Mario 64

When I was a kid, Mom would send me over to play games in the electronic department in Walmart as she went shopping. Around 1996, the Nintendo 64 came out and they had Super Mario 64 there for all to try. I played that game to death. However, I assumed the guy behind the counter kept pressing the reset button. Either that or the game automatically reset after about an hour. I played... maybe three sections.

I remember hearing people talk about how fast they were able to complete the game. I always ignored them because they would do all these glitches in the game to bypass all the door requirements. Every now and then I'll find one that legitimately used hard-mode skills to retrieve stars in 1/5 the time it took me. Those were great to watch.

Well, a couple days ago I decided to go ahead and play through. I remembered the three sections I played and the Clock Tower level people complained about being ridiculous. For the first half of the game, things went smoothly. The other half... not so much. The 3D camera was still an issue. Even as I kid, I kept pressing the camera reset button every minute. Then there were sections where one mistake would cost you to redo the whole level. This would ultimately prove frustrating as the challenges built up in certain levels, especially that Clock Tower. The kid in me wouldn't mind as he pounded against each obstacle over and over. Today, I really didn't feel like collecting every star and doing every challenge. I didn't feel like scrounging around for 100 coins after resetting the level every single time I collected a star.

Did that mean the game wasn't fun? No. I actually loved it. The levels reminded me of any other ordinary modern Mario game. There was enough there to keep my interest for a day or two as I tried my hand at completing it. One person stated that it would take a normal person 15 hours to complete, or 4 hours if revisiting the game. I think I spent around 10 hours. 15 courses: 5 challenges, 1 collecting 8 red coins, and 1 collecting 100 coins. Add a few more secret stars and you can get up to 120 stars. I was done at the minimum 70 stars required to defeat the final boss.

 

8-4-2016