All the way back in 2010, me and my brother were gifted a Wii during our first week of school that Fall. I had just started the 5th grade and a week or two prior I had rented and played a chunk of Super Mario Galaxy 2 on my dad's friend's Wii during a beach trip. I absolutely loved what I played of it but after the trip was over, I had to return the game back to the rental store and of course the Wii was not mine, so I craved more. Like I said, my dad gifted us a Wii and with it was Super Mario Galaxy. My brother got the Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs game so it's pretty clear only one of us got a quality title. I was infactuated with this game. I can still remember running home from school, going right to my Wii as I couldn't wait to play it any longer. I'd wake up super early on weekends too just to play more. This and Galaxy 2 were basically the first non-licensed game's I truly loved and I'm very thankful for that as it made me want to play more Nintendo titles afterwards. As you can see I adore this game, let's talk about why!

I think the defining factor as to why people love this game so much (besides the story) is it's atmosphere and portrayal of space. Sure, you have more goofy or lighthearted galaxies like Honeyhive or Beach Bowl that wouldn't feel out of place in another game. But a good chunk of the galaxies in this game, as well as the Comet Observatory, just have this really unique emptyness or marvel that really makes you feel like you're in space. Take Space Junk Galaxy for example. It's a very serene and solemn galaxy where most of the setting is literal space with some junk spread throughout just like the name implies and it's very relaxing to go through. A lot of the time I would just go into first person and marvel at the scope of all the planets or just look at the different skyboxes each galaxy has. Even on this playthrough, when I've played this game countless times, I still did this..it just never gets old to me.

As I said, the story is probably the other aspect people love about this game the most. It's still a Mario game so don't expect something mind-blowing but the cutscenes that are here are all great. Be it the beginning cutscene where Mario gets shot at by a magikoopa and gets flung to the starting planet while Peach screams his name, to the ending cutscene where all the Luma's save the entire universe by sacrificing themselves. It's just all so well done. Granted, these cutscenes only really happen at the beginning and end of the game, but it's what's contained in them that matters and it's the single best story in any mainline Mario game hands down. That's not even getting into the optional Rosalina's storybook which is in itself the single best part of the story. It just adds that extra depth to her character and let's you see who she is and how she got there. And even replaying it now, I still teared up...it's that good.

The OST I also think is the single best soundtrack in any Mario game. It has it all, it has catchy songs, it has majestic songs, it has atmospheric songs, it has emotional songs. I love Galaxy 2's OST too but it doesn't top 1 in my opinion and I think that's specifically because 2 doesn't have those emotional/sad songs which I value a bunch nowadays. Those would be A Wish, Sad Girl, and Family. Those last two especially, goddamn dude, I always can't help but get emotional when I hear them. Some other more lighthearted songs I love are Gusty Garden obviously, Melty Molten Galaxy, Buoy Base Galaxy and The Comet Observatory. All in all, an absolutely fantastic soundtrack.

As for the galaxies themselves...they're good! There may be some I'm not the biggest fan of, mostly the beach/bee galaxies and that's mostly because they reuse that theme twice which kinda stinks. But in general the galaxies are quite good even if they're aren't a ton of main one's. In that regard, 2 still does it better because there's way more fun and varied galaxies in that one, but 1 still has some really great levels to play around in. My favorites were Gusty Garden, Buoy Base, Freezeflame, Melty Molten and Space Junk. Special mention to Toy Time too for being so wacky and fun. Though, honestly another small critique I have with the game is the prankster comets. I'm fine with the purple coin ones but for the ones you playthrough your first time through before Bowser, there only being 4 types is kinda lame. 2 fixed this somewhat by adding more types and making it less obvious what it's gonna be but I felt it was worth pointing out. I will also say, people saying the movement in this game sucks I will never get. Is it better than Odyssey's? Definitely not but I still think it's a ton of fun to play around with the gravity. That's just me at least.

So yeah, I know I gave a criticism or two but I still absolutely adore this game and 2 fixes those issues I have and I sort of group them together as one game so it balances each others faults out. It and Galaxy 2 are basically my favorite games ever and I go back and forth on which one I prefer regularly for different reasons so I usually group them together even if both give pretty different gaming experiences. Either way, this game means everything to me and it's a must play for every gamer I think. I love it so much. Anyways, figured I'd go and replay 2 while I'm at it so look for that review soon!

Also forgot to say, I played as Luigi this time around. He's fun to play as even if he is slippery cuz his jumps are much larger. The reward you get for 100%ing both Mario and Luigi is lame as hell though and definitely was improved in 2.

few games linger in your brain cells for decades and decades to come and super mario galaxy wouldnt be able to leave my mind even if i wanted to

this is a game that monumentally changed the course of my life into the deranged all nighter videogame addicted junkie depressed mess of a person i am today and it is all thanks to this masterpiece

i used to play this game when i was little A LOT and somehow it didnt end up being only romanticised in my head by the nostalgia but even playing it after so many years it still shimmers of a beauty of its own that i cant even understand fully to this day

it looks beautiful as fuck the atmosphere is unmatched the graphics still hold up the gameplay is simple yet addicting and the story is probably the best in the 3D collectathon mario games and caused me a 20 year old adult to bawl my eyes out not only during the finale but also during the entirety of rosalinas storybook which many years ago left me with a lasting ptsd that still echoes to this day

in the end i kinda believe that if everyone in the world played this game maybe more people would know what kindness and empathy and tenderness mean . but thats just me

Nothing quite beats the feeling of long-jumping off a little planetoid and seeing Mario orbit around it as gravity slowly pulled him in. It's a small thing, but I had never experienced something like that in video games and Mario Galaxy is full of moments like it. This game was a joy and I still think back on it fondly. One of the most original and delightfully innovative 3D platformers I've ever played. I loved it so much that I even 100%'d it which involved playing through the entire game a second time as Luigi.

Siento que son muchas las razones por las que este juego es algo único dentro del mito de un personaje como Mario y es el conseguir evocar el vacío y existencialismo que causa un ambiente como el Espacio sin olvidar que se trata de una Aventura infantil y sin dejar de lado la vibra alegre y divertida de los variados mundos que conforman una galaxia que resguarda el más vivido lamento de una niña que tuvo crecer forzosamente para afrontar un destino lleno de tristeza pero con la bendición de poder ser una madre.

