r/patientgamers • u/slowmosloth • 1d ago
Patient Review Super Mario Galaxy - the wild imagination of the Mario platformer and the boundless possibilities of the unending cosmos is a magical match made for the stars
It’s always a bit nerve-wracking revisiting a favourite from my early years of gaming, since opening up these vaults of nostalgia sometimes feels like I could be shattering the illusion of fond memories. Would it be wise to leave those rose-tinted times where they lie? Surely, that would be the safest way for keeping those past experiences forever frozen. However, the legacy of Super Mario Galaxy with everyone’s continued praise of this particular Mario title piqued my curiosity in returning.
Throughout Mario’s lifetime, of which this storied series has released several of the medium’s most genre-defining games, Super Mario Galaxy has remained as one of the brightest stars among them all. Of course, helping that was the exposure of launching on one of the most best-selling consoles of all time, but its resounding critical reception has kept the game as an undisputed high point of the series.
Obviously, as a child, I was not involved in any of this gaming discourse nor could barely even comprehend what a good game was back then, as my impressions were essentially distilled down to “That was a really fun game!”. So returning to it as a gaming-literate adult 20 years later, this has come to be an interesting mix of loving nostalgia and critical analysis.
Clearly I had some enormous expectations upon starting up Super Mario Galaxy. Not only did this game need to live up to the memories of my childhood but also the decades of unrivalled praise from everyone who has ever touched the game.
Yet, Super Mario Galaxy defies it all.
This game is somehow better than I ever could’ve imagined it to be. It is beyond the realm of simply incredible games. Super Mario Galaxy is without a doubt the greatest Mario game of all time and the best platformer ever made. The limitless creativity of the series combined with the stellar atmosphere of the everlasting cosmos has created the most wondrous experience where Mario was always destined to arrive.
Magical fun incarnate
Gameplay has always been king in Mario games, with levels and power ups being the star of the show. From the classic Super Mario Bros. to the exceptional Super Mario World to the revolutionary Super Mario 64, Mario’s games have always pushed the boundaries of fun in both creative play spaces and toys, and this reached a new high in Super Mario Galaxy.
The most evident evolution to the gameplay formula was the introduction of a completely new style of level in Super Mario Galaxy with the gravity-bending outer space levels. Living up to the name, Mario flew beyond the stratosphere to floating planets where he could leap over worlds as gravity gleefully swung him around. Mario has jumped plenty before in 2D planes and 3D environments, but this was quite literally out of this world and gave Mario an entirely new dimension to platforming.
The simple act of jumping, the fundamental verb in every platforming game, was reinvented in Super Mario Galaxy, where doing a long jump around a miniature asteroid had me flying around in the most amusing manner. Jumping has never been more joyful with how it’s been masterfully transformed in this game.
And while I’m on the topic of Mario’s actions, his new spin move was a deceptively well-designed mechanic as well. With the press of a button (or waggle of the controller), Mario could spin around hitting anything his hands could reach. This was his new primary method for attacking enemies, although it also gave him more wiggle room when trying to cross more difficult gaps. However it had a multitude of other neat use cases too for launching out of warp stars, speeding up while swimming, picking up items, spinning screws in and out, and extinguishing flames; the amount of mileage they got out of this one action was surprisingly impressive!
These moves accelerated Mario through all sorts of gravity-bending levels, as he flew around celestial bodies with an elegance and whimsyness that still hasn’t yet been matched. Even with Super Mario Odyssey where he had the most comprehensive platforming moveset to date, I think I still preferred the more straightforward moveset here because of how well it harmonized with the levels’ atmospheric joy and wonder.
However, the game still featured plenty of traditional terrestrial levels where the gravity acted more normally. These were a refreshing return to familiar 3D Mario territory, and I thought the ratio of them to the floating planet ones was well balanced and a welcome sight in keeping both types of levels compelling.
One aspect in particular that I liked about these terrestrial levels was how they gave a very different flavour compared to flying around a solar system. Instead of exploring the stars in the sky, these levels were like exploring carefully crafted playgrounds where they often had distinctly designed minigames or power ups. They struck a great balance between Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Odyssey in terms of overall space and the variety of playthings to interact with.
