for the Super Smash Bros. series. They were made by the same guy, Masahiro Sakurai. Because of that, a lot of design elements from the Kirby series (scrapped or otherwise) became core pillars for the gameplay of Super Smash Bros. And it’s abundantly apparent here, as in many ways, Kirby Super Star plays similarly to Super Smash Bros. It’s absolutely fascinating to analyze. We won’t go into it too much, as this is a Kirby retrospective. Not a Super Smash Bros. retrospective. But I would be completely remiss if I didn’t mention it.


- Sprites for an unused NES prototype of the game. There are three copy abilities here, and you may be able to tell that they have multiple moves each. Imagine if this game actually released on NES, though. An 8-bit Marx battle would be legendary.

Back to the beat-’em-up gameplay, now. Let’s talk about the potential drawbacks this style of gameplay brings. I haven’t played a lot of beat-’em-up games, but I do know that quite a lot of them, especially at the time, suffered from simplicity. You can often just button mash until the enemies die. And that definitely applies to this game as well. Worse, Kirby is already a simple series, so combining the two could potentially lead to issues. So how does Kirby Super Star circumvent that issue? Well, it does that in three major ways. For one, variety in the copy abilities. This game has a staggering 24 copy abilities. When we don’t count limited use abilities like crash or mike, we get 18 whole abilities, most of which featuring multiple moves. And because your copy ability is changing constantly, you always have to adapt to your situation. You have to learn the new movesets and work around them. Even though the gameplay is simple, it never stays the same thanks to the depth and the sheer amount of copy abilities. And it’s not like in Adventure where a bunch of the copy abilities are worthless. No, all of them have their uses. They all feel like they belong. Plus, they all have adorable little hats now!

Second thing: Helpers! At any point in the game, you can sacrifice a copy ability to turn it into a helper who will fight alongside you. You can also turn them back into copy abilities, but why would you do that? They’re so cute! And they’re quite helpful, too. They can take out enemies that you might not be equipped to handle, they can act as a copy ability in reserve, they can help you deal extra damage to bosses, and best of all, they can be controlled by a second player! I have not had the chance to try it yet, but I’ve heard good things. Anyways, helpers don’t just help the player, they help the game overall! It adds more variety, more complex gameplay, a co-op mode, and 20 more cute characters to befriend! What’s there not to love? Well, a lot of people apparently don’t love helpers because of their poor AI. They’re pretty stupid, and they don’t always do what you want them to. That can be somewhat frustrating, I agree. But I personally find their stupidity to add to the variety. They die fairly frequently, so you’ll never have the same helper for too long. That encourages you to try out different helpers. And getting a new helper requires getting rid of your copy ability, so it not only enhances the variety of your helpers but your own copy abilities as well. I think my only real problem with the helper system is that, unlike copy abilities, they all feel pretty equal. There’s not much of a reason to use one helper over another, so not much strategy can really go into helper choice. That’s my only real complaint, though.


- The helper tutorial! The text doesn't lie; he'll be a big help. But he's also probably going to fall in lava because of his poor AI. Shucks.

Hi! Editing Exi here. I recently visited a friend of mine, and we tested out the multiplayer mode. For her privacy, I'll call her Tamme. She’s also the one who drew the art piece for this review, as well as the doodle for my last update. We played Spring Breeze in multiplayer, and I’m pleased to report that it’s a good multiplayer mode. I was the helper, and I always had stuff to do. This is not a Mario Galaxy situation where the second player does nothing, this is the real deal. It didn’t feel like we were compromising to play in multiplayer. It feels like an honest to goodness multiplayer mode. The only drawback is that when the helper dies, the second player can’t do anything. Not a big deal, however, as helpers are easy to get. But yeah, big thanks to Tamme for her help. Lots of love from Editing Exi!

Thirdly, Kirby Super Star is absolute chaos. Like, I mean it. I don’t care if the gameplay is simple because it’s just so chaotic. Even the simplest fights don’t really feel simple when they devolve into frantic button-mashing mayhem. Some people may not like that, they want a more mellow experience. But me? I love it. I love it so much. It’s so fun to just tear hordes of enemies to shreds with Kirby and his trusty helper. There are times where you feel like a straight up action hero, and the chaos really sells it. Now, the question on my mind was this: Is it too chaotic? Well, I don’t personally think so. It’s usually a manageable amount of chaos. But there are a couple elements that I’m not a fan of. In particular, the sound effects from hitting enemies are really unbalanced and weird. They’re way too loud sometimes and way too quiet other times. It makes the game a bit overwhelming on occasion. They’re arbitrarily inconsistent as well, so some attacks don’t feel as meaningful as others. Plus, I personally think that enemies do a bit too much damage to Kirby. He can take approximately the same number of hits as in previous games, but this game is a lot more chaotic and hard to manage. I think that he should have gotten a health upgrade to compensate. Not that this game is too difficult, it just can cause some annoyances during stressful moments.

On the topic of chaos, let’s talk screen size. This game has much bigger sprites than in the last home console entry, Kirby’s Adventure. And that was a big problem with that game! The screen was kinda zoomed out, making it hard to hit enemies because of the small, fast moving sprites. In Super Star, we’ve got much larger sprites that take up more of the screen. I’m honestly not sure what the consensus is on this, but I personally don’t have an issue with the screen size in this game. The game was pretty well designed around it, probably because of the de-emphasized platforming. Even in larger, maze-like levels. I don’t get the feeling like there’s something offscreen that I'm missing. And enemies are a lot slower, so they rarely come out of nowhere for some unfair hits. In addition, the bigger sprite size makes for some great sprite work, so I don’t have a problem with it. But I can totally see why some people would. It may just be a “me” thing, so take that with a grain of salt.


- Some Dyna Blade gameplay. You can tell that it's definitely more zoomed in than Adventure, although it has more than two colors, so that's a step up.

Another potential “me” thing: I can’t pinpoint exactly what it is about this game’s controls that rubs me the wrong way, but they could be better. I think the issue is that they’re not as tight and responsive as they could be. And this is an intense game. You need precise controls, especially during tough boss battles and late-game challenges. I’m not looking for Hollow Knight level precision, but this is still not great. I may be wrong, but I’ve heard of others who have issues with these controls as well, so it does seem to be a problem.

It’s time to reveal the deepest, darkest secret about my gaming tastes… I don’t like the SNES that much. The games, graphics, and music just never did it for me, I gotta be honest. But this game is the weirdest SNES game for me graphics-wise. It uses pre-rendered backgrounds like the ones you might find in Donkey Kong Country, and that does not fit Kirby in my opinion. Actually, it’s not just my opinion. Masahiro Sakurai, Kirby’s creator, said the exact same thing. Not only that, I just don’t think they look that great. In particular, The Great Cave Offensive has these pretty detailed stone blocks just aren’t it. And Floria just looks straight up bad. As for music, I already said that I’m not a fan of pre-2010’s Kirby music in the prior retrospective, but this game does have some great tracks. There’s obviously the iconic Gourmet Race that you know and love, but Knightmare Warship is great, too. Corkboard is permanently engraved into my head, it’s just so goofy and silly. Spring Breeze is full of some good remixes, too! But overall, I still am not a fan. The style of pre-2010’s Kirby music does not gel with me. I will now say my catchphrase: It’s not my thing but many people love it and that’s all that matters. This won’t be the last time I say it in this retrospective.

The last general point I wanna touch on with this game is the bosses. Kirby bosses are usually pretty good, but they’re even better here. If you’ll recall, I disliked the bosses in Kirby’s Adventure and Kirby’s Dream Land 2 because the battles mostly devolved into spamming a strong copy ability until they’re defeated. But this is a beat-em-up take on Kirby, so that approach actually fits really well here. These bosses are really solid and creative. Dyna Blade, Meta Knight, and even King Dedede are highlights for me. Computer Virus is pretty bad from a gameplay perspective, but it’s wildly creative. I won’t forget fighting it as a kid and being blown away by how cool and unique it was. But the best boss is Marx. He’s the final boss, and it shows. Kirby games have a tendency to pit you against literal demons and eldritch horrors, and the trend continues here. Marx is just a weird little monstrosity that is a joy to fight. This is all to say that I love the bosses in this game. Some of them are real highlights. But upon reflection, they do have some issues. Some are just not great. They can range from forgettable to frustrating. Fatty Puffer and Heavy Lobster are just bad in my opinion. They require more precise movement that the controls don’t offer. In addition, certain copy abilities are significantly better at dealing with bosses. When fighting a boss, you almost always want bomb or hammer on you, and that makes the boss rush kind of luck based. It’s not so bad in the actual game, but fighting them sequentially is somewhat frustrating because of this.


- Oh my Termina, is that Marx from Super Smash Bros. Ultimate for the Nintendo Switch family of systems?

We’ve talked a lot about the game as a whole, but Kirby Super Star is 6 games in one, isn’t it? We’ve gotta talk about all six main games! I’ll briefly review each one in the order I usually play them in.

Spring Breeze is a remake of Kirby’s Dream Land on Game Boy. The level designs are very similar, although they are simplified and shrunk down. Castle Lololo and Float Islands were merged together and the boss rematches were removed from Mt. Dedede. These factors make Spring Breeze the shortest of the main games. You can beat it in 20 minutes. I would be fine with all of this, but you have to consider that Kirby’s Dream Land didn’t have copy abilities or helpers. It just doesn’t feel right, to be honest. I think it would have made a lot more sense if it didn’t have them, which is why Masahiro Sakurai has stated that it wasn’t supposed to. He was urged to do so by some of the producers, and he still wishes that it didn’t have them. I can’t help but agree. As of now, it feels more like a tutorial that I just breeze through before springing to the more substantial main games. I wish I had more to say, but it’s a shortened remake of an already short game that I’ve previously reviewed in-depth. It’s definitely the worst of the main games (excluding Gourmet Race), and I don’t think this should come as a surprise.

Dyna Blade is more of what I'm looking for. All 6 main games have some kind of gimmick or defining feature, but Dyna Blade’s gimmick is that it has none. It’s basic Kirby goodness, and I like that. It’s just a short and sweet adventure that, unlike Spring Breeze, feels properly designed around the new mechanics that this game brings to the table. But despite its short length, it feels substantial. There are two Big Switches that unlock secrets, just like in Kirby’s Adventure. And there’s only one boss, but that boss is one of the best in the game. Dyna Blade feels like they plucked out a world from a full Kirby game and turned it into a main game. Which, as a reminder, is the whole point of the corkboard format. It’s a good time, although its simplicity does make it pretty unmemorable. This is probably the most forgettable of the main games for me, but don’t take it as me disliking this one. It’s still very solid.


- Dyna Blade herself. She kinda scared me as a kid!

Gourmet Race is more of a distraction or a side mode. Kirby and King Dedede are racing to the end of the level, and they must eat as much food as possible by the end of it. You get a bonus for finishing the level first and the winner is the one who eats the most food. It’s a really fun time with some killer music to boot. My problem is that it just wasn’t fleshed out enough. It’s got a measly three levels, and only one of them includes copy abilities. I think they could have included more. There should have been three cups of three races to choose from. It’s honestly hard to call it a main game because of how small it is. However, I’d love for this mode to come back in a future Kirby game. I’m surprised that it hasn't happened yet, to be honest. It’s a really solid idea, it just needed more content.

Revenge of Meta Knight is one of the greatest things that the Kirby series is responsible for. Meta Knight is up to vaguely evil shenanigans, and it’s up to you to infiltrate his ship - the Halberd - to stop him and his crew. I’m having a hard time putting my love for this main game into words. I love nearly everything about it, but I mostly love how intense it feels. The music is intense, the atmosphere is intense, the bosses are intense. And you’re on the clock, so you’ve got to go as fast as you can. Even though the time limit is quite generous, it makes for a truly heart-pounding experience. And as you tear the ship apart, you get to see the reactions from Meta Knight’s crew. They start off cocky, but by the end, they’re panicked and scared of the monster that is Kirby, abandoning ship one by one. Meta Knight’s Revenge is literally an action movie, and you’re the star. You’re the cool agent who gets to destroy the engine, you’re the hero who gets to have a climatic duel with the big bad, all building up to a frantic escape sequence where your fate is on the line. It’s absolutely incredible. My only issue is that the bosses aren’t my favorite, but they’re very thematic. And it’s made up for with literally everything else.


- The Heavy Lobster boss fight. He is no match for a pink ball with a silly hat.

The Great Cave Offensive is probably the meatiest campaign here. This one takes a more exploratory approach, challenging you to find sixty hidden treasures across four areas. It’s still pretty linear, but there are way more branching paths and secrets than normal. And it takes some serious effort to find all of the treasures. You’ve got to keep a sharp eye open and play well to find them all. One thing I like about this main game is how it’s very puzzle-y. There are lots of treasures that require clever uses of the copy abilities to find, and I always love that in any Kirby game. It challenges you to really understand how the game works, but it’s all completely optional, so no biggie if you skip it. However, this mode is brought down because of how frustrating it is to play for me. I try to find all sixty treasures when I play this one, but finding some of them is a chore. And there aren’t many checkpoints, so dying means that you’re sent all the way back to the last save point. It can be a nightmare to 100%, although I’m just glad that we have a more substantial main game that takes some time to complete. It’s like the Pikmin 2 of Kirby Super Star.

Milky Way Wishes is another meaty campaign (comparatively, at least). The gimmick here is that you can’t swallow enemies for their copy abilities. Rather, you find copy essences throughout the levels. Finding one doesn't just give you an ability, it lets you permanently use it. Forever. And you can swap to and from the abilities you’ve collected at a moment's notice. Now, this is very much an experimental main game. It’s nowhere near fleshed out for many reasons. The ability to always have your collected abilities removes variety and the need to adapt to your rapidly changing moveset. It doesn’t have too much flexibility in progression unless you know where everything is ahead of time, since your favorites might be found later or earlier in the game. Also, the level design needs to account for every ability, so it focuses more on puzzles that aren’t that interesting. Again, it’s more of an experiment. Despite that, it’s a really, really interesting one that I do enjoy. And it also has some stellar bosses (even if most of them are reused from earlier in the game) and some neat puzzle ideas. Definitely a fun way to finish the game!

Can’t forget the side content! Every good Kirby game needs side content, and this is the first one that really started leaning into the idea, even if there really isn’t much here. You’ve got The Arena, which is a boss rush, nothing crazy. Although it’s really… really hard. Kirby is pretty easy, but the boss rushes are usually no joke. To this day, I’ve never completed it. You’ve also got two sub-games, Megaton Punch and Samurai Kirby. They’re basically just minigames akin to Mario Party, so nothing much. There unfortunately aren’t any hard modes for the main games, and that’s a bit of a shame. But what’s more important is that this game has designated side modes! They’re very simple here, but it’s more about the fact that they exist at all. And to think that this would eventually blossom into Return to Dreamland Deluxe…


- Nova! He's so silly. Do you think there are any clocks that are supposed to look like Nova?

When I look at the list of main games, I definitely think that each individual main game could have been better. Outside of the obvious, there’s not one main game that stands out as significantly better than the rest. They range from interesting and undeveloped to pretty standard Kirby gameplay. And I was a little disappointed by that, to be honest. But when I look at them as a collective, they’re amazing! You get so much Kirby content here. From the basic Kirby stuff to experiments that tread new ground, there’s just a ton to sink your teeth into, now in a format that very easily allows for pick-up-and-play sessions that require little commitment. And you’ve got extra content that makes it really feel like an all-in-one package that anyone can enjoy.

I’ve covered everything I think I reasonably could have. I know that I complained a fair bit about this game, but that shouldn’t take away from how much I adore it. Kirby Super Star is a massive step for the series in nearly every way. It takes the formula from the prior games and pushes it to new heights while creating something that also manages to be unique and memorable. It improves the core Kirby gameplay while trying so many new things. The emphasis on action makes it very engaging, but it still has that patented Kirby accessibility that anyone of any age can enjoy. It’s got everything you could want in a Kirby game! But on a more personal level, It has this sense of childlike awe to me. When I play this game, I feel like I’m playing with action figures and pretending to be a superhero, beating all the bad guys and saving the day from the dastardly villains. This game is not perfect by any means, but I rarely care. I’m too caught up in how cool the game is! From both a personal perspective, I love this game. But it still holds up from a critical perspective. It’s a solid game no matter how you slice it, and I’d recommend it to any Kirby fan. At least… that was until 2008.