Now this is a 3D platformer!

I played this game quite a few years ago when I had a wii and played the hell out of it, and years later I still love it. This is definitely the game that got me into the mario series as a whole and what better game to begin with. There’s so much emotion here and the levels are really well-made. In my opinion this is a must have for the wii.

Great gameplay, excellent story, 2 Luigi’s

Super Mario Galaxy is the game that made me love video games.

It wasn’t the first game I played, or even the first Mario game (that honor goes to Mario Kart Wii), but it was the first to make me see games as an art form. It’s been over 15 years since I first sat down to play it at the tender age of 4 years old, but that first play session is burned into my brain. The transition from a quiet, somber storybook into a joyous festival instantly invokes a sense of childlike wonder and turns the remotely interested into the completely invested. Then, Bowser’s attack on the Star Festival and Mario’s defeat lets veteran Mario players know this adventure will be something special, while also making the basic elements of Mario clear to new players.

Speaking of basic elements, Gateway Galaxy is a fantastic tutorial. The Star Bunny segment seamlessly introduces the game’s gravity mechanic, as well as the concepts of bushes, pipes, and craters. Rosalina’s introduction introduces a sense of mystery and quiet contemplation, and the next few planets establish the game’s phenomenal sense of epic adventure and even more gameplay elements: spinning, crystals, Launch Stars, Star Bits, enemies, Black Holes, Star Chips, Flip Switches, and electricity. And all this culminates in the rescue of the Grand Star, giving 4-year-old willn46 his first chance to save the universe and make it back home to the beautiful Comet Observatory.

But even beyond its importance to me, Mario Galaxy is simply an incredible 3D platformer. Right from the outset, Mario controls like a dream. Every input is immediately taken into account, with jumps, ground pounds, and everything in between being perfectly tuned to just feel good to use. But I’d be remiss not to mention the crown jewel of Mario’s moveset: the Spin Move. Not only is it a fantastic use of the Wii’s motion controls that feels both significant and unobtrusive (unless you have a disability that renders the controls unusable for you, in which case I am incredibly sorry), it’s also an incredibly versatile tool that’s easy to use, but has nearly limitless potential. First and foremost, the momentum-halting midair jump lets players easily recover from mistakes and adjust their positioning on the fly, giving newer players a safety net that eases them in to platforming in a 3D space. Additionally, the extra jump is great for getting places that seem just out of reach, horizontally or vertically, enabling the game to set up interesting platforming challenges and fun opportunities to skip past sections if the player is good enough. But the Spin Move isn’t just for platforming; it’s also the player’s primary means of interaction with the game. It’s used to defeat enemies, break objects, collect shells, swim faster, and so much more, and every interaction is completely intuitive (Ceave Gaming has a great video on this exact topic).

I’ve seen some people criticize the Galaxy games for not having as much movement tech as other 3D Mario games. While, yes, the movement here is much simpler than 64, Sunshine or Odyssey, I actually think it works to the game’s benefit. Not only is it much easier to learn, requiring the player to understand a few basic moves rather than a plethora of complex maneuvers, but the more limited moveset lets the game be carried entirely by its level design.

And said level design is top-notch. Like 64 and Sunshine before it, Galaxy spreads its 120 stars across multiple worlds for the plumber to tackle. But it trades their handful of levels holding a few collectibles for a supercluster of memorable locales, each one bearing a unique mechanical, visual and auditory identity. Fully committing to Sunshine’s separation of individual objectives lets the designers get the most out of a single Galaxy by introducing multiple ideas while still maintaining the level’s core themes, and splitting up the action across multiple planets allows for great variety within missions as well as between them. Plus, the introduction of mid-level checkpoints allows for longer levels that don’t feel like they drag on and gives the designers more time to play with a level’s gimmicks. The more linear level design even means the game’s limited camera rarely feels limiting. And the generous amount of Power Stars gives players plenty of freedom in choosing which levels to tackle.

This would all mean nothing if the levels themselves were boring, but luckily they couldn’t be further from that. Galaxy takes basic level tropes like Ice, Beach, and Desert levels and pushes them to their absolute limits: combining ice and fire mechanics in a lava-skating course, hiding the path to a deadly obstacle course behind an underwater cave, and navigating sand streams and tornadoes across an ocean of quicksand. And that’s not even mentioning the more original levels, like HoneyHive Galaxy, BattleRock Galaxy, or Toy Time Galaxy. Besides a few stinkers like the ball-rolling levels and some of the race levels, the level mechanics on display are consistently excellent in a way I think is only matched by this game's own sequel. Interesting obstacles like altered gravity, throwing Bob-Ombs, and launching from Sling Pods are expertly paced and explored to the fullest. Cool enemies like spinning tops, bugs that need to be ground-pounded, and giant eels combined with interesting spins on classic enemies like Goombas and Boos work wonders both from a mechanical and aesthetic standpoint. Plus the bosses are great tests of skill, utilizing a level’s mechanics in their battles on top of being tests of basic skill. Power ups are pretty fun too (besides the spring), with their own unique attributes, interactions with level gimmicks, and hazards to deal with.

And do I even need to mention the visuals and music? The artstyle is vibrant, yet the locales are consistently stunning, with great attention to detail both in the actual levels and in background elements. The character designs are excellent, both with how returning characters look and how the new characters perfectly fit in with Mario while still standing out. Plus, there are tons of cool little details and secret areas that, while they may be a little pointless, give the levels tons of personality. But even more impressive is the game’s music. The confident, orchestral themes give the game an almost cinematic feel, and yet each one perfectly fits within the level and the Mario series. There are so many standout pieces in this regard, like Good Egg Galaxy, BattleRock Galaxy, and Buoy Base Galaxy. However, the game also knows when to be more subdued and reflective, with pieces like Space Junk Galaxy and Gateway Galaxy.

And on that note…besides sparking my love of video games, there’s another reason this game means so much to me.

