EPGR: Why Super Mario Sunshine (GCN) Is Even Better in 2017

[Music] [Music] sup folks XO paradigm gamer here and much like the 1996 animated film we're back and yeah it's been a while and I apologize that but if you guys want to know more about what the hell's been going on I've focused like two or three update videos that are very detailed on the situation so you'll watch those if you're interested that being said last time we met we talked about Super Mario 64 and Super Mario 64 DS room is a video that was requested for a long time it's good to have it off my plate the meme is dead and since I've given that in-depth treatment to super my 64 I'd like to do the same for the games follow-up Super Mario Sunshine on the Nintendo GameCube and this games kind of divisive I guess some people just absolutely love this game other people are like who's alright and there are other people who are like this game sucks and I'm not even going to pretend to know what the consensus is because every time I do people like that's not the consensus so I think though it's still safe to say that this is probably usually not considered one of the best mario games and for that reason long under any others I guess I'd like to examine this game in-depth and see whether any of the criticisms hold water so without further ado let's jump right in after the release of the at the time beloved Super Mario 64 the Mario series dope head first into the realm of spin-offs this is where games like the Mario Party series the sports games and the first Paper Mario game came into being there was originally going to be a direct sequel to Super Mario 64 and the Japanese only Nintendo 64 disk drive tentatively titled Super Mario 64 - which would offer cooperative multiplayer and introduced Luigi as a playable character as you probably know the nintendo 64dd failed harder than the wii u so the game was cancelled early in developing its possible that ideas from the cancelled prototype were incorporated into future 3d Mario releases a true follow-up to Super Mario 64 would have to wait for the release of Super Mario Sunshine on the Nintendo GameCube in 2002 development began in late 2000 early 2001 when someone floated the idea of a game centering around a water pump the game received only about a year and a half of development time with key figures in the game's development admitting that the game was rushed and that content was cut nevertheless the game was released a Universal critical acclaim and was considered another laudable Mario classic over the next few years however a popular opinion quickly shifted through a public conversation that I always imagined when something like this boy Mario sure is amazing every game Nintendo puts out is great yeah even sunshine was pretty good yeah I mean I I guess like game was kind of weird now that you mention it I didn't really like the pachinko shines bright and what's with all those weird enemies and those bloke right ah what a hassle it was to collect them all yeah and all you get is a postcard you know now that I think about it well most Mario games are really good sunshine is one of the weaker ones yeah kind of a disappointment after Super Mario 64 you got to remember that the early 2000s were a different time for the Mario franchise this was back when mainstream releases were fewer and farther between and before Nintendo released four separate new Super Mario Brothers games so it makes sense that sunshine would receive acclaim despite its trouble development cycle given time however people started to notice things they didn't before I'm sure there were many people who never liked the game would begin with again I don't really know what the consensus is but I think I can say with relative certainty that most people prefer 64 the galaxy games in 3d land slash 3d world as for me Super Mario Sunshine was a huge part of my childhood but even back then there are a lot of things that bothered me I thought all the enemies were really weird I didn't like how few levels there were and getting a hundred percent seemed to vastly out of reach at the time back then I preferred Mario 64 and in 2004 the DS remake then overshadowed both games now after the release of the groundbreaking galaxy game it's safe to say that for all of Sunshine's attempts to experiment with the series very little of that stuck around going forward I've since played the super Maya sunshine seven or eight times to a full completion and yeah my opinions changed quite a bit on this one and seeing as I gained super -64 such an in-depth treatment in the previous video I'd like to do the same for super Brian sunshine to see whether any of the criticisms I hear around the internet our meritorious or not without further ado this is my review of super mario sunshine the story is something else it starts out strikingly similar to super mario world mario and Princess Peach once again head off for a much-needed vacation joined this time by the overprotective toadsworth making his debut in this game their destination isle delfino a tropical resort where the Sun shines 24 hours a day except and pianta village for some reason as they come in for a landing they discovered the airstrip is covered in some sort of a key paint like goop now by don't have stop toadsworth asks Mari to sort things out who then uncovers a water pact named flood a flash liquidiser ultra dowsing device the pump registers Mario as his owner and agrees to help him clean up the sludge after defeating a polluted piranha Mario is arrested by law enforcement and taken to trial there the prosecution claims that someone in Mayas blackness has been covering the island in goop scaring away the islands Guardians the shine sprites and plunging the island into darkness is only evidence a police composite sketch the truth is obvious that guilty party sits among us it is none other the prosecution's case is specious at best and rests entirely on hearsay which is forbidden under Delfino rules of evidence 802 the opposing counsel claims to have eyewitnesses but it's declined to call them to the stand so that my client may cross-examine them pursuant to the confrontation Clause of the Delfino Constitution and opposing counsel has not shown that it's hearsay witnesses are unavailable under the exceptions listed in rule 804 a of the rules of