The "New" was only ever entirely literal: disappointingly, that subseries was essentially a Mario highlight reel rather than anything actually new. Of course, novelty isn't tantamount to quality, but it often feels like Nintendo's only strength as a developer in the modern age is their willingness to experiment. We'll never see another first-party Nintendo game that's not painfully easy and overtutorialized, or one that pushes its mechanics and is at all willing to punish you, or even one that feels mysterious, but buy a Nintendo console and you'll still always end up with a handful of exclusives that are at least fresh conceptually. Just... without "Mario" in any of their titles. Galaxy is far from my favorite Mario game, but it's the most recent one that actually felt like something new, which is concerning considering that it released when most of this site's userbase was still in diapers. We're in the mid 2020s now and traditional, lives-and-continues-based 2D platformers are basically dead and buried, but here comes Super Mario Bros. Wonder with what seems to be a singular, concentrated effort to be new and not just New. You can turn into an elephant in this one!
Unfortunately, though, the elephant powerup is even more emblematic of the entire game than anyone could've anticipated. It looks completely unique to Mario, and, I guess, technically, it is, as he's never had an upgrade that requires him to reload his projectiles before, but does it actually change the gameplay in any meaningful capacity? No. It's just another way to break blocks and attack enemies horizontally. The whole game is preoccupied with appearing new instead of actually being new, and, I mean, it succeeded in this regard, considering I actually bought it after skipping both New Super Mario Bros. U and Bowser's Fury. Wonder flowers feel less like a central gameplay hook and more like short bonus sections that are part of already minuscule levels. The only way they were ever gonna work from a mechanical perspective was if they all happened during high-pressure situations and forced you to adapt to unpredictable twists on the fly (although that would just be a rehash of Wario Land 4) and the only way they were ever gonna work from a spectacle perspective was if they actually went all in. For every wonder section that genuinely took me by surprise- switching the point-of-view to top-down or putting me in outer space or making Mario really, really tall- there'd be five that would just turn the level into an autoscroller, or just make the enemies bigger, or just move the geometry around more than usual. Too often, it's weird in the same way that Mario Land 2 is weird: visually, and that's it. Ultimately, it's far prettier than the New Super Mario Bros. games, but it's no less bland.
And outside of the wonder sections, there really just isn’t all that much to talk about. The badge system makes Mario’s moveset loose and flexible akin to something like Yoshi’s Island, but it’s missing the level variety and mechanical experimentation that made that game work. A few stages have bonus exits, but they lack any of Super Mario World’s pseudo-puzzle solving or sense of mystery. What’s left? The fact that it has a handful of decent stage-specific mechanics? (All of the other New games do, too.) Those one-screen puzzle levels? (Didn’t care for them in Mario Maker, still don’t here.) The weird, Dark Souls-ass asynchronous co-op? (I refuse to pay for Nintendo’s online service, so I can’t comment.) How every individual world feels like its own little adventure? (Alright, I admit it, I liked this one.) If you’re not going to be new, you could at least be cohesive- I’m a big fan of both 3D World and Odyssey, but I’d hesitate to call either of them particularly revolutionary, instead focusing on being a conduit for co-op shenanigans and a modernization of Mario 64’s mechanics, respectively. Besides being bright and colorful, is there a similar underlying summary that you could apply to Wonder? More and more, it feels like Mario is becoming Kirby: not striving for anything beyond a vaguely pleasant experience and producing no bad games, but no great ones either. Maybe my standards are just too high- after all, we don't expect Star Wars or The Simpsons or Halloween to be cutting-edge anymore, even though they were at one point, so why should we Mario? But, in 2024, this franchise is unrecognizable from the one that gave us 3's level map and World's secret exits and 64's moveset. And that just saddens me more than anything else.