Back in late 2016, I made some mistakes. The details are personal, but long story short, I was a stupid 12-year-old who took his friends for granted and ended up losing them all. And for the entire month of November, going to school was absolute Hell for me because of it. In every class, I would argue with people, get teased, or get laughed at, and since a lot of it was my fault, I didn’t want to ask any teachers or my parents for help. Luckily, Thanksgiving Break rolled around eventually, and I was home safe. But at this point I realized something horrible: I had no one to turn to. All my friends left me because of my egotism, and my parents wouldn’t understand enough to help me. For that entire week, I was more or less left to think about my actions, angry at myself and at the people who hurt me. I didn’t know if I could go on, and before long, my mind went to some…dark places.

Then, on Sunday, the day before I had to go back to school, I thought I would boot up Mario Galaxy so I could at least have a little fun. I played around a little, going through some of my favorite levels, not really accomplishing much. But I enjoyed it. The game didn’t judge me. It didn’t try to hurt me. It didn’t care what I did. It was just there for me, and it was there to make me happy.

And…suddenly, I wasn’t alone anymore.

Not only did that moment save my life, not only did it bring me out of the hole I dug for myself, but it made me realize the true power of a good video game. Some people might say video games are silly little things, that they’re hunks of digital junk to give to a kid so they’ll shut up for a bit. But I think they’re more than that. Like any form of art, they can lift a person up, give them a new perspective on life, and help them move forward even when nobody else will. That moment is why I wanted to become a game designer. Because I wanted to help someone feel like someone cared for them, the same way Super Mario Galaxy helped me. Sometimes, when you’re feeling hopeless, that’s the only message you need to hear:

“Thank you so much for playing my game.”

Galaxy diferenciates itself from the previous more open world-ish and sandbox-y entries in the series by being much more focused on tight and polished level design and linear platforming. While 64 and Sunshine stages, for the most part, were built as playgrounds with different and diverse obstacles, objectives and the occasional platforming challenge to approach as you saw fit, Galaxy instead takes the more linear and abstracted moments of those games, like Tick Tock Clock in 64 or the no F.L.U.U.D. stages in Sunshine and creates a whole game around pushing the player forward through meticulous and straightforward platforming, not unlike the 2D entries.

This change in design philosophy that removes a certain level of choice and expression from the player, and the initial realization that Mario's moveset is drastically taken down a notch from the previous two games might cause disappointment at first, but the platforming layout and creativty at display in Galaxy more than makes up for those shortcomings. The pace of every single stage is perfectly constructed, moving the player from one gimmick to the next one, never wearing out their welcome, and providing a set of challenges to overcome much more well crafted and tied into a cohesive thematic idea than what 64 or Sunshine ever had. Additionally, Galaxy makes good use of it's motion controls, giving a good sense of kinesthetics and never feeling out of the player's control.

What elevates however Galaxy to the upper echelons of the Mario canon is without a doubt its presentation. The space theme provides some of the most unique and mesmerizing stages in the franchise, having Mario twirling around small planetoids, being affected by gravity pulls, being launched into flight from a moon to another, and traversing expansive windy blue skies on a dandelion, all while beautiful orchestrated renditions are played in the background, providing the whole experience a great sentiment of videogame magic and wonder. Super Mario Galaxy is a classic, for sure.

This had to be my first log on this website. My favourite video game of all time. To this day, this is the only mainline Mario game that truly feels like an "experience". This is the game where all of Nintendo's signature ideologies came together to produce arguably the most complete package they have ever made. Honestly, I still can't believe a game this well-made even exists, let alone one as absurdly creative as this.

It's easy to take it for granted now, but the game's central concept is simultaneously so innovative, so ambitious, and so stupid that it's utterly mind boggling that it worked out so perfectly in execution. And the game still managed to fire on all cylinders in every other aspect too! This game is an utter miracle and I don't understand it.

i didnt really expect this going in , but mario galaxy - with it's bombastic opening and incredibly typical saving princess peach plot - ends up being a very thoughtful and often melancholic rumination on both the wonder and loneliness of space.

this is in large part due to the incredible score, which delivers on all fronts. the majesty and unbridled joy of "Gusty Garden Galaxy" has been praised to the center of the universe and back, but the soundtrack also explores space in a more melancholic way. the theme of "Space Junk Galaxy" is a standout here, it really captures the beauty and loneliness of the universe's expanse.

of course this stuff goes beyond just the soundtrack. it's in how the game frames mario Galaxy's planets, clustered together, but still hanging adrift in space. it's in the domesticity and liveliness of the hub world, how all of the individual "observatories" in the game are actually the rooms of a house. and it's in the return from a level when you collect a star, and are rewarded with a moment of downtime.

at the end of the day it's still a mario game, it's still about saving princess peach, it still has an ontologically evil antagonist, and it still has dumb minigames and poor underwater controls. the gameplay - while being far beyond serviceable - didn't really do it for me either. but that's okay! because mario galaxy is an incredibly special game, and is so so much more than just the sum of its parts

Yeah just play the soundtrack, specifically "Gusty Garden Galazy," at my funeral as they lower my casket into the ground please. Every song is a masterpiece.

I thought nostalgia was blinding me, but replaying it as an adult, it justified all my previous feelings toward this game. It's the GOAT I don't make the rules.

Nothing will bring me as much joy and comfort as running & flying around the Comet Observatory.

Veredito: um dos jogos mais divertidos já feitos, com muita folga.

A pessoa que não se diverte quando joga um Super Mario claramente não tem mais qualquer salvação nesta vida. Ela já deixou pra trás toda esperança. Virou um robô.

Mario é praticamente projetado em laboratório para nos deixar felizes. Não adianta, você vai abrir um sorriso bobo do começo ao fim do jogo, de orelha a orelha. Resistir é inútil. Aceita que dói menos.

