New Mario Galaxy Scans from Famitsu! I said WOW!

[omoneru]

Here's a translation of some of its highlights. Forgive me for grammatical mistakes etc. I did it very quickly. I couldn't get the fourth page. 404 not found. So this is page 1-3.


- The director Koizumi did SM64 and Sunshine so he's the director who knows everything about Mario.
- Project started right after finishing Donkey Kong Jungle Beat
- The idea of gravity has been around for a while but never been realized completely until this title.
- 60% of the ideas developed for SM128 are utilized for SMG.
- We managed to get it work well by the time of E3 last year. By that time, we made it so that people don't have to pay much attention to camera and can play without getting motion-sickness.
- Miyamoto has even edited and modified maps and objects in detail. Swapping things around and testing new things out.
- Platformer is about jumping and you can't do it all that well on a spherical platform. That's why we introduced a new move called Spin which fits well with a round platform. Based on that, we developed Staring with which you can travel from star to star, which gives you an exhilarating feeling.
- You can travel fast or sometimes it has no gravity and float you slowly. It's a mix of very different actions.
- There are some places where multiple gravitational forces simultaneously exist and because of that, Mario sometimes moves unexpectedly, which produces tons of new actions and makes it very complex. This unpredictability increases its depth and fun.
- Once you get used to the concept of gravity, you'll learn how to utilize gravitational forces.
- In general, Miyamoto thinks that there really is no rigorous barrier between core gamer and casual gamers. After all, core gamers sometimes play casual games as well. In addition, casual gamers without much experience often get better at games very quickly and can sometimes beat core gamers.
- Of course, there are easy games and hard games certainly. It's hard to adjust difficulty settings. But developers need to try to make games that aren't hard but sill very fun. In other words, you can't rely solely on difficulty to make it fun. If you don't underestimate game newbies, respect them, and work very hard to entertain them, you can make a game that can also satisfy core gamers. But this is a very hard thing to do in reality. But with new young and talented staff we recruited, we are confident that we can do it. There is a way in game design that lets both newbies and veterans entertain together. There must be a way, Miyamoto believes.
- Most core gamers are playing alone these days, but they used to play with their friends having fun in front of TV saying "give me the controller" and such. We'd rather like to change the conventional style of playing alone. That's why we incorporated the assist play into SMG. You can either help your friend doing co-op or actually can annoy him/her as well. Your friend may say "hey stop that!". You can have fun with your friend in various ways. While you do that with your friends, naturally you start to converse with them while playing like "that way that way!, help!" (just like old days). We love how this co-play encourages conversations between players. With a pointer, you can direct your friend more easily. You can say "go this way" and can just point the where he needs to go.
- We are trying to make it so that some people can say it's fun because it's difficult while newbies can also say it's fun because it's doable. We are examining every piece in the game to make it satisfying for both parties.
- You can clear the game by finishing 60% of the contents. But if you are a core gamer and want to challenge and explore the whole content including difficult ones, you can do that as well, and the assist play helps you get through difficult contents.
- With this dual structure, both core and casual players can clear the game with their own difficulty.
- A lot of stars. It's really a galaxy. A lot of adventure packed in. Bigger than the solar system for sure (laugh)
- Traveling from star to star makes you feel like you're really traveling the universe.