Unfortunately, though, the elephant powerup is even more emblematic of the entire game than anyone could've anticipated. It looks completely unique to Mario, and, I guess, technically, it is, as he's never had an upgrade that requires him to reload his projectiles before, but does it actually change the gameplay in any meaningful capacity? No. It's just another way to break blocks and attack enemies horizontally. The whole game is preoccupied with appearing new instead of actually being new, and, I mean, it succeeded in this regard, considering I actually bought it after skipping both New Super Mario Bros. U and Bowser's Fury. Wonder flowers feel less like a central gameplay hook and more like short bonus sections that are part of already minuscule levels. The only way they were ever gonna work from a mechanical perspective was if they all happened during high-pressure situations and forced you to adapt to unpredictable twists on the fly (although that would just be a rehash of Wario Land 4) and the only way they were ever gonna work from a spectacle perspective was if they actually went all in. For every wonder section that genuinely took me by surprise- switching the point-of-view to top-down or putting me in outer space or making Mario really, really tall- there'd be five that would just turn the level into an autoscroller, or just make the enemies bigger, or just move the geometry around more than usual. Too often, it's weird in the same way that Mario Land 2 is weird: visually, and that's it. Ultimately, it's far prettier than the New Super Mario Bros. games, but it's no less bland.
And outside of the wonder sections, there really just isn’t all that much to talk about. The badge system makes Mario’s moveset loose and flexible akin to something like Yoshi’s Island, but it’s missing the level variety and mechanical experimentation that made that game work. A few stages have bonus exits, but they lack any of Super Mario World’s pseudo-puzzle solving or sense of mystery. What’s left? The fact that it has a handful of decent stage-specific mechanics? (All of the other New games do, too.) Those one-screen puzzle levels? (Didn’t care for them in Mario Maker, still don’t here.) The weird, Dark Souls-ass asynchronous co-op? (I refuse to pay for Nintendo’s online service, so I can’t comment.) How every individual world feels like its own little adventure? (Alright, I admit it, I liked this one.) If you’re not going to be new, you could at least be cohesive- I’m a big fan of both 3D World and Odyssey, but I’d hesitate to call either of them particularly revolutionary, instead focusing on being a conduit for co-op shenanigans and a modernization of Mario 64’s mechanics, respectively. Besides being bright and colorful, is there a similar underlying summary that you could apply to Wonder? More and more, it feels like Mario is becoming Kirby: not striving for anything beyond a vaguely pleasant experience and producing no bad games, but no great ones either. Maybe my standards are just too high- after all, we don't expect Star Wars or The Simpsons or Halloween to be cutting-edge anymore, even though they were at one point, so why should we Mario? But, in 2024, this franchise is unrecognizable from the one that gave us 3's level map and World's secret exits and 64's moveset. And that just saddens me more than anything else.
20 Comments
I share several of your grievances with the game, but I think the Wonder flowers were well-implemented. Platforming gimmicks have been a given since Mario 3 and the fact some effects are reused later on in a more challenging way, like when the game alternates between slowing down and speeding up instead of doing one or the other, told me these mechanics had a lot of room for expression. There was absolutely room to push the challenge further, but the free-roaming sections on the map often featured at least one level that was more challenging than its neighbors. The special world being available as early as World 1 is another example. I think Nintendo is trying to figure out how to truly satisfy players of all skill levels, and I definitely prefer this approach over every level being easy and the difficult ones being blocked off until the tail end, which has been a problem since 3D Land.
@dwardman: From NSMB1? You're right, it was pretty sick, especially in that download play versus mode
@EldestBrisingr: I don't even think it's a difficulty level thing for me, I wouldn't say I dislike easy games as a general rule. It's just that the platforming twists here aren't very interesting on their own without being challenging. I wanted it to go completely off the rails, since wonder sections are pretty much blank checks to do anything at all with the gameplay, but it doesn't. Slowing down/speeding up time just isn't a particularly creative idea. That's a good point about the more difficult stages being better interspersed than in past games, though. Especially since you're only required to beat a relatively small percentage of each world's levels so you'd probably be free to skip all of the ones with low star ratings if you wanted to.
@EldestBrisingr: I don't even think it's a difficulty level thing for me, I wouldn't say I dislike easy games as a general rule. It's just that the platforming twists here aren't very interesting on their own without being challenging. I wanted it to go completely off the rails, since wonder sections are pretty much blank checks to do anything at all with the gameplay, but it doesn't. Slowing down/speeding up time just isn't a particularly creative idea. That's a good point about the more difficult stages being better interspersed than in past games, though. Especially since you're only required to beat a relatively small percentage of each world's levels so you'd probably be free to skip all of the ones with low star ratings if you wanted to.
Thanks for voicing all my problems with the game pretty much 1-1, alongside the direction of the series at large. At least Zelda still seems to be going strong, I think.
@Scamsley: Funnily enough I feel like Zelda was in more or less this exact spot before Breath of the Wild. So that's a glimmer of hope, at least.
