This review is spot on. At first I was blown away by the spectacle and visuals but as you articulate really well, the game just settles into a predictable, easy, underdeveloped rhythm that’s super unsatisfying. I revisited NSMB Wii for the first time since 2009 after beating Wonder and was shocked by how much more challenging the game is, and to be completely honest, how much more memorable and clever the level designs were. ESPECIALLY the castles which are true tests of skill and feel like the developers are trolling you. It’s clear the designers saw the super guide as a means of upping the difficulty and asking more from the player. Also was lucky enough to replay Super Mario Bros 3 on Famicom over Christmas - the world map of that game is a masterclass of adding an extra layer of strategy on top to give the player a chance at navigating a difficult game. MUCH smarter than Wonder’s “choose a level” world map which doesn’t have any strategy to it and takes away agency from the player. What makes 2D Mario games special is how the developers always achieve a lot with a little. Like adding wind to a desert level. Or making a level out of ice blocks with fire breathing piranha plants everywhere. Or that star coin in NSMB Wii where you have to freeze a penguin and ride its corpse over a gap. This creates unforgettable moments which were replaced by shallow spectacle/gimmicks in Wonder. It also really bothered me how the designers in Wonder continued the spell out the optimal jump route with coins well into the final levels of the game, and how it still counts as having collected a giant purple coin if you die afterwards, negating the whole point of them (challenging your consistency)
I couldn’t agree more, seriously Wonder was all glitz and glam and very little substance. Definitely a game that makes it feel like the Switch is on its way out, something to put on the console to make sales because “Mario”.
Wonder is fine but certainly disappointing. I might be biased as NSMB wii was my first Mario 2d game but, it was better and more memorable. NSMB got a lot of shit for Nintendo just practically repeating them but they did have a good solid foundation. A better alternative for my taste is actually Newer super Mario bros wii (not an official game). That game had a lot of what I was actually looking for. 1. Interesting and unique world map, areas progression, subversion and 5 secret worlds. Like a lot of inspiration from older games (mario world, mario Galaxy, mario kart and more nostalgia) and interesting and unique combinations. 2. Music solid, unironiclly listen to some of it (castle and fire theme for example). 3. More unique levels and power ups, also levels are longer and more challenging 4. More levels! (wonder was damn too short and easy) 5. Cool bowser boss (that bridge theme song solid). While there might be more things that one might want to evolve like design (which wonder did) or adding an actual story. For someone who is looking for more challenging and unique modern Mario experience in my opinion its the best and my favourite. I would hope Nintendo will take inspiration from that game.
Yea the lack of multiple save files is just such a weird move.. I don’t get it. I’m right there with you brother, as soon as I beat it, I had zero desire to go back to it.
@@CameronRoberts-jh9mr no, you have to make a another account to add a user, so the lack of multiple save states in one user on mario wonder is a baffling decision & literally no point playing in the replay value ever again. If you disagree with his opinion about the lack of multiple save states in one user, then that’s fine, but i don’t think that i replay the entire level all over again.
I’m so glad I’m not the only one who feels this way about Mario Wonder. I played through almost every 2D Mario game because of how hyped I was for when Wonder would release, but when the game came out and I 100 percented it I felt pretty disappointed by it. This game just doesn’t feel anywhere near as replayable to me as most of the other 2D Mario games do, and heck, even NSMBU DX felt more replayable to me. 100 percenting this game felt more like a chore than in any of the other 2D Mario games, and the level design seems to focus more on spectacle than platforming challenge like you said. Even the Special World levels in NSMBU felt more challenging than the ones in Wonder except for the very final special level in Wonder. I know most people got tired of seeing the Koopalings in 2D Mario games, but I feel like this game could have made their battles more interesting with the Wonder Flower gimmick, and they would have been better than having Bowser Jr. as the boss battle each time. And speaking of boss battles, it’s disappointing that Worlds 3 and 5 don’t have boss battles at all. The final boss battle also felt a bit silly to me and didn’t feel that intense or intimidating. I also think the Search Party levels (especially the first one) are some of the worst designed levels in this game. With all that said though, I still think this game is alright and definitely isn’t a bad game by any means, and I still had fun during many parts in it. I also appreciate that this game at least tried to be different and innovative from every other 2D Mario game, and the physics for the characters in this game are some of the best physics in any 2D Mario game, though I hate that there’s no option to map X as the run button since using Y to run and B to jump feels uncomfortable for me when playing in handheld mode which is how I play all of my games on Switch.