evidence to convict my client also requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt and in the light of the opposing counsels lack of evidence I move for summary judgment in favor of my clients overruled I judge the defendant guilty as charged I hereby order the defendant to clean this entire island until isle delfino is completely free of his vile handiwork Mario shall not be allowed to leave court adjourned after that travesty of criminal justice Mario is sentenced with cleaning up an entire island by himself well it's better than jail time I guess shortly after beginning a sentence Mario discovers that a shadowy doppelganger known as shadow Mario with his magic paintbrush is responsible for the island's graffiti shadow Mario attempts to kidnap the princess but Mario manages to chase them off and follows him through a magic gateway and so begins Mario's quest to clean Isle Delfino from top to bottom along the way Mario have to collect shine sprites which will bring back peace and sunshine to the island that's the basic setup for Super Mario Sunshine but there are a couple of twists Oh spoiler alert around the quarter mark shadow Mario Returns absconds with Princess Peach two penis Park with Mario shooting himself out of a cannon to give chase after a face-off against shadow Mario's Mex a doe Mario reveals himself to be none other than Bowser jr. who is under the delusion that peach is his mother somehow even more concerning is that peach can't seem to remember if this is true or not as my brother Erik once said didn't you remember having a slimey Koopa baby come out of her vagina by the way remember how Bowser had seven Koopalings in the classics well them those aren't Bowser's real kids anymore so declares Lord Miyamoto from the mountaintop anyways Bowser jr. reveals that his plan was to frame Mario for his crime so that it could make up with the princess bo mario rotted in jail which is probably Bowser's smartest evil plot to date Bowser jr. then escapes with Princess Peach to Corona Mountain after chasing down shadow Mario across the island Mario finally gains access to Corona Mountain and makes his way to Bowser's evil hot tub in the sky what follows is Bowser's first and only official speaking role great hey Mario wow you just hurt my family vacation it's laughable to say the least after Mario defeats Bowser recovers the final shine sprite Bowser and his son float away from the island Bowser jr. then admits he knew peach wasn't his mother the whole time but pledges to keep helping his dad anyway then what was the point of introducing this whole maternity plot point to begin with plot also dies but it gets fixed right away so yeah overall this plot is a strange mix of both incredibly silly and surprisingly intelligent plot points with a decent presentation and goofy voice acting and I absolutely love it to pieces I'll admit that I like it mostly in an ironic way and I wouldn't exactly want this to become a new standard for main series storytelling but it's such a fun change of pace from the usual Mario plotline and so damn endearing that I can't help but enjoy it anyway this the only official Mario game to feature voice-acted cutscenes and yeah these aren't exactly top-tier performances but at the same time I find them immensely enjoyable in an ironic way this script is unforgettably quotable from start to finish again just the mesh mouth you're free shop and get rid of Paul yet ok and remember we'll be watching you pal we'll know it starts like off the good news is that if you don't like the plot there's not a whole lot of it past the beginning so if this handful of cutscenes ruins this Mario game for you I challenge you to evaluate your priorities at the very least the plot is an adequate justification for why you're collecting shine sprites so it doesn't feel like mindless busy work and for that I say it does its job moving on the visuals by hi Lia is this a gorgeous game for its time compared to Super Mario 64 which was a decent looking launch title with a few ugly character models Super Mario Sunshine is one of the best looking games of the generation despite being released early in the GameCubes lifecycle all the character models look great the texture work holds up remarkably well and everything is just overall pleasant on the eye part of what makes the visuals hold up so well is that unlike many ps2 classics Super Mario Sunshine supports progressive-scan thus fall super mario sunshine still looks great on a CRT to this day it looks even better on a modern one with the right cables meaning the visuals have aged like fine one of course I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the art direction Super Mario Sunshine goes for a tropical island theme with levels taking place in a Venice inspired hub world a windmill village a commercial Harbor a beach a chintzy theme park a haunted hotel in ancient bay and a mountain village honestly the aesthetic here really does the trick as a kid I always used to revisit sunshine every summer and it almost always felt like I was taking a vacation of sorts obviously there's not as much visual variety here as there was in Super Mario 64 but honestly for one game I don't really mind the more limited theming I feel like they squeezed about as much out of the motif as they possibly could and it's nice to see Mario not explore an ice field or a desert for once the levels also contain exclusive mechanics and set pieces to stand out from each other as for the enemies I think this was another great change of pace goombas were replaced with these cute little lumps called strolling Stu's which look like birthda Bosch roll from Yoshi's Island Koopas in this game are either electrified or creepy eggshell monsters bullet bills have wacky googly eyes loopers have big floppy tentacles pokies look like emojis Monty moles have little trucker outfits and Bob bombs have LEDs for a face so while most of the enemies have technically appeared in most other Mario games they have wacky new designs that make Sunshine's stand out as a kid these redesigns bothered me but today it's one of my favorite things about this game the unique art direction and visual aesthetic are a refreshing change of pace in an era where Mario games now repeat the same nostalgic cliches over and over again well I think most would