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the removal of mario's 3D abilities since 64

bdizzle said:
Why won't Nintendo make Mario fly anymore? Not that fucking bee suit, really flying. I'm talking 3 jumps, bitch I'm off the ground, fuck the police, fly!

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Why won't Nintendo give me a cape again, so I can fly to the end of the level without touching the ground?
 
the grooves in the analogue sticks have helped Mario 3d games retain the precision of hard 8way run while allowing for degrees inbetween. since the loss of the grooves in the 3ds and Wii u. the games now snap to 8way run instead. is there a correlation?
 
bdizzle said:
Why won't Nintendo make Mario fly anymore? Not that fucking bee suit, really flying. I'm talking 3 jumps, bitch I'm off the ground, fuck the police, fly!

N64_Super_Mario_64_flying.jpg
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Wing Cap's a bad example then, since that really only let Mario glide, not fly. :P You really can't gain any altitude with it, which is why you either start off in the sky like in the Wing Cap course or it's combined with shooting yourself out of cannons and whatever. The Red Star from Galaxy is much more about flying than that thing.
 
Ah, SM64. For me, it's the best in the series. The open-world parkour and corresponding amazing theme-based level design, where there is always something to do, are incredible and if you don't feel like fulfilling one particular objective, just skip to another part that interests you more. That's simply genius. And the large move set made it feel like an extremely fluid game enabling you to go anywhere. I also like the fact that the use of the Wing Cap is pretty narrowly limited and that there are no other mechanics in the game enabling you to either float, glide or fly. This is key, because it makes the platforming and level-design-abusing skills of amazing speedrunners like Siglemic really exciting to watch. One missed jump could mean the end of the run, something I really missed playing Sunshine (plus all that boring clean up gameplay). This gives the runs of every level a feeling of palpable immediacy. The levels themselves are also very tightly designed and never force a specific path on you. With 120 stars to collect, there's also a heck of a lot of game to go through.

As you can see, I like to gush about SM64. It represents 3D Mario perfection to me. It's also one of the most speedrun-enabling games I've ever encountered. I dream of a return to its roots, but with NSMB-like co-op, where everyone has to collect stars or something or other in one gigantic parkour map. The race-like aspects of interaction and obstruction would be amazingly fun to watch, I reckon.

There are also some pretty fun ROM hacks for it, now that I'm thinking about it again.
 
It's the right thing. Mario must be the purest possible platform game. So happy the nonsensical triple jump is gone in 3D Land/World, it was just irritating.
 
Sprinkling a bit of water and start sliding in Sunshine was a game in itself. I feel the joy of just moving around, jumping on rooftops, running and wall jumping for no reason was losts in the Galaxy games. The playground feel of Sunshine is still unmatched. Pity about the camera though.
 
Super Mario World had an insane number of moves as well. There's like eight pages of them in the manual, two of which are dedicated to flying with the cape. I never really mastered that because there were like three different dive bombs and I couldn't remember which to use when.

And when Mario 64 was on the way I'd be poring over magazine articles dedicated just to the controls. Stuff like crawling I can only remember being used once, but you could crouch and you could move, so it made sense that there was something for when you crouched+moved, and sure enough, there it was.

It's a shame that all these navigation tools have been lost. The games are much simpler and I don't think they're better for it.
 
I don't really mind that. All I want is great level design & a moveset that complements that. Mario Galaxy did that!! And maybe Super Mario 3D World is designed in a way where such controls would come in the way of their vision.

3D World still looks very underwhelming & after Galaxy it's such a meh direction for a mainline 3D mario but I'm still optimistic.
 
This is why i still consider mario 64 to be the best 3D platformer. No game since has been able to make the act of simply controlling your character such a joy. Fucking incredible what they achieved on their first try and made even more impressive by the fact that all these years later no one has matched it.

Bill Rizer said:
It's the right thing. Mario must be the purest possible platform game. So happy the nonsensical triple jump is gone in 3D Land/World, it was just irritating.
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What exactly was irritating about it? You never have to use it so if you don't like it you can just play without it. It makes no difference if it's in the game for you or not.
 