Many great things happened in 2008. Same-sex marriage was legalized in the US state of Connecticut, The Dark Knight premiered, Danica Patrick became the first woman to win an Indy car race, the Google Play store was launched, so many cool things. But among all of them was the release of Kirby Super Star Ultra, one of my favorite games. I love Kirby Super Star, of course I do. But Kirby Super Star Ultra makes that game look like a rough draft. This remake ticks off nearly every box. More content, better controls, amazing graphics, it’s got everything. This is, no joke, one of Nintendo’s best remakes. It’s that good.


- The cover art! Definitely a far cry from the original, but it has a Waddle Doo at the bottom so it's better. Waddle Doo makes everything better. Can't argue with the facts.

From the very moment you start up Spring Breeze, it becomes immediately apparent how much better this version is. I talked about how the controls of the original weren’t great. And I knew going into this that Super Star Ultra improved them, but I wasn’t prepared for how much it improved them. The controls are buttery smooth. They feel awesome during gameplay and they make intense moments feel that much more intense. It really shines in Revenge of Meta Knight, which is pretty fast paced. I rely less on button mashing in it because the controls allow me to actually use skill and precision. But they’re still floaty like you would expect from Kirby controls. They’re the perfect controls for this style of Kirby game. And that alone would be enough to make this significantly better than the original, but it kept going.

This game uses the art style introduced in Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland, which is a godsend. I don’t think that Kirby Super Star looked ugly, but it didn’t look great. But this game? It looks amazing! It retains the pre-rendered 3D backgrounds from the original, but they look much more natural here. Maybe it’s because of the lower resolution of DS games? I’m not sure. Point is, they look better. Some places look downright amazing (I particularly like Chapter 2 of Revenge of Meta Knight). And the sprites are amazing! Literally every sprite in this game looks great. Oh, and you’ve got more breathing room for the visuals because they moved the Heads-Up Display to the bottom screen, so you can enjoy the graphics to their fullest extent. And the animations are great, too! And all the effects are great! It just doesn’t stop! And it won’t stop yet, because this game adds four new side modes. Yes, you heard me. FOUR. They aren’t as new and fleshed out as a main game, but they add a lot of extra content that can keep you playing for a long time.


- Spring Breeze got a glow up!

For starters, there’s a new boss rush mode called Helper to Hero where you pick a helper and play through a slightly shorter version of the arena, ending on a new, harder variant of Wham Bam Rock. There are twenty helpers to choose from, and although you only need to finish the mode as one for 100% completion, beating the mode as all twenty is a very fun challenge idea that could take a lot of time to complete. I’m personally not too interested in this mode, but younger Exi loved busywork challenges like this. They would have loved this mode… if they ever managed to unlock it. Besides, Exi was too busy doing busywork challenges in Kirby Fighters.

Something that was noticeably absent from Kirby Super Star was the Extra Mode from Kirby’s Dream Land and Kirby’s Adventure. So in comes Revenge of the King, acting as an Extra Mode for Spring Breeze. It’s pretty much exactly what it sounds like: A much harder and slightly longer remix of Spring Breeze, although it oddly takes quite a lot of elements from Revenge of Meta Knight. It uses new, more challenging variants of its enemies and bosses. Because of this, it lacks many of the iconic Kirby enemies, instead being replaced with these weird variants that you rarely see. I think that’s cool! But beyond that, it also includes a returning gimmick boss from Kirby’s Dream Land, Kabula! And he’s a lot of fun in this game, I liked the fight quite a lot. But what I liked even more was the final boss, Masked Dedede! He’s not as difficult as I would have liked him to be, but the music more than makes up for it. The Masked King is definitely one of my favorite Kirby songs. The fight as a whole is pretty darn memorable, and it’s what this mode is best known for. But even outside of that, it’s just a nice twist on Spring Breeze that I certainly enjoyed.

But what if you want a remix-style mode that doesn’t just cover Spring Breeze? Well, look no further than Meta Knightmare Ultra! This is a sequel to the mode seen in Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland and the prequel to the mode seen in Kirby: Planet Robobot. I unfortunately have not tried either one yet. But now I kind of want to, because this mode is awesome! You play as Meta Knight and have to play through all the main games (except for Gourmet Race). That sounds lame, but then you realize that this isn’t Kirby, this is Meta Knight. He demolishes every enemy in his path, goes at blazing speeds, flies around with precision, and can use the energy from fallen foes to enhance his power for a limited time. It’s a TON of fun to play through, and it ends on yet another new boss, Galactica Knight! Your goal is to go as fast as possible, whittling down your time as if it’s a speedrun. This is such a great mode, and if I didn’t have so many Kirby games to play through, I could see myself really getting into this mode and going for a record time. It’s a shame that only three Kirby games have this mode (even if it does have similar modes in the form of Dededetour and Guest Star).


- Meta Knight... calm down... he did nothing to you...

These modes have introduced some new bosses that weren’t in the original game. So welcome to The True Arena, a boss rush where you’ll fight all of the new bosses and mid-bosses that weren’t in the original, ending with a harder version of the original game’s final boss, Marx Soul. I gotta be honest, I’m really not interested in this mode. I think it was a mistake to only include new bosses. An ultra-hard boss rush of all the bosses, new and old? I’d love that! In fact, Kirby’s Return to Dreamland Deluxe did exactly that. And all of the later iterations of The True Arena would feature all the bosses. I get that this one was the first, but I really don’t see why they only included the new bosses, especially when five of them are just slightly harder versions of the simple bosses found in Spring Breeze, the very first main game. But to make up for the lack of bosses, they only give you less healing and copy abilities between rounds, which I’m also not a fan of. I vastly prefer the endurance focused challenge that the original version had. But don’t take my word for it. I might be completely wrong because this is the only mode that I haven’t tried. You have to beat The Arena to unlock this mode. But I suck, so I haven’t done that yet. I do want to try it eventually, mostly because I’m interested to see what Marx Soul is all about. Maybe it’s more fun in practice, but from a conceptual standpoint, I’m not a fan of this mode.

Regardless of my thoughts on The True Arena, I can’t deny how much content these modes add. Kirby games are short and easy, we all know that. So having extra content designed for skilled players can greatly enhance the overall package. Kirby Super Star Ultra does a great job at that. It rivals modern Kirby with how much there is to do here. Even if none of it is a must-play, it really didn’t need to be. All it needed to be was some extra-hard bonus content for veteran players, and it did that job quite well (ignoring the lack of a real final boss rush).


- The new corkboard. It's fuller with loads more things to do. But more importantly, it still kept the goofy corkboard song. That's how you know they went all out with this game.

This game has enough side content to fill up Kirby himself, but we’re still not done. Because on top of the new modes, the enhanced graphics, and the amazing controls, this remake enhances the original content in many small ways. Here are just some examples:

- The reused bosses in Milky Way Wishes now have increased health and new color palettes for variety and challenge.
- You can now skip the tutorial theaters entirely.
- The bottom screen of the DS allows for more information to be displayed, such as the health of the Halberd in Revenge of Meta Knight and a world map of Dyna Blade. You can also use the touch screen to easily change abilities in Milky Way Wishes.
- Certain bosses now have new animations.
- The designs of certain characters and locations have been updated to accommodate for their changes since the original game’s release.
- Cutscenes are now 3D FMV clips. This could be seen as a downgrade depending on who you ask, but I find it quite charming.
- Some sub-games and Spring Breeze have download play capabilities, although multiplayer is still available game-wide if you have two cartridges on two systems.
- Helpers now have significantly better AI. They don’t jump into lava anymore!


- Thanks to the bottom screen of the DS, we can now see which Great Cave Offensive areas we've completed at a moment's notice, no additional menus required!

And to wrap up all of this, to end off this entire review, the cherry at the tippy top of the cake… It has three new sub-games! My favorite is Kirby on the Draw, I used to play that one all the time.

We’re at the finish line now. I’m not sure what I can say about this game that I haven’t already said, but I hope that this serves as an alright conclusion: Going back to the original after playing this remake is impossible. It just does everything better in nearly every way. And if you could only play one Kirby game, I’d honestly recommend this one. It feels complete. It does everything, it has everything, it’s just… a great Kirby game. There’s very little reason to play the original these days if you have access to this version. It is a strictly better version of an already very good game. I would recommend Kirby Super Star to all Kirby fans, but I would recommend Kirby Super Star Ultra to anyone, regardless of their experience with the series.

Over six-thousand words later and I finally breathe a sigh of relief knowing that I finished this project. I put a lot of time into this one, and I feel like I did this game justice. And more importantly, we’ve finished what I consider to be the “Classic Era” of Kirby! Special thanks to Wikirby for the images and info, and to Tamme for her art. Moving on, we’re going to cover some Kirby games that I know very little about. In fact, you probably know little about them, too! Kirby’s Dream Land 3 is actually the lowest selling mainline Kirby game. Very few people talk about this one, it seems. Why is that? I’m not sure. But I’ll find out! In the meantime, I hope that you enjoyed this review and that you know how much I appreciate you for reading. I hope to see you again sometime soon!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

Season 1 Reflection - RF1

Hi! Exi here. This is gonna be a lot different from what I normally do. I’m going to be reflecting on my work by going over the entirety of Season 1 and talking about what I did well, what I could do better, and what I'm going to do moving forward.

If you’ve read any of my updates, you might have noticed that I tend to take this blog pretty seriously. I want things done in a very specific way, and I rarely deviate from that. Now, is that a good or bad thing? That’s up to you. Whether or not it's a healthy approach to this blog, it’s just the way I like to do it. But my point here is that I don’t really see this blog as a place to review games, I see it as a playground to practice and improve my reviewing skills. Because some day, I’d love to make an indie game. And I’m also planning to work as a writing editor. Having the ability to fairly analyze games and writing will be a huge boon for me.

So here’s how this will work. I’m gonna go through all of my reviews in order and just talk about each one briefly. I’ll be pointing out both their strengths and weaknesses. I will clarify that I do not like editing my work unless I find blatant grammatical or spelling errors, so most of the issues I point out will not be fixed in post. Rather, I will focus on avoiding these issues moving forward. And you may notice that I’m writing very differently than normal. When I write, I usually like to focus on whatever it is I'm reviewing. Not myself. But this topic of discussion is directly tied to myself, so I’m going to be a bit more casual about this. If I feel off, that’s why.

Sonic Retrospective Part 1: Sonic the Hedgehog (16-Bit)

This was the first review I posted. When I did, I was absolutely giddy. I was so, so, so excited to share my work. I stayed up all night to get it done, too. And it kind of showcases my writing before I had really defined my “style”. So it’s fun to reread for that. But looking back, it definitely is very simple. I think that I could have gone a whole lot further into the game mechanics. You know, what makes Sonic different from Mario, how the levels are designed, the special stages… As a review on its own, it’s fine. But as the start to the Sonic retrospective, it blows. It doesn’t establish the core principles of Sonic’s design like the Kirby retrospective did. I guess that’s forgivable because not only was it my first review, it was the first Sonic game. Those core design elements weren’t set in stone yet either. I could have done better, but it was my first review so it’s fine.

My biggest problem with this one is that I said near the end that I would be playing Sonic 8-bit next. I actually did play Sonic 8-bit for review, but by the end, I realized that I had close to no notes on it. It’s a very unremarkable game. So I decided to only focus on what I consider “major” Sonic games, but I never addressed that change. That kinda frustrates me on reread, but again, it’s fine. Although a Master System ranking sounds like a fun idea, I won’t lie.

Sonic Retrospective Part 2: Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (16-Bit)

I’m definitely a little prouder of this one. I focused more on actually analyzing the levels, and you can definitely tell. The Sonic 1 review was more just “here are my thoughts!” but the Sonic 2 review feels like an analysis. Problem is, I don’t think it was a great analysis. There are only 4 paragraphs that talk about the game pre-level analysis. The biggest regret I have with this review is that I didn’t talk about the changing level design. Sonic 2’s levels are designed in a very different way than Sonic 1’s levels, and I think I could have and should have spent more time establishing that rather than just saying "the levels are better". I think I was just really excited to post this, and I didn’t really give it a proper reread. And worse, there’s a bit of misinformation in there. Tails can’t pick Sonic up and fly without a second player. That was added in Mania.

What I am happy with, however, is the level analysis. I put in a lot of thought to pinpoint my thoughts on these levels, and I’m very happy with how much I improved from the Sonic 1 review. Particularly with Casino Night Zone, I’m especially proud of that one, since I worked pretty hard to figure out my thoughts on that zone. Overall, I should have done a lot more but it was still a massive step up.

Sonic Retrospective Part 3: Sonic CD

I wrote this review in one sitting. It’s not the only review I’ve done that for, as I am a fast writer. But the Sonic CD review is the only one that I feel was rushed. You can pinpoint the moment that I started losing steam, and that was the level analysis. I am embarrassed about the level analysis for this review because it’s literally nothing. The Palmtree Panic segment was okay, but the rest of them are miniscule and barely cover any important details. Now, how much of that is because Sonic CD is just a lame game without much to talk about? I’m not quite sure. I don’t think I could have gotten a lot out of each individual zone, but I could have done so much better.

After playing through a game as lame as Sonic CD, I was exhausted. And I was clearly too exhausted to write a level analysis about it. I needed to take a break. But instead, I pushed myself to get it out before it was really ready. The pre-level analysis portion is good, though. I feel like I did quite well with it, and I covered some more complicated topics (such as the special stages and amount of levels) with a bit more finesse, and I’m happy with how it turned out.

My absolute biggest regret here is that in the Wacky Workbench segment, I used the word “hell”. I’ve said “bullet hell” and “Helldivers” on this blog, but other than that, this is the only time that I’ve sworn on this blog. But hell isn’t really a swear word, is it? Here’s the thing, I have a bit of a pottymouth in real life. Who doesn’t? But when it comes to this blog, I always like to keep swear words to a minimum, no matter how tame. I find that they distract me and the reader from what this blog is really about: the games and the writing. I believe that a swear word doesn’t really add anything that a normal word can’t, so there's no point in using them if all they accomplish is adding edge. Again, I like to do things in a very particular way. But without even realizing it, I slipped in a “hell” in this review. And that does not sit well with me. Silly problem to have, I know. But it's a problem, nonetheless.

My other regrets here are that 1.) I didn’t talk more about the amazing Japanese soundtrack (Metallic Madness’s theme in particular), 2.) there was some slight misinformation. The Super Peel Out returned in Triple Trouble, but I claimed that it wasn’t seen again until Mania. I’m not losing sleep over that, though. And 3.) I was really scared to post a negative review about a game that a lot of people liked, and I was very unconfident. You can see it with how long of a disclaimer I gave at the start.

This review was a lesson to me: Don’t rush things. And I clearly took it to heart, because the Sonic Adventure 2 review has been cooking for like… half a year or something.

Sonic Retrospective Part 4: Sonic 3 & Knuckles

I was extremely proud of this review when I first posted it, but I think I could have done this game more justice. In particular, the level analysis could have been better. There is so much more to say about most of these levels that I just… didn’t. Like, Ice Cap Zone only got two paragraphs, which is unacceptable. That’s one of my favorite 2D Sonic zones, and it’s a fairly complex zone. It deserved way more than two paragraphs. Even with the pre-level analysis, I didn’t really touch on as much of the game as I really should have. It was just too light of a review for such a heavy game.

You can really tell that I wasn’t used to reviewing complex games like this, as Sonic 3K is a much beefier game than all the previous ones. I needed some time to really develop my reviewing style before I talked about this game. I should have considered taking a break from the Sonic Retrospective to review something else. I’m definitely disappointed in this review. It wasn’t bad but I could have done so much more. This is the first game in the series that I'd call truly exceptional, and I wished my review mirrored that level of quality.

Sonic Retrospective Part 5: Sonic 3D Blast

I don’t have a lot to say about this one that I haven’t already said for the other reviews. This one is very similar to the Sonic CD review for me. I did a pretty good job with the pre-level analysis and a pretty bad job with the actual level-analysis. I think It’s more justifiable here because Sonic 3D Blast’s levels are very plain and repetitive, so I’m not really sure how much more I could have said about them.

I think the reason I’m so critical of the level analysis segments of these reviews is how I don’t always justify them. If I’m gonna review every single level, I need to do enough to warrant it. What’s the point of going through all the levels if I only have a single paragraph to say about them? That’s more of an issue with the CD and 3K reviews but it does still apply here. That’s a big part of why I’m ditching the level analysis going forward.

