Rant about a Mario game

[Nelsonic]

Hopefully one of these doesn't already exist; if it does, it hasn't been used in a long time (though I was unable to find one).
This thread is for exactly what it says on the tin. Rant about any aspect of a Mario or Mario-adjacent game. Anything that you don't like. It can even be the whole game, if you want.

For me, NES Remix is one of the worst video games Nintendo has ever made. Especially if you're going for 100%. The times are ridiculously tight on some of the challenges (especially for games that I would assume very few people would know the controls for, such as NES Baseball or Urban Champion). The game doesn't ever tell you what times equal what stars to my knowledge, only giving the super freaking vague hint ("hint") that "Your stars increase the faster you beat a challenge" or whatever. NOT TO MENTION, the game includes some of the absolute worst NES games when it comes to controls. This includes - but isn't limited to - Clu Clu Land and Ice Climber. These games just aren't fun to play, and this game expects one to do something ridiculously fast in both of them. And they aren't just limited to their respective stages, no - these damn things show up in the additional Remix packs as well!

The only saving grace that this game has is that it doesn't force you to rainbow-star its challenges (though, for some godforsaken reason, NES Remix 2 and [if I remember correctly] Ultimate NES Remix BOTH force you to rainbow-star THEIR challenges). And also, for some reason that I cannot freaking comprehend, the game decides to end off its Bonus challenges with a 36-LEVEL MUSHROOM HUNT FROM HELL in Super Mario Bros. Like, my only question is WHY. Why is THIS what we have to do at the very end??? Even though there's no time requirements for three stars (thank god), you still have to find Super Mushrooms in ALL 36 LEVELS OF THE GAME without messing up more than a few times. Like, how is a person supposed to do this without a video guide?

I get that most of these grievances are made null and void if you don't go for 100%, but if you DO go for 100%, it shouldn't be this AWFUL. Nintendo games are RARELY punishing to play, especially something they've made relatively recently. Like, the SEQUEL includes Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels for some reason, and that sounds absolutely HORRIFYING to attempt to play precisely and fast. And hell, the UNLOCKABLE THING you get for getting all rainbow stars in NES Remix 2? Well, one of them is literally just CREDITS. Like, yeah, let's watch a bunch of video game credits. Sure.

 

[Boo1268]

Is this for only negative rants? Or can we do positive ones?

 

[Nelsonic]

You can do a positive rant if you want. Either type is fine.

 

[Boo1268]

You can do a positive rant if you want. Either type is fine.

Then in that case.....

I dont understand why people dont like or even acknowledge Luigis Mansion Dark Moon/2! To me its literally one of the BEST entrys in the series! Being comparable to the 1st in equal quality, the games comedy is great, its puzzles fantastic, and while its combat to some may be simple it has deeper mechanics that many players can understand. Also I find that the Ranking system is very generous as long as you do what your meant to do in exploration/collection games like these, and GET THAT MONEY!

 

[Sparks]

Luigi's Mansion. I wanted to like this game, but unfortunately it's pretty bad. This is from someone who grew up with Dark Moon as his first Luigi's Mansion game.

The game has many problems:

• You're forced to capture 40 Boos, and they are atrocious to collect, especially the later ones which have a whopping 300 health. I guess Nintendo did this to prevent the game from being too short?
• Boss ghosts drop Poison Mushrooms. Why?! All they do is tick me off while I'm trying to get the best portraits for the ghosts. They are such a terrible design choice it's not even funny.
• Catching ghosts is awful. I get it's the first game, but sometimes they pull so hard I still lose grip of them/I still take damage. Dark Moon and 3 did this way better.
• Elements are fine, but having to run back and grab one just to fight a random elemental ghost that shows up later on? Not cool.
• The fortune teller. Just a massive unskippable wall of text.
• King Boo fight was lame, especially because it's just basically a Bowser battle.
• Luigi's movements are awkward, but it's manageable. What I HATE is when I'm fighting ghosts. Every single time one appears Luigi jumps in fright, basically stunning him for a second. This leaves me vulnerable to being attacked by other ghosts already present. Another design flaw that thankfully got removed in the sequels.
• Hidden Mansion was awful. Thankfully there's an exploit of returning to E. Gadd's lab to fully heal yourself.

I don't care what anybody says. Luigi's Mansion is a bad game and Dark Moon and 3 are way, way better games in comparison.