@dwardman: That's probably a fair assessment. NSMB1 is one of those games that I played over and over again as a kid but admittedly I haven't returned to it since then, I really should at some point to refresh my memory.
@dwardman: That's probably a fair assessment. NSMB1 is one of those games that I played over and over again as a kid but admittedly I haven't returned to it since then, I really should at some point to refresh my memory.
I think my outlook is more positive than yours overall, but I agree with pretty much everything you say. I noticed a stark lack of verticality in most levels, which sucks because both Bros 3 and World had a decent amount of that to my memory. Also, the bosses also underwhelm me, but I think they do most people.
Even though I wholeheartedly disagree with this review, this is actually a really good review. Props to that.
But I do have to say...
"Ultimately, it's far prettier than the New Super Mario Bros. games, but it's no less bland."
There's no way you genuinely think that lol
But I do have to say...
"Ultimately, it's far prettier than the New Super Mario Bros. games, but it's no less bland."
There's no way you genuinely think that lol
@JCLKaytwo: Which aspects of Wonder's gameplay would you say make it less bland than the New games?
@chump
Like... the whole thing? Every single aspect of it?
I know that's not the kind of answer you were looking for, but I really don't think there's much else to it. NSMB is the definition of the word 'bland', and there's a reason Mario Wonder was such a breath of fresh air for most people.
Like... the whole thing? Every single aspect of it?
I know that's not the kind of answer you were looking for, but I really don't think there's much else to it. NSMB is the definition of the word 'bland', and there's a reason Mario Wonder was such a breath of fresh air for most people.
@JCLKaytwo: I feel like I did a pretty good job of outlining why Wonder's non-aesthetic changes didn't manage to feel new, and thus not like a breath of fresh air, to me personally. If you think I missed something or I'm misrepresenting the game in some way, then I'd love to hear your perspective. Otherwise I'm not entirely sure how you could've read the review and come to the conclusion that the statement you quoted isn't my actual opinion.
@chump Sorry for late reply but here's my response
Ignoring Wonder's aesthetic, conceptual, and presentational contributions is ignoring what makes Wonder a unique and fresh game at all. The NSMB games are bland not because of their gameplay, which is perfectly sound, but their presentation. They are recycled, they are soulless, they are lazy copy pastes of each other, they intend to be nostalgia-pandering pseudo-remakes of Mario 3 and nothing more. All four games in the series have the same exact 8 world themes, the levels and visual design are strictly by the numbers, and the games really only serve to give Mario a consistent brand image. Wonder has a new location, new visual style with great animations, so many new level concepts, and even though the wonder effects are objectively superfluous from a gameplay perspective, they serve to give the game an identity. And I guarantee you, if each of the four individual NSMB games had something to call their own, people would be way less negative on them too.
Sure, as a platformer, Wonder isn't innovative. But to call it as bland as the NSMB games is just completely baffling and untrue for one reason alone: It's not soulless. It never feels like it was made by a corporation that only set out to make a game that says "this is what Mario should look like", to earn money from brand recognition alone. It feels like it was made by real human beings. Wonder is less bland than the NSMB games BY DEFAULT because of that.
Tl;dr the presentation, not the gameplay, is what makes the game so refreshing compared to the NSMB games, and it is nonsensical to intentionally ignore those aspects.
Ignoring Wonder's aesthetic, conceptual, and presentational contributions is ignoring what makes Wonder a unique and fresh game at all. The NSMB games are bland not because of their gameplay, which is perfectly sound, but their presentation. They are recycled, they are soulless, they are lazy copy pastes of each other, they intend to be nostalgia-pandering pseudo-remakes of Mario 3 and nothing more. All four games in the series have the same exact 8 world themes, the levels and visual design are strictly by the numbers, and the games really only serve to give Mario a consistent brand image. Wonder has a new location, new visual style with great animations, so many new level concepts, and even though the wonder effects are objectively superfluous from a gameplay perspective, they serve to give the game an identity. And I guarantee you, if each of the four individual NSMB games had something to call their own, people would be way less negative on them too.
Sure, as a platformer, Wonder isn't innovative. But to call it as bland as the NSMB games is just completely baffling and untrue for one reason alone: It's not soulless. It never feels like it was made by a corporation that only set out to make a game that says "this is what Mario should look like", to earn money from brand recognition alone. It feels like it was made by real human beings. Wonder is less bland than the NSMB games BY DEFAULT because of that.