It's largely just a spectacle game. 64 and Sunshine had sometimes frustrating jank to their platforming, but that same jank also allowed for greater options in movement and let you exploit the loose and fast movement of Mario in fun ways. Here, not only is the movement slower and more restricted, but levels are sectioned off into these tiny chunks that make proper movement exploits and section skips nigh impossible. The walljump in particular is so frustratingly limited here compared to older 3D Mario games, it's only really viable if you see 2 directly vertical walls next to each other in predetermined placement. 64 is dated as hell, particularly its camera, but I think it and Sunshine both manage to craft the ideal of the skill balance in a 3D Mario game: fun but challenging for kids, with enough tricks and harder sections to offer a satisfyingly high skill ceiling. This feels like the beginning of what Odyssey would go on to do to a much greater degree, restrict so much of its gameplay to pre-decided spectacle moments and consistently reward players for just participating in them. The spectacle is admittedly really good though.

Super Mario Galaxy is the greatest game ever made. Mario controls beautifully and the platforming is all built on his movement, which allows you to just move around elegantly through the level, even the water levels are good.The gravity mechanic is easily the best mechanic in any platformer, it makes the movement so fluid so seamless, and the spin move makes the platforming so satisfying as it helps you adjust a mistake and gives you a boost that allows you to come up with ways to jump longer or higher and its just so satisfying when it comes in clutch to make that shortcut. The design of the galaxies were hand crafted by god, each planet already has the best level design but gives it that charm. All of the galaxies are filled with life and got so much personality but some of my favorites are Good egg Galaxy, Honeyhive Galaxy, Bowser's star reactor, Bowser's galaxy reactor, Gusty Garden Galaxy, Freezeflame Galaxy, Toy Time Galaxy, Battlerock Galaxy, and Beach Bowl Galaxy. The music, oh my god the music is so majestic, it is the greatest OST in gaming history, every galaxy has tracks that just add to its charm. Gusty Garden Galaxy is the best song in gaming, nothing will ever come close, but its not to shine out other galaxies such as Good Egg Galaxy, Beach Bowl Galaxy, Ghostly Galaxy, Space Junk Galaxy, Melty Molten Galaxy and many more. The Comet Observatory is the best hub in any game with such a majestic song. Now, this game can get very emotional as its the most dramatic a Mario game has gotten, the first cutscene is so cinematic and it makes Bowser the most menacing he has ever been. The fist cutscene where bowser takes the castle is so dramatic and cinematic that it instantly makes this journey feel much more important. It also installs wonder in the player as they traverse the game and the final scene where you storm Bowser's Galaxy Reactor and the level being a combination of every mechanic makes it truly feel so epic. Another emotion this game makes you feel is sadness with Rosalina's Storybook. The music that plays as you read the story paired with the emotional story never fails to make me cry. No words can explain it, you truly need to experience it. Some may have issues with the motion control but i like the manta ray and star ball mission. The manta ray is so fast paced and the music is so catchy, and the star ball is so anxiety inducing as you try to maneuver the ball to the end goal without falling, and the music adds to it as it slows down or speeds up depending on how you move. Super Mario Galaxy is simply the best there is, the best there was, and the best there ever will be. 100/100 you need to play this masterpiece

Super Mario Galaxy is the most beautiful game that has ever disappointed me.

I should make it clear that I didn't always feel this way about this game. I'd never owned the game until the unfortunate 3D All-Stars collection, but it was always around me with an air of wonder to it: some of my first memories on the Internet include watching pre-release footage of this game and getting absolutely stunned that video games had the capacity to be so breathtaking; the few times I was able to play it at friends' houses was nothing short of magical, and as an early teenager who unfortunately refused to listen to anything but video game music, the Super Mario Galaxy soundtrack was a mainstay on my music library.
This isn't my first time playing this game. I emulated it back in 2015 alongside Super Mario Sunshine and enjoyed my experience enough, but the more I've thought about it ever since, especially with the release of Super Mario Odyssey, I've found my feelings on it shifting around in somewhat cynical ways.

But that's enough trying to force parallels out with my Super Mario Odyssey review. It's true that I feel that Odyssey and Galaxy are mirror images of each other, most of their strengths being the other's shortcomings and vice versa, but Super Mario Galaxy deserves a slightly different approach. It may be my least favorite 3D Mario game in the series; it may be close to being farthest removed from the formula that Super Mario 64, the video game of all time, one that's time and time again defined my entire relationship with video games, had established... but that could have been its strength.

So let's not start with the controls. Let's not start with the game progression or pacing. Instead, let's talk about the single galaxy in the game that I understand the least:

And that's Buoy Base Galaxy. It's a pretty unique galaxy, with a fully orchestrated theme unique to it, complete with an underwater variant that brings out a pipe organ, with a really intense atmosphere to it that's only rivalled by a few other galaxies in the game. It also only has two Power Stars to it, oddly enough.
Have you ever stopped to think about why it exists before? Have you ever thought about why this galaxy only houses two Stars?

I've come up with two different interpretations of this Galaxy, if you'd care to let me speculate. The first is that as an old, unused fortress, it makes sense that there's not a lot of missions left to do in this place. Its stories have already been taken place long ago, its battles already fought, and Mario is visiting a relic of the past, a constant reminder of the battles that continue to go on in the world, and the vigilance he ought to maintain in a time of current conflict, just as Buoy Base continues to be maintained in the slight chance that it may be important in battle again one day.
The other interpretation is that the developers intended it to be a full-sized galaxy with six full stars (which the Super Mario Wiki also believes), but backed out, maybe because its tone was a little too intense, to focus more on more conventionally themed galaxies like the Sea Slide, Dusty Dune and Gold Leaf Galaxies.

I assume my intent in bringing this up should be pretty apparent: Buoy Base is a perfect metaphor for the dichotomy I feel Super Mario Galaxy suffers from, its Two Big Ideas that are completely at odds with each other in the specific way Galaxy goes about executing them.

