Super Mario 64 (Nintendo 64) - Part 8
0NOTE: I AM BAD AT THIS GAME. I KNOW. DO NOT REMIND ME. THANKS :D
Back in late December, I got my hands on a Hyperkin Admiral - an after-market Nintendo 64 appliance which not only grants the system wireless controller support via Bluetooth but drastically changes the feel and layout of the controller as well. One new feature is an analogue stick more akin to what the Nintendo Gamecube had. Wanting to try out this new device, I decided that Super Mario 64, with its sensitive analogue focused playback, would be the most appropriate game to try it out on. What commenced after the fact became this very playthrough itself.
Perhaps I should be more elated to find a new excuse to play Super Mario 64: It is the defining 3D Platformer of the fifth generation in gaming, and with good reason, because it's core mechanics are satisfying even today. The flexibility of Mario’s movement means light touches will have him move slowly and aggressive motions have him rapidly move into a sprinting animation. It is possible, and necessary, to make precise measures with the controller to do much of the tight platforming featured in the game. Mario’s many acrobatic flips, rolls and dives make the character come to life in 3D. Despite the cartridge’s 6MB of limited storage as well, presentation is strong, featuring bright and colourful visuals. The sound and music both leave a lasting impression too, with the chirpy tunes of Bob-omb Battlefield and relaxing tones of Jolly Roger Bay always sticking out in particular. Mario 64 likewise is the first entry into the series where many first heard Charles Martinet give the memorable Italian plumber his voice.
I suppose the reason Super Mario 64 never grew on me, unlike as it had done to many of my peers in school at the time, has a lot more to do with how the game was such a departure from previous main series Mario games. Progression with Mario 64 in particular comes more in the form of collecting stars and often in a very confusing manner. Hazy Maze Cave has a star which tells to “watch out for falling rocks”, never doing much to suggest you need to move to an obscure area of the map separate to the rocks, perform a wall jump between a closed space, and reach the top in order to obtain the star. It is clunky and certainly frustrating for an older player, nevermind a new one. I also NEVER liked collecting 100 coins on many of the stages featured in Super Mario 64, as it felt a needless way of padding out the number of obtainable stars in a game.
It is rather cute how the game introduces its camera controls, treating it as if a live news-feed from the Lakitu Bros’ point of view, and while certainly it worked better to introduce the design to both the players and game world at large, the perspective controls are not without their own set of flaws. Often the camera does not keep up with the flow of the action, with it getting caught on stage scenery, obfuscating your view, or getting stuck on parts of the environment. Some jumps are difficult or nigh on impossible to determine because it is impossible to adjust the angle to make sense of where you are moving to. Modern analysis rarely reflects on how poorly this aspect of Mario 64 has aged, becoming quite rose-tined about its functionality because it was one of the first. Yet contemporaries again arguably were better in displaying the third-person view, with the likes of Crash Bandicoot and Bug! perrhaps side-stepping the issue with a fixed camera plane, and Croc, as well as Tomb Raider, going for a locked camera behind the character, except at vital moments.
In anycase, I enjoyed most of what I got out of Super Mario 64, despite my reservations about the issues mentioned earlier. If anything else, Mario 64 has revitalised my interest in some of the other Nintendo 64 luminaries of this same era. Platformers, and classic action adventure games for that matter, take a lot more dedication but the reward for doing so feels enormously fulfilling. It is something I often miss when playing games of the seventh and eighth generation, which instead lock the joy of victory and success behind a paywall, besides not really understanding the flow of challenge - moving from one stage of difficulty to the next. If Super Mario 64 has anything, it has game design that recognises the escalating level of challenge, artificial (through bad camera work) or otherwise, and gets the therapeutic feel of besting the game. Maybe, sometimes, that is enough.
--------------------------------------------------------
A LEGAL NOTICE:
--------------------------------------------------------
Any copyrighted footage I use is covered under fair use laws, or more specifically those listed under Section 30(1) of the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1989 and under section 107 of US Copyright Act 1976. This video exists purely for the purpose of research and criticism. I do not make a profit from any uploaded content, nor do I intend to. Thank you for watching.
Other Videos By Louis B
Other Statistics
Super Mario 64 Statistics For Louis B
At this time, Louis B has 510 views for Super Mario 64 spread across 8 videos. About 7 hours worth of Super Mario 64 videos were uploaded to his channel, less than 0.80% of the total video content that Louis B has uploaded to YouTube.