Sonic Retrospective Part 6: Sonic Adventure

This is the last Sonic review in season 1. And I’m gonna be frank with you, I’m embarrassed of this one. That’s for two reasons.

1.) Word choice and sentence structure. If you’re on a computer, go to page one of this blog and press Control + F, then type “however.” You’ll notice that I used the word “however” WAY too much, and it's especially bad in this review. No joke, I used “however” 23 times in this review. It’s aggravating to read for me because of this. The sentence structure was also pretty bad, too. It was repetitive and uninteresting. It may not be perfect as of now, but it's absolutely not as bad as this.

2.) The level analysis. I don’t like that I skimped on the level analysis for the prior reviews, but I get it. They’re 2D platformers, and old ones at that. There’s no excuse to say this little about a 3D Sonic game. These levels are dense, so why can’t the review be? If I rewrote this today, I could have doubled the length of every level’s analysis here, and the review would have been better for it. I said less about Final Egg than the Chao Garden. THE CHAO GARDEN! AND I DIDN’T EVEN GIVE THAT THE TIME IT NEEDED!

This one desperately needed a second draft. I think I made a lot of good points in the review itself, but the writing itself was messy, repetitive, and rushed. This review was an indicator that I needed to ditch the level analysis format.

Mario Kart Track Ranking Parts 1 and 2

I’m going to be completely, 100% honest with you. My heart was not in these ones. I have considered taking them down entirely, but I decided to keep them up. I’ll just say this: I wrote this just to get something out, and it shows. I’m very passionate about Mario Kart, but this was a bad choice to start with. I should have ranked the tracks in Wii, 7, or even Double Dash. But instead, I ended up with a woefully undercooked mess of a ranking. I’m going to make sure that when I redo these rankings, I will give them more thought and time.

Luigi’s Mansion Review

Alright, now we’re getting into some reviews I’m actually proud of! This review was a turning point for my blog. All of my previous reviews followed a very strict format with little room for deviation. I wasn’t confident enough, so I used this structure to guide me through the review. Problem is that the level-by-level analysis format doesn’t work with most games. Sonic? Sure. Mario Kart? Go for it. But if I was going to evolve as a writer, I needed to take a big step forward, and this was that step.

An interesting tidbit about this review is that I had no intention of writing it when I started playing Luigi’s Mansion. But around halfway through the game, I realized that if any game was going to help me break out of my comfort zone, it was this one. It’s so short and simple but there’s a whole lot to talk about. Because of that, I didn’t have many notes taken by the end of the game, which made it very difficult to write about. But while it’s not perfect, and I could have done more, this review was huge for me because it proved that I’m not just limited to the prison I created for myself. But I actually did it. Not only is it the first review of mine to use a looser format, the writing quality took a big step as well. I took a very long break after the Mario Kart Track Rankings. And during that time, I was working on bigger projects in the background, all of which probably won’t be released for a long time. But because of them, I got so much more practice. You can really see that reflected in the writing. I was able to dissect the game a lot more effectively and I’m very proud of it. This is probably the most important review I’ve made yet. Not the best, but the most important for myself and this blog.

Kirby Retrospective Part 1: Kirby’s Dream Land

Another important one. My mental health fell off a cliff after the Luigi’s Mansion Review was posted, and I was barely writing anything during the break after it. I had zero motivation to do anything, let alone write. I wanted to get back into writing, but it was hard. So I chose the absolute simplest game that I could have possibly written about: Kirby’s Dream Land. It’s like… 30 minutes long? I needed something to get me back into the groove. You can kind of see that reflected in the review, to be honest. Over half of the review wasn’t really spent “reviewing” Kirby’s Dream Land. Rather, setting up for future reviews. And that makes sense, especially since there isn’t a ton to talk about with this game due to its length and simplicity. It didn’t really need to be any bigger than it was. This is less of a review and more of a starting point, and I think it worked quite well.

My only real problem with this one was the lack of a good ending that ties everything together. My takeaway was “even a simple game like this can have a lot to talk about”. And while I do think that ending the review with that point made some sense, it should complement and be complemented by a thesis statement on my overall thoughts on the game. Other than that, I’m happy with this.

Kirby Retrospective Part 2: Kirby’s Adventure

This is probably the best review I’ve posted because I didn’t skimp out on anything. I covered everything I needed to. And everything that I covered was done well. If I had to nitpick… I could have talked about how the enemies move too fast? But that’s about it. There’s not too much to say about it, I’m just really happy with it. I think this is the review that really solidified my style and ended the growing pains. I honestly should have just ended the season here because of that.

Kirby Retrospective Part 3: Kirby’s Dream Land 2

This review was especially hard to write because I simultaneously had so much to say and also nothing to say. It was so weird. I spent basically a whole day writing this thing nonstop. Kirby’s Dream Land 2 is kind of a “nothing” Kirby game. And when I was writing I knew exactly what I wanted to say but I was just struggling to put it into words. Reading it back, I think it shows.

There’s nothing here that I did egregiously wrong, but I didn’t write this one with the same finesse that I had with the Kirby’s Adventure review. Some of my points were a little vague and underexplored, the conclusion could be better, and the writing overall just wasn’t as tight as I would have liked. It was not easy to write, that’s for sure, and I think this review as a whole could have used a second draft.

-----------------

Before we wrap this up, let’s talk about the future. The following is a list of all my future projects:

In-progress

Kirby Retrospective (part 4 and 5 are done in their entirety, just waiting on an art piece to go alongside it)
Classic Mega Man Ranking
Super Mario Ranking
Pikmin Review
Exi Rants About a Hypothetical Nintendo Legacy Collection

Not Started or Very Early in Development

Luigi’s Mansion 2 // 3 Review
Pikmin 2 // 3 // 4 Review
Metroid Ranking
Castlevania Ranking
Mega Man X Ranking
Mega Man Zero // ZX Ranking
Mega Man Battle Network Ranking
Pokemon Ranking
Zelda Retrospective
Sonic Retrospective Act 2 (will likely post the first five parts of this review at once to avoid repetition)
Danganronpa Review
Mario Kart DS Track Ranking
Five Nights at Freddy’s Ranking (yes, seriously)

Unsure

Hey! Pikmin review
WiiWare Ranking (not sure what this entails)
Touch Generations Ranking
Ace Attorney Ranking

Season 1 was a bit rocky, and I know that this blog has had many ups and downs, but I’m really trying to make it the best it can be. It’s not easy, but it’s a whole lot of fun. I spent a long time with these reviews trying to figure out what this blog even is, and I feel like I’ve finally got it. I have a clear direction with this blog now, and I know exactly where to go after this. But most importantly, I can never truly put into words how much I appreciate you and anyone reading this. I mostly write these for myself but knowing that even a single person reads these helps me keep going with it.

So thank you to anyone who read any of my work or have shared their thoughts. I’ll do my best to make reviews that you can enjoy and that I can be proud of!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

Hi! This is both an update and an announcement. I wanted to cover a couple important things regarding this blog for both the near and far future.


- Happy pride! I will celebrate by continuing to be genderfluid, although I was gonna do that regardless of the month.

First off, its summer vacation, and I've had plenty of time to write. I've been writing a whole lot, actually. So why haven't I posted anything? Well, I actually have the next two parts of the Kirby Retrospective completely finished and ready to go, those being the Super Star // Super Star Ultra review and the Dream Land 3 review. But I haven't posted them yet because a friend of mine is drawing a little doodle for the former! However, I wasn't too clear about when I needed the art done, so I'm currently waiting on the art piece. It shouldn't be too much longer, now. I'll probably post both reviews simultaneously. And for the record, not every future review of mine will have sketches to go alongside them, only ones that cover more important games. Big thanks to my friend for being willing to help me, she's wonderful. I returned the favor with two trips to an ice cream place, so it's not unpaid labor.

But the time I've spent writing has made me think about some of my past reviews. More specifically, the Sonic Retrospective. You may notice that I have not posted anything in that retrospective in over half a year. I've been actively working on the Sonic Adventure 2 review during that whole time. It's over 50 pages long now! But I was thinking about it. And however hard it is to admit it, I realized that I need to restart the Sonic Retrospective. If I'm going to continue growing as a reviewer, I can't continue the current Sonic Retrospective.

When I first wrote the Sonic Retrospective, I used a very strict format. I would review every level individually. I did this because I was not confident enough to structure reviews in any other way. A level-by-level analysis gave me a clear and simple structure to follow. But the Luigi's Mansion review and especially the Kirby Retrospective proved to me that I'm far more capable than I once thought. My style has evolved to a point where a strict structure honestly hurts the review more than anything. I don't have any room to breathe with it! And besides, I don't have that much to say on every level. There are some levels that are so unremarkable that it would just be filler. And while I still do love the idea of reviewing Sonic levels individually, it no longer fits in this blog. It doesn't compliment my writing, and my writing doesn't compliment it.

If you want proof, look no further than my review of Sonic CD. The review itself was strong for my skill level at the time, and I made some very good observations about the game's mechanics. But the level analysis is fluff. It's nothing. It's pointless. Rather than expanding on my core points at the heart of the review, I spent a bunch of time talking about levels that I had nothing to say about. The review was made actively worse by the level analysis format.

My point is this: I no longer believe that the Sonic Retrospective is worth continuing in its current state. I believe that the best course of action is to start fresh and make a Sonic Retrospective that I can be truly proud of. I love Sonic, and I really, really, really want to review the series at large. But the way I've been doing it is not the way to go about it. Maybe someday, I'll do a level ranking separate from the retrospective for a game like Mania or Generations, where I actually have a lot to say about every level. I do think that could be quite a lot of fun. But that's a "someday" thing. My current plan is to finish up my review of Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards, then review the Genesis Sonic games. Also, I will not be covering Sonic 3D Blast this time. I said everything worth saying about it already and I do not believe any interesting discussion will come from reviewing it again.

If this works out (and I see no reason why it wouldn't), I will be able to write and post a lot more. By not being held back by a structure that no longer works, I am able to write more confidently and consistently. I've been writing very frequently for the Kirby Retrospective, so a similar format will allow me to maintain a similar pace. And then I'll finally be able to write about a Sonic game that isn't Sonic Adventure 2! What a novel idea.

So yeah! I'll have two Kirby reviews out in the next handful of days. I'm proud of both of them, although the Dream Land 3 review is probably the most negative and harsh review I've made for this blog, so I'm a bit nervous to post it. But regardless, I hope to see you then!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

I'm glad to see that you're having fun with it, too! Mario Kart World has a lot of issues but it's so much fun, and it'll absolutely keep me busy for a long time. I've just been driving around and trying to see if I can find all of the question-panels on my own, no guide. I just finished up crown city, and it took HOURS but it's such a fun treasure hunt that helps kill time.

I'm really, really glad that you enjoyed the read! I wasn't expecting anyone to read through that whole block of text, but It's nice to know that people enjoy it. In the words of the late, great pajama sam 9, "Thank you! Wherever you voyage next, in continuing this world grappling I hope that the capers and excitements follow when visiting myself a great array of untested horizons."

Exi Rants About their Nintendo Switch 2 Launch Experience - ERA1

Hi! Exi here. Welcome to my little ranting corner, where I’m gonna talk about a topic. Just… a topic. Normally with this blog, I like to keep everything structured. I don’t want to just talk about the games I play; I want to actually review them. Dig deep and understand them. But the issue is that there are topics that I’d love to talk about, but they don’t fit well into a structured format. So, I’m introducing a rant format that will be separate from the rest of my reviews and retrospectives. This is literally just me talking about a topic or subject that I find interesting because why not. These rants won’t be the most evergreen as they cover topics that are currently relevant but may not be in the future. This is something I’ve wanted to do for a while now, and I think the best topic to start with is the Switch 2.

I got my Switch 2 at 11:01 PM CST on June 4th, 2025. I’m writing this sentence at 5:53 PM CST on June 7th, 2025. I’ve had this thing for a couple days now (almost a week at the time of posting), and I’ve already developed lots of opinions about it that I would love to share. Because oh boy, this has been an interesting point of discussion recently. We’ve gone through a lot from the Switch 2’s reveal to release. Prices, specs, games, leaks, politics, and everything in between. It’s so bad I’m willing to bet that there are people that you know who have heard about all of this, even though they don’t play games and can’t even SPELL the word Nintendo. It’s a big deal. But the console is out now, and after spending some time with it, I’ve finalized a lot of my opinions about it all that I’d like to share. I hope that I can share some different perspectives and help people who are on the fence make their decision.

The Switch 2 Console



I want to start with the console itself. I have been dealing with my dinky Switch Lite for a while, and it was on its last leg. Online didn’t work for nearly all of my games, the SD card would refuse to work sometimes, load times would be minutes long on occasion for the simplest tasks, dead zones and drift on the control sticks, and moving the right stick would also move the left. Believe me when I say that I needed an upgrade. And the Switch 2 has been that upgrade in almost every way. Key word, almost.

Let’s also get this over with now: I am going to talk about some of Nintendo’s bad business practices here, but I still bought the console and will continue to buy games for it regardless. A common response to people like me is “if the business practices are so bad, don’t buy the console.” But personally, I don’t think that responsibility should fall on the consumer. I do not want to sacrifice my enjoyment of gaming because of this, as I love Nintendo games. I’ve gotten thousands of hours of enjoyment from them, and I would not get nearly as much playtime out of a PS5, an Xbox Series, or even a Steam Deck. Nintendo games and systems are where my gaming passion lies first and foremost, and I can purchase Nintendo products while also wanting the company to do better. Blaming the consumer is very silly in my opinion, because Nintendo still makes products that they enjoy. I love so many things about the Switch 2, so yes, I purchased it. That’s not something I or anyone like me should be blamed for. This is all to say that I’m not going to boycott Nintendo because of all of this, because I still want to purchase their products. But I’m also not going to blindly praise everything they do.

First off, the console itself feels great. Way better than the Switch 1 ever did. Holding it in your hands feels comfortable for how big and heavy it is, although it can dig into your hands during long play sessions because of its weight. But what makes this console so much better is the build quality. It’s not perfect, not at all. But when you held a Switch 1, it felt like plastic, it felt rickety, it felt like it could break if you grabbed it the wrong way or something. I don’t get that with the Switch 2 because the console feels premium. The material is much nicer, it’s bigger and heavier without feeling too bulky, and the screen is way sharper and more detailed. Some people have complained about the 450 USD price tag, but I can’t get behind that way of thinking. This feels like a modern piece of tech. You pay a higher price for a console that reflects that price. The Switch 1 is hard to go back to because the feel of the console pales in comparison to the Switch 2.

What really pushes this console over the edge for me are the Joycons. The idea of the Switch 1 Joycons are brilliant, we all know that. But what we also know is that the Joycons themselves are not the most fun things to use. They’re tiny, first off. The buttons aren’t all in comfortable locations, especially the SL and SR buttons which are borderline unusable for bigger hands without the strap. The control sticks have a very limited range that even 12-year-old Exi didn’t like. And worst of all, they felt cheap and plastic-y. The Joycon 2 are better in nearly every way you can think of. Bigger and more satisfying buttons, amazing shoulders and triggers, a more comfortable design, awesome SL and SR buttons, everything! And they connect to the system using magnets. It’s too early to say if they will wear out easily, but I promise you that they’re more durable than the rail system of the Switch 1. Snapping the Joycons onto the console feels amazing and sturdy. They’re locked in there. And despite concerns shared online, I don’t feel that the magnetic connectors are going to break easily. You’d have to try to break them, it seems. It’s not like how the dock of the Switch 1 (and Switch 2, spoilers) kinda feels like it could scratch your screen if you put it in the wrong way. No, these magnets are sturdy. You aren’t breaking this thing unless you do something really, really wrong.



Once you’ve put the Joycons onto the system, you’ve got a console that feels good in the hands. It’s pretty comfortable in handheld mode, although I did notice that the Joycons aren’t as snug as they could be, most likely because they have a little bit of range when you twist them hard enough to prevent damage to the connector. Every once in a while, the Joycons will just kinda feel a bit off for a moment, like they aren’t as tightly snapped onto the console as they could be. Not that they’ll fall off or anything, just that they could be better.