acknowledge Sunshine's great visuals I feel like the soundtrack has unfortunately gone under the radar as greatest 64 soundtrack was it kept reusing the same 7 tracks over and over again across the 15 levels sunshine on the other hand has a dedicated musical track for each of the main stages as well as a few tracks for the side stages most stage themes are a remix of essential motif but if Super Mario World can get away with that then I don't see why sunshine can't all 5 of the boss themes are great with the face off against mecha bowser being a standout as always a couple songs from the NES original return with the remakes used in Delfino airstrip being my favorite rendition of the overused underground the-- other highlights include the tracks playing in the casino Sandberg and of course Delfino Plaza I wouldn't call it the best Mario soundtrack of all time but I do think it's unfortunately overlooked that said let's move on to the gameplay being a sequel to Super Mario 64 Sunshine has a similar structure Sophie knows capital city Delfino Plaza acts as a hub world connecting stages together by magic gems pipes and cannons the goal is to collect the island shine sprites which he earned for defeating bosses collecting a red coins finishing platforming sections completing minigames and accomplishing other objectives in contrast to 64 there's a much bigger focus on collecting things which we'll get into when we talk about the blue for much of the game the focus is still on exploring the stages and completing tasks just like in Super Mario 64 the game has seven main stages each with eight missions or episodes in terms of stage counts Super Why 64 definitely enjoys the advantage 15 main stages in 64 was already on the short side but sunshine has less than half as many compared to other collective thoughts at the time seven stages is embarrassingly few I'd understand if people consider this a serious flaw but as for me the content and design of these stages as well as all the side stuff more than makes up for these shortcomings in my 64 review I criticized both versions of the game for kicking Mario out of a stage every time he grabbed the power star calling it antithetical to the game's open world nature and a blatant way of disguising the game short length sunshine carries on that tradition but it makes a few adjustments that makes this design choice enhance rather than detract from the experience for one thing each episode changes around the stage layout to correspond with each episode implying a passage of time between tion for another thing each stage is given its own plot that progresses over the course of the eight episodes shadow mario shows up and causes trouble with mario foiling him for the first six episodes in the seventh episode shadow Maya himself appears with Mario chasing him away from the stage after that the eighth episode shows a resolution of sorts with life returning to normal for the residents some stages have more interesting plots than others but Serina beach in okie Bay being highlights over the course of Serina Beach you rescue a hotel from a phantom manta ray clear out a ghost infestation scrub off a beach chase off shadow Mario and restore Hotel Delfino to its former 4-star glory stages also contain memorable NPCs like the hotel owner the old nooky and the lady who owns all the chain jobs this makes the stages in Super Mario Sunshine much more lively and memorable than any of the stages in the previous game bottom line the splitting of stages into discrete episodes to tell an ongoing story was an original smart idea hoping sunshine to stand out for most games in the collectathon sub-genre as for how these stages are designed sunshine once again improves markedly over its predecessor while most of Super Mario 64 stages worked perfectly with the collectathon gameplay stages like dire dire docks tick tock clock and tall tall mountain had overly linear level design which coupled with the forestry entries made them unnecessarily repetitive to fully complete Super Mario Sunshine on the other hand applies the design philosophy behind something like whomps fortress to every stage in the game from Bianco hills to peon to village every stage is open-ended with seemingly countless ways to get from place to place provided you know the controls because of that playing the main shines feels considerably less repetitive if you were looking forward to playing some well-designed linear platforming sections don't worry Sunshine's got you covered too much like hell super mario 64 saved its most linear level design for secret or Bowser stages sunshine relegates all of its linear level design two secret stages and the final dungeon there are usually a couple of secret stages and each main stage and they're among the highlights of Super Mario Sunshine gameplay in my opinion on your first visit to these stages shadow mario will show up and take your flood away forcing Mario to get through an obstacle course with only its wits and superhuman athletics these stages are surprisingly challenging by 3d Mario standards and will push your platforming acumen to the max many other optional stages are accessible from Delfino Plaza to test your skills even further does sunshine offers the best of both worlds open-ended level design for collectathon missions and some of the best when your stages in the 3d series for folks looking for something more traditional without repeating Super Mario 64's mistake of trying to mix them both together in the main stages as for the bosses it's a considerable improvement over Super Mario 64 as well while there was a decent amount of them 64's boss fights all fell victim to their sheer ease of defeat and overt repetition you can only fight big boo or big bully so many times before it gets old unfortunately sunshine doesn't seem to have large as much from that mistake as it really shouldn't seeing as you fight five polluted piranhas to Monty mole cannons to Petey piranhas and three goober bluebirds I can at least credit sunshine with trying to make these bosses slightly harder in later fights with polluted piranhas taking additional hits and spawning more MOOCs or PD piranha flying around and throwing tornadoes in the second fight this doesn't really make them that much harder but it's a step in the right direction beyond that