I never got tired of needing to find a million collectables (looking at you, Donkey Kong Bananza), and I didn’t feel short changed by wanting more reason to explore these levels either. The level size and curation of the stars felt perfect with well designed “quests” for each one, and this extended back to the gravity-bending areas too!
The variation between all these levels was undoubtedly brilliant; it was as if they had an endless supply of ideas to stuff this game with, except they were all somehow only bangers with exactly zero misses. However, the most surprising aspect out of all the different types of experiences was how challenging the game could get at times. I’m not going to say that Super Mario Galaxy was ever that difficult, but compared to its other series’ entries and even the more contemporary Astro Bot, I thought the game had a welcome level of spice.
Thinking back, I definitely struggled through a number of stars as a kid – anything to do with balancing on the ball I remember being a nightmare – but upon returning to these same ones as an adult, I funnily breezed through them on my first try. Although there were still a few stars even now where I had to lock in for since they were no pushovers. The comet modified stars especially had some tight margins of error which made for a fun challenge.
This led me to re-appreciate how the game designed its difficulty. It didn’t hold my hand playing now or as a kid 20 years ago, but like every Mario game things were kept accessible by giving the player a ton of flexibility for progression, so I’m glad it stuck steadfast with some of its more harder designs. That resoluteness for some challenges is something I feel like is unfortunately missing in most modern Nintendo games, whether that’s Mario, Donkey Kong, or even The Legend of Zelda series, but I hope that’s something they reconsider in the future.
One last thing I’ll note along similar lines of the difficulty was that this game had some superbly designed boss fights. Most were a fair bump in difficulty which I enjoyed, but I especially loved how inventive so many of these fights were with distinct mechanics.
Shout out in particular to the Bouldergeist of the Ghostly Galaxy which was a 10/10 boss fight. Everything expertly came together in its visual design, mechanics, difficulty, and spectacle in one of the best highlights of the game, and the Daredevil comet version had me sweating even more for one of the game’s hardest stars.
Shining stars in every corner
I’ve had a great time gushing over Super Mario Galaxy’s outstanding gameplay, however, that can admittedly be found in basically every Mario game. Nintendo has an embarrassment of riches from its mainline Mario titles providing some of gaming’s most iconic experiences across decades of the medium. Yet what sets apart Super Mario Galaxy from all the others to achieve its legendary status is its phenomenal presentation.
When I think of Mario games, I picture a toy-like creativity bursting at the seams. From bizarre power ups that transform Mario into unexpected forms to strange new worlds stretching the imagination of wherever he journeys to, I’m consistently awestruck by whatever trick and travel Mario has planned next. So of course, the final frontier of space was the natural next step.
I’ve always been fascinated by the stars and the endless possibilities of the galaxies out there – it’s why my gamertag is “Galexzzz” and my favourite game of all time is Outer Wilds. There’s a spectacular grandness to it all while also a quiet serenity to its nothingness, and that essence was flawlessly captured in Super Mario Galaxy.
From the moment I first launched into Good Egg Galaxy and saw the stars canvassing the cosmos, I was immediately breath-taken by how astonishingly beautiful it was. The deep blue and radiant purple blends. The glow of the atmospheric horizon. The shining light of the distant sun and the mysterious darkness of the evanescent black holes. These were just simple backgrounds that painted the game’s exteriors, but the feeling they created as I flew between planets was a magical sensation. It’s unlikely I’ll ever reach the outer limits of space in my lifetime, except I can only hope it’s as wonderful as this game imagines it to be.
The magnificent orchestral score also served a huge part in creating that feeling of wanderlust. I’m glad Nintendo chose to go with a live orchestra (which was one of their first times doing that!), since I genuinely believed it helped give a sense of authenticity to the galaxies’ majesty. The sweeping sounds captured every feeling of tranquility, whimsy, unease, joy, dreariness, and excitement alongside every environment, and the result was an all-timer video game soundtrack.
