With the release and buzz of Super Mario Galaxy this past week, I’ve decided to run a poll to see what everyone thinks of this game. BTW, it’s on the very right sidebar if you don’t see it. Please feel free to participate! 

Variety.com has been getting a lot of attention these past couple of days since their first review of Super Mario Galaxy. Of course there’s been tons of reviews on Galaxy since it’s release but what the significance here? Well they’re the first to provide negative view points on the seemingly “perfect” incantation of the Mario genre and this has sparked a lot of anger from the usual gamer, other reviewers, and of course Nintendo fan boys alike. Now I’m always up for negative view points on anything, because its those little things that can make or break a game that I always like to see. Especially when a game is almost seemingly too perfect I tend to like to see why some folks may think its not. But when some of these view points turn up to be basically personal nit-pickings, I get just a little irritated. Before I begin I will make it clear that with all of the points which was considered faults in Galaxy, the reviewer who made these views did state that it is a “brilliant” game.

So in case you missed it, one of our readers posted this link yesterday to Variety’s review of Super Mario Galaxy. Its a short and quick run down of the game, except for the noticeable complaints about it. Usually I would validate points like this because every game will always have it’s flaws - yes even Galaxy has some flaws that I’ve picked up on but that’s just a personal thing. But the problem here is that this guy who did the review seems to be smoking crack when he wrote this. I’m not one to slag on people for their personal view points but I’m going to have to rant and ramble a bit on his particular idiocy. Some of the exerts of interest that I shall quote :

““Super Mario Galaxy” is proof positive that Nintendo still has some of the best videogame development talent in the industry, but they no longer have the best platform on which to work. “

Very first sentence in the review, yet one of the most idiotic. Why is that? Should Nintendo stop making games on the Wii and go and develop for say…the PS3 now? How is the Wii not a good platform to develop on all of a sudden? Has Super Mario Galaxy totally ruined it for Nintendo now? Give me a frickin break.

“But “Galaxy” makes poor use of the Wii’s motion-sensing controls and the graphics simply aren’t up to par with what players can now find on the Playstation 3 or Xbox 360.”

The “poor motion control” is just him nit-picking, which I will get to later. But his comment about the graphics not being “up to par” with the PS3 and Xbox 360 is just plain stupid on the level someone whos been in a coma for the last year - but at least the coma guy would of been understandable for his thoughts. Take a look at what else this dumbass says concerning graphics :

“Fans may claim that the graphics are good “for the Wii,” but that argument quickly grows tired. There’s clever art design on many of the planets Mario visits, but given the vastly superior quality of the graphics in a game like “Ratchet and Clank: Tools of Destruction,” currently available for the PS3, “Galaxy” looks old fashioned and lifeless.“

As video gamers, we ALL should know by now what are the strengths and weakness of each gaming console system, and as game reviewers we should most definitely know what they are by now. Even the biggest Nintendo Wii fan-geek-boy in the world would not argue that the Wii’s graphics would ever rival the PS3 or 360. So why would a game reviewer, which this guy apparently is, make such a stupid dumbass comparison regarding graphics? We all know that games on the Wii are going to be graphically inferior to games on the PS3 or 360. We all can accept that Galaxy has incredible graphics for a Wii game - especially with this past year of weak ports and lame cutsey kiddy graphics. But no one in their right mind would go and say Galaxy has better graphics than Ratchet and Clank on the PS3 (atleast I don’t think they would). No one would expect it to, and Galaxy does not even try to be the graphical front runner on the Wii. Does this guy not realize this at all? Has he not been following up on video games in the past couple of years? Or is he just a plain dumbass?

“it’s evidence of how bad the Wii is for third person action games, a problem first made clear in last year’s “Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.” Holding the nunchuk, which moves Mario, and the Wii-mote, which makes him jump and spin, in separate hands, is an awkward arrangement. Since there’s only one thumbstick, players rarely have control of the camera and when they do, it’s not easy to manipulate.”

I definitely can not relate to what he’s saying about the “awkwardness” of the control scheme. Is holding a nun-chuck to control the movement in one hand, while using the Wii-mote in the other such a tedious arrangement? I guess aside from Zelda TP, he hasn’t played any other Wii games (like he claims) which all apparently uses that exact control scheme (RE4, MP3, Godfather, Manhunt2..etc). He also states that use of the Wii-motes to pick up the “star bits” in Galaxy is “not integral” to game and that “pointing at them is a chore.” Yet another stupid view point because I’m guessing that the simple act of pointing, not pointing and clicking, but simply aiming the reticule at objects in the screen is such a hassle to him. Maybe he would actually rather prefer to run up and manually pick up the star bits themselves?

This is definitely just personal nit-pickings. Perhaps he isn’t simply coordinated enough to hold a nun-chuck and a Wii-mote which is why he seems to prefer to regular control pads of the other consoles. Or perhaps he’s just plain biased against the Wii itself. In which case he shouldn’t be reviewing games on the Wii in the first place.

