You know it's not often I play something with any kind of modicum of popularity these days, I have a soft spot for being the demented weirdo who plays the most random garbage that spans god knows how many systems. I like to celebrate the obscure, whether they're hidden gems or entertaining garbage that gets non-stop chuckles. It's very off-brand for me I know, but I've been interested in giving this an honest replay for a while.

It might be shameful for me to admit, but I was one of those edgelord kids ten years ago that went "ugh, why do people like Mario 64 so much?!" Often citing uninspired stage design, the camera being unhelpful at times during careful platforming, and just generally not liking it's philosophy of constantly booting the player out of the stage and have them experience the same stretches like groundhog day if they wished to 100% it.

Unfortunate for me to say, but I still don't enjoy 100%'ing this game. You're gonna need to threaten me with some kind of power drill to make me collect 100 coins on some of these stages. I think maybe that's why Spyro ended up aging better for me in the long run, as it's easier to just go through levels in one visit and collect everything and move on. Meanwhile Mario 64 kicks you out of stages like an angry pet owner constantly, and collecting 100 coins in one life just isn't as fun as collecting gems at my leisure. It's all subjective of course.

It's not to say I didn't enjoy my time with it. They really struck gold with Mario's movement in this game, just kinda bewildering how they managed to get it right and still give us a few useless moves. Do you use the little breakdancing kick from the crouching position? Nah, you're lying. It's worth full respect that they went out of their way to make sure every position had some kind of additional movement or attack, regardless if they even had any realistic use. It's the last thing I'll ever complain about, because well....movement good? Except sliding, I don't like the sliding bits much. "Mysterious Mountainside" my ass, that shit originally took me years to find.

It's weird, you'd think I'd have more nostalgia for something I played on Christmas with my dad when my family got me an N64. Probably because all of it is front-loaded into Peach's courtyard at the beginning, where I just had a barrel of laughs jumping around, and Mario hoot and hollered like a funny guy. Couldn't imagine a reality where Mario kept to himself in this game, don't think it'd be as fun. Trying to envision a scenario where Mario tries to walk up to a signpost, and instead clumsily runs into it and doesn't go "OOF!". It just isn't funny anymore.

For all my complaints I still see it's place in history despite being a Jumping Flash stan. At the risk of upsetting the speedrunning and A-Button challenge community, I don't think I love it as much as others do, but I will say my opinion has improved on it. If you ever get tired of me complaining about Rainbow Ride or the scab Lakitu they got doing the terrible camera work just throw this piece of music at me. I'll be instantly disarmed, not gonna lie. I tear up every time.

Thanks Koji Kondo, I'll forgive you for composing the slider theme that got spammed near the end.