So let's get a bit more direct as we explore the First Big Idea. In its best moments, Super Mario Galaxy has some of the most interesting concepts, tones and themes ever explored in the Super Mario games.
If you really like thinking about this game, you may have watched a video titled The Quiet Sadness of Super Mario Galaxy: it's a fantastic, sentimental essay that gushes about one of (in my opinion) the best parts of Super Mario Galaxy, and watching it will undoubtedly help in understanding what I mean here, but I'll provide an interpretation of my own, using a quote from the long-time Super Mario composer, Koji Kondo:

"I try to evoke something in the silence, in the absence of sound. Rest notes are very important to me, and the connecting space between sounds." - 2001 interview from Game Maestro, translated by shmuplations

Let's think back to the opening of Super Mario Galaxy. The assault on Peach's Castle is easily the most exciting, cinematic intro to any Mario game ever, and the stakes have never been higher, with the castle uplifted far out of reach, and Mario flung out into the reaches of space - all hope seems lost.
It's at this moment Super Mario Galaxy takes a moment to breathe, to take a step back and zoom out from the Gateway into showing a vast space encircling it. Constellations and stars visible in the distance but very much currently out of Mario's reach represent a sort of Mu (無) that I think is best represented by a quote from One with Nothing:
"When nothing remains, everything is equally possible."

This sense of space between sounds, space between sensations is something that pops up every now and again in Super Mario Galaxy. Space Junk Galaxy, better known as Stardust Road in Japan, is a standout example of this, serving as a bit of a comma in the game's pacing and somehow making the idea of random objects strung together in space into something beautiful, almost introspective. Rosalina's Library can serve this purpose as well, but there's more thematic cohesion to it than just this aspect that I'd like to bring up later.

This sense of space is perhaps more important to Super Mario Galaxy than it might be for any other Mario game if only because of the intensity that's spaced apart by these moments of quietness. Super Mario Galaxy is quite maximalist in its louder moments, with an odd emphasis of war and battle; warships are common imagery within this game more than any other in the series, boss battles are found in almost every major galaxy and many minor galaxies, Bowser and Bowser Jr are fought six times compared to 64's three and Odyssey's two, and the Battlerock and Dreadnought Galaxies serve as mascots of this aspect of the game, representing the almost sci-fi militaristic aesthetic that the game adopts every now and then. The contrast makes for a very interesting tonal balance that I wish was explored in more depth, and more consistently.

I've ended up doing a lot more reading for the purpose of analyzing Super Mario Galaxy's themes than I'd expected to, going into this review. A specific Japanese idea that I've found that I feel Galaxy uniquely tackles unlike the other games in the series is mono no aware: (物の哀れ) treasuring the ephemeral, seeing beauty in the transience of everything, accepting change and letting go, but simultaneously holding those memories of the past close to your heart.
Rosalina exemplifies this idea through and through, in both her backstory, and in the ending. The storybook is one of a small (but growing) list of video game moments I've cried to, and I can't really do it justice except by saying it represents these ideas very well.
The ending literally sees the end of the universe as we had known it for the entire duration of the game, and lets it go, embracing elements of it in every new galaxy created from the ashes of the old one, accepting that this is the true purpose of stars and lumas, to constantly undergo growth, change, evolution and rebirth.

There's a lot of really fascinating ideas reflected in Super Mario Galaxy that I admire very much, themes that mean so much to me represented in such an approachable fashion. With all this said, you'd think I would adore Galaxy just as much as the other 3D Mario games, elevated just as high as Super Mario 64 and Sunshine, wouldn't you?

But transitioning into the Second Big Idea, Super Mario Galaxy came at a slightly tumultuous time in Nintendo and Mario history, after Super Mario Sunshine failed to live up to expectations, and the GameCube itself landed in third place behind the PlayStation 2 and even the Xbox. Nintendo needed the Wii's new Mario to be a solid, indisputable win, one that didn't suffer from the excess complexity that the late Satoru Iwata speculated was a contributor to Sunshine's failings. Super Mario Galaxy, a game that so far aimed to subvert Super Mario, now also needed to define it, be completely identifiable as what people envisioned a Super Mario game to be while also presenting something beyond what Super Mario had done. So what did they do?
They compromised.

I'd started talking about Super Mario Galaxy's themes by highlighting a couple of fantastic galaxies that emphasize the game's biggest strengths, so I'll start by talking about a galaxy. One that's my absolute least favorite course in the entire franchise that is Super Mario, in fact. I look at it, and I question why on earth Nintendo saw fit to include this in the same game as the Battlerock.

And that's Toy Time Galaxy.

Toy Time Galaxy feels like a personal insult, the representation of the tragic compromise found in Super Mario Galaxy's vision. The part that stings more than any other is its music: an ironic echo of the Super Mario Bros. Ground Theme plays, stripped of all its stylistic context, its original latin, reggae and jazz fusion-inspired roots, recontextualized into something offensively juvenile as Mario jumps across a pixellated version of himself collecting Silver Stars, as though the developers are saying "Yeah! Isn't this the Mario you remember from the good old days?"

And, well, no. It's not. Super Mario Galaxy drenches itself in Mario iconography (particularly that from Super Mario Bros. 3) to keep itself grounded - digging up the airships last seen in Super Mario World complete with a fantastic orchestration of their Super Mario Bros. 3 music, resuscitating the same game's athletic theme, bringing Fire Mario into 3D for the first time, and even constructing parallels between it and Super Mario 64's Bowser courses by using the Koopa's Road music once again - all for the sake of doing something the series had rarely done quite so blatantly up to that point: appealing to nostalgia.

I'm okay with nostalgia, don't get me wrong. After all, I am a Kirby fan, and that series likes to bring up connections between and across each and every game almost as much as Pokémon does. But I find it so dryly amusing that this careless self-referential attitude makes for the most ironic imagery in the franchise, such as a moment in Good Egg Galaxy's Battle Fleet where some of the most raw depictions of an open battlefield that Super Mario would allow is juxtaposed by the bolted block platforms from Super Mario Bros. 3 thrown around haphazardly all around the field.

It's moments like that that make it clear that Super Mario Galaxy felt obligated to be a video game, and especially a Super Mario game. Cliched locations like Beach Bowl, Melty Molten and Ghostly Galaxies feel like Super Mario Galaxy checking off a list of things that it contractually needs; its star-based structure seems taken from Super Mario 64 and Sunshine without really understanding what they did for the games' design, and musical moments like Bunny Chasing and Ball Rolling just feel embarrassing to be in the same game as the rest of Super Mario Galaxy's soundtrack, which often borrows harmonies and musical language from the deeply sentimental French world of musical impressionism like no other Super Mario game had really done before or since.