As for the console itself, it’s very nice. I have no issues with the actual console, at least not yet. The screen is gorgeous, a bit better than the Switch OLED if you ask me. The screen also has an unpeelable protective film on it to stop scratches. And it’s big. Every day when I grab it after waking up, I feel a bit shocked by how big it is. But it’s not unwieldy, not at all. Any bigger and I think it would have been a bit too big. It’s the perfect size. And the kickstand is really, really nice. I haven’t had a chance to test out the kickstand on the OLED, as the few times I’ve tried it have been at store kiosks. I assume that the OLED kickstand is better, but this is still really solid. I have had zero issues with it, especially when compared to the one found on the base Switch 1 model, which is so bad that it barely qualifies as a kickstand at all. Plus, you’ve got two charging ports and killer speakers. It’s a great handheld. I have only one issue with the console, and that is that the volume and power buttons are in a little bit of an awkward location that can be hard to reach. Other than that, it’s great.

No, that was a lie, I have another issue. The console gets pretty hot right after you take it out of the dock. It doesn’t reach dangerous levels for you or the console, and it usually only stays hot for 15 seconds or so. But it is a strange issue. Speak of the malice, let’s talk about the dock, because it’s not that different from the Switch 1’s dock. It’s certainly better, and built-in ventilation is a huge upgrade. But it’s also 100 USD, which is stupid. And it doesn’t feel good to put the console in, which is an issue I had with the Switch 1 dock that lives on here. It feels like the same dock outside of the fact that it looks nicer and it has a fan.

The grip is not the most comfortable thing to hold. To add space to insert the Joycons, it’s slightly flat. I don’t like that, but it’s not unusable. However, the Joycon straps are actually quite nice this time around. They make single-Joycon use more comfortable, and they double as mouse feet. That’s a really nice addition!

Speak of the malice yet again, we’re talking about mouse control now. And I think the best way to put it is this: it’s exactly as you imagine it. It’s not the most comfortable thing in the world; it was never going to be. The Joycons are too thin to be replacements for an actual mouse. But they do the job and aren’t bad at all, especially with the straps on. I have yet to play an actual game that makes use of them outside of the Welcome Tour, so who knows, I may be wrong about this all. But from what I’ve seen, they’re usable mice. That’s all they are and that’s all they needed to be. While we’re on the topic of new accessories, I am also yet to try the camera or the new Pro Controller. From what I can gather online, the camera is basically on the same level as the mice: usable. not much more, not much less. But I have not used it, so who knows. As for the Pro Controller, if it’s anything like the Switch 1 Pro Controller, it’s amazing and you should buy it, as it will make you ditch the Joycons the second you pick it up. Could be wrong, but it uses practically the same design, just with two back buttons and a C button.

Speak of the malice for a third time, the C button! I have not tried GameChat yet, but I’m planning on doing so later tonight with a friend. So I’ll have Editing Exi let you know how it goes.

Hi! Editing Exi here. I spent a couple hours with a friend on GameChat, and I’m pleased to report that it went well. The framerate is pretty terrible and the resolution kinda blows, but I don’t think being able to watch your friends in 120 fps was the point. The point was to be able to see what your friends are doing when you’re on call, whether you’re playing together or not. Me and my friend were calling over Discord while sharing our screens on GameChat, and it worked very well. It felt amazing to be having an unrelated conversation and just say “hey man, check out what’s going on in my game”. It’s perfect for those late night calls with friends where you’re just kinda relaxing and gaming. Now, none of this was made or even pioneered in any way by Nintendo, and I think it’s pretty goofy that they continuously act like it’s their invention or something. It’s not, you’ve been able to do basically this exact same thing over Discord for years now. But we’ve still never really had the ability to do that for the Switch, so a win is a win, I guess. Anyways, I’m gonna go to sleep now, as it is 4 AM. Lots of love from Editing Exi!

I was going to move on and conclude this segment of the rant by talking about how much I like the console, but I need to mention it: The dead zones and drifting have not been fixed, which is unacceptable when a pair of Joycon 2’s are 100 USD. It was an easy thing for Nintendo to fix, fans already know how to fix it. And they’re offering free repairs, so that’s good. But if you know that it’s going to be an issue and you offer free repairs within the first couple days of the launch, why was it an issue in the first place? My left Joycon is already showing signs of dead zones. It’s not an issue yet, but I imagine that I'll need to repair them before the end of the year, which means that I won’t have a left Joycon for about a month. That’s absolutely infuriating and I hate it.

Regardless, the Switch 2 excels in so many areas. It makes the Switch 1 feel like a Fisher-Price toy. This is a premium device that is worth its price, no doubt. Is it enough to be an immediate purchase for the average Switch 1 owner? I wouldn’t say so, though it’s definitely something that any Switch 1 owner would be satisfied by. But that’s just the console itself. We haven’t talked about the games! Keep in mind that I did not buy every Switch 2 launch title. These are the titles I picked up or played with a friend:

- Mario Kart World
- Deltarune
- Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour
- Breath of the Wild Switch 2 Edition (Upgrade Pack)
- Street Fighter 6 Years 1-2 Edition

I’ll mostly be focusing on the Nintendo developed ones, because I’m not sure if Deltarune fits this discussion all too well. (If you’re curious about my thoughts on it, Chapter 3 was a solid filler episode that overstayed its welcome and I haven’t finished Chapter 4 yet. But so far, it’s got some of the best writing in the game).

Breath of the Wild, Street Fighter 6, and Friends



Before I talk about the big ones, let’s take a detour to talk about the system’s power. From everything I can gather, the Switch 2 is a little more powerful than a PS4 (potentially closer to a PS4 Pro). I know that we were all expecting this, as the Switch 2 was very likely the most leaked console in history. We knew that it would be this powerful, and it’s certainly not small potatoes, especially with how graphics have been kind of capping out recently. A portable console as powerful as a PS4 could keep up with the others for a long while. But I think it took until the Switch 2 Direct to show us the full extent of its power.

The Switch 2 launched with loads of great games. This is arguably the most stacked console launch ever, not just for Nintendo. Not too much in terms of new stuff, but still a great launch. We got Split Fiction, Cyberpunk 2077, Civilization VII, Yakuza 0 and even Hogwarts Legacy (the real one this time)! And we got confirmation of loads more third-party games coming later down the line, including Elden Ring, FF7 Remake Trilogy, Borderlands 4, and an exclusive online Fromsoft game called The Duskbloods. This console is no joke, and it’s able to keep up with the rest of the industry.

So of course, I had to put it through its paces. Me and a friend played Street Fighter 6 on Switch 2 recently. This was our first time playing, and let me tell you, it was a treat. SF6 is incredible! It’s literally everything you could possibly want from a modern fighter. Awesome character designs and variety, accessible yet deep gameplay, flashy finishers, a solid story mode, it’s got everything. It even has Rashid who is one of the best characters in fiction. That obviously makes SF6 an 18/10, and I have no doubt that this game will sell a Rashidillion copies in its first week on the market. But that’s not what I’m focusing on right now. Street Fighter 6 is a great game, but how does it fare as a Switch 2 game? Pretty great, actually! In many ways, this is the definitive version of the game.

For 60 USD, you get the base game (valued at 40 USD) plus all of the DLC (valued at 60 USD). That’s 40 USD cheaper than on other consoles. And as a reminder, this is on the console famous for how unaffordable it is. It has every single piece of content from other consoles, from the story mode to the online functionality, and that does include crossplay. It even has some exclusive gimmick modes, such as motion-controlled battles, plus some exclusive amiibo that let you save your custom settings with ease on a character-by-character basis. Not a fan of it being locked behind amiibo, but that’s still a feature that other versions don’t have as far as I know. The game also runs buttery smooth at 60 fps. I was only able to notice a couple lag spikes, and they were during moments when I was in hit-lag, so it didn’t make any difference at all. The game doesn’t look perfect, as some textures aren’t the prettiest. But they’re still good and they never took me out of the experience. If you handed someone this game and told them it was the PS5 version, there’s a good chance that they’d believe you. But unlike the PS5 version, this game is portable. The definitive version of a current gen, AAA game is a launch title for the company known for how behind the times and childish it is. That blows my mind, and you can say the same for many of the Switch 2 launch titles.

There is one major caveat, however. And that’s the fact that the story mode runs at a locked 30 fps. I have not played the story mode, but I understand that this is a big negative. In other switch 2 games, 30 fps is an annoying sacrifice, but it’s not the end of the world. But this is Street Fighter. Your success in a fighting game depends on precision and reflexes. And by running at half the framerate, you’re giving the player half the frames to work with and eliminating many opportunities to pull off tough combos. This is fine for more casual players, but for an experienced player, this could automatically make the Switch 2 version their least favorite of the lot. It’s still not the worst thing ever, as most of the people playing story mode are newbies who are still learning the ropes. The lower framerate is more of a minor annoyance to them, especially when the game runs at a near-perfect 60 fps otherwise. Depending on who you are, this could significantly hinder your experience. But if it doesn’t, then you should absolutely pick this game up. SF6 is the best traditional fighter I’ve ever played, it’s honestly remarkable. And for a version with all the current DLC at a 60 USD price tag, it’s a bargain that I’d recommend to anybody.

So the Switch 2 can handle modern games pretty well, although there will be some sacrifices. This appears to be uniform across the board, so the Switch 2 is in a good state third-party wise. So how about the rereleases of first party games?



Obviously, I had to try my favorite game of all time, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. That game was amazing. It wasn’t perfect by any stretch, however. The story was a bit too light, weapon progression was artificial, sidequests weren’t always worth doing, these are issues baked into the game’s core. They can’t be fixed with a simple update. But the biggest issue for many reviewers at the time of the game’s release was its performance. For a launch title on a new system, it had some pretty distracting slowdown, especially in Great Hyrule Forest which is otherwise quite beautiful. You can’t usually fix a bad story or unsatisfying sidequests, but you can certainly fix bad performance, and a shiny new console is the perfect opportunity to do so.

For 10 USD, you can get an “upgrade pack” that will transform the game into the Switch 2 Edition. I started a new save file and am going for 100% completion this time. So far, my experience has been great. It’s got a 60-fps framerate that has not dropped even once for me, gorgeous colors thanks to the HDR support, and a higher resolution that makes the breathtaking vistas of Hyrule even better. That’s all great stuff. But what was so interesting to me is how natural it was, like it’s always been like this. To be honest, it’s hard to remember how the game used to be. When I first got out of the Shrine of Resurrection, I was blown away by the opening scene as I always am. But after that, it felt like I was playing Breath of the Wild like I always do. And I love that! This doesn’t really feel like “Breath of the Wild Deluxe Edition”. It feels like what Breath of the Wild was always meant to be, like the game has broken free from the shackles of the Switch 1. At its heart, it’s still the same old Breath of the Wild that I fell in love with. At least, it would have been, but the story doesn’t end there. Introducing Zelda Notes!

By linking the Nintendo Switch app on your phone, you get a wide array of new features that help you explore Hyrule. I’ve heard mixed reception towards it, but I’ll go ahead and say it: This feature, while not for everyone, is amazing for certain types of players. Specifically, those who want to spend hundreds of hours in the game. And I’m one of those people! The feature I enjoyed the most was the navigation system. it’s basically an interactive map that links to your game. Or, in other words, a Hyrule GPS. While that sounds silly, I find it to be quite useful. It can help you find basically any collectible in the world. Looking at a guide on IGN can be tiring when you’re trying to find the 867th Korok Seed, but the navigation system helps me find those pesky collectibles as if it were a real GPS, like “turn left at the shrine to find the Korok”. And while that would be considered cheating in other games, this is Breath of the Wild. A lot of its collectibles are arbitrary. You aren’t supposed to find them all, that’s not the point of the game. But thanks to Zelda Notes, those who DO want to find them all will have a much better time. Plus, you can customize it to hide spoilers or certain collectibles that you want to find on your own. For example, I toggled off shrines and towers since I want to look for those myself. But I turned on Koroks and voice memories because they’re mostly arbitrary and I would appreciate some assistance with them, and Zelda Notes does that extremely well. It’s just another option for people who play the game for a long time.

It also has a bunch of other features, but they tend to feel overcompensation-y if I’m being honest. Like they’re trying to add value to the Switch 2 version but they kind of feel forced. Like, getting a random bonus meal every day, or the ability to get double the daily amiibo rewards every 5 days. Oh, and photo editing. How about sharing items with other save files? These are all fine enough features, but they can often feel like fluff that was only added to make the Switch 2 version seem worth the 10 USD price tag. But like… a daily bonus meal? Extra amiibo scans? THOSE feel like cheating in my eyes, like a sort of microtransaction you’d find in a mobile game. I’ll probably use them in the later game to cut down on the grind, but for the first chunk of my adventure, I’m going to avoid using them.

There are, however, even MORE features that enhance the game. Achievements, global data tracking, and 80-something new “voice memories” scattered across Hyrule? Those are huge additions! Breath of the Wild is a game that you can spend hundreds of hours in, so being able to track random statistics like monsters slain or chests opened adds a sense of accomplishment to every little thing you do and rewards you with achievements for your hard work. And voice memories are awesome! They’re like mini-memories where you get to learn about Zelda and Hyrule Kingdom. Or like new pages in Zelda’s Diary but now spread all over Hyrule as a new collectible! I love them so much! But my question is this: Why were these additions tied to a mobile app? With the navigation system, I get it. While it would be really weird if your Shiekah Slate started giving you directions, smartphones give us directions all the time. That makes sense as a part of the mobile app. But achievements don’t. Voice memories don’t. There is no reason why these had to be tied to a mobile app. And while I praised the navigation system for giving the players options, these honestly remove options. Like, let’s say that you don’t want to use Zelda Notes because it separates the game across two screens like on the Wii U. That’s totally reasonable. But you'd be missing out on not just the navigation system, but also achievements and an amazing new collectible that adds new lore and gives Zelda more screen time, which is something she lacks severely in the original game. You don’t wanna pass on these new features, but you also don’t want to use the app, so you have to make a sacrifice either way. This wouldn’t be an issue if these features were just a part of the game itself. There is very little reason for them to be a part of the app other than trying to add more value to it. That’s pretty stupid, if you ask me.

The only other detail worth mentioning is that the Switch 2 version of the game doesn’t include the DLC. I personally don’t like that, but I see why they did this. It’s not really a new “deluxe” or “ultimate” version of the game and including the DLC would make the fancy Switch 2 version cheaper than the original. Honestly, it was a lose-lose situation no matter what. I think it’s silly for Nintendo to charge 90 dollars for the full package, but I think it’s sillier for us to act like THIS is where the line is drawn… especially when we haven’t even covered Mario Kart World yet. Besides, the DLC is pretty skippable. Some could argue that the game feels a little more natural without it. So it’s not a huge loss or anything, just kind of annoying.

All things considered, It’s still Breath of the Wild, now on a console that can handle its artistic vision. It’s already one of the greatest games of all time, now looking and running better than ever. Zelda Notes is a mixed bag, but it can definitely enhance the experience for lots of people, myself included. In my opinion, it’s not really a “new way" to experience the game like some people are calling it, nor is it an upgrade that will “make you fall in love with the game all over again”. Rather, it’s the same great game you’ve already played, now with way more breathing room and some neat new features for more hardcore players. If you’ve played the game recently, I would skip it for now. But if you haven’t played it or if it’s been a long time since your last playthrough, absolutely give it a go! It’s an amazing game that deserves to be played by everyone in its 60fps, 1080p, HDR compatible glory.

Hi! Editing Exi here… again. I somehow forgot to mention Tears of the Kingdom. It also has a Switch 2 edition, and everything I said about Breath of the Wild’s Switch 2 edition still applies, Zelda Notes and all. The only notable difference is the ability to share your Ultrahand creations online in the same method that you share items. So, it’s still a great upgrade. I’ll probably pick it up after I finish 100%ing Breath of the Wild, because I have no doubt that the upgrades will still make a big difference. That’s all from me, I’m gonna go to sleep again. Lots of love from Editing Exi!

The Breath of the Wild upgrade was 10 USD, making the final game 70 USD, which is perfectly reasonable in my eyes. It brings an already great game up to modern performance standards, and modern games are often priced at 70 USD. But how about free upgrades for old games? A handful of Switch 1 games got free updates to enable GameShare and // or some simple performance boosts. Most of them are in the Breath of the Wild camp: It surprises me that the game wasn’t always like that. All of them except for Pokémon Scarlet and Violet. I’m not even going to bother talking about these games in-depth, but it got a big patch to allow the game to actually function. I quite like Scarlet and Violet, I think they’re a huge step for the series and they have a lot of things going for them. But I'm so burnt out from discussing this game with others that I haven’t even downloaded the patch onto my Switch 2. Maybe someday, but I figured that I'd say it here: The game is playable now, yippee. But as for other games such as Super Mario 3D World, it makes a big difference, but it doesn’t change the game substantially. It’s just a really nice addition; that’s about all there is to it.