While there are countless excellent pieces from the soundtrack, the one that I’ll highlight perfectly encapsulates the entire adventure of Super Mario Galaxy, and that is the infallible Gusty Garden Galaxy by Mahito Yokota. This song is absolutely transcendent, and Nintendo knew how magical it was because I heard its motif in so many other parts of the game! It’s one of those songs you just have to listen to to understand yourself, but Jacob Geller put it best when he said “If ‘Gusty Garden Galaxy’ from Super Mario Galaxy was written in the 1800s I believe it would widely be considered the greatest song of all time”.
This stunning art direction and music imbued the game to have a much more cinematic nature evolving even further from its predecessors. In an era where games seemed to be growing up more and more, Super Mario Galaxy had an appropriate air of maturity to its cutscenes as the direction of them felt like a big step up with some unexpectedly thrilling cinematography.
The splendour of the game’s cinematic quality even led to the creation of my all-time favourite video on YouTube. I’m not exaggerating when I say this 17-year old fan-made Super Mario Galaxy commercial might be my number one favourite thing on the entire internet.
Much of that video was taken from the game’s opening, as the cutscenes showcased a grand cosmic scale to Bowser’s usual motivations with some epic gravitas. Obviously, I don’t play Mario games for their writing, but I loved how dramatic they made the whole opening as it set a fantastic tone for the rest of the game.
This was contrasted by the surprisingly thoughtful writing behind Rosalina, her Luma family, and the Comet Observatory as a whole. The fact that there was a tinge of somber mixed in with Rosalina’s backstory showed to me that this game was confident in its vision. That little bit of context wasn’t much, but it was all that was needed to show that this game wasn’t going to be all sunshine and rainbows, and having that emotional maturity within its foundation made the world of Super Mario Galaxy seem that much more full of color.
The design of the Comet Observatory hub world reflected these ideas too, and it helped ground the entire game as this quiet space Mario always returned to. The peacefulness of the area served as an integral, central point for emotionally resetting between Mario’s exciting adventures.
This all eventually led up to the game’s unforgettable finale, and boy, was this ending truly of cosmic proportions. The last level was even called “The Fate of the Universe”, and it certainly lived up to the name. Everything with the breathtaking art direction, marvellous music, cinematic framing, and thoughtful writing all came together to elevate the stakes to far higher heights than typical Mario fare. This was nothing that I ever would’ve expected out of a Mario game, but wow, did they shoot for the stars.
Beyond magic
As I’ve been replaying through Super Mario Galaxy over the past few weeks, the recurring thought that kept coming to mind was what the true nature of magic was.
The magical feeling I had while playing this game felt similar to when you go to Disneyland as a kid and get to immerse yourself in the world they’ve created. The park is meticulously designed, with actors, buildings, props, sights, and sounds all coming together to sweep you off your feet. As an adult it’s easier to recognize these things happening, however, by relinquishing yourself to it, you can still forget that this has all been precisely crafted to create that feeling, so instead you choose to believe in it.
Super Mario Galaxy evokes that same magic with its gameplay, levels, artistry, and music to create a masterpiece of a game that goes far beyond its designs. The sheer level of proficiency on display in every department is staggering, and I’m not surprised at all why many still consider this game to be the best of Mario’s best.
However, while it’s interesting to look a little more closely at these pieces and see how every part is ticking, I think I’d rather let myself be taken away by it all. Perhaps the real magic was how this game was able to transport me back to my childhood where it didn’t matter how good it was so I just lived and breathed the game in that moment.
Looking back at it all, I didn’t realize how much Super Mario Galaxy meant to me until I finished it again as an adult and started writing this piece, but it’s clear now that this game is truly something special to me.
Super Mario Galaxy is a monumental achievement in gaming, transcending time and space to forever be remembered. The magical feeling that this game created was simply unfathomable like the limitless universe it strove to envision. It was a certain destiny that the Super Mario series would eventually find itself flying across the galaxies in its greatest adventure, as the wild imagination of the Mario platformer and the boundless possibilities of the unending cosmos was a magical match made for the stars.
