I agree that the structure of the levels remained largly the same regardless which star you chose, but in SM64 you could only get the star you picked in the beginning, any other star would be blank and thus wouldn't count to your star total. That's a design decision I never understood.

Hmm...has it really been so long that I haven't played SM64? I could have sworn you could get almost any star even if you choose one at the beginning of the level. Ah well, kinda makes me wanna play it again for old times sake.

I just checked; that guy is wrong. For most stars you could get them on any star. Stars would only be 'blank' if you'd already collected them which is obvious.

There were certain stars only accessible on their 'own' star or sometimes a 'later' on (e.g. Snowman's Lost His Head and the penguin race requires you to click on it) but on that same level (Cool Cool Mountain), any star 1-6 allows you to get Stars 1,2, 4 and 6. It was mostly non-linear though and I remember getting many stars out of order.

In Sunshine, Galaxy and Galaxy 2 it became completely linear. There was an easter egg in Sunshine where you can get Star 2 of Bianco Hills from Star 1 (and the NPC says something funny when you do) but that's the only one I recall.

As to this thread I think 2D and 3D Mario are different series and should be kept so; I like 2D linear and 3D open-world exploration and started to dislike Galaxy's style once it got to the second game and 3D Land is the first Mario game I will not be buying (and I have MANY)

I love both, still as you said they aren't as good as Mario64 for many reasons.
What SMG needed is more freedom, in M64 when you enter a level you don't have a forced objective, you can go for the star you prefer. Also, and more important, in M64 you aren't forced to do a anything in the way the designers have tought, almost every platform and action in the game can be perfomed in the way you like it, I can't think of other 3D games giving you this kind of freedom. This video explains better than words.

As for future 3D marios, I'd like Nintendo to bring back some focus on exploration on WiiU. On 3DS, I'm ok with a more immediate type of game (like 3D land  should be).

I just checked; that guy is wrong. For most stars you could get them on any star. Stars would only be 'blank' if you'd already collected them which is obvious.

There were certain stars only accessible on their 'own' star or sometimes a 'later' on (e.g. Snowman's Lost His Head and the penguin race requires you to click on it) but on that same level (Cool Cool Mountain), any star 1-6 allows you to get Stars 1,2, 4 and 6. It was mostly non-linear though and I remember getting many stars out of order.

In Sunshine, Galaxy and Galaxy 2 it became completely linear. There was an easter egg in Sunshine where you can get Star 2 of Bianco Hills from Star 1 (and the NPC says something funny when you do) but that's the only one I recall.

As to this thread I think 2D and 3D Mario are different series and should be kept so; I like 2D linear and 3D open-world exploration and started to dislike Galaxy's style once it got to the second game and 3D Land is the first Mario game I will not be buying (and I have MANY)