I think that your point about musicals versus games with cutscenes is way off base.  Some games, like Mario, do just fine with hardly any cutscenes at all.  But others use them heavily to enhance the game experience.  And that's what it's about in my opinion:  enhancing the game experience.  It's okay for Mario to be given a simple goal like "princess kidnapped, go save her (by running a giant gauntlet of nearly nonsensical obstacles)."  But Nathan Drake's goals need a little bit more structure and narrative.  

That's what cutscenes are supposed to do, I think -- deliver that narrative and structure when it can't be delivered during pure gameplay.  Lots of cutscenes have things going on that would be hard to show the gamer in gameplay, or have an action sequence that would be too hard or boring to fit into the game and make people play through, etc.  It enhances the game experience by bridging the gap between playable areas and giving the player a sensible narrative connecting them and keeping him interested in the character's exploits.  

If you want to come back with, "Well, they shouldn't try to tell a story that they can't deliver in pure gameplay", you have a right to that opinion.  But I think that that's unfairly restrictive.  

And this also, I think, accounts for a lot of the 'lower standards' you see in game storytelling -- it's not the focus in many cases, just a support.  

I think that your point about musicals versus games with cutscenes is way off base.  Some games, like Mario, do just fine with hardly any cutscenes at all.  But others use them heavily to enhance the game experience.  And that's what it's about in my opinion:  enhancing the game experience.  It's okay for Mario to be given a simple goal like "princess kidnapped, go save her (by running a giant gauntlet of nearly nonsensical obstacles)."  But Nathan Drake's goals need a little bit more structure and narrative.  

That's what cutscenes are supposed to do, I think -- deliver that narrative and structure when it can't be delivered during pure gameplay.  Lots of cutscenes have things going on that would be hard to show the gamer in gameplay, or have an action sequence that would be too hard or boring to fit into the game and make people play through, etc.  It enhances the game experience by bridging the gap between playable areas and giving the player a sensible narrative connecting them and keeping him interested in the character's exploits.  

If you want to come back with, "Well, they shouldn't try to tell a story that they can't deliver in pure gameplay", you have a right to that opinion.  But I think that that's unfairly restrictive.  

And this also, I think, accounts for a lot of the 'lower standards' you see in game storytelling -- it's not the focus in many cases, just a support.  

But... but that is the fun! Complete chaos!

Maybe it's the people I've played with, since we kinda enjoy yelling at each other...

Even without the multiplayer, though, I think the game is among Mario's best. I'm surprised people can prefer NSMB DS to this, I found that game to be kind of mediocre.

To make things clear right from the start, this isn't just about the Wii, it's about all gaming systems, so overall Game Of The Year. That's why this thread is in Gaming Discussion and not Nintendo Discussion.

Some people might have noticed that I didn't log in for almost two weeks, that's because I got NSMB Wii. I guess my absence due to this game makes even the biggest distractors of NSMB Wii thankful that Nintendo made this platformer, even if it is only for a brief time. Obviously I played NSMB Wii a lot during the past two weeks, so I can judge the game quite fairly now. So is it worthy of the title Game Of The Year?

No, because it has three major flaws.

1) It is made by Nintendo.
2) It doesn't have any guns.
3) The main character doesn't have an ass that would turn a straight guy gay.

But in all seriousness, what has New Super Mario Bros. Wii going for it?

Perfect controls, jumping mechanics that make it a joy to play, lots of levels with unique ideas, tons of secrets and only a few new, but useful power-ups. The penguin suit helps you in so many ways that it isn't funny (well, actually it is) and the propeller hat let's you fly, but only in a limited way. That's actually better than the flying in SMB3 and SMW where you could skip entire stages just by flying over them and the lack of star coins meant that it didn't even feel like you missed anything. 

The level design uses just about anything from previous Mario games, including air ships, and throws in new ideas. It just never gets boring or starts to feel stale through the entire game, it just never ceases to amaze the player. And afterwards you want to play it again, maybe with a friend. Or two, or three. The number of players changes the way how the game is played drastically and you'll get a new experience each time, depending on who you play with. The replay value of NSMB Wii seems to be unlimited.

But does this make it worthy of the title Game Of The Year?

No.

This game is so gigantic that just calling it the best game of the year is an insult. NSMB Wii is so much bigger, so much better and so much more badass than anything before it, that the title Game Of The Year is not worthy of NSMB Wii. We need something more special, like Game Of The Decade or Game Of The Forever to honor this master piece accordingly.

New Super Mario Bros. Wii really is all that.

I was too. I just could not resist to raise an objection when I saw yours.

I agree it is goty

ps:That was funny.

http://objection.mrdictionary.net/go.php?n=3460843