 

[Nelsonic]

Super Mario 64 DS's completion requirements are absurd. Since this is a REMAKE of the N64 version (from the group up, by the looks of it), you can't rely much on muscle memory from the original.

1. First of all, the controls are absolutely horrific. I'm aware that the DS didn't have a stick, but making the D-pad the SOLE MEANS OF MOVEMENT has to be one of the WORST-FEELING ways to control a character in a Mario game that I have ever seen.
2. PAIR THAT with the fact that you have to spend an entire game with FOUR CHARACTERS moving like that. Each character has some stars ONLY they can get, meaning if you are in a level and want to collect X star but are playing as Y character, you've gotta leave the level, go back in, and put on whichever character's cap you need. But you'd better PLEAD that you don't need Yoshi for something - and you WILL - because [to my knowledge] he doesn't HAVE a cap. Meaning you've gotta walk ALLLLLLLLLLLL the way downstairs, go into the 8 star door, switch to Yoshi, walk ALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL the way back to the level, enter, and go to the star.
3. Even though the controls suck, they aren't the ONLY thing that sucks. The movement is absolutely TERRIBLE. Mario controls like he's covered in double-sided tape, Wario jumps like he's wearing cement pants, and Luigi is pretty much the sole good character to play as. Luigi's backflip is amazing, but he CAN'T WALL-JUMP. WHY. Mario's the SOLE character who can wall-jump, despite Luigi being PERFECTLY capable in other games and Wario lacking the ability being rather nonsensical. Like, I get wanting each character to have unique moves, but Mario's being THE WALL-JUMP feels borderline ridiculous.
4. Oh my GOD, the rabbits are the least fun collectible I have ever had the misfortune of having to find. The individual character rabbits are fine if you've got a guide pulled up, but Luigi's LAST RABBIT is on the freaking ROOF for some reason. And this means, if you don't have all eight glowing rabbits (more on them later) and all 150 stars already, you've got to do this awful backward-scuttle-jump-slide-jump-kick-hold-backward-scuttle-repeat thing all the way up the hill on the side of the castle. Which I had to do, since I didn't really want to go hunt down all eight glowing rabbits before I could get the LONE Luigi rabbit that was missing.
5. SPEAKING of the glowing rabbits.. WHY. I mean, I get they aren't intended to be found in one go, but they spawn completely randomly in the place of other rabbits. THIS means that in order to find them, you've gotta either
A) sprint around the castle and re-check every single freaking rabbit location until you get them all, or
B) enter and exit the front door with Yoshi over and over and over until nearly ALL of them spawn outside.
I just happened to get lucky after finding three or so of them, because I proceeded to get absurd luck when it came to the spawning and got the remaining rabbits with Luigi.
6. It seems borderline SADISTIC to lock literally ONE or TWO Red Coins behind a Black Brick Block. Wario's the only dude who can break these, so if you've got seven Red Coins and are missing a single one and it just HAPPENS to be in the Black Brick, you've gotta leave the level, turn into Wario, and get them ALL AGAIN.
7. I have ZERO idea how Wario is meant to get the random star hidden in the Black Brick Block in Over the Rainbows. He can't use the Wing Cap, so the only thing I could come up with is doing this absolutely awful nearly-perfect long jump off the starting cloud to just BARELY land on the platform and break the brick. This is one of the most cryptic additional stars I've seen in this game.

 

[Xiahou Ba]

Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island is a complete dogshit platformer. I've ranted about that game in great lengths with several posts on this forum but here's what I can recap:

Played through some Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island. The more I play through it, the more I think the game's a bit of a mess and its level design is all over the place. While fresh on my mind, the level named What's Gusty Taste Like? is barely about platforming through Gustys or using them to do anything at all, instead only being through the first section where they throw these enemies at you willy nilly (most of the time you're inside the cave part of the level; level should be named Break the Dirt with Eggs instead, also a fun way to randomly hide Winged Clouds in there so you have to break through all dirt patches you see for that very tedious 100% completion). It has a short and pointless Superstar Mario section that I felt they threw in there only because they felt like it and a small Mole Tank section that, doing the puzzle as they "intended" gives you only a key that lets you access a shitty completely optional minigame.