Maybe I'd be okay with this if it at least was a good game, one just as solid as Sunshine and 64 in its design when stripped of its thematic elements. But I'm sorry, I just don't think it is.

It's finally time. Let's start with the controls. Where Super Mario Odyssey gave Mario an extremely streamlined moveset that's almost too smooth and optimized to trivialize the platforming it throws at the player, Super Mario Galaxy's controls are by contrast a bit too fixed, with momentum all but missing, the spin serving as a one-dimensional extension to Mario's jump and most moves having zero synergy with each other except for the wall jump and spin.
It's streamlined, but in an opposite direction; there's very little depth to Super Mario Galaxy's movement, and the level design ends up being built around it to a fault. I know this is from the sequel, but think about the Throwback Galaxy for a second, and how much less interesting of an experience it is now that Mario can no longer dive all around and play around with the momentum that the slopes give him compared to Super Mario 64.
If Super Mario Odyssey makes Mario feel like a fat guy with a hat, Super Mario Galaxy just has that fat guy, and... I'm sorry, I'm just not a fan of it.

The controls were probably streamlined for the sake of the spherical, gravity-based platforming, and I feel like that's a case of compromising your game to force it around an ill-fated gimmick. Although I don't think the Course Clear-style of level design was inherently bad, the planetoid aspect messes with my sense of depth and spatial awareness far more than any other Mario game does, and the camera angles that are even more limited than Super Mario 64 (how do people defend this, again?) absolutely do not help in that regard.

Certain stars can be done in courses out of order again, but at a deadly price: only three out of six stars in each major galaxy is a properly story mission akin to Super Mario Sunshine's eight episodes per course, and the rest involve a single hidden star each that are sometimes found through clever exploration, but far too often handled through a painfully conspicuously-placed Luma that demands your Star Bits, and two Comet-based stars that you can't really predict when you'll have access to.

This throws any capacity for detailed, long-form environmental storytelling that Super Mario Sunshine had right out of the window, and the missions are instead distinguished specifically by mechanical changes and sometimes just sending you to different planetoids altogether and removing the last bit of possibility Super Mario Galaxy had of showing how its worlds would change with time.

And honestly, much of the comet stars are flat-out padding. I concede that some of the missions, mainly the Cosmic Mario races, can be interesting, but redoing certain missions again but faster? Collecting a hundred Purple Coins all thrown about an unnecessarily large map? No damage runs of certain sections of levels without any checkpoints whatsoever? Count me out.
People complain that Sunshine is full of padding and red coins, but honestly - Galaxy is no better in this regard whatsoever, and I'm sick of putting up with this hypocrisy, the blindness people seem to have about this aspect of Galaxy just because... I don't even know, honestly.

I could go on. I think 100% completing Super Mario Galaxy is a tedious experience, especially doing it a second time with Luigi and fighting the final Bowser fight a total of four times; the Grande Finale Galaxy is another example of Super Mario Galaxy choosing function over form by ignoring the fact that there's no way it could canonically take place, since the Toad Brigade being promoted to Royal Guards would have no reason to happen in the New Galaxy welcomed at the end of Super Mario Galaxy; I hate Star Bits, having to make sure I have enough to give Lumas both within galaxies and in the Comet Observatory, especially using the Switch Lite's touch controls; Super Mario Galaxy has an extremely bizarre conflict on how much it wants to be function-over-form, and vice versa... but I've taken up so much of your time already, and I've taken up so much of my own time in writing and researching for this, (preparing for this review involved an entire re-read of The Little Prince for example, and I never actually ended up directly referencing any of it in this review... though there are some slight aesthetic and tonal parallels) and I don't wish to keep the both of us here much longer.

After all, we need to move on. Isn't that something this game was talking about?
I want to make it clear that I don't think Super Mario Galaxy is by any means a bad game. It's far more interesting than many other platformers I've seen and played; it's not even as confused in its gameplay progression as Super Mario Odyssey was.
Super Mario Galaxy has provided me with some of my favorite ideas in video games, and has influenced me significantly as a musician and as a creative in general. Its best musical moments are some of my favorites from the series, even if the Bunny Chasing theme will make me cringe any day of the week.

Super Mario Galaxy's thematic vision is easily the best in the Super Mario series, but it's undermined by the dichotomy it created for itself, and ends up with a very diluted focus that I wish had really gone so much farther than it had the freedom to go. This might be the only Super Mario game whose biggest problem I would consider is that it had to be a Mario game. I want it to go harder on the themes it introduced, series image be damned.
But this might also be the first game where Super Mario found itself unconfident, and glossed over it with a shiny, cinematic aesthetic while it figured out where the series was to go next, just like Super Mario Odyssey would find itself doing exactly ten years after it.

It's... it's just a little misdirected. It's stuck between subverting Super Mario, and defining Super Mario, and didn't quite know how to commit, in an almost mirror image of Super Mario Odyssey's fatal flaw. It doesn't land quite as well as any of the games that committed, for better or for worse (my list would include 64, Sunshine, Galaxy 2, 3D Land and 3D World), but I want to see Nintendo revisit these ideas. Odyssey tried in some ways and played it safe in others, but maybe we might be getting close. I'll maintain hope for the future.

But now, it's truly time to move on.

Farewell, Super Mario Galaxy.

Super Mario Galaxy is the perfection of the 3D Mario formula even to this day for me. As a kid, this game left its mark on me that video games are more than entertainment, they can be art.

Super Mario Galaxy makes its scale known right from the start. The booming orchestral soundtrack greeting you at the title screen, a small fairytale like story being told, and then an iconic callback to Super Mario 64 with Peach giving Mario a letter. Not only does it hammer home how far Mario has come, but respects the origin of Mario's 3D debut, as they likely went back to Mario 64 to craft Galaxy, unlike the much more different Mario Sunshine. We get the opening sequence which is far more cinematic, with an orchestral score, some insane visuals, and a bit of action before Mario is blasted into the depths of space itself. That first moment when Mario wakes up in a field of flowers on an unknown planet stands out to me so much, when they pan out to the planet itself, it's magical.