Bill Rizer said:
It's the right thing. Mario must be the purest possible platform game. So happy the nonsensical triple jump is gone in 3D Land/World, it was just irritating.
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I agree that mario making lots of things was not really mario like, and more a thing that came from Nintendo learning 3D, like easter egg levels. It was hard to convert pure platform mechanics at first.

Now, there is an other problem. It's not true that there are less actions, cause the replaced it with power ups, and this time it's just for variety and making the game popular among most people. Ruuning on walls, fighting etc.. Not really platformish..

That's why i find paradoxically 3D mario way more casual and unmario, which is weird cause everyone like them so much there.
 
A lot of moves in 64 were pretty redundant. I think the only actual attack move I ever used was the jump kick. That said, I miss that move for the extra air it'd give you and I especially miss the air dive. That was one of the things I loved that they brought back in Sunshine, and they made it even more fun to use in that game.

I think a lot of Mario's abilities in 64, coupled with the design, would make a really good 3D Wario Land game. There's some really good mentalities here that have gone to waste and they should be applied to a franchise where they could actually turn it sort of faithful to its 2D roots.
 
While it's sad that some of the moves from SM64 have been removed in recent Mario games (for example the belly slide + jump, which I loved), I found many of them difficult to pull off in most platforming situations, thanks to the awkward controls and camera. I never needed to use the triple jump, as the slide flip was far more useful and easier to execute. I certainly wouldn't call SM64's controls 'intuitive'. Sunshine and Galaxy both featured much better control schemes, and I personally don't miss most of the old techniques.

3D Land's control scheme was very stripped down... but then the whole design of that game is a rather strange mix of 2D/3D Mario styles.
 
orioto said:
I agree that mario making lots of things was not really mario like, and more a thing that came from Nintendo learning 3D, like easter egg levels. It was hard to convert pure platform mechanics at first.

Now, there is an other problem. It's not true that there are less actions, cause the replaced it with power ups, and this time it's just for variety and making the game popular among most people. Ruuning on walls, fighting etc.. Not really platformish..

That's why i find paradoxically 3D mario way more casual and unmario, which is weird cause everyone like them so much there.
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I'm totally with you on this. I love 3D Mario, but 2D Mario is the purest and "hardcore-est" kind of Mario.
 
giapel said:
Sprinkling a bit of water and start sliding in Sunshine was a game in itself. I feel the joy of just moving around, jumping on rooftops, running and wall jumping for no reason was losts in the Galaxy games. The playground feel of Sunshine is still unmatched. Pity about the camera though.
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It's as if the Galaxy games were more about the levels themselves than Mario's moveset. Controlling Mario no longer felt euphoric.

Sunshine really did perfect that rapid, frantic platforming flow. Though they didn't have to make the wall jump that easy. Or remove the long jump (I guess they did, cause there was no Z-button). The camera would glitch out once in a while, but it was no biggie.
 
E-Cat said:
It's as if the Galaxy games were more about the levels themselves than Mario's moveset. Controlling Mario no longer felt euphoric.

Sunshine really did perfect that rapid, frantic platforming flow. Though they didn't have to make the wall jump that easy. Or remove the long jump (I guess they did, cause there was no Z-button). The camera would glitch out once in a while, but it was no biggie.
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Don't get me wrong, I get that the Galaxies are the superior games. It's just that I have more fond memories of Sunshine than most of GAF. Being summer now only makes it more pronounced. THAT water!!!! :D
 
Jaded Alyx said:
How far did you get in Galaxy?

ivRl4MKyQSEdI.jpg
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Probably the most disappointing part of Galaxy for me. All that potential to have free-form flying between planets and it's relegated to a power-up in the hub which you don't get until the post-game and has no proper physics to it.
 
Good riddance IMO. We finally have a 3D Mario game without the need for a goddamn health bar and punches/spinning attacks, which were a bastardization of the formula added to compensate for the open 3D navigation, and yet nobody talks about it. When my 6 y/o cousin can consistently kill goombas by jumping on them on a fucking 3D Mario, you know something finally works as it should.

