What Nintendo strategically did is expand the Mario flagship and divided it into a series of different genre. This enabled Nintendo to fix the Mario demand in all aspect of consumer needs, meanwhile releasing different Mario titles a few each in every generation at full price subsequently creating a slew of new Nintendo fans; thereby establishing the cycle of nostalgia all over again.

^So, am I being too greedy in a sense? Should I just let the new generation have their 2D Mario?

But then, shouldn't the gamer community realize this and stop being overhyped for a game that isn't meant for their generation? By the way, your post bears the mark of the beast. (666 posts ftw!)

That 'selling point' is what will always make the game sell above 10M, but to go well beyond 15M it still needs other huge points as well.

The thing I realized about nintendo games is that no matter how recycled and lackluster their games may be people still go out and buy them! So why should nintendo change that formula?

^I love my Nintendo peers, but this gen at times it became almost ridiculous. Supporting something through the fire (aka GC) is one thing, but justifying the crappy content, that's, I don't know what that is tbh with you!

Fair, it is early to tell if any of this will change, I understand that. But in general the attitude of justifying everything... at times it gets redundant. Of course, this can be explained by "NSMB is no longer meant to cater to you", then okay, I get it. But don't come and tell me it's good and it's what I want.
Just don't.

This whole thread doesn't make much sense to me. I get the want for graphical improvements over the game's predecessor -- that makes sense, since its predecessor was on an inferior console. Where you start to lose me is when you essentially say the game has not improved over its predecessor.

Looking at pictures of NSMB for DS, that's ludicrous. You yourself posted a screen comparison between NSMB and NSMB2, and the latter looks worlds better to me for obvious reasons. So much so that I wonder how you can even complain. So maybe your complaint has more to do with the fact that NSMB2 isn't an improvement graphically over the Wii iteration. Mind you, disregarding the 3D capabilities of the 3DS, the Wii is a more powerful machine with more graphical power, which makes sense since it's a console. So first of all, I don't know why you would expect a 3DS game to look better in 2D than a comparable Wii game. The bigger problem with this is that in the few comparison screens I've seen between NSMB2 and NSMBW, the 3DS game DOES look better to me. It looks like it has much more detailed backgrounds, and of course it would, since they'll enhance the 3D effect.

Whenever the actual graphical improvements over the Wii version are brought up, you dismiss them as "cheesy." That's all good and fine, but that's not the game's problem; that's YOUR problem. You said yourself, "I guess I kind of accepted Yoshi and all because I was still a kid." You're basically admitting that Super Mario Bros. has always been what you now consider "cheesy," and yet you still complain that the new game looks "cheesy."

Elsewhere you say you want a new visual style entirely, because the NSMB style has grown stagnant and worn off its welcome. I don't know of ANY video game series that changes its visual style from one game to the next other than The Legend of Zelda. There are exceptions, most usually during advancements in hardware. But imagine how crazy it would be for, say, Halo 2 to have looked drastically different from Combat Evolved, or if Marvel vs Capcom 3 had looked completely different from Marvel vs Capcom 2. Kingdom Hearts 3D doesn't look much different from the original game from 10 years ago, either. Most games don't do that. You might point out that Super Mario Bros. was constantly evolving graphically in its first 4 iterations, and you'd be right; however, that was commonplace for games in that era because of the rapidly evolving graphical techniques and power available. It's much more common now for a series to develop a style that works for it and stick to it.

New Super Mario Bros. 2 might not be "what you want," but can you believe that there are hundreds or even thousands of games made every year that I don't want? Crazy, right? Man, if only they had looked marginally different, I would have been all over them!

Maybe you should reconsider what you want. It's not Nintendo's job to cater directly and solely to you. If you want one of the best 2D platforming experiences you're likely to find this year, maybe you should swallow your pride and pay close attention to this game. If you want an outstanding 2D platforming experience with a AAA production quality and cutting-edge non-cheesy graphics and live music, I'm afraid I have some bad news...

^I can understand people telling me it's not gonna happen, you're not getting an improvement in graphical quality, more depth in presentation and more detailed surfaces and environments, so get with the beat.

