Some examples of things I expect in mario's color palette:

Some ennemies and colors

Some Screens

Notice the tones of brown, green, red, foggy blue, orange-ish yellow. Now watch your eyes:

It is just so off to me...

Friends, if this helps, Mario is my main character in Super Smash Bros, and I dress him classic brown.

^^ i think they just might be rushing to get ready for a holiday release IMHO. I dont know about all that palette talk. You're going way to deep for me my friend. But even a rushed Mario turns out to be a good game

Rol, it mainly applies to the bottom left one, and to the top right one. The others are tolerable despite some needed detail here and there. It's the general direction I don't like. I hope it gets fixed through UAT by release.

@happydolphin

I understand what you're saying, but honestly the art style doesn't bother me too much it looks in the same level as Super Mario World to me, although I agree that Mario art style has become more "kid friendly" over the years but in this particular case I think it's ok, Sunshine and Yoshi's Island were worse.

But the important thing is, you're not satisfied with it, and in the same way a lot of people here don't have a problem I can also imagine a lot of people do, hell I know people like that already even before the Wii was released they talked like that about Mario.

As Rol says, Nintendo is rushing this one for sales, but just imagine a lot of people not buying it because it looks very similar to the DS and Wii games, I think that could happen, at least the excitement may not be as huge as the DS game because of this, we're already seeing it in other forums.

Mario games used to look very different one from the other, this one is not. A risky move for Nintendo, hopefully it will sell and the WiiU version will finally have a different approach.

@Colors due to hardware. (your idea Rol)

Well let's talk about it. Here is the artwork for Super Mario Bros., which was independent of HW as can be seen by the liberty in the body proportions of the drawn characters.

For some reason, the color scheme was the same between the sprites and the drawn characters. I'd be hard-pressed to find that the explanation for that is due to HW limitations.

A few others as food for thought

(Ignore Yoshi's Island there, not important to the discussion)

Even in the post I gave with the pics, one of those was from Galaxy (the 3D fireball mario one). As sparkly as Galaxy was in certain areas, it was never flashy, and at other times it compensated with more traditional moves, colors and power-ups. The same can probably be said here, but certain things in general would make that compensation much harder I think.

@Soma. Are we seeing this kind of thread on other forums too? I'd be glad to know that: I don't like feeling like I'm the only one thinking like this. Knowing other people also think so makes me feel less insecure about my opinion on this.

Yes, it's true, there seems to be little changing from the art direction of the previous NSMB entries. I was expecting a SMB to SMB3 kind of evolution here too, but it looks like Nintendo is trying to stick to a tried and true formula.

On the topic of non-evolutionary sequels, I know that Nintendo released a second version of Mario Bros. in Japan, a sequel actually. I remember enjoying it as an older kid in my copy of Super Mario All-Stars, it was called the Lost Levels. It was essentially called Super Mario Bros. 2 in Japan if I'm not mistaken. From what I understand, that game didn't sell too well. It had minor differences from the original, but the few changes it made did not make the game look much better actually it lost much of the graphical charm of the original.

However what made it more interesting is that it was more challenging, I can attest to that. I only finished it with save points (mario all-stars). Needless to say, that (gameplay) didn't convince consumers.

It makes you wonder, why would Nintendo think it'll work better this time? I have a sad feeling it won't. If Super Mario Bros. 3, an excellent game if I may say and a good evolution to SMB was not able to expand sales of SMB, I don't know if a symbolical clone like SMB2 or NSMB2 can do any better. If SMB2 couldn't do better than SMB3, then I don't see why Nintendo would try the losing formula here.

thought as much, theres always Wii U

^Rol, I don't like your tone here.

I'm reluctant to pursue the dialogue with you, I don't know if you even care at this point it seems like you just find it stupid. If art, colors and graphic design is a topic you find stupid, then why talk?

My reason for being underwhelmed given a pair of pre-emptive screenshots is due to not liking what I see in terms of graphics. If you don't want to talk about that, then this isn't the place for you.

I don't want to drive you up the wall. Try to stay composed, you've helped me before, consider this my turn to return the favor.

When I was talking about SMB2, when I likened it to NSMB2, ... I meant it in the way that gameplay had certain minor improvements, but that graphics were largely the same graphical architecture.

Where I could give you room here Rol is that the gameplay improvements for NSMB2 may be considerable (especially the p-wing) in contrast to the minor changes of SMB2 (poison mushrooms, memory stages). But SMB3 revolutionized SMB with concepts such as sliding, holding shells, using items, using costumes (boots, suits). It just really pushed the envelope in the gameplay department. I don't think that will be said for NSMB2 but I could be wrong. I'll make this a debatable point.

But from a graphical standpoint, SMB2 is to SMB what NSMB2 is to SMB, in my humble opinion, while SMB3 (the true evolutionary successor to SMB, as even sales dictate) really changed the graphical architecture radically.

Is that a fair statement though?