The tutorial level introduces everything we need to know. Gravity mechanics, and the spin attack, as well as some collectibles, and other puzzle/collectible elements later levels will be using. It's perfect, it also does a nice job at showcasing how galaxies will be laid out, a cluster of planets and other platforms/debris you'll launch to so you can reach the area of interest to get a star. Similar structure to Mario 64 with having six stars per galaxy, but also has Sunshine's idea of each level altering the galaxy in unique ways each time to explore new parts of it. This not only fleshes out exploration of these beautiful galaxies, but keeps things fresh and interesting every mission almost. Minor boss battles will also be encountered, the larger bosses are reserved for their own specific galaxies.

Atmosphere in Mario Galaxy is profound. Capturing the haunting beauty of space is not easy, yet Mario Galaxy to me has my favorite interpretation of it. Space Junk Galaxy to me capture this haunting beauty I described absolutely perfectly. Space Junk feels very lonely, and the music permeates this feeling of loneliness, yet it's also got a tinge of curiosity. The way all the junk is floating through space undisturbed for a long time, almost perfectly preserved, makes you ask where it came from. The beauty is created from all of this, the music, atmosphere, and setting create a feeling of utter peace, and curiosity, which I find beautiful in a pure sense. Other levels like Beach Bowl Galaxy are so vibrant with upbeat music it makes me want to go to the beach, bask in the sun, and look up at the sky. Mario Galaxy is able to provoke so many strong emotions in me through the different galaxies, it's honestly incredible. Each Galaxy is like a work of art, and having the backdrop of empty space, stars, a sun or two, or even a swirling vortex of ghosts makes it more special than if it was just a skybox of some clouds, which are present but fit the worlds they're used in.

I've mentioned the vibrant colors already, but Mario Galaxy is a beautiful game. It's also got a refined polish in all aspects. Mario feels the best he ever has in Galaxy, just the right amount of weight and float to his jumps, the spin attack doubling as a correction for bad jumps or positioning is great, and feels impactful when attacking enemies as well. Mario even gives an energetic kick to most enemies you stun with the spin attack which is so satisfying. All the smaller details in Mario Galaxy feel so essential because without them, it would not flow nearly as good. The only true complaint I can give this game is some of the motion control gimmicks they use for certain levels. I can't even complain too much since the more harrowing challenges are rare, the game mostly just asks you to point and click pull-stars that have a generous amount of room for error. Enemy variety itself isn't strong, however unique enemies per galaxy fixes this issue and makes those galaxies feel even more unique. A fully orchestrated soundtrack that is also one of my favorite soundtracks of all time, my favorites being Battlerock Galaxy, Buoy Base, Beach Bowl, and Good Egg Galaxy. The only other complaint I could make are how all power-ups are temporary and mostly used for puzzles, rather than combat. Fire Flower has some offensive utility to it, but is still mostly used for puzzles. I don't mind this, since Mario 64 did the same thing, Galaxy has way more variety however, though maybe not as iconic.

Super Mario Galaxy is a masterpiece of a video game. I've played it every few years consistently since it came out on launch, and I always find something new about it I love. It's easily my favorite Mario game of all time as well, since everything just came together like lightning in a bottle for this particular experience. The music, graphics, controls, gameplay, all of it, just felt so perfect, and always will. You can get Super Mario Galaxy on the Wii, you can also play it through the Super Mario 3D All-Stars collection on Switch. While a controversial game to some, Galaxy does look stunning in the port, they've also made some small changes such as mapping the spin to the "X" button, you also now use gyro controls instead of motion controls. Also, I forgot to mention this and didn't know where to put it in my review, but... Whenever you make progress in Super Mario Galaxy, you might get notified another chapter of a storybook is available. I implore you to see for yourself what the story is and to experience it for yourself. It might be the best writing Mario has ever seen in the mainline series.

this game is epoc

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Super Mario Galaxy was always one of my favorite games growing up, but over the years I've drifted apart from that notion for reasons outside my understanding. Any time I would attempt to revisit the game, it never quite stuck the landing like it did during my magical first playthrough. Recently however, I think I realized what made this game stick out at the time, while falling short under my current standards for 3D Mario games.

It's honestly really simple, the game loves to show you impressive things, while never letting the player do anything interesting on their own.

Now I understand to a point why this may not bother a lot of people. Nintendo themselves have described 3D Mario games as falling under two categories: linear course clear games like Galaxy and 3D World, and sandbox games like 64 and Sunshine. The former dropping the player into one-off level concepts that railroad the player, with the latter letting the player find the fun for themselves within smaller playground-like levels. While these are both going for vastly different approaches in design, it's hard for me to look at them in a vacuum when one thing ties all of his games together regardless of dimension, and that's the joy of moving Mario around an environment.

Simply put, Super Mario Galaxy just does not control as well as other 3D Mario games, or many other 3D platformers for that matter. When talking about what Galaxy does well, people often lean on the level design, which is true to a point. While these levels take the planetoid concept and do really interesting things with them, the player doesn't have many options to make their own fun while completing these samey linear objectives. At least in a game with movement as simple as 3D World, the developers crafted an identity for every single stage, while Galaxy tends to send you down paths that only slightly differ in structure.

Now, an argument can be made that the levels are built around what Mario is capable of so it's foolish to complain about the controls, but to me, the levels can only be so fun when the playable character feels so sluggish. After all, a game is only as interesting as the characters that inhabit it, regardless of the genre. Even a game with levels as barren as Devil May Cry 4 houses some of the most interesting combat in the entire action genre. Developers should ideally strive to find a good middle ground between interesting movement and interesting level design, but I'll always personally prefer games that allow the player to make many interesting choices during gameplay.

I do not hate Super Mario Galaxy, the universe exploring concept still holds so much potential Nintendo has yet to tap into, but if they were to make a Galaxy 3, it may be in their best interest to rethink some of the fundamental design choices they made during the first two games. For now though, I'll just stick to 64 and Sunshine.

Super Mario Galaxy is proof of how drastically an orchestral score can elevate a gaming experience.

