The camera sucks half the stages suck walljumping sucks and dying is overly punishing this is one of the best 3D platformers every made and not enough games took the right lessons from it.

The lack of a double jump or gliding and the near complete lack of air control makes platforming actually rewarding unlike most other 3D platformers. I get that the genre is mostly aimed at toddlers but kids fucking loved Mario 64 so I don't want to hear any excuses.
Mario 64 also manages to avoid the "every collectible is just lying on the ground" problem that every other collectathon including mario odyssey has by having some platforming or exploring involved behind getting most stars.
What I'm trying to say is that I fucking hate Banjo Kazooie. Bitch fuck Banjo Kazooie and its fans hope they get exactly one new game and gruntilda marries a man.

Most people I talk to (understandably) don't like this game, It has some pretty shitty levels no doubt, and the controls do not really hold up, but despite these frustrations I find myself continually going back to it every so often. It's just one of those games that clicks, that I get so sucked into while playing for just a couple minutes. I love revisiting levels I already know like the back of my hand and trying get stars in different, faster, ways, and I love fucking around in the areas and doing stuff that serves to impress no-one but myself. It's so unhinged, and I love it for that. In that sense I guess you could call it a guilty pleasure of mine. Just pure, dumb, fun.

It might not be the best in mechanical terms, but nothing has come closer to the eerie, adventurous, colorful, diverse, creative aesthetic of it all. Each level has a unique personality, a unique feeling and atmosphere attached to it. You really feel you're traveling to different worlds.

Probably the best game ever just because it's the essence of a videogame taken to its limits: to use mechanical, visual and musical aspects to make you feel in control of things, while also delivering a special, diverse and unique aesthetic experience.

And I always consider a plus the community around a game. The fact that this game continues to be reviewed and analyzed, tier lists and speedruns and unique run ideas like the A Press Challenge (I recommend you watch asap Bismuth's video about such challenge) come out almost every week or the thousands of rom hacks available that add new and fresh ideas are just some signs that this hits the right spot and it does it in a way that shines above similar works.

One can't overstate the historical impact of Super Mario 64. Its analog-stick controls and adjustable camera set the stage for 21st century gaming. Its 3D platforming has as many imitators as a mid-1960s Beatles album. And there's still nothing like the surreal invitation to stretch the features of Mario's big face before the game even starts.

But I still hesitate to call Mario 64 great. Once you acknowledge the major leap in presentation and get over the thrill of moving in three-dimensional space, you're left with a Mario that overemphasizes the collection of items in levels that you must play to death. Before Mario 64, Mario games had a momentum to them. Mario 64 feels more like a scavenger hunt without stakes. There's little urgency or pressure. By the halfway point, I'm already disinterested.

And whatever happened to the creative thinking behind Mario's abilities? The conservatism started with Super Mario World, which merely updated how the hero can fly and gave him a gimmicky dinosaur buddy. In Mario 64, the most notable addition is the expanded repertoire of jumps, but let's not forget this more acrobatic style already showed up in the greatest remake of all time, Donkey Kong 1994. The effects of the special caps in Mario 64 don't spark my imagination: another flying ability and two passive abilities, one of which corrects the stupid regressive rule that Mario can't breathe underwater. It's almost as if 1990s Nintendo threw up its hands after conceiving the wide array of game-changing powers in Super Mario Bros. 3 and Yoshi's Island.

I also despise Mario 64's patronizing, one-dimensional tone. This is a case where the massive influence of Mario 64 has short-circuited the gaming world's memory of what pop games could achieve emotionally. No matter the stage, Mario hoots like he just won the lottery as he jumps about. This creative decision smacks of the condescension Nintendo trotted out with the smiling clouds in the remakes within Super Mario All-Stars. It's clear Nintendo stopped trusting the emotional reactions of its audience with the release of Mario 64. Now people expect to hear the cute yelps and get showered with praise for finding a star under a rock. Would our tails no longer wag without these features?

I'm very emotional as I write this. This is my favorite single player game ever - it's not even close. I could talk about some of it's flaws, but while they might be flaws to most people, they're not to me. I love everything about this game.

Tonight I finally did it. I wish I had an audience to witness me. My 120th star - 100 Coins in Hazy Maze Cave - and I went outside, got shot out of a canon and met that scum bag rat fuck son of a bitch bastard Yoshi for my very first time!!!