What I don't get are people seeing that Nintendo is not putting in their full effort in the presentation department, and us gobbling it up as if it was the cup of Khali.

You say you don't know of ANY video game series that changes its visual style from one game to the next, but what about Street Fighter, what about Diablo, what about TES, what about Warcraft, What about Metroid, what about Donkey Kong. You give me the example of Halo 2. Look at the screenshots for Halo 4!!! They are breathtaking! Why is it so much more to ask for when it comes to Mario 2D.

Well, friends, the answer is quite straightforward, and the truth lies in what Lord Ciansworth wrote, it could be the best explanation apart from time constraints (which I mentioned in OP). He said that possibly Nintendo is keeping certain surfaces and character generic so as to not alienate the mainstream that already purchased NSMB, and they need to make sure not to affect the winning formula. That's says money making to me.

My complaint isn't that NSMB2 isn't an improvement over the Wii version. I'm just suprised as to why it is so inferior. For this, I'll be willing to accept that it's a matter of resolution. But pezus mentioned that the screenshot was about the size of a 3DS screen, which makes sense. So there's either something we're missing (maybe the screen was taken at a poor resolution), or it's what it is. Assuming it's what it is, in terms of resolution only, I'm underwhelemed. Then, in terms of detail, yes I expect it to go beyond NSMBWii, because detail has little to do with HW capabilities at this point, the 3DS is more powerful than a GC for all suits and purposes. It would more have to do with time and talent, time for talent to spent on making the environments look more rich, more detailed. The time was simply not put, but the only question that remains is why, and I believe Lord C. did a good job at explaining it.

If that's how Nintendo wants to go a bout it, well I'm surprised you'd think I'm part of the minority, but I say Fuck You Nintendo, and here's why. The game is selling 20M+ copies a pop. It is their highest-selling Super Mario game. It is a 2D game, and requires a small team. Do the math, you'll find it odd that with those 2 considerations the game is not given more budget/resource allocation. So it brings us back to why.

We have 2 reasons:
1) Time constraints (possible)
2) Sticking to a formula (very likey)

If it's 1, it's excusable. If it's 2, I say I've had enough of this cash-cow strategy, I'm a big-game hunter, I've had enough.

Maybe I will still try the game, but I'll try it as a mediocre entry in a highly popular series and that's it. And I wouldn't care about it much more than that. Hype it all you want, it passes under my radar. If that's what Nintendo aims to do, then it worked (thank the Lord, I finally saw the light)

The graphics aren't the issue. After all, how much can you really improve the graphics of a 2D sidescroller? I suppose you can do a psuedo 3D style sprites like DKC but I just don't see that looking right for Mario.

The issue for me is the lack of new environments/worlds, at least judging from the screenshots released so far. I'm not asking for a whole new setting like dinosaur world in SMW, but at least give me some new imaginitive worlds to keep the series fresh. Forest world in the Wii game was a good example of this, but one more new world is not going to cut it. We keep seeing the usual suspects like ice world, desert world, lava world, etc.

That said, I am hugely looking forward to this game, and the return of the p meter and raccoon tale is pretty awesome. Even a recycled Mario game is superior than 90% of the junk I see being pedaled around these days - games that seem to focus more on cinematics than actual gameplay.

It amazes me how someone can get 300+ posts in just over a day for complaining about a game's graphical styles, despite the fact we haven't seen a video, or read any hands-ons, or any real information.

We've seen 4 images. That's it. You're making it sound like we've had thousands of details on the game and it's making people's eyes bleed.

Settle down. And wait until we've seen something concrete on the game

There's a reason those Sonic games are called Episodes. They're short, just like most of the other cheap 2D platformers on the download services like Braid and Limbo. You could 100% the game in a very short amount of time, and often the first playthrough will clock in at less than two hours (I completed Limbo in one sitting in about 70-80 minutes for example). That's why those games are cheap. They aren't offering the same content as a retail release.

Mario games can be completed that quickly, but only with the aid of a warp pipe or the equivalent where you skip huge chunks of the game. There's no equivalent in those other games, they are just that short.