Most of the gameplay in 64 was done out of necessity, not vision.
 
giapel said:
Don't get me wrong, I get that the Galaxies are the superior games. It's just that I have more fond memories of Sunshine than most of GAF. Being summer now only makes it more pronounced. THAT water!!!! :D
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Ehh, it's like comparing apples to oranges; that's how far removed the mechanics are. But when it comes to just sprinting around doing random shit, I prefer the feel of Sunshine. Shame that the level design couldn't have been just a bit more ambitious.
 
I hate how Nintendo tends to remove things for sequels. Mario's 3D moves, being able to pick up enemies' weapons in Zelda, the extra modes and characters in Mario Kart, gameplay elements from 2D Mario, the glitches in Smash Bros that people liked to use in battle, etc. Instead of capitalizing and expanding, they simply remove and replace; which is incredibly annoying.
 
I imagine it's mostly an attempt to cut down on the amount of tutorial time required to learn the moves. As I recall Mario 64 slowly introduced all of the tricks with certain areas intended to teach wall jumps, backflips etc. Now that the novelty of 3D is gone, they probably wanted to focus on new level designs without spending hours teaching you how to jump. The exploration style is different between Mario games, and they made the design decision to streamline the controls to focus less on parkour style trick-jumps.
 
Mr Sandman said:
Mario 64's controls and moves still haven't been topped, even by Nintendo. Galaxy was good, but Mario felt so much more capable/precise, agile and acrobatic in 64.
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I agree with this.

Looking back, it's truly amazing how Nintendo could get 3D platforming so right on their very first try. Its contemporaries look downright silly in comparison, control-wise, from a modern perspective.
 
The_Endgamer said:
Goddamn, i forgot how varied his moves could be.
64 and Sunshine Mario ftw.

Galaxy and 3D Land Mario? Not so much. I wouldn't be surprised if they started taking away the wall jump soon.
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Mario has the same moves in Galaxy. Triple jump. Backflip. Wall jump. They're all there. I have no idea where people are getting this "THEY TOOK HIS MOVES" mindset from. The OP is simply wrong in his assertion.
 
GrotesqueBeauty said:
I won't lie, I think it's kinda bullshit that you can't throw koopa shells upwards in the NSMB games.
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Heck, if we're on that subject... I think it's kinda bullshit that the koopa turtle - bop it, get a shell to fling - isn't really a thing in the 3D Mario titles.
 
orioto said:
Runing on walls, fighting etc.. Not really platformish..

That's why i find paradoxically 3D mario way more casual and unmario, which is weird cause everyone like them so much there.
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Well you know, Nintendo could create like 2 or 3 complete new franchises just with all these terrible unmario gameplay mechanics used in SM64 and Sunshine to please a broader audience, but they somehow decided to only please one part of the huge fanbase with going more linear, more tighten up platforming.

They just have to to build some new characters and worlds and put all this awesome gameplay in it, but they are somehow afraid of creating those new franchises. I just do not understand why...
 
Just like another poster said earlier; Mario 64 was a test bed for 3d platforming. They really went crazy with it, and it shows. You could almost say that Nintendo's 3d design peaked with Mario64. They will never manage to catch that feeling again.
 
DonMigs85 said:
Mario also had tons of moves in Donkey Kong '94 for Game Boy
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Interesting point.

Much like Link's Awakening bridged the gap between A Link to the Past and Ocarina of Time, DK94 debuted some mobility elements that would appear more prominently in Mario 64.
 
IIRC about one billion teens and kids finished Mario 64 so it couldn't have been that much more difficult than Galaxy so dumbing it down doesn't make much sense
 
shuri said:
Just like another poster said earlier; Mario 64 was a test bed for 3d platforming. They really went crazy with it, and it shows. You could almost say that Nintendo's 3d design peaked with Mario64. They will never manage to catch that feeling again.
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With the recent streamlining of the Mario games (NSMB, M3DL/W), a part of me wishes that they would just separate the M64/MSS/MG/MG2 line of games into a separate franchise. I wouldn't even mind a new/separate protagonist.

