"When I first played Galaxy, I was very excited because it felt like I could explore anywhere. But, sadly, I realized I couldn’t, and I was stuck on a very linear path that led to the star. "

The 2-D mario's are all linear, and a star is no different that a flagpole, bird-head door, spinning star-mushroom-flower block, or exit gate

Mario hasn't changed a whole lot, whether you're getting to a star or getting to a pole, it's the same thing. Mario World was kind of a step down, and (while many disagree) I felt Mario 64 was a step further down. Mario Sunshine and Galaxy have stepped it up though, and Galaxy is my personal second favourite behind 3.

I don't like comparing stuff to Mario 3, because I feel like saying movie A, movie B, and movie C suck because they don't compare to Citizen Kane, or something like that. Mario 3 was THE game, it was Miyamoto's masterpiece (though many would argue Ocarina of Time, it is one of those two). Just like Will Wright has his Sim City and Sid Meier has his Civilization 2.

That's exactly what I was thinking at that part.  The games you can explore anywhere, like M64 and Sunshine, he doesn't like anyway, so go figure.

Mario world is me favorite mario game, I actually prefer it to 3. The great thing about it is you can just play it by going left to right, but to beat it 100%, you can do the hidden stuff and all the puzzles.

I stopped reading when he complained about.

"In the 2d Mario games, you just kept moving to the right. It didn’t matter how you did it. There were many ways to go to the right. Starting in Super Mario World, the goals became more and more puzzle orientated with collect-a-thons. 3d Marios so repel me not so much that they are 3d but because 3d Mario is a collectathon. It isn’t about moving to a flagpole. It is about finding a star and this always results in some stupid ‘puzzle’."

This shows his ignorance. The reason Mario 64 was designed the way it was because of high 3D level development costs. The had to use the "star" system so they could have multiple objectives per level, and therefore save money in the budget. Sonic 3D games tried to keep the "moving to a flagpole" system, and the games paid for it. Sonic games tended to be shorter than they should be and didn't tend to match the quality of their 2D games.

He can not like Mario 64 and likewise games for that reason; I won't fault him for it. But he doesn't mention the cause of the problem and that leads me to believe he doesn't know it and thinks it was a design choice.

Malstrom: Random stuff

Ninty fans: Malstrom is awesome!

Malstrom: Super Mario Galaxy sucks!

Ninty fans: Malstrom is an idiot!

Kantor said: Malstrom: Random stuff Ninty fans: Malstrom is awesome! Malstrom: Super Mario Galaxy sucks! Ninty fans: Malstrom is an idiot!

Malstrom understands the business strategy that Nintendo is employing.  Games, not so much.

theRepublic said: Kantor said: Malstrom: Random stuff Ninty fans: Malstrom is awesome! Malstrom: Super Mario Galaxy sucks! Ninty fans: Malstrom is an idiot! Malstrom understands the business strategy that Nintendo is employing.  Games, not so much.

He understands the success of Wii Sport, Wii Play, Wii Fit and Mario Kart Wii and that it has to do with, among other things, their arcade style gameplay.

As a Nintendo fan, I can say that.... Malstrom is right. Kinda. It's not just Nintendo. All games have been dumbed down in the last 20 years to expand the audience. Some games are just movies you click through now. In the 80's we didn't even have save points, let alone unlimited lives or continues or tutorials or anything. Imagine a 3-D Battletoads game today, with save points, save files, item collecting, tutorials, and puzzles. Kids today couldn't lay a finger on Battletoads. The game would bite their fingers off.

After reading the full Malstrom article, and as much of the Kotaku article as I could stomach, I'm a bit conflicted. Although I somewhat agree with some of the conclusions, I take issue with a lot of the examples they use. I don't think I could disagree more with how Malstrom feels about the original Zelda and Metroid. I also think that the guy who wrote the Kotaku article played a completely different game than I did that also happened to be called Super Mario Galaxy.