I didn't mean in terms of sales, more that it hardly ever gets talked about relative to its quality, usually games this great generate way more discussion and mentions.

Maybe it's not that great then  

TRUST ME, when 3D World + Bowser's Fury launches though ... 

It's going to be YHUGE!!! 

3D World's a good game, but not in the same league as Odyssey. It's multiplayer focus means its level design, while elegant, is also rather simplistic and lacks the variety of depth of Odyssey.

I don't know what you're talking about. Odyssey's level design has the depth of paper. Yea I guess it has more going on and more verticality, but it doesn't really matter much if the objectives are simple and bland, and always super easy.  

3D World also has about as much variety as you could possibly ask for in a linear non-sandbox Mario game, too. I guess maybe you mean variety in movesets or presentation though, which I can understand. 

Verticality and more going on, but also hidden areas to discover, and tons of objects you can possess with each have their own properties.

One thing I really dislike about 3D World is how inconsistent its levels are thematically. Each world has its own theme, you have the water world, the ice world, the cloudy world, etc, but then it's always just the first stage that fits the theme of its world and then the other stages are just variations on other stages you found in different worlds. It kinda ruins the immersion of the game, makes it seem like nothing more than just a set of challenges for you to overcome, which itself is kind of an issue since there's pretty much zero challenge during the game's first 5 worlds and the difficulty curve is basically a flat line.

I know that Mario games aren't known for their immersion, that's not what they're supposed to be best at, but personally I really can't care about a videogame if I'm not invested in anything that's going on in it. It's just worse when you compare it to another linear platformer that came around that time, Tropical Freeze, which had masterful level design and worlds that felt entirely cohesive, with each level being part of a larger "story". Without needing to have any actual narrative.

Odyssey is a lot better at this, it's a game I could actually have some investment in. But personally, I'm never truly gonna care about Mario.

3D World actually has a ton of hidden areas, some of them even can be hard to find iirc. But yea, there's nothing like the possession mechanic. 

There wasn't any sense of discovery in 3D World though cos the game's limited array of components meant there was never anything really interesting to find in them.

I mean, no one is denying that one game is more exploration heavy. Just that your assertion is, subjectively, wrong to me. I don't think either game is particularly great at having hidden content that's inherently interesting to find, to be honest. It's all an excuse to spend even more time in levels you already like. If anything I might give that to 3D World just based on sheer consistency, since stamps were one of the coolest collectibles I've ever experienced and they were usually hidden. 

That being said, Odyssey just by it's nature is usually better at being specifically interesting due to it's exploration. Finding out that jumping off a cliff wasn't an insta-death in Steam Gardens is still one of the coolest moments of this generation for me. 

I mean, just last night I was playing Metro Kingdom and found that possessing a parked taxi took me to a hidden zone where you battle and possess tanks, collapsing girders to create bridges, in a storm. Can't think of anything that cool in 3D World.

I mean, that sounds about as inherently interesting as using a motorcycle to outrun a T-Rex. Yet, that moment in Odyssey is one of the biggest disappointments, and that's even on top of the dopamine you get from finding a secret mission like that. It's so bland, so poorly done and just ends up being super pedestrian.