If you don't wanna use an emulator this is probably the best way to play all three (unless you're a speedrunner)

Sunshine has widescreen. While Dolphin has this too sometimes you have to deal with annoying stars popping up on the side. It's a decent amount of work to make Sunshine work in widescreen+60fps on PC. If you don't mind sacrificing the 60FPS this is probably the best option.

Galaxy runs in HD, has mostly good gyro controls.

Yes this collection could be better but this is probably the best official way to play these games, and all you gotta do is pop in a game cart (until March 31st when it fuckin' dies)

A title that revolutionized the industry that sadly doesn't hold up, a deeply flawed but great experience, and a bonafide masterpiece that perfected the 3D platforming formula all bundled together in a disappointingly low effort collection. Like them or hate them, these three games are iconic parts of video game history, and they deserved better. Had 64 and Sunshine been updated to include some quality of life improvements, as well as given fresh coats of paint, this would've been quite possibly the best collection ever. Sadly, this is what we got instead.

This is kind of a weird one for me.

I think it's safe to say that all the games in this collection are still really good and imo hold up pretty well, and overall some of the finest 3D platformers you can get both on the Switch and in general.

But when rating this as a collection? That's where it gets iffy. This collection doesn't necessarily "ruin" the experience of these games - the games still play perfectly fine and being on the Switch you can also play them portably which I believe is a plus. But it really feels like Nintendo did the bare minimum with this collection. I wouldn't say they had to go as far as to completely remake these games, but for $60, you're essentially getting barebones ports of these old games with very little in the way of improved visuals (Super Mario 64 doesn't even have widescreen for whatever reason), and a pretty bland presentation where the collection doesn't have anything more than a simple menu, the games and the soundtracks.

Considering Mario is Nintendo's mascot, I would've expected them to do so much more with this collection, especially at a $60 price tag, but this collection just feels like the bare minimum. Compare it to, say, the Crash and Spyro remake trilogies - where all three games are completely overhauled visually with improvements to the controls and mechanics, both for $40, or the Kirby's Dream Collection in 2012 which not only had the games, but history of the franchise, box art to look at, challenge stages, and episodes of the Kirby anime series. For such a classic franchise and mascot, and especially for the price you're paying, this collection could've easily been so much more.

if you havent seen the frank cifaldi GDC talks about game emulation and preservation i do recommend them, especially because you can see what they do to make rereleases of classic games worth a higher price point
https://youtu.be/HLWY7fCXUwE
https://youtu.be/dp-DRU24J18

super mario 3d all-stars is not worth it's price point
the games are fine (if a bit thrown together, sunshine especially had some weirdness) but the games still hold up just fine and i greatly appreciated the lack of motion control requirement for super mario galaxy
but the piss-poor attempt at making it worth $60 by adding a music player really feels like they just went for the absolute simplest, easiest option
beta material for the games? no!
trailers, cutscenes, other video? no!
literally anything extra besides the games themselves and the music player? heck no!
its just disappointing, especially because there is a VERY PROMINENT interest in the nintendo development cycle for these games
remember the gigaleaks from a while back?
remember the absolute insanity that occurred when people realized there was some pre-release/beta stuff from a bunch of different games, including mario 64?
remember fucking LUIGI BEING REAL?
the secret was out nintendo! there was no need to hide it anymore! or, you couldve pretended like the leak never happened and revealed it yourself! but you didnt! you fucking didnt you sat on your fat fucking asses and and threw together a few games (almost exactly as they were, without any improvements), decided against packaging the direct sequel to one of them despite it playing literally the same as the first one, releasing on the same console as the first one, and is just as praised if not more, realized that if they released -just- the games, people wouldnt be satisfied, so you threw together a music player that was fucking useless because who the fuck goes "hmm i want to listen to dire dire docks let me just boot up my switch and open mario 3d allstars and go to the music player" no they're going to google it and listen to a rip of it on youtube (because you refuse to put any of your soundtracks anywhere officially online)
then you decided that this collection, as disappointing and shit as it was, was good enough to slap the big ol 60 on the price tag
and then of fucking course that couldnt be it
no it had to be SPECIAL so you put a fucking arbitrary time limit on purchases
not like limited run games where the physical releases are timed but the actual games are always available online no you fucking said "after march 31st NO ONE can buy this game EVER online or not"
which of course, was a fucking lie because there is new stock on amazon right FUCKING NOW