My point in this section is just that the Switch 2 is powerful. It brought back a lot of those magical feelings from the Switch 1 for me. Like, these are huge games running on a little tablet that could fit in a backpack! This thing will be able to keep up for a good while, and I expect a solid number of big third party titles to show up on it.

Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour



Let’s move onto the Welcome Tour. This was the first game I played on Switch 2, and it was certainly an introduction. I’ll preface this by discussing the “paid digital game” elephant in the room first, because it forces me to look at this game in a very different light. This game is priced at 10 USD. For comparison, the average AAA game is 70 USD (or at least it used to be prior to Mario Kart world, more on that in a bit). That was a gutsy move. A lot of people have complained that it should have been a pack in, and while I don’t necessarily disagree, I’m not entirely sure if I agree, either. I know that sounds stupid, but please hear me out here.

For context, I’ve played up until the fifth area of the game, which is roughly 40% of the way through. I’ve been collecting every stamp and medal as they become available, as well as completing the quizzes and collecting lost items. Basically, I’ve been trying to 100% this thing, at least as much as I can without required accessories like the camera or a 4K display. And I’ve had a good time with it! Running around a giant replica of the Switch 2 and its accessories is a treat. It's a lot of fun to hunt for hidden stamps. They’re not too hard to find, but it’s still a nice little game of hide-and-seek that is made easier by having a good understanding of the console and its accessories. There are also quizzes to take, and they offer some good insight into the console. They’re called “insight quizzes” for a reason, after all. And they do the job very well. One thing I love about this game is that it’s no joke. It gets pretty technical and teaches you a lot of obscure little details about the console that you would never figure out on your own, not unless you take apart the console yourself. In fact, some of the technical insights helped me write this rant! It doesn’t treat you like a little kid, not at all. The questions aren’t as simple as “what button takes you to the home menu”. They get down and dirty into specifics, like how the magnets work and the ergonomics of the Joycon 2. It doesn’t take a master’s degree to understand this stuff, but the complexity would for sure educate even die-hard Nintendo fans about their new system. I watched Switch 2 news like a hawk, and I didn’t even know half of the stuff they talked about here.

It also comes with a sizable number of tech demos. They’re not really… “minigames”, per say, despite the fact that many of them are labeled as such. There’s not much replayability to any of the ones I’ve played. They’re more so illustrations of how these new features can enhance games. But unlike something such as Wii Sports or even Wii Play, they don’t really contextualize these tech demos as a game, or even as minigames. They’re very much just neat tech demos that you play a couple times for medals before moving onto the next one. Which I guess fits the exhibition-tour aesthetic, as it’s very similar to what you may find in a real museum.

The point I’m trying to make is this: the Welcome Tour isn’t really a game. It may act like it is, but it’s not. If you compare it to something like Wii Sports or Nintendo Land, it will for sure come up short, especially when those games were packed in with initial bundles of their respective consoles. I’m not sure if Welcome Tour would make sense as a pack-in because it’s not a game. It’s not even a collection of tech demos like Wii Play. It’s a digital museum, an exhibition of secrets. In fact, that’s what the title is in Japan. Nintendo Switch 2 Secrets Exhibition, which is a far more fitting and accurate name. “Welcome Tour” is, in my opinion, a terrible name that poorly represents its goals and intentions.

I know what you’re thinking… you’re thinking the same thing as I did prior to playing it. “Not being a pack-in limits the game’s audience. By being a pack-in, it would show so many more people the console’s capabilities and encourage them to buy more games.” And while I do think that this is true on paper, I don’t know if that applies to this game. It doesn’t scream “Welcome Tour” to me. It may be overwhelming at times, especially for casuals. A casual Switch 2 owner would not understand the intricacies of the magnets or the springs, they wouldn’t understand why they need ray tracing or HDR. Yes, more people would play this game if it was a pack in. But most of those people wouldn’t get much out of it. They may be overwhelmed or confused by it. This is something that appeals to the more passionate Switch 2 owners, so why push it onto everybody?

Now, I’m not trying to say that the way they’re doing it now is flawless because it’s not. 10 dollars is pretty steep for this thing. In my opinion, it does offer 10 dollars of value, but that 10 dollars could be used to get much more value from indie games like Hollow Knight or Celeste. The Welcome Tour wouldn’t have been the best pack-in, but it also shouldn’t have been as expensive as it is now. Because right now, it’s kind of failing to win over anybody. I propose the following methods to make this game what it could have been:

Method 1: Lower the price to 5 USD and change the name to “Secrets Exhibition” or something similar. Anything but “Welcome Tour”.

Method 2: Make it a pack-in but give the tech demos more replayability and depth. Also, reorganize the different areas. Instead of making each area represent a different part of the console or accessory, organize them by difficulty level. Start with the easier stuff first, then ease the player into the harder stuff. This will make it a more accessible title more fitting of pack-in status.

Method 3: If you’re scared of casuals playing it, sell the game through different means. Maybe it could be a MyNintendo reward? Or a bonus when you get the Switch Online Expansion Pack? That way, it would still be a freebie bonus, and it would still mostly be played by its intended audience.

This is a complicated take on a complicated subject. So if you’re confused, I’ll sum it up like this: The Welcome Tour positions itself as a pack-in, despite the fact that it’s not that at all. By calling it the “Welcome Tour”, Nintendo forced everyone to view it as a pack-in. When in reality, It was designed to be something very different. This was supposed to be a supplementary title to let you explore the console you already know about, not a game that teaches you the basics. It wasn’t designed in the same way that other pack-ins were, yet it marketed itself just like them. This wasn’t a failure of the game itself, this wasn’t a failure of its pricing. This was a failure of its marketing and positioning. Because as of now, I feel like I got a pretty sweet Switch 2 Exhibition but a pretty bad Switch 2 Welcome Tour.

Mario Kart World



In the words of Pajama Sam, “Alright, this is it. This is the big one.”

Mario Kart World is THE Switch 2 game right now. Much like how Breath of the Wild was THE Switch 1 game and Wii Sports was THE Wii game. This is the blockbuster, the one everyone’s picking up. Are you really gonna buy a Switch 2 without this game? It even comes bundled in with many Switch 2’s, being 30 USD cheaper than normal. Speaking of the price, let’s talk about that. I don’t like it. I don’t like this game’s price.

80 USD is absolutely absurd for any game. Nintendo said that the price tag reflects the value that this game offers, and while I can understand that reasoning, it never goes the other way. They didn’t charge less for something like 1-2 Switch, nor did they charge less for Super Mario RPG, a remake of an SNES game. But 80 USD Mario Kart is okay. This is a wild double standard that I will never get behind. 80 USD doesn’t just mean a higher price, it sets a precedent for Nintendo and the industry at large. But that’s not what I want to talk about yet, because you know all of this. Rather, I want you to keep the price in mind as I review this game. It was in development for 8 years and costs 80 USD, higher than Breath of the Wild’s Switch 2 edition and Cyberpunk 2077. I believe that it is perfectly reasonable to have very high expectations for this game, even if it can’t realistically meet them. That’s what the 80 USD price tag does in my eyes. Normally when I review something like this, I like to say “forget about the controversy for a second”, but much like the Welcome Tour, the price tag has forced certain expectations. Now, with that being said, let’s talk about the game. Because as a game, Mario Kart World is awesome. It’s the most fun I've ever had with a Mario Kart game. But as a product, it leaves me underwhelmed and upset.

Here’s the thing, I love Mario Kart. We all do. In fact, I’m willing to bet that I love Mario Kart more than most do. Mario Kart Wii was the first game I ever owned, and I’ve played all of the games in the series except for DS. But Mario Kart has never risen above “really, really fun”. Like, I’ve never played a Mario Kart game that blows my socks off. They’re always a blast but they’re not games that break the mold and are truly exceptional. Mario Kart 8 got close, however. That game was amazing, and it became the fifth best selling game of all time. But it was almost too good. Mario Kart 8 was the peak of Mario Kart track design and gameplay, and it was seemingly impossible to top it. So for a Mario Kart game to be a truly exceptional experience and a follow up to the greatness of Mario Kart 8, this new one needed to innovate and become something different. Not something bigger, but something new that pushes the series to new heights and defies what it means to be a Mario Kart game. Those are some big shoes to fill, but I think that Mario Kart World did it.

Mario Kart World has 32 tracks (technically 30) that are all connected together as a part of a cohesive world. You can drive from one track to another. In fact, nothing is stopping you from doing a giant 32-track marathon across the entire world other than intermissions to tally up the score. You’ve got to drive from track to track, and the segments in between tracks are basically tracks of their own. This setup, to me, is exactly what the series needed. You can’t top Mario Kart 8 when it comes to traditional 3-lap tracks, so they did something completely different to top it in other ways. And while I understand that interconnected racing games are nothing new, Mario Kart adapts that concept into something that anyone can play and greatly enjoy. Heck, I'm gonna play this game with my 8 year old cousin in a couple days! It’s not just the concept, either. It’s the execution. It adds so much variety to races and creates a sense of place for every track. It’s not just a gimmick, nor is it a marketing ploy. This is a genuine innovation of the series that somehow manages to push it so far without feeling like it loses the fun and identity of Mario Kart.

You can also just drive around randomly in free roam, and this is so much fun. Recently, when I’ve been getting sleepy or bored, I just pop in Mario Kart World and go on relaxing drives. It’s just so… nice, you know? It doesn’t appeal to everyone, but if you think it'll appeal to you, it probably will. Seeing something neat in the distance and going to it just because you can is such a nice way to kill time and relax. And there are loads of collectibles and secrets, so you might find something cool along the way! The world is quite big, so you’ve got plenty of places to explore. Be sure to take in the scenery, because the game is gorgeous. It uses a cartoon-y style inspired by 2D animation like from Super Mario Bros. Wonder, but it does that without sacrificing the beautiful visuals that you’d expect to find in an interconnected racer.

On top of all of that, races are just flat out fun. There’s obviously the good controls and sense of speed, but it excels in other ways, too. 24 racers makes a huge difference, especially online. And the items this time around are amazing! This is the perfect item selection. Every item is satisfying to use, minus the coin but that was an inevitability. These factors add up to create some of the most chaotic races in Mario Kart history. Coins littered all over the track, explosions every time you blink, shells flying at mach speed, racers bumping into each other, it’s insane. But crucially, it’s never too much to handle like it was in Wii. And while it can feel unfair sometimes, it’s only as unfair as all of the other Mario Kart games. In fact, it may be less unfair, as there’s tons of skill to employ here thanks to the greatly expanded moveset. You can jump, grind on rails, drive on walls, and even do multiple tricks at once to position yourself just right. These new moves are at their best when you chain them together in rapid succession, kinda like Sonic. The tracks feel designed around the new move set, too. There’s always cool tricks to pull off. I feared that the new complexity may overwhelm new players, as it can be quite tricky, even to experienced ones. But luckily, it's never a requirement during normal races. You don’t have to use any of these moves if you don’t want to, they’re just more options that raise the skill ceiling for those who like that stuff.

And did I mention how amazing the roster of tracks is this time? This is probably tied with 8 Deluxe for me in terms of its track selection and I do NOT say that lightly. Mario Kart World only has 32 tracks, 2 of them being in the same map location with the same name. But trust me, nearly all of them are amazing. Outside of Mario Circuit and Peach Stadium, I love every track in this game. Boo Cinema, Crown City, Bowser’s Castle, Toad’s Factory, Salty Salty Speedway, Peach Beach, Cheep Cheep Falls, Starview Peak, even Sky-High Sundae, which was my least favorite track from Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. This game has the highest ratio of good to bad tracks in the series for me. It also brought back the stupidly long Rainbow Road, but it’s actually really good this time! Dare I say, it might be the best Rainbow Road in the series. I’m planning on doing a full track ranking for this game, but it’ll probably just be 32 entries of me talking about how amazing these tracks are.

But there’s more, because there are lots of different ways to enjoy the game. Versus mode, grand prix, and time trials are just as good as always. Battle Mode is solid here, and it brought back the elimination-style balloon battle that has been sorely missed by me and many others. Free Roam is great, as I already talked about. But the real star of the show for me is Knockout Tour, which is a battle royale style mode where you do a continuous 6-track race with no breaks. At the end of each track, the players in the last four places are eliminated until there’s only one winner. This mode is phenomenal, I can’t describe how much fun I’ve had with it. I haven’t won yet, but I’ve made it to the final four multiple times and even got second place twice. And I have a feeling that once I do win, I’ll still play this mode frequently thanks to how replayable and plain fun it is. It’s an absolute blast. I usually play this mode online, and I’ve had zero issues online with this game. Not one. No lag spikes, no disconnects. It’s worked perfectly for me despite how chaotic it is. But the game is great with couch co-op, too! I played it the other night with my friend. We did a 32-track mega marathon across the entire world, and it was indescribably enjoyable. The chaos of the game makes it a beautifully savage and cutthroat time with friends. And this is all without mentioning the expressive models and animations for the wackiest roster of racers the series has ever seen, or the fact that the soundtrack is one of the greatest in not just Mario Kart history, but Nintendo History.

Everything I’ve talked about combines together to create one of, if not the best Mario Kart ever. It’s that good. And you’ve got it alongside Mario Kart 8 on Switch 2! You’ve got 8 for traditional 3-lap races and variety, but you’ve also got World for its interconnected tracks and delicious chaos.

Now. All of that is great. But we once again circle back to the issue of pricing. No matter how good this game is, 80 USD is frankly disgusting. I do believe that this game offers 80 USD of value, but there are still plenty of other games - heck, NINTENDO games that are far more deserving of a price tag that high. You’re telling me that Mario Kart World is 80 USD but Breath of the Wild and Cyberpunk are 70 USD? It’s not about whether this game has 80 USD of value, it’s about the precedent it sets. Because shortly after the pricing of this game was revealed, other companies followed suit. I do not believe that this game offers more value than other games priced at 70 USD, but it was priced this way because they knew they could get away with it. And now, gaming is more expensive than ever.

Hi! Editing Exi here. Again… I completely forgot to mention that politics may have played a big role in this game’s pricing. I personally do not buy this. I hate the current state of politics and the economy, and I am far from supportive of the current people in charge of it. But I don’t think that was why they priced this game the way they did. I believe that they saw the success of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe and knew that people would buy the new one because it’s Mario Kart. I do not want to get into the weeds of it, but I wanted to bring up my thoughts on the issue. Anyways, I’m going to sleep now. Lots of love from Editing Exi… I’m so, so tired… Where's my melatonin…

The high price tag also causes me to be more critical about minor elements of the game that I wouldn’t have even mentioned if it weren’t for it. If I pay 80 USD for a game, I expect it to be a polished one. And for the most part, it is pretty polished. But there are many small issues that make me question how they could possibly miss it after 8 years of development. These issues include but are not limited to:

- The lack of an ability to stack character costumes, which is so unbelievably stupid.
- There is no easy method to track the P-switches or Peach Medallions you have collected or how many you have left to find.
- There are very notable gaps in the character roster. Specifically Diddy Kong and the main man Funky Kong. We got Cheep Cheep before Diddy Kong.
- No method to listen to music of your choice. It’s called the Jukebox! Why is there no actual jukebox where I can choose the music I want to listen to during free roam? That would be an amazing feature for a game with a soundtrack as large as this.
- Certain characters have way more costumes than others. When combined with the lack of stacking, it makes characters like Mario and Luigi take up way more of the character select screen than they need to.
- Only 8 rallies for Knockout Tour? I mean, they can’t take that much development time, can they?
- No 200cc, which isn’t horrible since 150cc is pretty fast in this game, but still.
- Mario Circuit’s existence.
- The lightning bolt has a terrible animation that shocks me not just in the game, but in real life. The lightning bolt has always been a sort of jumpscare, but it’s at its worst here.
- Speaking of lightning, the thundercloud would have been the perfect item to include in this game because of the large number of racers all clumped together. How did we get the coin block but not the thundercloud? This is more of a nitpick, though.
- Peach Stadium and Crown City have two paths that are treated as different tracks. This isn’t the end of the world as they’re very distinct, especially in Crown City’s case. But when it comes to Peach Stadium, they just ran out of time or got lazy, I’m sorry.
- Many portions of the in-between tracks feel empty, like you’re just going in a straight line with nothing else happening. It’s not too bad in 150cc, but it makes 50cc and 100cc basically unplayable for me.
- The retro track selection is odd. Not bad at all, but odd. Moo Moo Meadows, Desert Hills, and Choco Mountain are not tracks that I would have picked. And you’re only gonna include one track from 8, but you choose Sky-High Sundae? I like it a lot in this game, but there are so many other tracks that would have fit the interconnected world significantly better, such as Thwomp Ruins or Mount Wario. I would have killed to see Toad Harbor in this game!