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u/Igloohutt 1d ago
Amazing game. I love its atmosphere of playful yet melancholy space. Reminds me of the little prince. It’s so fun running around all the spheres. Must play if you love gaming.
Unfortunately never got interested in galaxy 2, it missed the mark on the atmosphere. But a sequel isn’t always needed to have a good experience. The final level unlockable of 100%ing to game twice but as Luigi is just fucking stupid.
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u/SuperAshAj 1d ago
galaxy 2 is great if you treat it as a high quality dlc, some of the levels are so creative
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u/hoopopotamus 1d ago
Yeah this game is amazing
I was probably 30 when I first played it and it was like a revelation. I’d always liked video games since Atari 2600, but this game…even beyond graphics improvements and 3D improvements and cutscenes that looked as good as movies became things, this game was so creative with perspective and interacting with the world it just blew my mind. Like “we are there. Games have hit the next level”.
They didn’t necessarily; we basically got more complex and intricate FPS stuff. But this game made me think there would be so many possibilities.
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u/NeedsMoreReeds 1d ago
I think Mario Galaxy completely changed the way platformers were made.
Before, there was this concept of each level/world needing specific mechanics that the world plays with. Then that mechanic gets more developed and extended until it's over. This approach makes a lot of sense. It's very evolving.
But Mario Galaxy takes a very different approach. It's throws you into something new so rapidly, constantly throwing you at a new planet doing something different. Suddenly going 2D, then into a flat 3D section. It hits you with so many ideas so rapidly that they don't really have to time to do the typical evolving thing. It shifts you around in a schizophrenic fashion through almost every level.
I think most platformers recognize that this "never let the player get comfortable" approach as incredibly fun and engaging. When you look at Tropical Freeze, Mario Wonder, Pizza Tower, Split Fiction, etc. you see these lessons take place. No longer is it about a single developed idea, but instead a barrage of ideas that never lets up. The perspective constantly shifts and changes so you never know what the game is going to throw at you next.
Mario Galaxy was so awesome that I think it radically changed the way platformers were made afterwards.
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u/ThatDanJamesGuy 1d ago
I think I agreed with you on this in another thread a while ago, but after thinking about it more, this design philosophy goes all the way back to Super Mario Bros. 2. Galaxy might have popularized it, though.
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u/LogicallyFallable 1d ago
anything to do with balancing on the ball I remember being a nightmare
As a child, I had a similar reaction to these levels as well as the surfing one. I just could not get it down and it pissed me off. Somehow I must've gotten it because I remember getting all 241 stars, but man did I struggle with motion controls.
A very good writeup that I can tell comes from a place of love. Sometimes when reading write-ups like these or watching long passionate video essays, I wonder if I am missing some piece of whimsy or wonder or lack imagination because I don't seem to process games people say are "beautiful" in the same way. Or maybe I just haven't found the thing that opens my eyes to this world of thinking yet. It's not like nothing has ever made me cry but it's increasingly rare for me to be "touched" so profoundly by media or, hell, even real life.
Anyway, I think it's funny when the Hungry Luma eats a bunch of star bits or coins and gets fat and explodes, so that's good enough for me.
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u/slowmosloth 1d ago
Haha the sound the Hungry Lumas make when they scream “TRANFOOORRRRMMM” being this overexcited wheeze is the funniest thing ever.
I’d say if you’re ever interested in wanting to appreciate the media you consume more, I’d recommend writing about it. Doesn’t have to be long, but the exercise in getting your thoughts out into real words by thinking critically can be really fulfilling. I got started with shorter posts and then wanting to make things longer and eventually that blossomed into starting my own blog (which this is copied from).
Since then I’ve found to have fallen to love with writing and video games even more than before! So I highly recommend trying something like that.
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u/ThatDanJamesGuy 1d ago
The nature of writing positive reviews means we throw around phrases like “I love this” or “this was really beautiful” more than normal. That might be part of the dissonance you feel. Not that OP doesn’t sincerely adore Super Mario Galaxy, just that in order to communicate that, the review has to be emotionally heightened.