Tl;dr the presentation, not the gameplay, is what makes the game so refreshing compared to the NSMB games, and it is nonsensical to intentionally ignore those aspects.
@JCLKaytwo: It sounds like we just differ in why we find the New games to be bland. Personally my lack of interest in them comes from the fact that they feel bland, not the fact that they look bland. 3D World isn't particularly interesting from a visual or thematic perspective, but it feels like a constant flow of ideas that promote 4-player chaos, and, as a result, I enjoyed it much more than Wonder or any of the New games, including NSMB Wii's co-op. On the other hand, I find the entire Kirby series to be bland despite how charming, colorful, and "soulful" every entry is. I found Psychonauts 2 to be bland despite it having some of the best art direction I'd ever seen in a video game. Is it really that far-fetched that you and I look for different things in a platformer? If I had known that Wonder's only appeal was going to be its "aesthetic, conceptual, and presentational contributions," I wouldn't have played it.
@chump
I mean, you kinda get what you sign up for with a 2D Mario. I always say that if you've played one you've played them all. If you're not into the gameplay of these games a new game won't win you over. The primary appeal of this game isn't actually its presentation, it's the signature classic Mario-style gameplay. The presentation is just what sets this game apart from the others and I think that's valid.
I mean, you kinda get what you sign up for with a 2D Mario. I always say that if you've played one you've played them all. If you're not into the gameplay of these games a new game won't win you over. The primary appeal of this game isn't actually its presentation, it's the signature classic Mario-style gameplay. The presentation is just what sets this game apart from the others and I think that's valid.
@JCLKaytwo To butt in a little as an observer, I sort of disagree. I think this is a mentality that's only emerged as a result of New Super Mario Bros. cause the vast majority of classic 2D Mario games had lots of differences in design and focus. Sure, you'll probably like one if you like another still, but there's 100% huge differences that could alienate someone and it feels like the majority of the classics had a "reason" to exist as opposed to just iterating.
1/3/World/Yoshi's Island are so drastically different in focus, movement, level design structure, level length, power-ups, world maps... I don't think the same applies to NSMB games and up, including Wonder.
1/3/World/Yoshi's Island are so drastically different in focus, movement, level design structure, level length, power-ups, world maps... I don't think the same applies to NSMB games and up, including Wonder.
@Scamsley
While I agree that each of the classic Mario games were quite different from each other, that was mostly a result of the inherent evolution of game design that was occurring at the time, rather than being caused by new directions. World and 3 are very iterative of 1; they're just evolutions of the first game that serve to take advantage of advances in technology and programming.
I also just don't see why iteration is a problem. If a formula works, it's a great idea to try to make improvements to create the best game out of that formula. You don't always have to reinvent the wheel if there's room to improve on what already exists. That's not a bad thing. I'm happy that Wonder exists so that we could see what an NSMB game would look like if the developers actually tried to make the best game they could.
I honestly also think that Wonder is a lot more unique and distinct from the previous Mario games than World is from 3.
While I agree that each of the classic Mario games were quite different from each other, that was mostly a result of the inherent evolution of game design that was occurring at the time, rather than being caused by new directions. World and 3 are very iterative of 1; they're just evolutions of the first game that serve to take advantage of advances in technology and programming.
I also just don't see why iteration is a problem. If a formula works, it's a great idea to try to make improvements to create the best game out of that formula. You don't always have to reinvent the wheel if there's room to improve on what already exists. That's not a bad thing. I'm happy that Wonder exists so that we could see what an NSMB game would look like if the developers actually tried to make the best game they could.
I honestly also think that Wonder is a lot more unique and distinct from the previous Mario games than World is from 3.
@JCLKaytwo: Maybe I misjudged the game's promotional material, but, as I said in my review, to me it felt like Wonder was being sold as something completely new. If you think I didn't do enough research before buying it, that's completely fair. I tend to not read much about games I'm interested in playing, which often ends up biting me in the ass. But I played through the game so I'm entitled to my opinion. Your original comment wasn't "you shouldn't have expected any gameplay innovations from Wonder," it was "there's no possible way you could've found this game to be bland." I greatly enjoy the core gameplay of the 2D Marios back from when they were at least somewhat challenging, but, again, as I outlined in my review, modern Nintendo's unwillingness to produce games with any semblance of difficulty means I rarely enjoy any of the iterative sequels that they put out. And I agree with Scamsley here: even if you ignore the less noticeable stuff like the differences in physics and level design philosophy, 3's level map and World's secret exits genuinely felt like fresh, innovative ideas. There's a reason I ended the review by mentioning them, all I'm saying is that Nintendo became an empire because of their history of innovation, and it's just frustrating as a lifelong fan to see their biggest franchise reach this level of stagnation.
