something something "can we play the ds version for the retrospective"
I still remember reading about that & being super excited, then getting it a month before Christmas/getting the DS & just staring at how small & flat the cartridge was. I enjoyed it so much I got all 150 stars twice.
Now, it's kind of nuts we have a method (that's legal) where we can play not only SM64 but Sunshine & Galaxy portable. My teenage self would've been blown over portable N64, GCN, & Wii titles.
....though man, after hours of Odyssey, going to 64's physics & moveset feels....heavy.
The DS version was my first exposure to Mario 64, so going "back" to the original with 3D All Stars is a little bit of a funhouse mirror experience for me. On the one hand, so much is just like how I remember it, but on the other hand, so much isn't.
The main thing I noticed straight up when playing the 3D All Stars version was just how janky the camera was. There was a good seven year or so gap between the original release and the DS port, so it makes sense that lessons had been learnt in the meantime, but I am surprised the auto camera was that bad. It shudders and gets stuck at awkward spots in many places where it tries hard to avoid clipping into the geometry. It's a bit disorienting, as is the frame rate.
The second thing that the actual 3D models all look goofy. SM64DS redid the geometry for character models and I think I remember reading that the Mario model in the DS version actually had simpler geometry than the original, despite looking much better.
The third thing is that the controls feel "off" to me. Years of playing Galaxy 1/2 and 3D Land/World have me trained to expect a certain weight and momentum to Mario. In truth he feels "heavier" than I'm used to as well - Mario is slower to turn, slower to start running and harder to stop. Don't get me started on the flying controls - they're awful. It never feels like flight as much as trying to stay on top of a mechanical bull.
Finally, the weirdness of the game is something I remembered from the DS version, but at the time I assumed I was playing tweaked levels or extra content or something. Things like the warp zones in the alcoves, the way you unlock the ghost house, the hidden wall, looking up at the sun in the lobby etc. aren't signposted by coins or a landmark and depend on the player exploring the hub world as though it was a level. Galaxy might signpost that something might be hidden somewhere by having a platform sitting out by its lonesome or having a small trail of coins leading to an alternate path. There's often none of that here and you just have to jump up to every single wall niche
just in case something is hidden.
It's cool in that I love stumbling across secret levels, but also bizarre from a gameplay point of view in that if you walked away from the game for a while and forgot where a secret was, you might never find it again. If anything, it reminds me of bombing every wall for hidden passages in every 2D Metroid game.
www.nintendoworldreport.com