I can somewhat agree about the camera issue in certain games, but thats just a minor problem. In Galaxy, and just about all these 3rd games on the Wii, its possible to and quite easy to reset the camera view instantly when it occasionally goes out of place - not that this is a major issue anyway. Maybe he’s referring to the camera problem that plagued Mario Sunshine? Nah, he’s just bitching a whining because he can’t handle it.

To finish this off, this guy states that Mario Galaxy is “one of the worst two-player experiences ever seen in a video game.” I haven’t played two players co-op in Galaxy yet so I can’t make any disputes on it myself but I can definitely say that Shigeru Miyamoto would be dishearten to hear such a remark especially when he had such a wonderous plan for the two player mode in Galaxy.

With all the positiveness that Super Mario Galaxy has been getting, it would make sense for a negative review to creep up eventually. Its the negativity that also makes for a good read and I as well as other readers are always open to it. But when negative views are nothing more than just blatant nit-pickings from someone who seems totally unqualified for reviewing games, it just becomes stupid and pointless. I’m just wondering if they actually paid this guy to write this, because if so, they should pay me to review clothing line or something I have no clue about. Considering Variety states in the footnote of everyone of it’s article :

“Variety is striving to present the most thorough review database.”

The review charts that is. From the compiling list at MetaCritic.com which came from 24 reviews from different gaming websites, resulted Super Mario Galaxy with the current score of 97/100 which now beats out the following heavy hitters of this past year including : Bioshock (96/100), The Orange Box (96/100), Call of Duty 4 (95/100), Halo 3 (94/100), and Oblivion (93/100).

 11 reviews so far from major sites such as GamePro, GameSpy, and G4TV has given this game a perfect, I say again, perfect score of 100%. While the lowest current score from GameDaily.com gave Super Mario Galaxy a 90% citing :

“The at-times awkward Wii-mote controls and a tacked-on co-op mode keep the game from reaching perfection, but gravity-bending levels still manage to keep the game fresh from start to finish, while familiar characters and soundtrack hit all the right nostalgic notes. “

But what is more shocking and can be considered the begining of hell freezing over and the world going mad, GameSpot.com (otherwise known as Xbox360Spot.com) has rated Super Mario Galaxy a unusually high 95%!! This game must be that good then!

I, like the many other legions of Wii gamers out here, was able to pick this game up yesterday and put in a good hour or so into it. While I am impress with the simplistic gameplay and the mind-tripping upside down view, I haven’t had enough to time to truly enjoy it yet or to make a realistic opinion. But the initial first impression is enough to say that Nintendo has done a fantastic job of re-creating that first feeling you got over 10 years ago when laying your hand on Mario 64.

This game will be one of those that must be in every Wii gamers collection. So if you don’t have this game yet, then what are you waiting for? Pick it up right now!

Stay tuned for more updates on this must have game….

Gametrailers.com usually have some of the better, more indeph game reviews in my opinion. So here’s a very good one of the upcoming Super Mario Galaxy (launching on Monday woot!). NOTE, don’t watch it if you don’t want to see any spoilers!

Now in one of the most strangest turn of events since the success enigma of Wii Play, the “quiet” release of highly anticipated Super Mario Galaxy in Japan was…unimpressive? Super Mario Galaxy went on sale last night in Japan where according to Joystiq.com, the long lines everyone was waiting for was for “Ace Combat 6″. WTF? This is quite a stark contrast to what many were expecting, like the same chaotic mob-like scene from the days of Dragon Warrior 3 for the NES. CVG.com reports that Ameblo, a Japanese gaming site states that Super Mario Galaxy only shift 130,000 copies during launch day, which is a surprisingly small number for what many considers to be Nintendo’s biggest hardcore game to date. Plus its “a Mario”!

While the numbers are a bit low for a game of this caliber, but to put it in perspective, we often tend to look at Japan as the be-all trend for what the video gaming world should be. Which should not be the case. Their concepts and taste in gaming over there is nothing like here, Europe, or anywhere else so I wouldn’t expect the sales to be the same anywhere else. Plus, we’re only counting the numbers on a tiny country island, as opposed to continent-sized locations like North America, Australia, and Europe so it would make perfect sense that the numbers would be smaller! But then again….it’s A Mario! It’s Japan’s number foreign mascot….!

Needless to say, I wouldn’t worry too much about the numbers until we see it here. I’m going say it’ll make over 700,000 sales by it’s first week in the US alone. Less than two weeks to go people, less than two frickin weeks!

What we have here is a very detailed and scientific video clip that explains how Mario in the upcoming Super Mario Galaxy game, is actually able to run upside down and shoot like a rocket from planet to planet. But there’s only one tiny little problem - it’s in Japanese! To make matters worse, the subtitles are also in Japanese! After over 17 thousand views, the best we can make of this clip is : WTF?