A lot of levels in the game are like this, where they just throw a bunch of level ideas, not really being about the level's namesake at all (the level before, Baseball Boys, is more about Little Mousers than it is about Baseball Boys) at you while barley doing anything with them. I really do prefer the focused approach in later games of "introduce one or two level elements, base level around solving puzzles or platforming challenges with that said level element" than throw a bunch of stuff and see what sticks. Honestly, I don't really mind if something like the Mole Tank is used in only a few levels but the levels are designed around them rather than them just throwing a short and pointless Mole Tank section scattered throughout the game just because "hey we have mole tank why not use it just to obstruct the player with a brainless puzzle before you proceed through the level".

EDIT: In Watch Out for Lakitu after painstakingly backtracking through the level to try to find a single missing red coin while also painstakingly replenishing my star count by farming for red eggs for a max star after just being ambushed out of nowhere by a Bandit and seeing terrible Super FX chip effects, I'm done.

Bigger Boo's Fort is a fun level, but out of the first five levels of World 2, yeah every where else I just wanted to put down the game and play something else.

So in my opinion:

• Level design is a mess, the game will throw multiple kinds of shit at you but none of them will stick out because it tries to do everything at once and introduce too many ideas. For example, the game's first Gusty level has only the first section actually be about Gusties, does virtually nothing with it except spam them at you, while you spend the rest of the level underground (the same level also has a very pointless, short, Superstar Mario segment they threw in because hey remember that power-up?). In comparison, I prefer the more modern approach where they introduce Gusty in one level but it makes for a more focused time taking advantage of their mechanics than throw in like, fucking random Baseball Boys segments on top of it.
• Everything about the collection system is terrible and awful, one of the most miserable games to go for 100% in, it's already laid out in KCC's post but it's such a huge reason I hate the game, especially since extra levels are locked behind it (whether those levels are worth playing or not, idk, the rest of the game isn't worth playing).
• I spent a level almost getting 100% only to get ambushed by a Bandit at the very end of it, forcing me to farm Red Eggs to replenish my star count (no I don't have the extra stars bonus item). This was not fun.
• Red coins are awful and everything about them suck, it's not fun to scour every single nook and cranny and pixel and collect every single fucking coin of the level to find them, especially since the levels tend to be big (another reason I prefer New Island is because the more linear level design heavily works in favor of this collection system so you don't have to do tedious back and forth scouring the levels).
• Repeatedly pausing to check your collectibles is not fun.
• Terrible Super FX "3D" graphics that look like shit and play and platform like shit that aged terribly. People love to give flak for the mismatched YIDS sprites but none of it compare to the horrible looking corkscrews and Bacura-like flip panels straight from fucking Xevious.
• The minigame huts, where all minigames are terrible and waste your time.
• The bonus challenges, where all of them are terrible and waste your time.
• The vehicle sections, where they are clunky and they play terrible.
• Oh, Yoshi's New Island has only one autoscrolling level.

Would prefer you don't go piece by piece in my post telling me why I'm wrong and why it's bad that I don't enjoy this platformer, just explaining why I personally don't like it.

The only thing I like about this game is that it looks pretty, that's it. And yeah it's technically Baby Luigi's debut but he's barely in it, Double Dash is where he really debuts in tbh.

Spoiler

I didn't even mention Baby Mario in my post because his crying isn't even that big of a deal lol, especially compared to the tons of obnoxious elements I've mentioned above that makes up for it.

This game is easily Nintendo's worst 2D platformer on the SNES.

"Oh but going for 100% is optional! You don't have to do it!"

Well kiss my ass! Basically "don't do the part of the game that sucks". Okay got it. Ignore how levels are meticulously designed around exploration and how the game rewards you for it. Ignore how there are much better games to go for 100% in. How about this: don't play this game at all, play another game instead that actually respects you as a player. Play modern Yoshi games over this crap. I've went for 100% in Yoshi's New Island, and I actually had a fun time with it as opposed with SNES Yoshi's Island.

Luigi's Mansion. I wanted to like this game, but unfortunately it's pretty bad. This is from someone who grew up with Dark Moon as his first Luigi's Mansion game.

