I’ll also stake down a flag for Super Mario Land 2. Has a real fun experimental energy to for something with Mario on the box.
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Got this just in time
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I’m not exactly sure how common that opinion is, but I’m just remembering various discussions in the past where there were takes like “the only clever level design in the game is the bonus level where you change a W to an M” (factually incorrect), “the speedruns of this sure look unexciting” (yes, that is the most boring way to approach the game), and “the game doesn’t get good until Wario’s castle” (it’s a neat level, bit also illustrates why they took a different approach with the rest of the game).
I’m probably overgeneralizing based on a sample size of three over the course of a decade, but those are the kind of memories that surface when I scan my brain for “selectbutton SML2 opinion.”
If nothing else, the game is living proof that whoever is responsible for the aesthetic of the NSMB series should be launched into the sun.
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occasionally when i revisit sml2, the relative sluggishness of mario’s movement feels slightly offputting to me, but i’m always impressed at the level of variety and cleverness on display in the stage design. it almost makes smw look rote and predictable.
lol wtf
side note: maybe it was just because i played sml2 almost a decade before i played super mario world, but the spin jump being down+jump just feels better to me
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yeah honestly SML2 is better suited for the game boy than SML, which feels to me like a bad attempt to directly translate the feel of an NES mario game for the tiny screen of the game boy. don’t get me wrong, i love it, but it is a lesser game in my eyes
SML2 leans into the tiny screen and gives you big friendly sprites, and slows down the movement speed so that you can actually take time to react to things. and the bunny ears are fantastic in giving you more control over some of the weirder jumps and whatnot. it’s just really cool!!
plus you get to be a tiny guy in a big world, i am always a fan of that
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the initialism for the second game boy mario is
SML2:6GC
just an absolutely beautiful sequence of characters
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you know what’s kind of wild about the presence of the “6” in this game? i feel like every mario up to this point was all about 8s and 4s:
8 worlds each in mario 1, 2jp*, 2us, 3, world*, 8 bowser kids in world…
4 stages per world in mario 1 & 2jp, 4 worlds in SML1, 4 characters in mario 2us, 4 stages in donkey kong
then SML2 comes in with a goddamn 6?!?!
*i guess lost levels actually has a 9th world, and smw’s number of worlds isn’t really 8, only its number of koopa castles, i think?
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the six golden coins has always sounded like a mystical goal, so this mario numerology you’re conducting just feels fitting to me.
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I think SML2:6GC is best played very casually. After you beat it you just dink around going to your favorite levels. It should not be played in a rush. It should not be played w/ serious ideas in you head.
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I really like that introductory stage in SML2 that works as a great place to revisit for some quick power ups and coins and 1-ups.
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I agree. I remember playing it as a kid on long car rides, starting and stopping as you could between looking at the scenery. I don’t ever remember sitting down and playing it all in one sitting.
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Ever since they started bringing stuff from smb2us back into the games, sml:6gc has to be the most ignored Mario game right? Do any of the later games reference anything about it except Wario?
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I was gonna say SML was about as ignored, but it had a pretty big shoutout in Mario Maker 2.
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ah yes, the power ball power up, also known as “the banger”
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Holy shit 60fps in this game is transformative. Game is absolutely great, I recommend it. The cutscenes are a bit twee imo, but everything is skippable if you aren’t vibing with it (even some gameplay segments)
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Double posting to say while I still nobly defend teen FPS games like Starglider 2, Stunt Race FX, King’s Field 2us/3jp, and Banjo-Tooie (N64), fuck knows I’d play native versions of those games at 60fps if they were feasible/available. There’s something about straining at the seams of a hardware’s limits that makes it more acceptable to me
Shadow of the Colossus is still best on PS2, despite the very low framerate
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i feel like. . .it’s very ugly on ps4. i will probably never buy a remake again because i hate how it looks on everything but ps2.
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Hey someone asked me maybe in the last thread if marvels avengers gets better past the first campaign. No. It does not. the writing is actually worse now. All they ever do is bitch at each other and everyones weird to kate bishop because shes…25? she sounds exactly like kamala but snarky in this really generic way that isnt accurate to her character. but they finally realized “oh characters shouldnt suck at level 1” and shes fun so whatever. All the characters in this game are skrulls pretending to be the heroes it’s the only way anything ever makes sense
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I haven’t played the ps4 remake but while it looks good it feels like all the life has been sucked out of it. the original release had this blown out, terry gilliam-esque quality to it that you rarely see captured in videogames. I’m not sure if running at 15 fps was critical to that effect but it definitely contributed to it imo.
the ps3 hd version isn’t bad though.
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Mario Land 2 has the Jason goombas. Who’s not into that?
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