Again: these aren’t issues that hurt the game significantly, but this is an 80 USD game that was in development for 8 years. They shouldn’t be issues at all, full stop. I want someone from Nintendo to look me in the eyes and explain to me why you can’t stack costumes because that is an objectively bad decision. That’s not an opinion, that is an objective fact. It’s the same nonsense from Tears of the Kingdom and Echoes of Wisdom. Everyone hated it there and they hate it here, too.

But while I’m not defending Nintendo, I do want to bring up my opinion that some of the criticisms toward the game are quite overblown. Every game will have its haters, but calling this an unplayable trainwreck is just silly. I don’t like this game as a product, but I love it as a game. And while my opinion isn’t fact, it does kind of frustrate me seeing so many unfair criticisms toward the game. The game itself is good. Great, I'd say. Even when you consider the price tag, I believe that this is a great game. An overpriced one, yes. But a great game nonetheless. And the biggest complaint I’ve seen towards the game’s design is also the one I disagree with the most. It’s kind of like the Welcome Tour for me, as I believe it is misunderstood. So I’ll say it how it is: This is not an open world game. I will say it again: THIS IS NOT AN OPEN WORLD GAME. Doesn’t matter if the developers say it is, because it isn’t. It is a normal Mario Kart game with interconnected tracks. It’s not an open world, it’s an interconnected world. Just because you can go anywhere in free roam, doesn’t make it open world. From where I'm standing, it is extremely unfair to judge this game like you would for Breath of the Wild or Grand Theft Auto because it was never designed to be an open world game. It has open world elements, for sure. And I won’t deny that they could have done a lot more with the world, at the very least adding some NPC’s to talk to and get sidequests from. But what many people fail to realize is that the free roam mode is not the main attraction. It’s a side mode focused on relaxed exploration. The main attraction is normal races, which are linear competitions to see who can get from point A to point B first. BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT A RACE IS. The interconnected world creates variety in normal races, NOT openness. The races are still as linear as ever. There are many fair criticisms to make towards this game. Some of which I agree with and some of which I don’t. That’s fine, I like hearing opinions I disagree with. But I draw the line at unfair criticisms. Although I guess this is what you get when you price a game at 80 USD…

Mario Kart World is a complicated game to talk about, because if it was 60 or 70 USD, I have no doubt that it would be universally beloved in the same way that Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is. But the pricing has ensured that it will not happen, at least not for a while. This is a quality game that I’d recommend to literally anyone buying a Switch 2. I love this game, I really do. But I’m not gonna wear rose-tinted glasses here. The price is horrible. I firmly believe that Nintendo got greedy and raised the price of the game because they could. No other reason. And because of this decision, they have severely hurt the talk around their otherwise very strong launch.

Conclusion

Well that was a lot. I talked about pretty much everything I could, and I hope that I’ve helped inform your purchasing decisions or provided a new way to view the whole Switch 2 situation. I do believe that this is a good console that can stand up as a genuine competitor to the rest of the industry, regardless of the controversy.

If you are on the fence about buying the Switch 2, this is what I’d say to you: If there isn’t a Switch 2 game you really want yet, pass until they become more readily available. The Switch 2 is an upgrade, yes. But it’s not enough of an upgrade to warrant a purchase if you aren’t planning on playing Mario Kart World. It’s the Switch 1 but better, although the Switch 1 is still usable and powerful enough to run many great games. Hold off on the Switch 2 until you either need a new Switch or until a game comes out that you really want.

And if you aren’t in a financial situation to purchase it, I wouldn’t even consider it. Your Switch 1 will do just fine, and who knows? Maybe things will get better for you or for game pricing over time. To finish off this rant, I’ll leave you with a very wise quote from a very wise kong:



Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

Boo, update time.

Exi Update - May 28th, 2025

General Health and Wellbeing - School gets out in one week... which is coincidentally the day the Switch 2 comes out! It's pretty hard to focus on life stuff when you're this excited about something, but I'm really trying. I've been playing a lot of Hollow Knight and Persona 4, those are always a fun time. Other than that, not much has changed since last update.

Blog Updates - I've been gone for a while, but I have not stopped writing for this blog, far from it. I've been working on many projects at once. In particular, I've been working on a post that isn't a review at all: creating a "Nintendo Legacy Collection" that would represent Nintendo's entire history! I've had a ton of fun with it so far, and it's given me an excuse to explore the libraries of some systems that I'm not particularly knowledgeable about. I've also learned some cool trivia. For example, did you know that the original NES bundle didn't have any games that primarily used an NES controller? Did you know that Nintendogs was originally supposed to have 15 versions? Did you know that the 64DD exists? I've had a great time writing this, and I'm so excited to share it with you.

Kirby Retrospective - The Kirby Super Star review has proven to be quite the project. There is a LOT to cover here, way more than I was ever expecting. But I'm still making good progress. Also, I made a mistake when writing the Kirby's Adventure review. I should have covered the remake. My original plan was to do a "remake review" post where I reviewed all of the Kirby remakes, but that didn't pan out, as some Kirby remakes are way more in depth than others. I don't think that covering every remake at once is feasible. But I also can't make them their own reviews, as I'm not sure how much I'd have to say about some of them. To fix this, I'll be editing the Kirby's Adventure review to account for the remake. I'm not sure exactly how that will pan out, but I'm testing some different approaches behind the scenes.

Mario Kart Track Ranking - I've realized that I made a mistake with the Mario Kart track ranking. And that mistake was doing them when I did them. I have so much to say about later Mario Karts, but the old ones are harder to write about because of how simple they are. And with my skill level at the time, I wasn't ready. I barely had anything to say about any track. When most of the ranking is just the name and placement of each track, something is wrong. So here's what we'll be doing. Consider the previous Mario Kart track rankings the "old" versions. I'll be doing it one more time, and this time, I'm doing it right. I'll be saying more about every track and actually take the time to analyze them. In addition, I won't be 100%ing the Grand Prix mode this time. Doing it last time was incredibly frustrating and I think it drained a lot of the passion I had for the track ranking. I'll keep the old ones up, but I'll be adding a disclaimer to them.

Future Retrospectives - Full series retrospectives are what I enjoy doing the most on this blog. And I'd love to start a Zelda retrospective, but I've made a new rule for myself: I may only have two retrospectives going at once. I will start the Zelda retrospective after I finish the either the Sonic or Kirby retrospectives.

Another Idea (includes some more serious and personal junk) - I'm considering reviewing the Danganronpa series. It is a series that I have a strong disdain for. I've had some bad experiences with it in my personal life, despite the fact that my chosen last name is literally Komaeda (who is a character in the second game). I hate a lot of games critically, but Danganronpa is a game I hate on a personal and emotional level. I want some closure with this series. I want to lay out in no uncertain terms why I hate these games so that I can fully cope with the damage it has caused me. However, I don't know if that belongs on this blog. I want this blog to be about reviewing and analyzing games, and a more personal project like this may not fit. I haven't decided yet if they will be posted here. If they are, they will be done in a much different format than normal with a more serious tone. Let me know your thoughts if you have any opinions on the subject!

That's it for now, I hope to see you soon!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

It's been about a month since the last update, so we're overdue for one. Let's get into it!

Exi Update - May 6th, 2025

General Health and Wellbeing - When I posted my last update, I was feeling pretty horrible. But I'm happy to say that I'm feeling better. Not amazing, but better. The changing seasons and warm weather are very helpful, and school is winding down. Plus, I got my reservation for a Switch 2 midnight release, so I've got loads to look forward to.

Blog Updates and Kirby Retrospective - I'm feeling great about the state of this blog. I've been writing and posting a lot more consistently, and I'm happy with the work I've been putting out. The Kirby Retrospective has been absolutely massive for me because they're reviews that don't require a ton from me like the SA2 review does, for example. A major problem with this blog has been my lack of confidence to write about something when it doesn't have a set structure. Like, the Sonic reviews have a structure where I review each level individually. But I don't know, something about these Kirby games make them a lot more approachable to write about. I have had little to no issue with the less structured format of the Kirby retrospective, and it has really increased my confidence in other sectors of this blog. Plus, I'm just happy with them in general. The Kirby's Adventure review is probably the proudest I've been of a review on this blog. I felt like I covered basically every element of the game that I could have, and I did it with confidence. So yeah, it's looking up. I feel like I'm finally out of the drought.

Classic Mega Man Ranking - I'm making steady progress on this ranking. It's quite hard to write because of how similar a lot of these games are, but I've been consistently writing before bed or something. It's got a ways to go, but I think that it's shaping up very well. Plus, I commissioned one of my friends to draw a little doodle for it. We've been working for the past couple months to come up with a slight design change for the character in my profile picture, and I think some art will be great for adding that extra flavor to my reviews. We've got lots of plans for other doodles!

Sonic Retrospective - We're making good progress here. I've officially got full notes for every level written, and now I've just got to write the Dark Story level analysis. It'll be done eventually...

Physical Health Update (Spoilered as it is a personal trigger of mine) - I'm gonna keep this one brief, because wrists are a very bad trigger for me. But typing so much for school and this blog has caused my wrists some pain. I'm slowing down on writing in the near future until they feel better. That's why the Season 1 reflection has been taking so long.

That's about all. Just wanted to give a brief update. The Season 1 Reflection will be out within a week, hopefully. Thanks for reading, and I'll see you soon!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

Kirby Retrospective Part 3: Kirby's Dream Land 2 - KBR3

Hi! Exi here. Last time on the Kirby Retrospective, we talked about Kirby’s Adventure. It was definitely not my favorite Kirby game, and I found it to be somewhat unpolished and forgettable. I know that a lot of people really love Kirby’s Adventure, I am just not one of those people. But nobody can deny that Kirby’s Adventure did one thing really well, and that was lay the groundwork for the Kirby formula to expand. The Kirby formula and the new copy abilities are concepts that you can truly do so much with. Like it or not, Adventure proved that Kirby could be so much more than what it was on Game Boy. So naturally, I was very excited to play the next game, Kirby’s Dream Land 2. But to be honest, while it is an improvement, this game fell short in some key areas. In many ways, it’s better and worse than Adventure. I’ll try to explain why I think that and hopefully you’ll see where I’m coming from.


- Praise be to Wikirby for their info and images! Thank you!

Normally, this is where I’d talk about this game’s development history… but there is none. Seriously, I couldn’t find anything about this game’s development. Not even Wikirby helped this time. The only tidbit of info that is worth mentioning is that Masahiro Sakurai didn’t work on this game. I think that might be somewhat indicative of how noteworthy this game is, however.

All is not well on Popstar! Seven of the Rainbow Bridges that connect the Rainbow Islands have been stolen by Dark Matter, who plans to turn the Rainbow Islands into a dark world. He has possessed King Dedede to bring his plan to fruition. So it’s up to Kirby to defeat his henchmen to take back the Rainbow Islands and find the seven Rainbow Drops to create the Rainbow Sword to defeat Dark Matter and restore the Rainbow Bridges! Basically, get the MacGuffins, defeat Dark Matter. Fun fact: I said “rainbow” seven times in that explanation.


- The final boss, Dark Matter. He's really cool! But in-universe, he actually is one of Zero's minions. We'll be fighting Zero in Kirby's Dream Land 3!

Let’s go straight into the biggest discussion point, because it’s one that looms over the entire game: This game is more or less Kirby’s Adventure but on Game Boy. It makes some very smart changes to the copy abilities (which we’ll touch on later), but it’s not enough to truly make this its own thing. Everything about this game - from the plot to the gameplay to the music - screams Kirby’s Adventure. Is that a good or a bad thing? Well, that depends on who you ask. It’s a good thing because it allows for it to be a solid, comfortable game just like Adventure was, now with some enhancements. When you just do what came before, it will maintain a very similar level of quality, and it’s easy for anyone to play because they know what to expect. But it’s also a bad thing because of the fatigue for both the developer and the player. I don’t want to just play the same game over and over again, and I’m sure you don’t either. It takes away a lot of the individuality of not only this game, but Kirby’s Adventure as well.

Now, this is not a trait exclusive to Kirby. Mega Man, Mario, Call of Duty, Pokemon, Zelda, Assassin’s Creed, basically every sports series, this is not a new discussion. And it’s not an inherently bad thing. In fact, repetition is a big part of why I love Mega Man and Pokemon. It can be a great asset. But there’s a huge issue here. Kirby’s Adventure was not a perfect game by any means, but it was a perfect foundation for future games to build off of. But this game didn’t really build on that foundation at all. It’s just Kirby’s Adventure again, so it once again feels like a foundation as opposed to a truly realized game.


- The first level of the game. It's exactly what you expected.

Here’s an analogy: Kirby’s Adventure is like a simple vanilla cake baked by a beginner baker. It’s got everything you’d expect. You know, some vanilla frosting, multiple layers, it’s an alright cake, but it’s nothing special. They could have done a lot more. So obviously, their next cake will be even better. Maybe some decorations, or some fruit! This cake would go great with some fruit to add that extra flavor. But the next day, they hand you their second cake, and it’s just the same cake, now with whipped cream. The whipped cream makes it better, but at the end of the day, they still could have done a lot more. That second cake is Kirby’s Dream Land 2. It’s a better game, but it doesn’t feel like a substantial step up in quality, despite the fact that the previous game was the perfect foundation to build off of.

Let’s talk about the one aspect that this game actually improved on, and that is the copy abilities. In case you haven’t read my Kirby’s Adventure review, here’s a recap: That game handled copy abilities very poorly. It had 25 copy abilities, the third most in series history. But it was quantity over quality. Many of them felt like repeats of others, and many others were just flat out useless. You could remove over half of the copy abilities from that game and it wouldn’t make a big difference. And luckily, Dream Land 2 did exactly that. This game only has 8 copy abilities, and they all have their uses. I found myself using all of them quite frequently. The only ones that I’d argue are kind of pointless are Needle and Spark. Those are two abilities that fill similar niches. I think you could remove one of them and replace it with Beam or Laser to give the player an extra ranged option. But regardless, it’s still a balanced list that has an option for every occasion.

So that alone is an improvement, but it’s made even better by the headlining new feature, the Animal Friends! When you defeat a mini-boss, you’re rewarded with one of three Animal Friends. Rick the Hamster is for land travel, Coo the Owl is for sky travel, and Kine the Fish is for sea travel. Simple enough. But what makes these guys special is how they affect copy abilities. Each copy ability has a different effect when paired with any given Animal Friend. For example, Spark usually gives you a shield that defeats nearby enemies. But if you have Spark while riding Kine, it gives him the ability to shoot light bulbs for ranged damage (they also light up dark rooms!). And that same copy ability does different things while riding the other animal friends, as well. So although there are only 8 abilities… if you want to be more precise, there are technically 32 abilities! Now, not all of them are winners. Some of them are very similar. In fact, there are 11 that act as shields. They’re still not perfect by any stretch, but they do shake up gameplay in a meaningful way, and it encourages the player to try every combination. I know I did.


- Kine with Needle. Yes, this is real.

My only real issue regarding the Animal Friends is that outside of Copy Abilities, they don’t really do much. Coo flies a little faster and Kine gives you more control underwater, but they don’t offer anything else. In fact, one could argue they make movement worse because of their increased hitboxes. Especially Rick, who doesn’t do anything new without a copy ability outside of better control on ice, which is very situational. To be honest, when I'm not using a copy ability, I sometimes prefer to leave the Animal Friends behind. That’s a somewhat minor nitpick, but I do think that they could have done a little bit more to give the Animal Friends more worth.