The game has many problems:

• You're forced to capture 40 Boos, and they are atrocious to collect, especially the later ones which have a whopping 300 health. I guess Nintendo did this to prevent the game from being too short?
• Boss ghosts drop Poison Mushrooms. Why?! All they do is tick me off while I'm trying to get the best portraits for the ghosts. They are such a terrible design choice it's not even funny.
• Catching ghosts is awful. I get it's the first game, but sometimes they pull so hard I still lose grip of them/I still take damage. Dark Moon and 3 did this way better.
• Elements are fine, but having to run back and grab one just to fight a random elemental ghost that shows up later on? Not cool.
• The fortune teller. Just a massive unskippable wall of text.
• King Boo fight was lame, especially because it's just basically a Bowser battle.
• Luigi's movements are awkward, but it's manageable. What I HATE is when I'm fighting ghosts. Every single time one appears Luigi jumps in fright, basically stunning him for a second. This leaves me vulnerable to being attacked by other ghosts already present. Another design flaw that thankfully got removed in the sequels.
• Hidden Mansion was awful. Thankfully there's an exploit of returning to E. Gadd's lab to fully heal yourself.

I don't care what anybody says. Luigi's Mansion is a bad game and Dark Moon and 3 are way, way better games in comparison.

I grew up with OG Luigi's Mansion and I 100% agree with you that Dark Moon is an upgrade over it in every conceivable way. Luigi's Mansion had an obnoxious save system (you're forced to go and hunt for a Toad) and there are so many one-chance collectibles that require you to save scum if you screw up (like catching those fast ghosts and especially the Portrait Ghost fights). Not to mention the game is extremely short, you can beat this in a single afternoon.

Have you tried the 3ds remake? I haven't played it myself but it might fix all the problems you had with it.

 

[Sparks]

I grew up with OG Luigi's Mansion and I 100% agree with you that Dark Moon is an upgrade over it in every conceivable way. Luigi's Mansion had an obnoxious save system (you're forced to go and hunt for a Toad) and there are so many one-chance collectibles that require you to save scum if you screw up (like catching those fast ghosts and especially the Portrait Ghost fights). Not to mention the game is extremely short, you can beat this in a single afternoon.

Have you tried the 3ds remake? I haven't played it myself but it might fix all the problems you had with it.

Probably should've said this in my post, but yeah the version I played was the 3DS remake. I never played the GameCube version (and I never want to) and it's basically the exact same as the remake. The only difference being the hidden mansion, which was only in select regions in the original.

 

[Nelsonic]

Donkey Kong 3: Dai Gyakushū is just. Not fun to play. You can't jump, and the game is formatted more like a dang space shooter as opposed to what the previous game is, which I get as it is meant to be a different game.. but.. it's one of the worst possible changes they could've made. You can't jump, there's a crap ton of enemies, and some of the levels practically require you to kill every enemy to defeat Donkey Kong because otherwise spraying him just turns into a mash-a-thon.
This game has 20 levels, yet it took me an hour and 40 minutes to beat. This thing is best played as a novelty, not as something to 100%.

 

[Rykitu]

The game reviews on my userpage may be full of really outdated unpopular opinions (and a few bad takes that I need to fix), but one thing I still stand by is Bowser's Fury.

Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of positives I can say about this game. I like how its a mini open world Mario game bundled with a Switch port of a Wii U game, and the level design is pretty cool! (Except for Roiling Roller Isle, I hate that stage, but who doesn't?). I had fun playing it, but only when Bowser didn't show up...

I hate the timed Bowser gimmick. Not because I suck at games and think its too hard, but because it makes the whole experience worse. The game lags a lot, the more shines you get it takes longer for Bowser to leave and it gets to a the point where you can't get rid of him unless you get a shine, and most of the shines that center around this gimmick involve waiting for Bowser to return so he could break some blocks. There are WAY TOO many of those stars. Wow, riveting gameplay… On a positive note, the boss fights against him are some of the greatest fights in Mario platformers. It is so sick.

I 100%'ed this game hoping that once I do that, I could play the game without the Bowser gimmick, only for me to be disappointed when I realize I can't remove him. But no, we just had to give Bowser Jr. cat ears.

Not sure where else to put this, I don't like the whole cat theming, especially on the enemies. I think it's a bit overkill. I like the Super Bell, but not to the point we give realistic cat hair to every enemy.