however Sunshine's bosses are better than 64's bosses in almost every way first of all all the boss battles are a held a lot more interesting fending off a giant robot or riding a rollercoaster flipping over a giant angry wiggler or playing slots with King Boo second with the noted exception of polluted piranhas even the easiest bosses require some semblance of strategy and pattern recognition to defeat in stark contrast to almost every boss in Mario 64 third a few of the bosses are actually decently challenging every time you spray Fanta Manta for example he divides into two increasingly smaller parts until a bunch of mini mantas are swarming all over the place finally unlike Bowser's previous appearance none of the bosses Center on janky unreliable mechanics if you ask me the increased challenging creativity of the selection of boss battles vastly outweighs the blatant repetition in the early game making the bosses much better in this game overall by far the biggest improvement in Super Mario Sunshine over 64 however is definitely the play control well I'll still defend the analog control on 64 and the d-pad controls the DS remake I'll be blunt when I say that Super Mario Sunshine has the best movement physics and handling of any 3d Mario game full-stop no holds barred no questions asked as much as I love galaxies galaxies too and even 3d world they don't even hold a candle to this level of precision tightness just overall good game feel everything for Mario's running speed to the more precise turning to the more forgiving walljump timing to the more maneuverable jumps to that washy sound it makes whenever Mario does a spin jump or side somersault it's simply be perfection of 3d Mario platforming control sunshine also strikes a fine balance for new and repeat players but making the level design perfectly approachable for newbies while rewarding players who have mastered the controls with shortcuts and a sense of skill I remember chasing after shadow Mario as a kid and being amazed at all the cool stuff he could do when wishing I could do it too fast-forward to 2017 and I've achieved a mastery of Mario's moveset that I could have only dreamed of a decade earlier Super Mario Sunshine is one of those games for the simple act of running around too jumping is incredibly satisfying in itself and I could never say the same about 64 or either of the galaxy games that said there are a few blemishes compared to Mario 64 is more 3d conducive swimming controls why are you swimming controls in this game feel not only oversimplified but slower as well which is ironic for a game set on a tropical island nevertheless the swimming controls function the other problem concerns the sections where you move around underwater but the hover nozzle whenever you use the hover nozzle the game goes to a tank control scheme ostensibly to prevent players from overusing the mechanic only problem is that these underwater sections use the same tank scheme and the turning is too slow and it just doesn't feel as intuitive as it really should be the good news is that you'll only be doing this for three shines hardly a deal breaker the big bertha of control issues is of course the stupid mud boat spoiler alert if you've ever played the final dungeon in this game I'm almost certain you remember this nonsense it's only one very brief section but it was the bane of my childhood and even today I'm still not sure how this even works you're supposed to spray water in whichever angle to steer the boat but it almost never goes in the direction you expect it to with patience the mud boat is perfectly playable but that doesn't change the fact that it's just a Genki shape section post the fruits are all on this webs on if you know how to steer the boat other than that I have virtually no complaints about the controls as for the camera on Mario Sunshine once again blows away past and future Mario titles super mario 64 had a slow-moving camera that got caught on everything and could only move and set increments galaxies one and two with the limited button layout of the Wii Remote Nunchuk was forced to bring back and improve rendition of the system with centering and preset angles the later games removed camera control all together and make it entirely automatic not only to sunshine bring on the camera centering feature from the Zelda games but it's the only 3d game in the series to date to feature actual analog camera control and it feels oh good I know some people prefer preset angles because they always work but I'm going to side with Nick and aqua mag now when I say that having that extra degree of control can make a game that much more fun to play I haven't even talked about flood yet which Mario uses to spray enemies clear away shadow Mario's magic paint interact with objects and even platform around sunshine takes advantage of analog triggers to a degree that very few games have tap it and Mario will let out a little burst of water hold down the art trigger slightly and Mario can spray slightly while running hold down the trigger all the way and Mario will stand in place while aiming press the Y button and Mario will go into first-person mode for precision aiming hold down the L trigger and Mario will straight back and forth which you can mix with the R trigger to aim and that's not all you can spin in place and spray to become a human sprinkler head you can shoot at the ground flop onto it and write it as a makeshift slip and slide you could do a back flip move to spray a blast of water and clear out a bunch of goo ball at once and so on much like the base platforming mastering flood sheer versatility takes time rewards repeat players but the sense of skill while some may claim that foot is just a dumb gimmick and nothing more I highly disagree I don't think it's as big an issue as some would suggest I would agree that the caps in Super Mario 64 didn't have the greatest use case or sense of integration it spiced up the mechanics a little bit but nothing more flood on the other hand is a true game changer for the 3d Mario formula and everything from the platforming to fighting enemies to taking on bosses is structured to reflect that the hover nozzle is a significant improvement over Super Mario 64 providing a simple way to correct jumps in midair platforming shortcuts and training wheels