On a related note, copy abilities have a huge drawback in this game, and that’s the start-lag and end-lag. Nearly every single ability can’t be used instantaneously. When you click the B-button to use your copy ability, there’s a short period of time where it has you stop moving. And in most cases, you can’t start moving again until the copy ability finishes its attack. And this also applies to the Animal Friends as well. While that might not seem like a big deal, I assure you that it is. I cannot tell you the amount of times where I try to activate my copy ability, but it takes too long to activate so I get hit. And as a reminder, this is a Game Boy game. The screen is really small, so there will be plenty of moments where you can’t see what’s ahead of you. But surprise! It’s an enemy that you don’t have time to react to because the lag makes split-second decisions way harder. So while I do think that the copy abilities have seen a substantial upgrade from Adventure, they’re still not amazing. They feel sluggish and unintuitive to use.

So let’s move on and talk about the level design. And I'm gonna keep this short because there isn’t too much to talk about. For the most part, the levels feel like condensed versions of the ones found in Adventure. Slightly shorter and simpler, but that’s to be expected from a Game Boy game. And much like Adventure’s levels, they’re kind of forgettable. There’s not a single level that sticks out to me. They really are just Kirby levels. The only notable change is that there are more water levels than usual to give Kine something to do. That’s kind of a small change, but what else am I going to talk about? The levels are exactly what you expect, and that means they’re nothing special. Moving on.

The bosses this time around are very similar to the ones in Adventure, as with everything else in this game. They’re very easy to take down with copy abilities. Some of them can be defeated in less than 30 seconds, that’s how simple they are. This is a prime example of something that could have and should have been improved from Adventure. The bosses in that game didn’t change at all with the introduction of copy abilities. They felt like Dream Land 1 bosses that were now less interesting because you can defeat them by spamming one attack. They felt stuck in the past. And that was annoying in Adventure, but it’s even more annoying here. There’s not really a good reason that the bosses needed to remain unchanged in this game. The final boss is good, but it feels like a worse version of Nightmare from Adventure to me. Not all too noteworthy, other than the fact that the final boss is Dark Matter, who is a character that would go on to be a recurring character in early Kirby! I think that’s pretty neat.


- Whispy Woods, who apparently caught the flu since the last game. I hope he gets well soon.

The music is definitely Pre-2010’s Kirby music, and that means I don’t like it very much. I don’t want to get too hung up on that point because it’s very subjective. So allow me to say my new catchphrase: “It’s not my thing, but many people love it and that’s all that matters.” As for the graphics, it’s very much what you’d expect. However, Kirby’s Dream Land 2 has Super Game Boy support! It can play on an SNES with extra color and it looks great. Even on an original Game Boy, this game looks quite good. The sprite work is rock solid, and they clearly put a lot of effort into the Animal Friends, as their sprites and animations are extremely expressive (especially Kine). Actually, this game as a whole is very impressive on Game Boy. 31 stages, lots of animations for the Animal Friends, a big soundtrack, even some collectables that lead to different endings! Speaking of which…

This game has seven Rainbow Drops that are hidden throughout the game. Collecting them all rewards you with the true final boss and ending. And I'm just gonna say it, I hate the Rainbow Drops. They’re horrible. Kirby games are supposed to be easy to pick up and beat, right? Well I guarantee you that no average gamer is going to be able to find some of the Rainbow Drops. In fact, if I didn’t have a guide, I would absolutely never have found them all. They are hard to find and even harder to collect. The one in World 6 is downright diabolical, to be specific. And it would be fine if it unlocked a hard mode or an extra cutscene, but no! You have to get all of them to fight the final boss. The game doesn’t even tell you that you should be looking for them. You have to go to the instruction manual for that, which isn’t always something that people have access to, especially these days.


- King Dedede was actually possessed by Dark Matter. I've been there, man.

In my opinion, walling off a “true” final boss like this is only acceptable if the “untrue” final boss feels substantial. For example, the final boss of Hollow Knight feels substantial. It feels like an ending. If you don’t get the true ending of Hollow Knight, you still beat Hollow Knight. There just might be a better ending if you find some secrets. To juxtapose this, Kirby’s Dream Land 2 doesn't even have credits in the bad ending because Kirby did not save the day when you didn’t get all the Rainbow Drops. When I first beat this game, I had no idea that I was supposed to be collecting Rainbow Drops. And when I beat King Dedede and realized that I had to collect these awful collectables, I dropped the game entirely. They are way too hard to collect, yet they wall off the final boss in a game that is otherwise really easy. I’m not about to just skip the final boss, but I hate collecting these things. Nobody wins.

And what about the extra content? Well, there’s a boss rush, and there are some cute minigames called “bonus chances” where you get all the stars and avoid all the obstacles… and that’s it.


- Kirby saved the day by collecting the 7 Rainbow Drops, and all it took was his sanity.

I know that I’ve been really harsh to this game. But whether I like it or not, this is a better game than Kirby’s Adventure. It just is, at least in my opinion. The copy abilities are much more creative, mixing-and-matching with the Animal Friends is so much fun, the animations and graphics are great for the system, and it has a lot of improvements over Adventure (such as the lag, the color palette, and the poor copy abilities). If I was forced to play Adventure or Dream Land 2, I’m picking Dream Land 2. But when looking at them critically, I’m more forgiving of Adventure because it was ambitious. It had more of a vision, more love, more of an impact on the Kirby series. So you know what? I prefer Adventure.

This entire review can be summed up with this: Kirby’s Dream Land 2, to me, is a refined version of Adventure. And that means that it’s a solid game but not one that I ever need to replay. Adventure may have been a worse game, but it was also a more important game.

Thanks so much for reading! This is the hardest review I’ve managed to finish, because it’s not easy to pinpoint my thoughts on a game that is so similar to one I’ve already reviewed. But I'll be talking about my thoughts on this review with the Season 1 Reflection! That’ll be out within the next couple days. Then, we’ll start off Season 2 with Kirby Super Star. And spoiler alert, Super Star is one of my favorite games… period! I hope that you’ll stick around to read both the reflection and the Super Star review!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

Kirby Retrospective Part 2: Kirby's Adventure - KBR2

Hi! Exi here. Last time on the Kirby Retrospective, we took a look at Kirby’s Dream Land. It was the definition of short but sweet, just a very simple game to pop in from time to time. It established most of the core Kirby formula, and that was very important. But these days, Kirby’s Dream Land functions best as a game to plow through during an hour-long car ride. It was so short and replayable, why not? So naturally, the question on my mind was this: How does the Kirby formula translate over to a longer, more in-depth game?



Kirby’s Adventure is a fairly ambitious title for its time. It has 33 levels compared to the 4 from Dream Land, eight boss battles, a save feature, three sub-games, and most famously, the introduction of copy abilities! And even more notably, it introduced Paint Roller, who is the second-best Kirby character (only beaten by Magalor). This is an important title, and it was very impressive for the hardware it was on. But that makes it all the more surprising to learn that this game was really only conceived for a quick profit. Yeah, seriously.

Back in the early 1990’s, HAL Laboratory was nearing bankruptcy. Masahiro Sakurai, who created Kirby, had just finished work on Dream Land when the company asked him to make a Kirby game for the NES. They likely envisioned a direct port or upgrade of Dream Land, but Adventure was made instead. The game started development in 1992 and released in 1993. That sounds all fine and good, but you have to consider that the SNES released in 1990 in Japan and 1991 worldwide. They could have released this game for the SNES, which is a far more powerful system. But they kept it to the NES to make sure the game released quickly, as it would take some time to get the employees accustomed to next-gen development. That made Kirby’s Adventure one of the last major games to release on the NES, releasing in 1993 - the same year as Mega Man 6, an infamously late NES game.

A lot more went into this game’s development, and it’s all quite interesting. But I think the most natural way to go about this is to move on with the review and talk about the specifics as they become relevant. To understand this game, it’s important to understand why they made a lot of the changes they did, as many of them became staples of the Kirby series.

Before we start the review proper, I want to make one thing clear: this is far from my favorite Kirby game. I’m not sure if it’s my absolute least favorite, but as of now, it’s probably the mainline Kirby game that I enjoy the least. I haven’t played all of them yet, but I’ve played through this game at least four times by now and I still am not a huge fan. I respect it for the ideas it brought to the series, I do. I just don’t personally have a lot of fun playing through this one. I wanted to tell you that because I know that a lot of people love this game, and that’s great! I respect your opinion, and I ask you to respect mine as well.

As with last time, big thanks to Wikirby for their information and images! Where would we be without Wikirby?

One fine morning, the lovable Kirby woke up from his sleep and realized that he did not have any good dreams. That’s odd for someone who lives in Dream Land. In fact, nobody else in Dream Land slept well, either! So he went to the Fountain of Dreams, which is the kingdom’s source of good dreams. When he arrived at the Fountain of Dreams, he learned that King Dedede is up to his old tricks, as he has stolen the Star Rod from the fountain and broken it up into 7 pieces. It’s now up to Kirby to defeat the king’s henchmen once again and take back the Star Rod to put the “Dream” back in Dream Land. To sum it up: get the macguffins and defeat Dedede. Very standard Kirby plot.


- The Fountain of Dreams, AKA the best Smash Melee stage. Come to think of it, didn't I mention Smash Melee last time?

Control-wise, it’s more of the same from Dream Land. You fly a little slower and Kirby’s sprite is slightly wider, but it’s not too big of a deal. There are three new moves you can do, though! The dash lets you go extra fast by double tapping left or right, the slide gives you a more traditional melee attack, and the water gun gives you a wimpy attack while you’re underwater. These are all small additions, not much to them. They mostly just give you more options to add some extra depth to Kirby’s moveset. But you wanna talk about depth in the moveset? Then we have to mention this game’s biggest innovation and quite possibly the biggest innovation in series history, copy abilities!

When you inhaled an enemy in the last game, you had the option to either spit them back out at other enemies or to swallow them. Swallowing didn’t really do much, all it did was get rid of whatever you inhaled. But in this game, swallowing certain enemies will give Kirby the abilities of whatever he swallowed. For example, swallowing Sir Kibble will give you Cutter, which lets you throw boomerang-like blades at your enemies. There are twenty-four copy abilities, plus a twenty-fifth ability for the final boss fight. They were added in an attempt to satisfy both newbies and veterans, and I think it's an absolutely genius idea that did exactly that.

Copy abilities are very important for multiple reasons, but the biggest one is that they enhance that sense of flexibility we talked about last time. If you recall, flexibility is very important to Kirby’s game design. It allows for any players of any skill level to play how they want to. Some people like their Kirby games to be super easy, some people like them to be super hard. That was a great element of the previous game, but copy abilities make this game ten times more flexible. You aren’t just limited to your basic moveset, you can now test out all sorts of abilities and see which ones you like the most. Or you can just play without them, that’s fine too! Nearly every stage and every enemy can still be beaten without any copy abilities.

This adds so many different playstyles to such a simple game. There are only a couple ways to play Mario but, thanks to copy abilities, there are tons of ways to play Kirby. I personally like melee attacks such as Parasol and Sword, but others may enjoy ranged attacks like Laser and Cutter. And to encourage experimentation, the player can lose their copy ability quite easily. They have to improvise and test out other copy abilities that they might not normally consider using. But crucially, it’s balanced in just the right way so that losing your favorite copy ability is rarely a devastating blow. You will most certainly find that same copy ability in the near future, and certain places in the overworld let you stock up on the rarer ones. But stumbling across your favorite ability is still a great feeling, like you just struck gold! The copy ability system added a whole new layer of depth that redefined Kirby while maintaining the simplistic nature of the series.


- Meta Knight was introduced in this game, and he is one of two enemies that can't be defeated without a copy ability, the other being the final boss, Nightmare.

Now, that’s all great. But it’s not without flaws. Because as much as I love the copy ability system, this game does not handle it that well. The most prevalent issue is that many copy abilities overlap in this game. They feel very similar. You could easily replace some of these, as they fundamentally accomplish the same tasks. They have some minor differences, but at the end of the day, they don’t have much that sets them apart and they feel kinda lazy at times. I decided to do a little experiment by seeing how many of them do the exact same thing, and here are five archetypes that have multiple similar copy abilities:

- Grab (Backdrop and Throw)
- Shield (Freeze, Needle, Spark)
- Melee Weapon (Sword, Parasol, Hammer)
- Elemental Breath (Fire, Ice)
- Screen Wipe (Mike, Crash)

That’s not all, though. There are also some copy abilities that just don’t really accomplish much. Hi-Jump, Light, and UFO are only useful in very specific sections of the game, Throw and Backdrop are pointless in my opinion, Ball, Wheel, and Fireball are fun but not useful enough to justify using, and Sleep is just a joke inclusion (although it is cute). That leaves us with 8 abilities that, in my opinion, contribute to the game in a meaningful way. Those are Beam, Cutter, Laser, Tornado, a shield, a melee weapon, an elemental breath, and a screen wipe. The list of copy abilities is very weak in this game, not helped by the fact that there are way too many of them. The average Kirby game has 10-20 copy abilities, while this game has 25, the third highest number of copy abilities in the series (only beaten by Super Star and Star Allies). It’s very much a quantity over quality situation. The copy ability system was too new to have this many abilities, and many of them feel uninspired or lame. None of this is deal-breaking as it still adds a ton of gameplay variety. But it is still enough to make this potentially my least favorite Kirby game in terms of copy abilities. Overall, copy abilities are a brilliant idea that enhances the game tremendously, but it didn’t reach its true potential in this game.

Let’s talk about levels. There are 33 of them, which is quite a lot. Especially compared to Dream Land, which had a measly 4. These levels are certainly a lot shorter, but they still maintain the essence of that game’s level design, now with copy abilities! Here’s the thing, I didn’t complain about Dream Land’s length all too much because the gameplay was so simple that if it were any longer, it could become tedious. But copy abilities make the larger number of levels in this game a lot more bearable. There’s no one way to play a level because there’s no one way to play Kirby’s Adventure as a whole. That makes these levels very varied and flexible… but it also makes them very basic and repetitive.

See, because of how simple and flexible the Kirby formula is, there aren’t many levels that stand out as better than the others. They all kinda blend in, similarly to the New Super Mario Bros. series. They’re all fun to play through, yes, but none of them stick out in my mind. Don't get me wrong, there are absolutely moments that I remember fondly. But despite that, there are few levels in this series that I can really say are better than the rest. And that applies very heavily to this game. Off the top of my head, the only levels from this game that I remember well are the ones in Butter Building where the level wraps around the building and 7-6, which is an homage to Kirby’s Dream Land. This game is pretty unmemorable, I gotta be honest. Combine that with the lame copy abilities and this game just isn’t all too interesting to play for me.

The boss battles in this game are good as Kirby bosses tend to be, although they aren’t as interesting as Dream Land’s bosses in my opinion. In that game, you had to survive its attacks until it gave you something to spit back at it. But you have Copy Abilities in this game, so the battle mostly revolves around spamming a strong ability until it dies. The bosses in this game don’t seem like they were properly adjusted around the copy abilities. The final boss is great, though! It’s an amazing fight for the NES. The atmosphere is wild and the fight is intense. It kickstarted the trend of insane final bosses in the Kirby series that would eventually lead to the eldritch horror that is Soul of Sectonia from Triple Deluxe. So yeah, good fight.


- Paint Roller is one of the greatest things that humanity is responsible for. He is adorable and he is my friend and I love him.

One important detail in this game is the screen size. The screen of the Game Boy was 160 x 144 pixels, while the NES’s is 256 x 240, and it’s being displayed on a TV, not the Game Boy screen that's the size of a crumb. Masahiro Sakurai worried that this would allow the player to just fly over everything (he almost removed flight altogether). So the information panel that displays your health and current copy ability was expanded to fill up a lot more of the screen, limiting vertical mobility. I think this was a good change to make, although I still feel like the sprites are a little too small, and that does make it hard to hit enemies sometimes. One cute little addition is that instead of just telling you the name of your current copy ability, the extra leg room allowed them to add a cute little drawing that represents your current ability or action. That idea would later be expanded into different costumes for Kirby, but the current setup is still adorable. It was a really unique way to make the most of a potentially bad situation.

On a related note… This is an NES game alright. And because of that, it has some truly awful slowdown. I’m not one to care about slowdown in older games because I know that they're trying their best, but this one takes it a bit too far. Certain actions or copy abilities will cause the game to chug pretty badly. In particular, Spark is terrible. I feel like the game is gonna crash whenever I use it. And speaking of Crash, the Crash copy ability does that horrible thing that NES games do where they use bright flashing lights to highlight intense moments. And oh my god, it’s physically painful for me. I have fairly sensitive eyes, and Crash is so bad for me that I always pass it up no matter what. I'm not going to cause myself physical harm to improve my Kirby gameplay.

