Super Mario 3D Land
Jun. 13th, 2015 08:37 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroSave the Princess from Bowser! Only this time, do it in 3-D!
This is the game that REALLY uses the 3D feature of the 3DS. The first-party Nintendo titles have all tried to make use of it (and the third-party games paid occasional lip service to it), but this is the first game that really used it. I’m not a big fan of 3D platformers in general, but seeing it in actual 3D goes a long way towards addressing my issues. (The fact that the camera is fixed / area-dependent rather than controllable I actually consider a positive, as well.)
This is also the first game where I played extensively with the 3D on, and it’s an overall less comfortable gaming experience than playing 2D. I need to hold the 3DS at just the right angle, at the right distance, and I’ll still periodically shift and everything will lose focus. It also tends to tire my eyes out—I only played this in half-hour bursts.
It occurs to me to wonder why the Leaf / Raccoon Tail seems to have become the standard, rather than the Feather / Cape power-up from SMW. Maybe it’s more iconic? (And I’ll note that it’s actually the full Tonooki Suit, not just the tail.) It was World 5 before I encountered the Boomerang Brothers Suit, which is the other major power-up to appear. There are also brief occurrences of a helicopter hat and similar one-level tricks; and after you beat the game the “Special World” stages have the Stone Leaf (that allows you to turn into a statue along with regular leaf powers) and Poison Mushrooms.
The kind / anti-frustration nature of New Super Mario Brothers 2 carries over here: If you fail a level enough times (five, it appears), the game starts handing you free power-ups—golden leaves, that give you a tail and make you invincible to everything except falling. I needed these for a handful of stages, mostly near the end. The game’s challenge is really in finding (and collecting) all of the Star Coins more than actually beating all of the levels. (And some of the levels are hidden / locked until you collect a certain number of Star Coins!)
Overall: The day Nintendo makes a bad Mario game, it’s likely a sign of the apocalypse. This isn’t that day.
This is the game that REALLY uses the 3D feature of the 3DS. The first-party Nintendo titles have all tried to make use of it (and the third-party games paid occasional lip service to it), but this is the first game that really used it. I’m not a big fan of 3D platformers in general, but seeing it in actual 3D goes a long way towards addressing my issues. (The fact that the camera is fixed / area-dependent rather than controllable I actually consider a positive, as well.)
This is also the first game where I played extensively with the 3D on, and it’s an overall less comfortable gaming experience than playing 2D. I need to hold the 3DS at just the right angle, at the right distance, and I’ll still periodically shift and everything will lose focus. It also tends to tire my eyes out—I only played this in half-hour bursts.
It occurs to me to wonder why the Leaf / Raccoon Tail seems to have become the standard, rather than the Feather / Cape power-up from SMW. Maybe it’s more iconic? (And I’ll note that it’s actually the full Tonooki Suit, not just the tail.) It was World 5 before I encountered the Boomerang Brothers Suit, which is the other major power-up to appear. There are also brief occurrences of a helicopter hat and similar one-level tricks; and after you beat the game the “Special World” stages have the Stone Leaf (that allows you to turn into a statue along with regular leaf powers) and Poison Mushrooms.
The kind / anti-frustration nature of New Super Mario Brothers 2 carries over here: If you fail a level enough times (five, it appears), the game starts handing you free power-ups—golden leaves, that give you a tail and make you invincible to everything except falling. I needed these for a handful of stages, mostly near the end. The game’s challenge is really in finding (and collecting) all of the Star Coins more than actually beating all of the levels. (And some of the levels are hidden / locked until you collect a certain number of Star Coins!)
Overall: The day Nintendo makes a bad Mario game, it’s likely a sign of the apocalypse. This isn’t that day.