@chump
Wowww... I'm sorry but your reply actually kinda frustrates me.
You are misrepresenting my argument. I never once said that "there's no possible way you could've found this game to be bland." I'm not arguing with you about you finding Wonder bland (I personally don't think it's bland at all, but I know I wouldn't be able to sway you because that kind of thing that is very subjective), I was specifically commenting about you finding Wonder to be AS BLAND AS the NSMB games. That was what I was arguing against. Don't misconstrue it.
And ummm, I'm sorry but... World's secret exits are a fresh, innovative idea? Huh? Did 1 and 3 not already have a bunch of secret exits? World just added more of a thing that the series already had. How does doing more of something that already exists pass as an innovation to completely justify the game, and yet everything Wonder did doesn't pass? Plus, World is also piss easy. Just as unchallenging as Wonder. The amount of mental gymnastics people go through to exempt World from criticism and yet criticize other games for the exact same issues is just insane.
Wowww... I'm sorry but your reply actually kinda frustrates me.
You are misrepresenting my argument. I never once said that "there's no possible way you could've found this game to be bland." I'm not arguing with you about you finding Wonder bland (I personally don't think it's bland at all, but I know I wouldn't be able to sway you because that kind of thing that is very subjective), I was specifically commenting about you finding Wonder to be AS BLAND AS the NSMB games. That was what I was arguing against. Don't misconstrue it.
And ummm, I'm sorry but... World's secret exits are a fresh, innovative idea? Huh? Did 1 and 3 not already have a bunch of secret exits? World just added more of a thing that the series already had. How does doing more of something that already exists pass as an innovation to completely justify the game, and yet everything Wonder did doesn't pass? Plus, World is also piss easy. Just as unchallenging as Wonder. The amount of mental gymnastics people go through to exempt World from criticism and yet criticize other games for the exact same issues is just insane.
Also, to criticize the later Mario games for not innovating as much as Mario 3 or 64 is just plain unfair. It is not possible to innovate as much as those two games. They are two of the most innovative games of all time, and their innovations came as a direct result of the moment in gaming history that they came out. Those moments are not repeatable and it's unfair to judge any game that comes out in the 2020s by those standards.
@JCLKaytwo: You're right, that was misconstruing your original comment, I apologize. To summarize my perspective and try to get this conversation back on track: I found the New games to be bland because a.) they are very easy and b.) they didn't do anything new with their gameplay. I found Wonder to be bland because a.) it is very easy and b.) it doesn't do anything new with its gameplay. World isn't the hardest game out there, but if you find its difficulty to be as low as the modern 2D Marios, then it sounds like you're just better at video games than me. I don't think I ever dipped below 10 or 15 lives while playing Wonder (and I avoided the shops and using any badges that felt like they trivialized the game even further) whereas if I picked up World right now I'm sure I'd get close to game overing at least once before beating it, plus it actually contains the risk of being sent back a few levels if you do lose. There's certainly an argument to be made that World's secret exits are just an iteration on the ones from Mario 1 or Mario 3's warp whistles, but to me they feel completely distinct. On the NES they felt like ways to completely skip portions of the game, reserved for anyone who played the games so much that they knew them inside and out. In World, they feel like side-passages that you can incidentally stumble upon if you happen to have the right powerup, even on your first playthrough, and discovering them often borders on puzzle-solving or even exploration rather than pure, linear platforming. Combining this with the fact that they usually unlock extra levels instead of just allowing you to skip some, the end result is a world that feels more interconnected than any other 2D (or honestly even 3D) Mario game. Despite the fact that World came out nearly a decade before I was born, every time I play through it it feels like I find a new secret exit. I'm not asking for them to completely revolutionize Mario, I'm just asking for anything at all that feels new. If you don't think that's possible either, then I'm not sure what to tell you.
dwardman
2 months ago