Super Mario Sunshine
Does Mario’s new adventure shine, or come down with a case of the squirts?
Tags: Super Mario Sunshine Categories: Game Cube Reviews, Reviews
Posted by Jake McNeill on Jul 30th, 2003
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Super Mario Sunshine (title page) | |||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| Action | No | ||
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Time and again throughout the history of videogames, seemingly every Mario games has been touted as “The Best Videogame of All Time” upon release. Each game arguably as close to perfect as humanly possible. These are accolades Super Mario Sunshine will never receive. Although it certainly still ranks among the best of the best, it doesn’t live up to the series’ reputation.
Let me take a moment to say that Super Mario Sunshine is a wonderful game- certainly worthy of purchase, and one of the best games to come out this year. Whatever problems I may have with it, it’s impossible to ignore- Super Mario Sunshine is very fun and very addictive. It’s probably better than ninety percent of its competition, which certainly says a lot. It just so happens the other ten percent is comprised largely of its predecessors, which also says a lot.
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Super Mario Sunshine’s story is nothing out of the ordinary for a Mario game. It’s simple, it’s effective, and I commend it for at the very least not STARTING with a quest for Mario to save the princess. Mario, Princess, and their entourage have decided to take a vacation to the tropical resort island of Delfino. Of course, as with any vacation Mario tries to make, things start off with disaster.
It seems a Mario impostor has been wreaking havoc all over the island- spraying graffiti, spreading gigantic masses of paint-like goop, and unleashing dangerous creatures upon the populace. Worse yet, he’s frightened off the “Shine Sprites” (Mario Sunshine’s equivalent of Mario 64’s stars), whose absence is blanketing the land in darkness. Seeing Mario, the islanders immediately decide he’s guilty until proven innocent, and Mario is sentenced to spend the rest of his days in a jail cell. The end.
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… OK, maybe not. Being that that would make for a pretty short game, Mario is soon released under the condition that he clean all the paint and graffiti polluting the island. Conveniently, Mario has in his possession a keen little invention called the FLUDD, a high-velocity water cannon that doubles as a water-powered jetpack. Using this keen device, Mario must single-handedly cleanse the island of the paint-like goop, return the Shine Sprites, and discover the identity of the impostor.
The game plays basically like a slightly tweaked Super Mario 64. The game is comprised of areas of the island connected together in a central hub, Delfino Plaza. All of Mario’s moves from Super Mario 64, save for punches and kicks, are back in this one (Along with a few others). In addition, the FLUDD adds an extra element to the gameplay, and Mario is required to use it in some way seemingly all the time. Very seldom do you jump on enemies to defeat them in this game- now you spray them with water. Platform hopping look a bit tricky? The jetpack takes off the edge. More often than not, it helps enhance the gameplay, but every now and then you come across a mission where it becomes perfectly clear that despite all of Mario’s platforming skill and experience, he’s basically become a glorified janitor.
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Which brings me to one of the game’s biggest problems- balance. I’m starting to realize what Miyamoto meant when he said the newest Mario game would feature a “More mature” Mario, because every so often I feel like Mario is giving me the finger. “Episodes” (I.E. A trot through a level to obtain a Shine) range from super-easy-can-be-beaten-in-two-minutes easy to toss-your-controller difficult to pull-your-hair-out annoying, and there’s no real rhyme or reason as to which is which. One episode could be really difficult and the next extremely easy. And Shines (Unlike Super Mario 64’s stars) MUST be gotten in order within every area, which kills a lot of the exploration element that made Super Mario 64 such a joy, and can get players stuck in the beginning of one of the areas with no way to advance.
There are also numerous problems in the gameplay itself, not the least of which is the camera system. Super Mario Sunshine’s camera system is arguably WORSE than Super Mario 64’s- you’ll move it somewhere only to have it move right back to where it was, you’ll try and spin it around you and find that it won’t want to go all the way. Sometimes it’ll get trapped behind walls, and at times it won’t even respond at all. If Super Mario 64 was a constant battle with the camera system, in Super Mario Sunshine, it’s a war.
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Other problems stem from the fact that Mario has no recover time. Mario sometimes gets hit by an enemy and flung into a ceiling only to drop back to the ground and get hit by the same enemy again immediately, resulting in a slow, aggravating death. Little things like this spring up throughout the game to make one wonder if the game wasn’t fully playtested.
At times, it can feel like too much, though the generally fun and addictive nature of the game usually wins out in the end. Despite all the problems with the gameplay, Super Mario Sunshine is still a great game- well-designed with plenty of variety, and you always feel compelled to “Get just one more shine”. This game is possibly the most challenging in the series, as well, so series veterans won’t just breeze through the game. Though at times, this high degree of challenge may frustrate the game’s younger players.
Super Mario Sunshine’s graphics are a mixed bag. On the one hand, the water effects are truly stunning, and some of the lighting effects are wonderful, but everything else is disappointingly unimpressive and low-resolution. Mario and some of the main characters have very detailed character models, but the most of the enemies and the islanders look blocky and bland. Early environments go through the standard ho-hum town, grasslands, and port locations- nothing much to look at. But later, other environments like Noki Bay and Sirena Beach really are quite beautiful. All said, there are times when the game truly shines and shows off what the Gamecube can really do, and there are others where it looks almost as bad as an N64 game (Albeit with better framerates).
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The sound doesn’t fare so well. Music ranges from good to annoying. Some music, like Delfino Plaza’s theme, becomes particularly annoying over time, and none of the music is anywhere near as memorable as in previous Mario games. And the sound effects may as well all be directly ported from Super Mario 64. Yeah, that bad.
All said, is Super Mario Sunshine worth the purchase? Definitely. Is it a great game? Absolutely. Will it set the world on fire like just about every Mario game before it? ‘Fraid not.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
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-Fun gameplay the Mario series is known for -Good water effects |
8.0 |
| What Doesn't | |
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-Horrible camera -Often frustratingly difficult -Not much of a step up from Super Mario 64 |
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| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| It’s a fantastic platformer that succeeds despite a laundry list of flaws. People who were waiting for “The next big Mario game” will be very disappointed, but those just looking for “A good game” will find a lot to like in Super Mario Sunshine. | |
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Tags: Super Mario Sunshine
Posted by Jake McNeill on Jul 30th, 2003 and is filed under Game Cube Reviews, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can post a comment, or trackback from your own site.