for newer players you can eventually unlock two additional nozzles in the hub world in main stages much like the captain 64 these don't have much utility beyond what they're required for but I'd still say they're a little more useful on their own than the caps were overall flood fuels useful and integrated for the entire 11 and a half hour adventure and never comes off as just a forced or cheap gimmick if you're looking for an extension to Mario's move set then look no further before I forget Yoshi's actually in this game to making his 3d Mario debut and completing the Super Mario World parallel after you clear a certain shine he'll become available in every level upon bringing him his favorite fruit Yoshi will hatch in Mario can mountain Yoshi can do everything Mario can do but he's slightly faster jump higher can flutter in midair can destroy certain obstacles and can eat enemies and objects while he can't be useful for collecting 100 coin shines and quickly eating blue coin birds though she is again mostly useful for the stuff for which he's required he also dies if he gets into deep water for some reason still it's nice to see them back in retrieving them in some cases can at least serve as a decent puzzle of swords with all that covered it's time to talk about a hundred percent completion back in 2015 my brother and I did a 120 shine playthrough of Super Mario Sunshine and game Mavericks and it's one of the best playthroughs we've ever done you need to Banaras the burn artists should be somewhere over here where the Banaras Michael Tomi where'd you hide the bananas Michael loves our I have your family one member of them there any bananas Harry it'll be your head I know I was a damper in its arc anywhere the Piranha sons waters right oh he's giggling over here I think what he said was funny it's a rocking goldfish I've eaten is amazing it was right here the whole time more to the point we got a couple comments implying that sunshine is apparently a super difficult or tedious game to 100% and that seems to be the common opinion ever since this game came out as far as I can gather evidently there's just way too much stuff to grab and don't worry we'll get to the whole post card thing in due time as of writing iPhone completed Super Mario Sunshine a good seven or eight times twice for this review and I've got to say it's nowhere near as difficult as people make it out to be certainly there are games for completionist runs are easier but games like banjo - we have way more stuff to grab and games like Spyro a hero's tale are significantly more frustrating and exhausting well I would agree that Super Mario Sunshine is overall more challenging than 64 it's not bite - too much and whenever things become more trial and error there are checkpoints to back it up second the challenge is overall well designed and generally not based on cheap or frustrating game design the only thing preventing you from popping all the balloons within the time limit is your own level of skill you're given plenty of time and the controls are perfectly functional well the secret stage in okie Bay is actually pretty difficult that may be a little too much to redo if you it up it's a far cry from the god-awful level design of Super Mario 64 star road also as long as I'm on the subject the secret of the village underside is nowhere near as terrible as some people make it out to be you simply talk to the beyonce's from the proper angle and Bob's your uncle certainly there are a couple shines that can be a mite tedious trying to get this giant watermelon to this field of cataracts for example is an exercise in patience when one fails in Super Mario Sunshine though in almost every case blame rests with the player rather than the game's design 100 coin shines return from Super Mario 64 and since the levels change so much between shines you've got to be more careful about which episodes you pick when you're going after these things like 64 there's also times for once you enter a sub area you're not allowed to go back but sunshine makes this fact much more obvious also by the time you'd be collecting these things you'd likely have cleared all episode shines and know the levels pretty well you know for example that if you want to get 100 coins in Sarina Beach you should probably pick a shine where you can go to the beach the hotel lobby in the casino and one run well I'd say a hundred coin shines take a little longer than in Super Mario 64 overall you only have to get about half as many and some are really easy in penis parts you can get a hundred coins in two minutes by just spraying the beach and killing the fly in students also thanks to the absence of bottomless pits it's also way harder to die and have to redo them from scratch thus I'd say the 100 coin shines are inoffensive at their worst I should mention that sunshine has two secret shines per stage in addition to the eight episodes and 100 coin shoppings making for a total of eleven shines per stage I wouldn't be surprised if these exist as filler to make up for the v cut levels but I still think they're passable at worst most of them are second rounds in the secret stages this time you got flood and you're also trying to collect all the red coins for them a time woman well this is technically filler what you're doing in these stages is substantially different from what you did the first time so it gets a pass in my book I just wish I didn't have to redo all the build-up to the secret of the casino though because that just takes a while the rest of the secret shines are just randomly hidden in the stage which makes them kind of boring to navigate playthroughs but not cumbersome by the way there is an in-game hint telling you how to get the peon to village secret shine so it's not like it's super obscure or anything there are only two shines in the game that I say are poorly designed and unnecessarily frustrating the pachinko machine is quite infamous and for good reason the level seems to be based much more luck than it is on skill and when you die it never feels like your fault still at worst it's tolerable much less tolerable is the poison River honestly it's not the stage itself so much as it is getting to it depth of waste wood feels like 10 minutes slowly riding these boats to carry Yoshi to this island so you can clear