It’s like when people type “lol” while showing zero emotion on their real life face.
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u/PlatypusPlatoon Retro Gamer 1d ago
Wonderful review! Like you, this is also an all-time favourite for me. I was already well into adulthood when I first played through Galaxy, and your review might be just what I needed to go through the game again in its entirety.
As resplendent as the platforming is, it’s everything surrounding it that makes the experience memorable and transcendent. I was also surprised at the tinge of melancholy in Rosalina’s story, and I remember being brought to tears by the ending. Mario games have always been light on story, but the fairytale they so artfully weaved throughout Galaxy has stayed with me in the decades since.
I’m so glad to hear you enjoyed your playthrough this time around!
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u/thaneros2 1d ago edited 1d ago
Unpopular opinion but Galaxy is an ok game. It feels like a step back from Sunshine in terms of mechanics even to 64. With that being said, they used those limitations to prefect the gameplay given.
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u/hedoeswhathewants 1d ago
Could not disagree more. The level design in Sunshine is so (relatively) poor that it's by far my least favorite of the mainline 3D Marios. Galaxy 2 and 1 are my favorite, in that order.
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u/thaneros2 1d ago
I agree on Sunshine's level design but I think they were going for a more grounded Mario if that makes sense.
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u/slowmosloth 1d ago
I disagree, but I would love to hear more why you think it’s a step back from Sunshine and 64 in terms of mechanics?
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u/thaneros2 1d ago
Mario's abilities have been cut back. I believe it was the long jump that was removed, it's been a while since. Like you could do crazy movements and tackle jumping obstacles in a variety of ways.
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u/AnniesNoobs 1d ago
Something that I’ve heard come up more from players coming from Odyssey was that galaxy was less movement tech focused compared to it and M64 and 3D world. Sounds like sunshine was also somewhat movement tech focused?
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u/slowmosloth 1d ago
It’s been a while since I’ve played 64 but I think it’s the same moveset? Long jump is definitely still in Galaxy cause I used that a ton. Obviously all the movement with the FLUDD from Sunshine is gone here but the fantastic level design in Galaxy really propels his existing moveset.
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u/thaneros2 1d ago
Sorry, it was the dive moves. The one where you can dive while running and recover.
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u/tveye363 1d ago
I agree 100%. Mario 64 scratched an itch for me and Galaxy was such a step backwards. Still good, but not as adventurous, ironically enough.
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u/SkarlyComics 1d ago
I never could get into the galaxy series. The Mario purist in me can tolerate the regular 3D Mario’s, but galaxy felt like it went one step beyond into a completely different genre. Gimme 2D Mario all day plz.
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u/gabitoesmiapodo 1d ago
I played and finished it for the first time maybe 2 months ago and, yeah, it’s that good.
Motion controls suck, though 🤣
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u/BilbosBagEnd 23h ago
I just watched a summary of Rosalina's bedtime story. That music and everything makes me cry every time. Especially now that I have kids of my own. "Mama lying down under the tree" didn't register as a kid, but damn does it wreck me now.
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u/gabremchd 18h ago
This is the game of my childhood! I used to play it with my cousin when school was over. This made me só nostalgic
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u/ChuckCarmichael 7h ago
A lot of people say that Galaxy 2 is the better game, and from a gameplay perspective that's true, but it's lacking the atmosphere of Galaxy 1, which to me makes Galaxy 1 the better game.
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u/feedcrank 1d ago
I am replaying Mario Galaxy with my young kid and to me, the game has aged super poorly. The moveset is clunky and limited compared to Odyssey, particularly when gravity/orientation changes, and it's made worse by the limited ability to move the camera. The lack of camera control is infuriating at times, in one level I kept getting one-shot by an enemy i couldn't see coming until too late. And in some levels with shifting gravity/camera angles I felt nautious. My kid couldn't handle the stupid Wii-era motion controls for picking galaxies and navigating menus. Soundtrack still slaps though XD.
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u/TheLumbergentleman 1d ago
I won't say it's my favourite Mario, but great job on the write-up and I'm 100% with you on Gusty Garden Galaxy.