The 'race to the goal' style of level structure is clearly more popular with mass audiences, so I can't blame them for games like SM3DW. That said, the exploration-based high-mobility 3D Mario games still sold millions of copies apiece.

Just keep both of them firmly separate going forward. It will be terrible if 3D Land style games are all we get going forward.
 
Mario Sunshine was the last 3D Mario game where I can remember Mario's acrobatic expertise being featured. Ironically, the levels without FLUDD were often the best. Wall jumping at it's finest.
 
I never minded about the addition/removals of Mario's abilities in the 3D place. I trust the studios who make the 3D Mario's that they know what they are doing. Most of the time they are. I felt like the one set back on 3D Mario was with Sunshine... I Liked the idea behind the water pack for instance. I guess the execution wasn't so hot. The only fun levels for me were the levels without the water pack.

What remains very dear to me in 3D Mario games are how fluid the controls are. All the 3D Mario's, IMO of course, control wonderfully. If I can't control Mario like butter then I'll probably hate the game outright.

Can't wait for SM3DW. I thought SM3DL was amazing so I'm sure EAD Tokyo knows what they are doing with SM3DW.
 
Marios have typically changed up move sets each iteration. I think they've kinda learned from 64 and Sunshine that half the things Mario does just had no real gameplay worth outside of some very specific speed run scenarios so they've been running a tighter arsenal.

Also 64 and Sunshine were more free-form expecting you to figure out how to a get the stars in a handful of levels whereas later ones had a much tighter focus on specific obstacles over many courses.
 
It's gonna sound weird if 'you werent there at the time', but when the original Super Mario Brothers came out, the controls were incredible for its time. You had unprecented controls over Mario, it was very fluid, it just felt perfect, the scrolling, the jumping mechanics, for the time, it was a huge advancement over other tiles (on home consoles and arcades). The 'physics' were unmatched.

Mario 3 introduced the flying elements and once again, it felt so great compared to other titles of the era. It was really fun to explore around. Super Mario World perfected the flight mecanism with the cape and introduced tons of new features like the spinning jump, riding yoshi, the different variants of Yoshis, etc etc. It felt like an evolution.

Then Mario64 came out and Nintendo outdid themselves with the 3D controls, the different stunts and jumps, etc etc.

Ever since.. Well it feels like half-assed ideas, remixes and rehashes of previous concepts. Mario Galaxy was a nice concept, and a nice game overall.. But to me it really like like a bizzare gimmick to base your entire game on. It feels like it would had been a nice interesting idea for world in a regular mario game (kinda like the giant world in SMB3) but having an entire game based on this felt like they ran out of ideas. I didnt get very far simply, I simply gave up on the title.

As for the New Super Mario line.. Well it just feels uninspired. The levels feel 'strange', they all have that 'romhack' feel to them. You can tell that a new generation of developpers is behind this one, and it shows. The games are not bad, they are well made, well put together, but it really feels like it's stalling. Nintendo used to be at the top when it came to coming up with new designs and ideas, and their platformers really destroyed other products of their eras, they just felt that much advanced.

But now? The titles are very 'safe', they all have that 'design by comitee' vibe, they are following a recipe without having any kind of inspiration; the magic is gone. Maybe it's just that the decision makers at Nintendo are now old and they want to take risks, but eh.. That's why I feel like Nintendo's platforming design peaked with Mario 64.

Mario was ALWAYS about acrobatics and having excellent controls that allowed you to do nice 'runs' like in that gif posted earlier.
 
This is one of the biggest reasons (along with timed, linear levels and bland art) that I was so incredibly disappointed with 3D World. 3D Land is the fusion of 2D and 3D Mario and worked well on the small screen. A console Mario should push forward with the 3D gameplay. We already had a reach the flag pole with friends Mario game last year. This is completely unnecessary and overlaps too much with the recently released NSMBU.
 
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