up this zigzag and enter the pipe again Yoshi dies if you fall in the water as long as you're patient and not overzealous however you should do it easily on your first try the design of the stage itself isn't great either you have to get all eight of these red coins in one perfect run over instant kill poison water and it's basically just trial and error but to be honest it's really nothing you shouldn't conquer in a few tries no the real issue is one of the biggest kaizo traps in gaming if you're naive enough to jump in this pipe at the end thinking it'll take you back to the start you get booted out of the stage you can waste another ten minutes writing the boats again I think it's safe to say that almost everyone who plays the stage falls for this where the game designers afraid that people would forget how to pause and exit the stage manually why is this here so yeah the poison River sucks but again that's only two shines out of 96 aren't they the deal-breaker some folks make them out to be overall I think people have severely exaggerated the tedium and frustration as far as shine sprites go now we move on to blue coins a controversial inclusion to say the least each of the seven main stages contains thirty of these full Delfino Plaza contains twenty in Corona Mountain contains ten making for 240 blue coins in total for every ten you collect you can bring them to this raccoon and trade them in for shine spray hold on a minute Mario gets arrested for supposedly disturbing the shine sprites but monkey dee Cooper here gets to sell pilfered shines in the open market with no consequence regardless that means 24 additional shines derived from the blue coin so yes they are required for a hundred percent completion the popular opinion as I understand it is that blue coins are bad because there are a lot of them in a significant portion of them are evidently obscure or otherwise difficult to find and keep track of additionally some coins can only be retrieved in certain episodes for one reason or another and some people would suggest that a substantial portion of blue coins fall under this category frankly I think it's difficult to overstate how much people dislike the sidequest because I don't think I've ever heard a positive opinion of them as of writing this review before I offer my own opinion on the matter I'd like to share some observations I made from having examined the blue coins in this game I was curious as to whether the preceding claims about blue coins helped any empirical value so I opened up strategy wikis blue coin guide which describes the coins location and available episodes encoded each and every one of the game's 240 blue coins for obscurity and exclusivity I was specifically interested in answering two questions first how many blue coins are obscure I coated the coin at zero if it's out in the open and all you have to do is find it and pick it up a wand if the coin requires you to kill a conspicuous enemy or solve an obvious puzzle to collect in a2 if it is truly obscure requiring the player to perform an action that isn't readily apparent based on the environment I also counted em s and enemies that were hidden in places that you'd never think to look I tried to be really generous but that last category to err on the side of over estimating the number of obscure coins to correct for my own subjectivity second how many blue coins are collectible from episode 8 when everything is theoretically unlocked in case you didn't know it is true that not all the blue coins will be available in stages from the get-go I coded every coin you can collect in episode 8 a zero and coins that are only available in other episodes a one I collected all the data on the spreadsheet and analyze it in SPSS here are the results in chart form regarding the question of obscurity 33.7 5% of coins are out in the open 50.83 percent of coins require you to kill a conspicuous enemy or solve a simple puzzle and only 15.4 2% are not rarely a from the environment based on these results I think it's safe to say that the overwhelming majority of blue coins are not in fact obscure most of them are either out in the open or behind an obvious puzzle now I should stress that 37 coins that's 15 point for 2% of 240 isn't exactly a small number in fact it's a much larger number than I expected but again this is the maximum possible number of coins that could be considered obscure and really obscurity is going to boil down to the individual player do you think shooting down this bee's nest and eating the bees with Yoshi is obscure personally I just always thought to try that but I know not everyone will of course there are coins like ground-pounding on a statues nose that are definitely obscure but as the data shows these are few and far between either way you can find the vast majority of these obscure blue coins by following one simple rule if something looks suspicious or out of place spray it no really it's that simple and let's be honest is it really the end of the world if you have to look up a few blue coins for a level as for the other claims of a substantial portion of coins our episode exclusive the data once again does not support this conclusion you can collect eighty four point one seven percent of blue coins in this game by simply visiting the eighth episode of each stage the fifteen point eight three percent of coins that are episode specific are generally pretty obvious most players will figure out that NPC sometimes rewards you with stuff for cleaning them off so you'll probably grab the eight blue coins and pee on doesn't need no problem the four blue coins in the sandbar stage which is a required shine sprite by the way are right on the beaten path so you can't possibly miss them also if there's an episode where you go to a specific area like the casino I think the rationale player would think to double check there for blue coins bottom line based on these examinations neither the claims that people make about blue coins bear out empirically that being said blue coins are actually my absolute favorite part of Super Mario Sunshine no I'm not kidding I'm not just saying this to be a contrarian that is my honest sincere opinion as I established in my previous review I'm a huge fan of collectathon games be it banjo spyro when even Jack won yeah my opinion