Super Mario Sunshine is a game worthy of your time.
NOTE: this review was written years ago by me, but I thought I might share this review with GB. Enjoy!
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It's been a long time, but it's finally here. One of the most anticipated GameCube games this year is finally out in stores, and that game is Super Mario Sunshine. Six years have passed since Mario's last big adventure, which was one hell of a time. It's now the year 2002, and the mustachioed one is once again doing what many wanted to see for quite a while: lots of running and jumping in massive 3-D worlds. Okay, enough of this introductory mumbo jumbo...I know what you all want to know: does SMS live up to the greatness of Super Mario 64? Is Mario still the king of platformers? Read on.
After years and years of thrashing Bowser time and time again, Mario and Peach have decided to go on a vacation to the beautiful Isle Delfino. However, trouble has already made its way to the island before Mario and Co. could even make a landing. It seems that Mario has already landed on the island, and is making a mess of Isle Delfino. Of course, it can't possibly be the big man himself-he's on the plane with Peach, right? Upon landing on Isle Delfino, Mario is arrested and charged with vandalism. His sentence? To clean the entire island before he can leave it. That's not all that needs to be done, though-Mario must collect the Shine Sprites, which are an integral part of Isle Delfino.
SMS has more of a story than in previous adventures-there's even FMV, a first for a Mario platformer. However, despite the game having more of a plot this time around, don't expect anything much greater than what you've seen in the past. But you don't care about story in a Mario game, right? Let's move on, then.
SMS breaks away from the typical level themes that you've seen millions of times. You won't find the typical ice world, fire world, space world, etc. that is prevalent in 98% of today's (and yesterday's) platformers. Instead, SMS carries a tropical theme (Ok, so you've seen this one too), but it's used throughout the entire game. Mario's supposed to be on a vacation, so an ice world on a tropical island is a tad out of place. Most players will probably be disappointed in knowing that SMS has fewer worlds than in Mario 64, but that's not to say that SMS is a game that can be completed in one day (unless you're some kind of freak). Being a sequel to SM64, SMS follows the same gameplay structure of the Nintendo 64 classic: enter a world, complete an episode, and grab a star (Shine Sprite) at the end. It's all familiar territory. Let it be known that SMS is more of an evolution of SM64 than a revolution for the platform genre. SMS is to SM64 as Super Mario World was to Super Mario Bros. 3. Got it? Good.
Mario must clean Isle Delfino with FLUDD (Flash Liquidizing Ultra Dousing Device), a multipurpose device that's with you for the whole game. Mario even uses FLUDD to do his fighting for him (Mario's no longer a scrapper), though Mario can still jump on enemies if need be. More than a gimmick, FLUDD has many uses, and there are a staggering number of useful techniques that can be done using FLUDD. You can perform any of these moves quickly and easily, thanks to fluid, responsive controls. Unfortunately for Mario 64 fans, FLUDD makes up a majority of Mario's moves, at the expense of the handy long jump, as well as other moves seen in SM64. Oh, just in case you're thinking it--don't worry about having to do excessive cleaning tasks with FLUDD-the number of episodes that involve cleaning an area can be counted on half of one hand. Yoshi fans will be happy to know that the multi-colored dinosaur makes a triumphant return in SMS, though he plays almost exactly the same as Mario (he has the same moves that Mario could do with FLUDD).
There will be several cases where Mario will have to complete an episode without FLUDD. Each world has one episode where you must run through an obstacle course full of spinning cubes, breakable bricks, disappearing platforms-whatever. These stages require old-school techniques in order to beat them, and they'll have you using your entire arsenal of jumps. These obstacle courses are excellent, and are quite challenging-players who lived and breathed Mario in the 80's-90's will crack a smile every time they see a new obstacle course (there's even a remix of the classic Super Mario Bros. theme playing in the background), while other players may become frustrated with having to do these courses in every world. Speaking of difficulty, SMS is above the standard (which is "easy"); I've had my share of deaths, and I've even seen what the "Game Over" screen looked like more than once. I guess it helps that it isn't easy to get 1-ups like it was in SM64 (the number of lives I had never went past 10).
Some deaths were camera-related, which is never good in any 3D platformer. Unfortunately, SMS may have borrowed a little too much from SM64, as both games share this problem. Gamers may hate Nintendo delays, but SMS is a game that probably could've spent a little more time in the development phase. You still have free control of the camera (which all 3D platformers should have), but often the camera won't behave, especially in closed areas. A silhouette of Mario can be seen when he's not in view, but it's pretty useless-it would have been better if the objects blocking your view of Mario went transparent instead, because you want to see more than a silhouette. The camera doesn't make the game unplayable, but it's quite a nuisance in more than a few occasions. It seems no developer can master the art of camera mechanics--not even Nintendo, who pride themselves on making quality games.
Visually, SMS looks great, but there are better-looking games on the GC, though the water effects are arguably the best yet. Instead, Nintendo wisely put more effort into the level design-and it shows. The game's worlds are quite large (especially in height), and the draw distance is infinite, so you'll always get a clear (and beautiful) view of the entire level. There's even a heat wave in the distance! Levels are littered with objects (see Ricco Harbor as an example), including more enemies to battle--SM64 had some nice levels, but they weren't very populated with things to kill. In the sound department, SMS has some catchy tunes (the SMB theme remix is great), but the voice acting during the FMV movies is atrocious. They aren't even amusingly bad. To illustrate how bad it is, Star Ocean: the Second Story had less offensive voices, and they were downright nasty.
Super Mario Sunshine is basically an extension of Super Mario 64, but I don't mean that in a negative sense, because SM64 was an excellent game. SMS is a sequel, so it'll play like one. It's a huge improvement in almost every way, except in one key area, the camera, which hasn't really changed since 1996. Camera problems aside, the most important thing to know about SMS is that it's just plain fun. Granted, it's not the same "fun feeling" you felt while playing SM64 (because that was a brand-new experience in platform gaming), but if you enjoyed SM64 in the slightest, then chances are that you'll enjoy SMS at almost the same level, because it's more of what you loved. Revolutionary it ain't, but Super Mario Sunshine stands as one of the best.