My childhood is complete <3 this is a true coming of age moment for me.

One of the funniest games ever made.

Super Mario 64 revealed a platformer galvanized by the advent of 3D tech, unfolding its world in parallel to the new dimension. Far from including linear obstacle courses, this instead adopts a more open and surprisingly accommodating structure, akin to an adventure game that just so happens to contain the traversal of platformers. The wealth of movement options enabled by 3D - from long/side/back/triple/wall jumping to ever more eclectic 'powerups', grants a subtle degree of mastery over the perceived wobbly controls and shoddy camera. In addition, the change to quasi-missions leaves enough room for gameplay variety aplenty, that yet again complements the loose format.

That's just the tip of the iceberg, though. This is de facto less of a proper platformer and more of a delightful slapstick comedy where the player assumes neither the role of the audience nor director, but rather the bumbling stooge clumsily navigating the world around him. Primitive, almost volatile 3D physics and collisions actually contributes to the rampant hilarity, enhanced by a wondrous soundtrack and charming level aesthetics. Add to that the slippery controls plus odd sound effects from most entities (not to mention Mario's reactions) and the experience is an immaculate balance of skill-based complexity and unexpected humor. Of course, the unintentional nature of these gags is their greatest asset, an organic method that puts most overtly 'comedic' platformers before & after it to shame. That capricious nature prevails all throughout - even when their mannerism gets difficult lategame, the setbacks somehow get funnier as the stakes and desperation increase, defusing player frustration while making victory especially gratifying. Super Mario 64 is certainly influential, but its ilk - despite tighter controls and more memorable characters, never came close to matching this work's unstable goofball spirit.

esse jogo é tão estressante e divertido quanto cuidar de uma criança

e o Mario é uma criança sendo filmada enquanto brinca e se exibe com suas acrobacias

as fases tem literal o mesmo layout de parquinhos de rua, com desafios diversos mas nenhum ponto de progressão muito específico pra seguir

e os mundos serem fictícios dentro do próprio jogo é a materialização da imaginação fértil que o mario tem

eu não acredito nesse jogo, mas eu me encantei com suas brincadeiras.

I had never actually beaten this game until 2013, despite having played parts of it a few times since its release 17 years earlier. So even without copious amounts of nostalgia, this game grabbed hold of me and didn't let me go until I had 120 stars. The level of challenge is great. The N64's analog stick makes this the only way to play this game. On the Wii U's Virtual Console the stick has a huge dead zone. On DS you have a D-pad and a touch screen.

If it weren't for the Switch re-releases, the best way to play this would still be on the original N64 hardware!

...or an emulator, I guess

Ah, an instant classic

Nothing felt better than to 100% this game and see Mario waving to you at the end

What a masterpiece

This game looks like goddamn tech demo, and you know what? I fucking LOVE that. I'll be fucked if Super Mario 64 isn't satisfying to run and jump across. Maybe it wasn't perfect, but damn was it everything we needed in 1996. A world before my brain got corrupted by analysts and blowhard reviewers just itching their boners to call something "janky."

I loved this as a kid, and still revisit from time-to-time to love it some more, whether as a half-assed Switch port, or the code-dumped re-engineered PC port. This game still rocks. I'm going to tattoo low-poly Mario on myself someday.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D8sxTdvX4AAMqbd.jpg

Eu acho que é a primeira vez que platino a versão do N64. A primeira vez que joguei SM64 foi no remake de NDS, o qual platinei diversas vezes. Alguns anos depois emulei a versão original e zerei algumas vezes, mas a platina só tenho certeza que fiz dessa vez. Mais do que um mero espírito completionista, o que me motivou mesmo é que esse jogo é bom demais. Marios seguintes evidentemente trouxeram mais polimento e um visual mais aprimorado, mas em relação ao level design e game feel SM64 não deve nada a seus descendentes. Jogão.

fun game - lots of great levels, great design in place around them and tons of movement options

controls did NOT age well
you WILL bonk and you WILL slide way more than what is fun
you WILL want to ragequit a babygame for babies
you WILL fantasize about killing mario
you WILL call stage obstacles slurs
mario WILL spread his asscheeks with his entire two fists and point his depths directly at the camera (if you can manage to control the camera for more than 3 seconds)