on that games changed a lot whatever moving on regards to blue coins I see them as no different from gems and Spyro or precursor orbs and jak 1 these are finite collectibles that reward players for exploring stages interacting with the game environment in ways you wouldn't in a minimalist playthrough I enjoy collecting blue coins for the same reason I enjoy collecting gems and orbs it packs Sunshine's levels this seems with interactivity and exploration value every nook and cranny can house a potential secret what can be kind of annoying to find some of these on your first 100% run on repeat playthroughs it's fun to see how quickly you can grab them all based on memory alone honestly it reminds me a lot of 100% speedrunning Metroid games and let's not forget some of those games have obscure pickups too I've already cast doubt in the popular claims people make about blue coins but I feel like part of the reason people hate these things so much is that they save them all for the end of the game after they've collected all the other shines my preferred method is to collect the coins as I'm going through the episode shines this speeds up the process significantly you can see better insurance that you won't miss an episode exclusive coin if you do it this way you can grab all 30 blue coins in a stage as well as the 8th episode shines in about an hour and a half you might have to come back with Yoshi to get some of the coins from earlier stages but because you unlock penis park so quickly you can easily unlock Yoshi very early on I'd also like to remind the folks at home that sunshine tracks your blue coin tallies in the map screen and again it's hardly a deal-breaker if you have to look up a few coins to finish off the stage even I with all my experience have to look some up on occasion also because these stages are relatively compact there's only so many places you can look it's not like trying to find so why to know 120 shrines and one of the largest open worlds ever put on game media bottom line I just don't understand why this side quest is so notorious if you want to talk about rare e but I think the gem side quest in Crash Bandicoot are far greater offenders beyond all that however the biggest complaint people have about fully completing sunshine is that you don't get a good reward for doing so it's common knowledge at this point that collecting all 120 shines gets you a postcard of all the games characters in casino Delfina what people seem to forget is that getting a hundred percent also unlocks an alternate costume talking to this piata toggles a shine sprite shirt that you can wear where we're visiting the game's main stages the problem with this is that by this point you've already done everything in the game anyway then again the same could be said about the reward in Super Mario 64 which I didn't even mention the previous review Yoshi maxes out your live counter and you can also unlock an extra move by doing a triple jump that's nice but you've already finished the game so it's pointless in the DS version you unlock the final minigame which is at least something new the reason I didn't discuss the rewards in the previous video is because I don't fully complete these games for the reward fact is it's not just Super Mario Sunshine that's at fault here the entire collectathon sub-genre is kind of datoria sleep or when it comes to providing extrinsic rewards for 100% completion sure many will give you a secret final level but you'll almost never get an extra reward worth a damn for completing that even the permanent super flame upgrade in Spyro 2 which many lot is a great reward is equally as pointless as the shine sprite shirt unless if you decide to go after skill points much like how virtually all Sonic games contain at least some sloppy design elements it's something you just kind of have to come to grips with if you're going to play these games and you know what the lack of extrinsic rewards doesn't really bother me because of a little something called intrinsic rewards the enjoyment you get from doing something in itself after all isn't that why we play video games to have fun fetch quests and RPGs are boring filler and have no intrinsic enjoyment so the only thing that makes them worthwhile is the extrinsic reward doing missions in Super Mario Sunshine is fun on its own merits so I don't need an extrinsic reward to make it worth doing that's why I'm willing to find all the exits and Super Mario World even though the only rewards you get is a palette swap because Super Mario World is a fun game and I want to get the most bang for my buck it's the same thing here I have 100% of Super Mario Sunshine eight times because I think this game is fun as hell and I'm willing to tolerate the poison river and the pachinko machine and a few obscure blue coins precisely because I'm having so much fun even if you disagree and prefer a minimalist run that I still think Super Mario Sunshine has you covered oh that's necessary to finish the game is completing the first seven episode shines in each stage if you want you can beat the game at fifty one shines without ever collecting a hundred coins or secret shines or any of the blue coins some people may complain that having to fight shadow Mario in every stage to fight the final boss makes the game inflexible but given a narrative progression of each stage it makes perfect sense from a story perspective and it's not like any of the preceding shines are that much of a chore to play and I think that pretty much leads me into my conclusion I absolutely love Super Mario Sunshine to death like Sonic Colors this is one of those rare games that only seems to get better every time I play it on its own merits it's got great level design a fun goopy story excellent graphics for the time that still hold up today an underrated soundtrack and the best control and camera of any 3d Mario game today as the GameCubes sequel to Super Mario 64 it improves on almost everything from my point of view the graphics are better the soundtrack is better the controls are better the bosses are better the open-ended levels are better the linear levels are better the optional content is better power-ups are better and frankly I just find myself wanting to replay it a lot more often that being said I do think Super Mario 64 DS in particular