Also, the color palette. The NES could only display so many colors at once, I get it. You have to have certain colors repeat themselves throughout the game. But… Yellow and orange? When you think about Kirby, I doubt the first colors that come to mind are yellow and orange. This game just doesn’t really look like Kirby to me, but that might just be a me thing. Again, I don’t really hold it against this game because it’s doing everything it can. But I’ve played multiple NES games that are way more colorful than this, which is kind of sad when this game's worlds are all themed around colors.


- An image of 2-1. I can count the number of colors here on two fingers.

Music wise, I’m really… really… REALLY not a fan of this game’s soundtrack. It’s one of my least favorite video game OST’s, although it’s better than Sonic 4: Episode 1 and Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance (but that’s something everyone can say about themselves). I usually play this game with sound off, to be honest. It uses this weird sound font that's just unpleasant to me. However, loads of people love it, so it’s probably a me-thing. Besides, this game does have the iconic “how to draw Kirby” jingle, and that’s some extra points from me.

This would be where I wrap up the review, but we’ve got a couple extra things to talk about. One of my absolute favorite things about Kirby games is all the extra content, and this game is where we can start to see that trend take shape. There are seventeen hidden switches that will unlock secrets on the overworld, and they’re fun to find. Some of them require creative uses of the copy abilities which is always a treat. Although some of them are quite annoying, requiring you to use copy abilities that aren’t found in that level. They can be a chore, but hey, more stuff to do can’t hurt. Speaking of the overworld, this game’s overworld has a bunch of bonus challenges called “sub-games” that provide fun side content and extra lives. This game has three, and they are all playable with only one button. This was done to appeal to new players, and I think it worked out well. They’re all quite fun, especially Egg Catcher. That one’s my favorite but I’m really, really bad at it. To this day, I don’t think I’ve ever managed to beat it. Later Kirby games would add loads of brand-new sub-games, but these ones are really solid distractions that I never pass up.


- Crane Fever, one of the three sub-games in Kirby's Adventure. I may be awful at Egg Catcher, but I clean house at Crane Fever.

Once you finish every level, find every hidden switch and play every sub-game, you’ll get two bonus modes. In Extra Game, you have half of your normal health and have to play the game in one sitting. And in VS. BOSS, you’ll fight all the bosses in a row without healing. These are great additions, and combined with the sheer number of levels, Kirby’s Adventure is a pretty beefy NES game. You can get some playtime out of this, and that’s something you can’t say about a lot of NES games.

So, Kirby’s Adventure. I said it pretty early on in this review, but I think I’ve done enough to explain why this is not my favorite Kirby game. It has some truly incredible ideas, but I just don’t think that it was as focused as it could have been. The copy abilities are lame, the visuals are rough, the music is not my thing at all, the bosses are weaker than usual, the levels are unmemorable, you’ve heard me say all of this. But it’s not horrible. Not in the slightest.

Here’s the thing, if this is my least favorite game in the Kirby series, then that says more about the rest of the series than it does about this game. Because Kirby’s Adventure is still quality! The character designs are great, the controls and gameplay are what you’d expect, it pushes the boundaries of its weak console, and it introduced Paint Roller! And copy abilities, but Paint Roller is way cooler! This is a solid time, and I don’t regret playing it. I mean, this is my fourth time playing through this game, I obviously don’t hate it. Just because I don’t personally mesh with this game, doesn’t mean that I despise it. And if this is a low point then I’m beyond excited to see what else we’ve got in store for us.

Thanks for reading! I appreciate you so, so much. Feel free to share your thoughts, comments, or criticisms. I love hearing from people! I’m having a lot of fun writing about Kirby, it’s just such an unassuming and simple series yet it has so much to talk about. The next game I’ll be reviewing for this retrospective is Kirby’s Dream Land 2, and it shouldn’t take too long to make that one. That review will mark the end of Season 1, so I'll be posting a recap of sorts alongside it. I’m also making a lot of progress on the Sonic Adventure 2 review, and I even went ahead and did some work on the Sonic Advance review. I’ve got a lot of projects in the works! I hope that you enjoyed, and I hope that you’ll enjoy the other reviews that I’ve got cooking!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

Wow, that's amazing! I'm so glad that Kirby games are able to reach such a wide audience, they bring gaming to so many people! I hope she likes it!

I also forgot to respond to your prior comment, but the idea to link the reviews is probably more efficient than the codes, especially since the blog has now passed the 25 post mark and is now split across two different pages. I also really appreciate your kind words and advice. Reviewing Kirby games is definitely gonna help my confidence when it comes to writing. And i've actually got the next review in the retrospective finished, it'll get posted... within an hour, I would hope! Again, thank you so much!

P.S. Which Kirby game did she play?

Kirby Retrospective Part 1: Kirby's Dream Land - KBR1

Hi! Exi here. An unexpected problem I've come across with this blog is what to write about. There are so many games that I’ve played that I’d love to write about, but I can’t for one reason or another. What it has boiled down to is that I need more practice with writing. I need to get more practice so that I can be more confident in my skills. And I’ve been looking for a series to write about for a while now. So, the other day, as I was eating bell peppers and drinking coffee at 2 AM, it dawned upon me… Why not Kirby? Kirby is a series that anyone can enjoy in any way. What if I want to enjoy it through writing? So… let’s do it! Let’s start the Kirby retrospective with Kirby’s Dream Land!

Credit goes to Wikirby. The images you see on this blog came from there, and their info helped me write this review. Big thanks!


- The North American box art. Apparently, a misunderstanding led to Kirby being all white overseas.

Kirby’s Dream Land was created by Masahiro Sakurai and developed by HAL Laboratory. It was released on the Game Boy in 1992 and it actually became the 9th best selling game on the Game Boy, selling 5.1 million units! That’s nothing to sneeze at, especially back then. Despite being developed by HAL Laboratory, Kirby’s Dream Land spawned one of Nintendo’s key franchises, getting loads of spinoffs and sequels. It even got a condensed remake with Kirby Super Star’s Spring Breeze mode, and then that got a remake of its own for the Nintendo DS! Kirby’s Dream Land is a pretty important game in Nintendo's catalog. Let’s talk about why that is. Because despite how simple it seems, there is a lot to Kirby.

Let’s start with Kirby’s most basic trait, the one he’s known for. This is rule number one of Kirby, so you better be taking notes: Kirby is for everyone. I know that seems simple but hear me out here.

Back in the 80’s, game developers faced a problem. Games were smaller back then, you could only do so much with them. That led to them being really short. But they were so expensive! Gamers wouldn’t pay top dollar for a game that they would finish in an afternoon. So how would game developers extend their shorter games to an acceptable length? Simple: Make them extremely difficult. Artificially difficult. Games used to be wildly challenging, because if they weren’t… I mean, NES games could only be so big. You’d beat them in an hour. Artificial difficulty was a necessity born out of the limitations of the current technology. But not only did that harm the overall game design, it gatekept hundreds of games to only high-skilled gamers or those with the patience of a zen master. And while there is the occasional person who will preach about how gamers these days are spoiled by easy games or that they need to simply “get good,” it’s a fact: artificial difficulty only makes things worse. And that’s where Kirby comes in.

Kirby was a game designed for anyone and everyone. You’re a pink marshmallow puffball guy who sucks up enemies and spits them out at other enemies. It’s an easy game to understand. But unlike other games at the time, Kirby would be easy to understand and, more importantly, to play. Even a complete beginner who has never picked up a controller in their life could play this game and play it well. That’s because Kirby never asks too much of the player. Other simple games at the time like Super Mario Bros. would often require some tricky platforming. They may have had a low floor, but they also had a high ceiling. Kirby not only had a low floor, it also had a low ceiling. But crucially, it was still engaging enough for experienced players to just have fun with and to play with optional challenges that will raise that ceiling, like the hidden “extra mode” which made the game significantly harder. Add on the cutesy art style and adorable main character, plus the portability of being on the Game Boy and it becomes clear: Kirby was made for everyone, gamers and non-gamers alike. This design principle is core to what makes Kirby the series it is, and it’s even got a name: Kirbyism! Keep all of that in mind as we talk about the game itself.


- The original proposal for Kirby's Dream Land. Or, as it was called at the time, "Popopo of the Spring Breeze". It was pitched to HAL Laboratory, who - at the time - was looking for proposals of games for beginners.

As we already talked about, Kirby’s Dream Land is a simple game. And that also leads to it having a simple plot. On the faraway Planet Popstar resides a kingdom called Dream Land. Its power source is the 5 Sparkling Stars. They have the ability to make food for all of the people in the kingdom! But one day, the nefarious King Dedede descends from his castle and steals all five Sparkling Stars, giving them to his henchmen. Without them, the people of Dream Land will starve! So it’s up to Kirby to defeat King Dedede and take back the Sparkling Stars and to save Dream Land in a quick 30 minute adventure, give or take.

Controlling Kirby is really simple. You can move and jump, but you can also inhale enemies and spit them back out at other enemies. You can also inhale air and float above your enemies as well. That’s about it, but it actually makes for a pretty engaging game! The cool thing about this game is how flexible it is. Wanna suck up as many enemies as you can? Go ahead. Wanna float above the entire stage? You do you, man. Wanna avoid all of the enemies and go as fast as possible? Nothing’s stopping you. Kirby’s Dream Land has lots of different ways to play. But it does so while remaining extremely simple, and that’s something that few other games do as well as Kirby.

Now, this is the only game in the main series to lack copy abilities, and that’s a huge problem. Copy abilities are a huge part of Kirby’s identity. Without it, levels can feel kind of plain. And a big part of it is the enemy variety - Or, to be more precise, the lack of it. Enemies in this game have an issue with how similar they are. Nearly every enemy in the game is defeated in the same way: inhaling them or exhaling another enemy towards them. We talked about how flexible Kirby gameplay is, but there’s not a lot of flexibility with how you defeat enemies as they’re all defeated in the exact same way. Very rarely do you need to learn their patterns to defeat them. Later games would work around this with the copy abilities, allowing for flexibility in how you defeat enemies. But in this game, every enemy is defeated in the same way and that takes away a lot of the flexibility the series has.

Not that any of that matters though because the game is short. Like, we’re talking an hour at most. I decided to play through it a couple times to prepare for this. 3 times, to be specific. And I would bet money that all of those playthroughs took less than 2 hours combined. Why is it so short? Well, there’s only 4 levels and a boss rush. They’re longer levels than something you’d find in an average 2D Mario game, but that doesn’t change the fact that there are only 4 of them.

I would go through them all but I’m not sure how much I could really say. The individual levels aren’t anything special, it’s more about the gameplay. Green Greens is the most iconic Kirby level, and it’s exactly what you expect. It’s kind of just a straight line with some enemies that don’t pose much of a threat. Castle Lololo is a big tower with a lot of doors that can take you on different paths, Float Islands is kind of a mix of the last two levels, Bubbly Clouds is a longer level that requires more floating around, and Mt. Dedede is a boss rush.

The level designs are decent but I wouldn’t call them great. They aren’t anything offensive, but they can be somewhat incoherent at times. Especially Castle Lololo. There are just some paths that lead to nothing. It can be a bit of a nuisance. Some enemies are placed in questionable spots, too. These aren’t the worst issues in the world, not at all. The level designs can just feel a little unnatural at times. There are some secrets in the levels, however. Some hidden doors will lead to healing items and 1-ups, but the game is so easy that I don’t usually need them when I find them. But hey, that’s a me problem. It’s good to have secrets in any platformer. I’m glad they’re here.

Throughout the levels, you’ll find some powerups and special items. Unfortunately, they’re pretty minimal. The mic will clear the screen once, the superspicy curry will allow you to breathe fire for a little bit, the mint leaf is basically the superspicy curry again but float while using it, inhaling the bomb lets you defeat multiple enemies at once, invincible candy is just the invincibility star from Mario. They’re nothing special. That’s also highlighted by the fact that you almost never find them. In such a short game, you’re only going to find each of them once… maybe twice. And even when you do, they aren’t utilized very well. Especially the bomb and mic. The Game Boy screen is really small, so there are not a lot of instances where I really need to defeat multiple enemies at once.


- The first boss of the game, Whispy Woods. He's my favorite boss in this game and my least favorite stage hazard in Super Smash Bros. Melee!

Every level ends with a boss, and the bosses are actually one of my favorite parts of this game and the Kirby series as a whole. Basically every enemy is defeated the same way, so having a fight where you have to adapt to patterns is a lot of fun. Whispy Woods is very simple but very effective. Stumbling across this guy for the first time as a kid was a great experience. You’re used to fighting the same dinky enemies, but the game throws a giant tree with a face at you really early in the game. It’s pretty cool. Lololo and Lalala ramp the difficulty up, requiring some fast movement from the player. Kabula is a gimmicky shoot ‘em up boss, which is oddly a common theme across the series. But it’s a fun fight! The player needs to pay attention to where Kirby is compared to the boss, since its attack patterns can be unpredictable and tough to dodge otherwise. Kracko is a pretty tough fight that requires the player to adapt to its pattern and dodge some fast attacks. It’s a great test of skill before the finale, where you’ll have to face King Dedede. And he’s a final test of everything you’ve learned, requiring you to learn patterns, dodge quick attacks, and adapt to unpredictability.

The bosses in this game are very simple but very effective when it comes to testing the abilities of the player, and they ramp up the difficulty in a very natural way. But if they want more difficulty, turn to the extra game! It’s a much harder version of the main game. Enemies deal twice as much damage and have tougher and faster attacks. I tried out the extra mode, and I gotta be honest, it’s not for me. I mostly play Kirby games to have a simple fun time, and that doubly applies to this game where you have no copy abilities at all. I personally don’t see much of a reason to play the extra game, so I passed this time. But it’ll give seasoned players a good challenge, that’s for sure. And if that’s not enough, you can adjust how much health and lives you have after beating the extra game. Meaning the absolute hardest difficulty setting is a no-hit challenge on hard mode. If you really find yourself wanting a challenge, this game offers it. That’s the whole flexibility thing we talked about earlier. You can play the game the way you want to, and if you want to play on demon nightmare hyper impossible negative mode, go ahead. I’ll stick to baby mode, though.

Lastly, presentation. This game's graphics are adorable, as to be expected. The sprite work is really well done, and the small screen actually makes the floaty controls feel better in many ways. It's a good-looking Game Boy title that doesn't suffer from screen crunch at all. And, of course, the music. I have a confession to make... I've never been a huge fan of Kirby music. Or at least older Kirby music. I don't know, something about the style just never clicked with me. I don't have a ton of experience with the newer games, so as this retrospective goes on, my opinions may change. But that's not to say this soundtrack is bad, no, no, no. A lot of Kirby's most iconic tracks originated here! King Dedede's theme, Kirby Dance, Castle Lololo, Mint Leaf // Curry music, and of course, Green Greens! It's a small OST, that's to be expected. But even a non-Kirby fan could recognize a good portion of these tracks. They've been stuck in the heads of countless players for years and I'm sure they're stuck in yours as well.

And that’s Kirby’s Dream Land! It’s a very simple game, I know. But I got over a dozen paragraphs out of this game! That’s thrice as many paragraphs as levels in the game. I hope that I've shown that even the simplest and most unassuming games can have a lot of intricacies that make them tick. And I think it was very important to go over as many as I could, as I spent a lot of this review setting the stage for future Kirby reviews. This is a very interesting series to talk about, and I think that reviewing these games will improve my own confidence and hopefully give you some insight on the intricacies of the Kirby series. We’ll be talking about Kirby’s Adventure next. I hope to see you again real soon!

Lots of Love,
Exi Komaeda

I'm glad that the code system works for you. Also, I'm not quite sure if I'm gonna review Deltarune anytime soon. For one, it's not finished yet. And two, I'd like to improve my writing a bit more before I tackle a game I'm so passionate about. I'm down to review it but not yet. But my opinions so far are that chapter 1 is amazing with worse gameplay and chapter 2 has high highs but low lows (the ending is amazing but man... the DJ segment dragged on for years). But I love them both and if the game keeps up this quality to the end, it'll be a 10/10 for me, no questions asked.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you'll enjoy the projects I've got coming up!