We’re less than two months away from the May 23 release date of Super Mario Galaxy 2, and Nintendo is playing all its cards characteristically close to its chest.
On a recent trip to Nintendo’s Redwood City office to play the upcoming Wii game, I got to see exactly five new levels, carefully chosen and orchestrated by Nintendo reps to ensure that I only experienced tiny slivers of the game, keeping anything else hidden behind the curtain. And just on the off chance I saw anything the company wasn’t ready to reveal, I was given an extensive list of things that I couldn’t talk about if I happened to see them. Mario isn’t the company’s biggest cash cow anymore by far, but it’s still serious business every time.
What I can say is that Mario and his sidekick Yoshi are filled with more brand-new moves than we’ve previously heard about at E3 or the recent media summit. Mario can roll up into a rock and bash around the levels, and Yoshi can eat Glimmer Bulb Berries that cause him to phosphoresce.
As Nintendo revealed at that media summit, Galaxy 2 has a straightforward world map that’s more reminiscent of New Super Mario Bros. You move around the map on the Starship Mario, a little mobile planetoid shaped like Mario’s head that you can play around on. You’ll be able to find secret levels and branching paths in the game’s many different worlds (of which Nintendo is not saying how many there are, although I saw three). Each world contains several galaxies, and each galaxy contains several levels (objectives).
Here are the new levels I explored.
Rock and Rollodillo — Boulder Bowl Galaxy
The first thing I did was pick up the new Rock Mushroom, which turns Mario into a rolling boulder of death. The boulder smashes into things and destroys them. Like big giant red crystals that have things inside them. Once Mario smashes something, he reverts to walking around, and you can turn into a rock again by shaking the Wiimote. You can jump while in rock form, which I am pretty sure will translate into some really hard levels that will involve rock-jumping. At any rate, this isn’t one of those. It’s pretty much just an introduction to smashing things, one that culminates in a boss battle versus an adorable giant baby armadillo, who you have to bash in the ass three times.
The Puzzling Pictureblock — Puzzle Plank Galaxy
As the name so helpfully implies, Puzzle Plank Galaxy is full of puzzles. And wood. And puzzles made of wood. I had to butt-stomp on wooden columns and such to get to new areas, then jump across a section of planks as they were being cut apart by massive circular saw blades. The final challenge was butt-stomping a sliding-block puzzle into place. The thinking man’s platform game.
Twin Falls Hideaway — Cosmic Cove Galaxy
Everybody knows that when you go swimming in a Mario game, the first thing you need to do is grab a Koopa shell. Why is it so much easier to swim holding a shell? I don’t know, but the trick has been the same ever since Mario 3 20 years ago. But now the technology has changed. The shell has a headlight on it, and you can shine this on some of the more photosensitive underwater enemies to exterminate them. Plus, when you put the brakes on, the shell now has red brake lights. These are totally functionless, but funny. This level wasn’t as impressive as the rest. After swimming around, I just had to hit a switch, turn the water into ice, and jump up a now-solid waterfall (hmmm) to get to the star.
Bumble Beginnings — Honeybloom Galaxy
As we’ve seen previously, several of Galaxy 2’s levels are in 2.5-D style, meaning that the levels take place roughly on a flat plane of action with a side-view camera. This is one of them. The Bee Suit is back, meaning that Mario can float in the air for a limited time when he’s wearing the ol’ yellow and black stripes. New to the level are big grapes that give Mario back a little bit of flight time if he bounces off of them.
A Glimmer Bulb Berry — Haunty Hills Galaxy
Yoshi eats things that make him light up. Light causes the level to appear around him. Eat another Glimmer Bulb Berry before yours runs out, or the level will disappear and you will fall to your doom. Need I say more? It’s a recipe for frantic fun.
This was also the scene of my personal triumph, if I may close the show with this anecdote.
I played the living hell out of Mario Galaxy. After last year’s E3 I went back and got the rest of the stars I’d missed the first time through, so I’d be ready to roll into the sequel. So the game was fresh in my mind when I jumped into this level. And as I jumped and ran through the disappearing-platform challenge, I saw the final platform at the end, and from eyeballing the distance I was pretty sure I could do a long jump, spin right at the end, and juuust grab the edge of the platform. I did.
“You can do that?” said the Nintendo of America rep. “I didn’t even think you could do that. Now I’ve gotta go do that.”
Yeah: I am ready for this game.
Images courtesy Nintendo