has more content and less filler in Sunshine stage count and fill of shines portray the games rushed development cycle at least one person will argue that sunshine is inferior to 64 anyway because it isn't as classic or revolutionary as I said in my Donkey Kong Country review and as I'll be saying again when I review Super Mario Galaxy 2 what games should be judged based on their design not based on whether people found them impressive 20 years ago what was impressive 20 years ago may not be impressive today as this thorough examination of Super Mario Sunshine shows this game is competently designed with amazing controls and great level design and it outperforms Super Mario 64 on numerous measures because of that I think I can say confidently that Super Mario Sunshine is a sizeable improvement over sixty-four now that said Super Mario Sunshine born appeal to everyone and is definitely not beyond criticism well I think Sunshine's emphasis on missions makes it relatively accessible I still recognize that the collectathon genre is one that most people either love or hate additionally Super Mario Sunshine has a share of filler no doubt to make up for the loss of five playing levels during the game short development why personally don't mind that too much I would totally understand if people found this game boring or repetitive in certain parts there are also a couple of missions in the game that are decisively poorly designed I'd also like to state that if you do dislike this game for whatever reason I think that's perfectly reasonable and will respect your opinion despite its flaws whoever I upon that sunshine is a great game and holds up where it really matters in fact not only do I think Super Mario Sunshine holds up I think it's one of those rare games that's gotten better with time ever since 2005 the entire Mario franchise from the main series games to the spin-offs has become increasingly reliant on nostalgia and we're using the same level tropes over and over and over again why don't mind this as much as most people and while some games have given an honest stab at trying to be more original at this point the nostalgia pandering is just getting old and that's precisely what makes this game even better in 2017 than it's ever been before in an era where every Mario game from Mario Party the Mario and Luigi has to look the same and play the same it's so refreshing to play a game where the gameplay is distinct the standard level tropes are omitted and the enemies look and behave differently that's why I'd like to put forth my support the hypothetical super mario sunshine HD that phase of this game have been asking about for years now of course if we really want to play Super Mario Sunshine and HD Dolphin is a perfectly serviceable option that said the current HD texture pack is incomplete and has a few ugly assets and the widescreen and framerate hacks all have some kind of weird quirk that makes them less than completely satisfactory and all that's assuming you have a computer that's powerful enough to run dolfin to begin with that and I feel like a proper remake from Nintendo themselves could be so much more than a mere HD facelift just imagine how great Super Mario Sunshine would be if they gave it the Super Mario 64 DS treatment for the sweat not only with the portability on the switch be a plus for many people but it would be a great opportunity to reintroduce the content that was abandoned during development imagine a version of Super Mario Sunshine that had the five levels that were caught during development that provided more detailed accounting for blue coins so you could choose to play as Luigi with altered physics or you can unlock a variety of outfits from the sunglasses pinata after collecting a certain amount of blue coins there's so much potential for a super mario sunshine HD and if it gives Nintendo an opportunity to reassess how formulaic mario has gotten over the past six years even better did you know what I think it just might be a possibility with Miyamoto foregoing much of his creative control for the upcoming Super Mario Odyssey it's shaping up to be the most creative and experimental Mario title since Super Mario Sunshine it's the mario game i've been clamoring for ever since the super mario galaxy debuted in 2007 whether sunshine HD will happen remains to be seen but for now I'd say there's hope well that took a hell of a lot longer than I thought I was going to but it I only get one chance to review this game and I sure as hell wasn't going to waste it so no apologies next video will hopefully be more reasonable but you know I never know until I really sit down and start scripting but man um I do want to do Super Why galaxy one and two eventually but not now creatively I need a new project to work on because under the past few years it's always been I want to do this I record footage three months in advance three months later I sit down actually write the script and I don't care about the project anymore I push thrilled with yeah I need something new to just sit down and work on so that's what's coming next and we're going to be going back to remake a rear break and as I fit easily in the update videos I want to do a marathon on remakes that are decisively not so great because most of the stuff I look at on this channel is pretty confident and I think that's fair to say and there are a lot of remakes and replaces on this on that segment so let's look at some more rimas andrey breaks possibly bored mediocre stuff yeah we'll come into them with an open mind but stuff that I will expect will not be quite as good so yeah I can't confirm or deny what those games will be but if you've been watching the update videos you'll probably have a pretty good idea of what I want to do next so until then I mix a paradigm gamer and I hope you'll enjoy the review [Music]

Channel: ExoParadigmGamer

Views: 308,623

Keywords: ExoParadigmGamer, Video Games, Mistertitanic, Game Mavericks, Review, Let's Play, EPG, Remake or Rebreak, ROR, Unversed Cast, Mario, Super Mario Bros. 3, Super Mario World, Super Mario 64, Super Mario 64 DS, Super Mario Galaxy, Super Mario Sunshine, Super Mario Galaxy 2, Super Mario 3D Land, Super Mario 3D World

Id: YT5Fg_sxQ5c

Length: 48min 37sec (2917 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 28 2017