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Super Mario Odyssey is the worst 3D Mario Game
A thread.
A thread.
First of all, I've defended this game in the past, and I want to address that. I will continue to latch onto this game because of one aspect, the movement, which is incredible. As someone who has spent enough time in the game to master the controls, it's fun to move around.
Obviously, it still isn't perfect. Lots of moves are completely useless and only exist to be frustrating when mis-inputted, the basic moveset without the complicated tricks is very underwhelming, and of course motion controls, which are another problem.
After playing Odyssey for more than a hundred hours, I've gotten used to them. However, this is the only saving grace of the game, and if you don't want to put in the time to learn the moveset, or it doesn't click with you, or movement isn't a priority, the game has little else.
First of all, let me address captures. They seem like a smart addition, and they definitely add a gimmick to make it "stand out", but they're incredibly underdeveloped and underemphasized. Most captures aren't used for anything more than five minutes in a playthrough, tops.
Mario's standard moveset is so robust that none of the captures have any practical use for world navigation. Mario can get the exact same amount of height as an Uproot can with well-timed cap bounces. Using a trick called vectoring, you can go further in the air than Glydon does.
Even the puzzles are so shallow and uneventful. Most captures are used only to get one gimmick moon and never again. In fact, since my file is in the postgame, I never capture anything. It ultimately slows down the experience and don't add enough in terms of versatility.
Another often criticized element is the overabundance of moons. I do like collectathons in general, but it's hard to disagree with the fact that Odyssey pushes it too far. Moons are everywhere, and by the end of the playthrough, they have lost all potential excitement factor.
On top of that, the moons that stick out are just frustrating. Playing Odyssey without Cappy is like Sunshine without FLUDD, both of which incredibly janky and unfun, but pushed onto the player in short and tedious sub-areas throughout the game.
Jump-Rope is fine in my opinion, but Beach Volleyball is the reason I'm never 100%ing the game. And once I decided that, I gave up on hint art, shop moons, Toadette moons, all of Snow Kingdom, and dog moons. There are a lot more frustrating moons than exciting and fun ones.
Another problem I have with the game is the kingdom design. After New Donk City, I enjoyed none of the kingdoms. I've never liked snow/ice levels, Seaside looks pretty but is too shallow for a water level, Luncheon is honest to god awful, Bowser's is too linear, and moon gravity.
Luncheon specifically is one that I hear people praise all the time but I had absolutely no fun with. The art style is technically unique, but they didn't go all the way, and at first glance it's hard to tell that it's even food-themed. The level design is really weak, too.
Like most late-game kingdoms, it's too linear for its own good, and it does not feel like a real world at all, even in this imaginary realm where possessing living beings is completely ethical. It has some of the worst captures in the game, and the bossfight is fucking horrible.
Speaking of the bossfights! When the game released, some people lauded the game for not using the Koopalings again. First of all, no 3D Mario has ever used Koopalings, and second, the Broodals are actively worse. Each of them can be beaten in about a minute, and none are fun.
Even outside of Broodals, every other bossfight is boring to miserable. Knucklotec and Torkdrift are standard bosses, Mecha-Wiggler is enjoyed by practically nobody, Mollusque-Lanceur is creative but ends up as a dragging chase sequence, and Cookatiel is absolutely abysmal.
Wooded Kingdom is a popular one, but personally, I have a big problem with the level design. It's technically open world, even though there are very few sprawling areas, but there's a big wall directly in the middle of the stage that's incredibly frustrating to navigate around.
Those are all the major issues with the game, but something that I noticed is how poorly the game handles difficulty. Not being difficult isn't a negative in itself, but my issue is that the difficulty present is laid out in a very awkward way.
Nintendo just couldn't figure out how to make an open-world game difficult here, which is strange considering how well they did it in BotW. The two end-game gauntlets are Bowser's Kingdom (completely linear, start-to-finish) and the Moon Caves (completely linear. again).
Even Luncheon is more linear than the average kingdom. And the exterior of Moon Kingdom is not difficult at all, especially the massive octopi which are supposed to be intimidating. Darker Side is a blast, but again, dead linear with no exploration.
This is a big one. Nintendo is big on accessibility. In fact, the Switch can be played with controllers connected to the screen, controllers disconnected from the screen, or with the screen connected to the TV. However, the game fumbles this by having motion controls.
Motion controls are, in short, awful. Every capture has them, they're the only way to access a bunch of moves, and they never fucking work. Just from trying to get some difficult balloons in Luigi's Balloon World, I actually strained my hand and had to stop playing for an hour.
You need motion controls to go at max speed. You need them to up-throw. You need them to instantly spin-throw. You need to skip whole segments of Darker Side (with Glydon and Uproot). They're necessary for certain moons in the overworld. They. Are. Not. Optional.
My biggest problem with the controls is that I play with a pro controller, which means I don't have access to my full moveset. With Joy-Cons, you can shake your controller down to do a down-throw mid-air, but that cannot happen on Pro-Cons. It's just not in the game. At all.
This is the way to get the furthest distance from a single spot. Up-throw, jump into it, bounce up, down-throw, ground-pound, and roll into the hat. First of all, you need motion controls three times for that, and second of all, it's flat out impossible with Pro-Cons.
I would go on about empty kingdoms, nonsense stories, uninspired music, the absurd amount of glitches (which ruin Luigi's Balloon World), and how obvious it is that this was a hail mary for the series, but I just hit the thread cap, so I have to end the thread here. Goodbye.