SMG had, upon its release, the grandest sense of scope and scale that any Mario game (or arguably, any platformer) ever had. Part of this was because you were zipping around through space, sure. But the music made it into something truly special.

In this game, you'll find clever platforming puzzles based around the gravity generated by tiny planetoids and other celestial objects. It's a creative mechanic that's pretty unique to Galaxy and its sequel. The camera can take some getting used to and might make you dizzy for a while, but it ultimately becomes a truly wonderful platforming experience. And it can't be stated enough, tracks like "Gusty Garden Galaxy," "Good Egg Galaxy," and "Rosalina in the Observatory" do so much to add this feeling of gravitas to your journey. At first, it can feel out of place for a character as grounded and simple as Mario, but as the game goes on, you realize that the galaxies are the real star (tee-hee) of the show here, not the Nintendonian Plumber.

Tl;Dr: Space good. Music better.

Even all the hype surrounding this game couldn't prepare me for how beautiful an experience this game is. The levels, fun, fast and flowing. The music, sweeping and graceful orchestras. The bosses were fun, offering spectacle and occasionally some light challenge.

What can you say? It's all been said before, the game is dazzling. There is so much content. But content you actully want to do, not content shoved in by Ubisoft to make the game 400 hours longer than it needs to be. I was bummed out finding a stopping point to do the final boss level. And the storybook could be genuinely sad, but still warm and joyful at the same time. I delighted when the game said another chapter was unlocked.

All you really can say is this is "Good Feelings: The Game." I am shocked there's a direct sequel that people seem to hold in just as high a regard. I cannot fucking wait.

My favorite 3D Mario:

- It has incredible atmosphere, very nostalgic and melancholic
- A beautiful soundtrack
- Snappy movement
- Great level design if you are into linear platformers rather than collect-a-thons
- I love Rosalina as a character and her background story

in theory, sunshine and galaxy should probably mean more to me than they do. super mario sunshine was the first 3d mario that i owned, and i very distinctly remember getting my wii a few years later and tearing into super mario galaxy - it was either the holidays of 2007 or 2008, i can't recall. i definitely recall being fascinated by galaxy's breadth and expanse, its scale and the variety i found in its ideas, constantly throwing new planet types and level gimmicks my way. i maintain galaxy does have moments of excellence that i was spot on for remembering as a kid.

it's really a bummer to return to this one with a lot more worldliness and experience in my early 20s, with my new outlook on what motivates and captures me in art and expression, and see galaxy for what it is to me now - not the milestone masterpiece that i thought it was, but a really good game too shy of pushing itself to take that step and become that masterpiece.

another writer here put similar thoughts together with a lot more expanse than i care to, but in summary, i feel that galaxy wants to have those moments in which it borders on subversion of what mario as a series has been, with a grander scale with lightly-dipped themes like the cycle of life and a nice layer of isolation and ambience thrown on top... but then for every moment of that, there's three in which the game loudly babies and parades itself around as another Quirky Nintendo Game with kiddish (not in the sense of childlike wonder, but patronizing babyish tone) aesthetics, music and design. galaxy is simply too afraid to be what it wants you to think it is, and given that this title ushered in the era of the mario mandate, a phenomenon which still exists in which the diverse edges of the mario series would be dusted smooth, corporate and conforming, this doesn't come into retrospection with a lot of surprise. ultimately, it's hard to take galaxy's moments of attempted profundity or emotional outreach all that seriously, because the GAME doesn't take them all that seriously. this is different from a game like earthbound, in which these themes are all tonally consistent and the quirk and charm are part of the grander narrative; it's just a clash of ideas vs. mandates that comes off a lot less inspired than sunshine, a game i'd still say is an overall substantially less completely worthwhile experience.

and that's nothing to speak of some of my gripes with the gameplay; while the planet navigation with its warping gravity is mostly good and certainly impressive, mario himself never feels quite right, with queer changes to his flow of movement inconsistent between various types of traversal. an archaic lives system returns making itself even more fruitless with the game's constant barrage of extra lives - which, now that i'm thinking about this while writing, actually begs an interesting thought about the galaxy experience itself..

q. if the concern is to make super mario galaxy accessible to newcomers, why even bother with the concept of 1-ups at all? why not forgo the system for infinite lives, allowing newcomers to continue until they complete the levels, and for veterans to not fan to belabor meaningless game over screens? to that point, if this was supposed to be a new step for a wider-than-ever target demographic, why all the back-steps and throwbacks to super mario bros. 3? why all the typical "mario series tropes" that steal away from galaxy's original identity? if this is supposed to be a new mario for a new generation of players, why are we stuck on all of these old ideas, even when in execution several of them are WORSE than they have been in previous entries (the camera controls, the star-based mission structure, the coin collection missions, forced control gimmicks in "special levels" which add arbitrary unneeded difficulty)???

a. "because this is nintendo, this is mario, and this is the way we've always done things. tradition overwrites innovation."

Super Mario Galaxy is the pinnacle of game design. It's atmospheric, beautiful, Cinematic, and nostalgic. This will forever be my personal favorite game of all time. It's almost impossible for me to describe how I about Super Mario Galaxy.
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Pros
+ Mario's movement feels crisp
+ The spin attack is simple yet effective
+ Motion controls don't get in the way of the game
+ Every star feels unique
+ Every level has a creative theme, gimmick, or challenge
+ Challenging, but rewarding
+ Rosalina's story book adds a lot of nice story and lore for the character
+ The greatest video game soundtrack of all time, all of it is beautifully orchestrated
+ Luigi is playable
+ You can actually play as Luigi in this game
+ Luigi
Cons:
- A 2 player mode for this game should have never existed

My personal favorite game of all time. I don't think I will ever stop being pulled in for another 100% playthrough! This is Mario at his best with creative levels, fun mechanics, and lots of challenge for players to encounter. One of the reasons I adore this game is the optional backstory for Rosalina, and how it isn't afraid to be a tear-jerking empathetic tale in the middle of a happy-go-lucky Mario game. It's always a joy to revisit this title since it is very easy to jump in and play 10 minutes at a time before moving on. It's a must play platformer and one of the Wii's crowning gems!