i bought this collection because (like many others) i didnt want to miss out in case it actually was going away forever, and because i had never actually beaten sunshine or galaxy and thought it would be a good chance to
but ill be honest
i regret it now
entirely i regret it and i wish i had just emulated those games
or played them on the original hardware
or done literally anything else

man what a kooky nintendo fanboy i am!
i didnt think i'd actually get angry writing this but here we are anyways im going to stop before i start complaining about the lack of save states eueuuerhhhuuhguhhuhguhhhgghhhhh

didnt even get my fucking pin set

Guess I'll go the opposite of Guacamole Boy. I think Super Mario 64 is easily the best reason to get this (well unless you get that stupidly overpriced Nintendo Switch Online bundle with N64 games).

Super Mario 64 is timeless, and many people forget this inspired a lot of the 'open world' 3D platformer/collecathons. It's a shame this genre of games is basically never done anymore. Mario 64 shows how it's done in a simple but effective, fun and replayable way.

I know the game is rough around the edges and the controls are still very early N64-ish but it works with Mario 64's simple and fun level design.

Getting rid of "So long gay Bowser" was a lame move though.

Mario Sunshine is kinda fun, though it relies a bit too much on the water gimmick. It says something when my favorite parts of Sunshine are the stars that take you to those bonus level where you don't have the FLUDD and it's just challenging but fun pure platforming.

I think Galaxy 1 is easily the most overrated Mario platformer game (and would be most overrated Mario game period if Paper Mario Thousand Year Door didn't exist).

Apparently Nintendo had the smart idea to take 64/Sunshine's design and make everything a LOT more linear. Sure the game looks pretty and all but what's the point where the level design is so boring?

With the button mapping, different controllers, camera inversion you cannot change and input lag you practically have to learn how to replay Mario 64 and it’s nowhere near as fun.

UPDATE: I have gotten use to it and while it's not the optimal way at all, for handheld mode it's the actual Mario 64 on the go and that has novelty value.

Sunshine is actually borderline unplayable. Absolutely baffling choices to adapt the controls to the Switch.

I’m glad I can play these games on my Switch, especially since this was my first chance to experience Sunshine and Galaxy, the latter of which is now one of my favorite games of all time and I consider it to be an example of a video game as a work of art.

However, the port jobs themselves and the package as a whole are sloppily handled, like they were thrown together in a few months just to be pushed out for a limited time.

The Galaxy port is good and arguably the definitive way to play, since the original game didn’t need many improvements beyond a boost in resolution and some optional button controls. It’s beautiful.

The Sunshine port looks great graphically, but it only runs at 30 fps and all of the horrible glitches that infect the original are left perfectly intact. Some of them are good for speedrunners, but most of them actively make the game worse, and it’s a shame that this game was left just as much of a mess as it was in 2002. A fun mess that I highly recommend, but one that needs a proper remake to iron its flaws.

The 64 port is pretty fucking disappointing. The game is still great, but it’s locked to its original aspect ratio and is otherwise devoid of changes, other than the removal of the beloved BLJ (which I never use, but it sucks that it’s gone). This could’ve been a good opportunity to completely redo the visuals and controls, add the extra content from the DS remake, and create the perfect version of one of the most important games ever made.

As for extra content… what extra content? You have the soundtracks for each game (aka stuff you can find on YouTube), but that’s literally it. No art gallery, no bonus mini-games, no extra Mario stuff, just an empty void.

Also, WHERE THE FUCK IS GALAXY 2?!?! That game is a masterpiece and deserves to be in this collection, but it’s just not. There’s absolutely no excuse for that other than laziness or some greedy strategy to try and sell it back at an inflated price later on. It’s unacceptable.

Yeah, the games are great, but the collection as a whole leaves a LOT to be desired.

64 and sunshine are good games. too bad they fucked up doing anything with a port and actively chose the worst version of 64. The joycons not having analog control made the sunshine controls god awful. Not sure if they ever changed it, but initially you could not use the gamecube controller either. Even if you could, I've heard that when the adapter is used on a switch it does not have analog triggers. Good job nintendo, you made it so you cant play the best game in the collection. At least 64 still works. Too bad they removed BLJ and mario's iconic catchphrase. Oh well. There's always Super Mario Galaxy, the worst of the three games by a long shot. I have beaten 64 and sunshine twice on 3das and have yet to touch galaxy because it sucks. Do not buy this secondhand because it is a waste of money. Do not buy this firsthand because it is not possible.