Overall, this game gets a 4/10 from me. There are a lot of positives, but theres just too many negatives for me to consider this good. It's in a weird gray area between ok and bad imo. People really like to consider this a mainline title, but I'm going to say no because it is apart of a bundle with a slightly souped up version of 3D World. I also just think people are making an exception for Bowser's Fury because they love it so much. If you like Bowser's Fury, that is completely fine. I just don't like it.

 

[Xiahou Ba]

I've ranted about Toad NPCs in these Paper Mario games, might as well do it again.

So I'm going to offer my take here. Warning: I say this as someone who actually enjoyed Sticker Star.

One of the most uninspiring things about the modern Paper Mario games are the terrible, godawful recolors of friendly no-name NPCs, aka the nameless Toads. I've ranted about this great lengths in the past, but if you want me to sum this up: imagine playing any other RPG, and every single fucking NPC you talk to is the same model of a generic human villager, except they have a different hair color. Like, for example, in Tales of Symphonia, every world has you trying to find a Wonder Chef who will give you a recipe for you to cook something with. He has a distinct character model from other NPCs, he wears a distinct outfit, he has unique hair style, he has a different body physique etc. These combination of factors leave an impression on players, and he's *entirely* optional to boot.

View attachment 52319

When bloody Sticker Star did a shady character who plays a very prominent role in the game, and his shadiness is hinted from just his dialogue? Literally a fucking purple Toad.

View attachment 52318

The frustrating thing is, Paper Mario used to do this, at least, care a little bit more about their townies than they do currently. In a desert, you have Bedouin-inspired Toads. In the cold areas, you have characters dressed in cold weather appropriate outfits. You have fat Toads. You have female Toads. You have child Toads. For the chef example above, we got Tayce T. and Zess T, dressed and aged uniquely from the others. Some people think oh who cares about generic NPCs, who cares about townies, in an RPG, why put no effort in townie designs and I'm like, every other RPG out there clearly DOES care about what generic, no-name NPCs wear, what they look like, what skin tones they have, what age they are, why would they put some attention and detail into their physical appearance especially in the setting? Oh it's Mario, it's for dumb babies, it doesn't need a well-designed town or any thought put into its inhabitants. No, shut up, developers are clearly cutting corners here, and besides, it's Mario, one of the biggest franchises, and you don't need to tell me they don't have budget for this?

They try to alleviate this in later entries like giving those Toads little outfits but they're *still* nameless NPCs and use the same fucking character model with fucking awful "names" like "Toad mechanic" or "Captain T. Ode".

So now you know what I want, at the very least, in a new trilogy: NPCs actually worth a shit. You don't need levels of detail in these towns in the same level as Baldur's Gate but damn at the very least give them unique physical characteristics and actual names and not "Toad who complains about kids playing front lawn Toad".

 

[Cubot]

I've been playing Mario Kart DS for the past couple of days and I really gotta say it:

The drifting system in this game is awful.

It constantly feels like I'm not boosting at all, I'm hitting walls or off-road trying to build up a drift (Frappe Snowland is a prime example), and it really doesn't feel good to drift with the constant left-right on the Control Stick or D-pad (I've tried both).

Much prefer the hold and charge system from Wii onward.

Posting this from the Unpopular opinions thread

 

[Mcmadness]

Tick Tock Clock can suck it
Bloody hate this annoying tedious level where you can be potentially fucked in getting a star based on what time you entered the level without realizing it.

 

[Nelsonic]

Mario Clash. Oh boy. I don't have anything nice to say about this game whatsoever.
First off, it has the unfortunate distinction of being released on the Virtual Boy, which means it'll give you a migraine regardless of if you enjoy it or not. Second of all... IT'S SO FREAKING LONG. This thing didn't need to be its own GAME, let alone one that lasts 100 freaking levels with NO SAVE SYSTEM. Thank god for save states in VB emulators, because you were initially expected to beat this piece of crap in ONE SITTING.

 

[Sparks]

Mario Clash. Oh boy. I don't have anything nice to say about this game whatsoever.
First off, it has the unfortunate distinction of being released on the Virtual Boy, which means it'll give you a migraine regardless of if you enjoy it or not. Second of all... IT'S SO FREAKING LONG. This thing didn't need to be its own GAME, let alone one that lasts 100 freaking levels with NO SAVE SYSTEM. Thank god for save states in VB emulators, because you were initially expected to beat this piece of crap in ONE SITTING.

Gotta admit the name is one of the best game titles in the franchise!