{"id":137365,"date":"2026-05-29T17:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T17:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/#article-200763"},"modified":"2026-05-29T17:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T17:00:00","slug":"opinion-it-took-me-nearly-20-years-to-fall-into-mario-galaxys-orbit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2026\/05\/29\/opinion-it-took-me-nearly-20-years-to-fall-into-mario-galaxys-orbit\/","title":{"rendered":"Opinion: It Took Me Nearly 20 Years To Fall Into Mario Galaxy’s Orbit"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Mario<\/a>
<\/span> Image: Omar Hafeez-Bore \/ Nintendo<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Launch Stars in Super Mario Galaxy<\/a> are pure cinema, from that spinning wind-up with the quick arpeggio to that compressed pause before a cannon-blast hurl into an arc unknown.<\/p>\n

And that camera work! As you trace an unseen thread through space, leaving a gleaming contrail of light and delight before the zoom-out to best catch that perfect 10 landing. Keep your bullet times and your smash cuts: this<\/em> is the music of movement, and it hasn\u2019t got old.<\/p>\n

It turns out Super Mario Galaxy is great and it took me nearly 20 years to realise because I kept thinking it was crap.<\/p>\n

I couldn\u2019t love it, despite multiple attempts. Even my bio here says it (but politely to stay safe on a website called Nintendo Life). I won’t go into my now-practised forensic analysis of its slightly stiff moveset, but because of it and my expectations of a 3D Mario\u2019s gamefeel, I always felt there was something amiss at the heart of the game, something flat in the hands, off-beat, the joke always slightly too late in the interface between me and this clearly gorgeous kingdom of planets. But then \u2014 finally \u2014 it clicked<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"Mario<\/a>
<\/span> Image: Omar Hafeez-Bore \/ Nintendo<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

What a great feeling! That click, the sudden pivot where the planets (metaphorical now) align just so and you feel the ‘Oh, I see now<\/em>‘ of appreciation for a game.<\/p>\n

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You can’t be persuaded to like a thing with logic, but sometimes you might be borderline enough that a recalibration of expectation, or approach, or timing can help you enjoy more things.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

But there\u2019s also the way that it sparks off like an action potential, past some invisible threshold, and now everything once annoying or naff makes sense and you<\/em> get it<\/em>. And I think it actually started with Penny’s Big Breakaway<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I’m wary of writing another stealth Penny\u2019s article, but bear with me because it\u2019s unavoidably relevant. It was my most anticipated game of 2024 partly because of its pedigree (Sonic Mania<\/a> team, and specifically that Sonic 2<\/a> Android port so good it feels Mega Drive right), but also because of the yo-yo.<\/p>\n

Like Viewtiful Joe<\/a> and the first time I saw a trailer for Shadow of the Colossus<\/a>, I didn’t just like the look of it, I recognised<\/em> something that had been latent all along. Of course! A yo-yo as wheels and as a grapple-line, with all the satisfactions of momentum management, of rolling and gravity and swing and fling! It also helps that I often carry an actual yo-yo in my bag as something tactile, playful and pure.<\/p>\n