Absolutely, it sort of blows my mind that all I see about Wonder is just everyone praising the hell out of it, seriously… it was nominated for GoTY? Like what?….. it just feels so half baked in some regards, like you said it’s not a bad game at all, but it just doesn’t stack up to past games in the series. Had this game had the visuals but played like NSMB or SMW it would have been an absolute masterpiece but i definitely feel like they sacrificed a lot of gameplay for the Wonder gimmick.
@@DontMindJoeThe main explanation imo is they had to rush the game out at the end so it would come out at the same time as the movie or too late in the switch’s lifecycle before switch 2, because there is no way none of the devs noticed the wildly different world lengths (W1 and 4 have about 14 full length levels while 3 and 5 only have about 6 or 7) or the lackluster (or just lack of) bosses, to me this is just sad because at its best (W1 and 4), it’s genuinely one of my favorite game of all time, but most of the other worlds just feel like plain missed potential
I wish they made it more of a puzzle platformer. Use freeze bubbles in the air to create a icey/slippery floating platform to get across a large gap. Idk, things like that, havjng to use various powerups to beat challenges, almost like injecting mario with a little bit of a zelda dungeon quality. I wish the powerups were a necessity rather than optional. Maybe u keep powerups even ij small mario mode too. Would have to change some gameplay stuff to make it work but i wish they would have went further with the experimentation.
I really really love this game, but I’m glad you shared your thoughts and I agree with a few of your points too! Especially in terms of difficulty; I was hoping for a good challenge, especially later on, but I don’t think any level took me more than 20 lives to beat, and most only took a handful.
It’s absolutely not a bad game! No hate towards anyone who love it! I love certain things but overall I just couldn’t bring myself to love it more than some of the older games.
I can only imagine an og at nintendo saying , you guys can do whatever you want , but i need the floating head with hands to be in the game , its literally everywhere , that one person is obsessed , its literally everywhere !!! That aside i agree with all your points , especially the music ill add that it doesnt really feel like mario music , aside from that one theme from sprcial world map , ill also add the fact that the backgrounds of the levels are really weird ? They really tried to stary from the overworld , desert , oasis , forest poison ...etc , kind of themes , but it starts from ok to wth is this , sometimes the level backgrounds become unsettling , some of the world map themes are wth like the world of trials its just weird to look at and doesnt make much sense , it would have been way more cool if they made like a grassy mountain world map with goats windmills instead of whatever that was , great video thank you for saying what you had in mind ,
I think overall they were so obsessed with the aesthetics that the core gameplay took a backseat, Wonder is a beautiful game but I see what you mean, they really tried to make the lands unique sometimes to its own detriment. Thanks for taking the time to watch my video I’m glad that it sparked this conversation! I appreciate your input!
I will never understand why they keep putting nabbit as a playable character in mario games. who is dying to play as nabbit? why not someone like wario? but really my biggest problems with this game for me was the difficulty, it was way to easy and the fact that nintendo plays things way to safe these days. I can tell they really wanted to make this game accessible to everyone except for Mario veterans like me. While I mostly agree with you when you say mario is for kids, Miyamoto has said a couple times that he doesn't consider mario a mascot only for kids and that he also wants mario to be a game that even your uncle could enjoy (although as far as im aware he doesnt really have much input on the newer mario games). Previous mario games were designed so that veterans could also enjoy, not only the new comers. The difficulty of the games would increase the faster you went for example. But its clear with mario wonder that they didnt have veterans in mind, and that it was pretty much made for kids. (talking flowers, colorful artstyle, easy,) Yoshi is adored by kids, so even though we complain that he is baby mode, it makes sense that they would do this. I had more fun with the nsmb series if im being completely honest.
Not liking this as much as the NSMB series really shouldn’t be the roast people act like it is. For how bland the presentation was in those games, they are incredibly well designed platformers. In fact, I’d say NSMBU + NSLU is arguably the best 2d platformer there is if you only focus on gameplay and level design. Really felt like a culmination of Nintendo’s skills in many ways. If only it got the production values it deserved, especially being a console launch title.
I feel like Mario in 2022-2023 has easily been the worst it has been in the whole franchise. Stuff like Mario Strikers: Battle League, The Super Mario Bros. Movie, and Super Mario Bros. Wonder all felt incredibly disappointing and barely had any of that Mario charm or substance the series is known for. The fact that Super Mario Bros. Wonder barely has any returning enemies and all of the new enemies are either abysmal or forgettable is just incredibly sad. Oh, and did I mention the fact that 3 of the 4 Mario games they announced for 2024 are remakes and the one game that isn’t barely even feels like a Mario game at all? Yeah, safe to say that Nintendo is barely trying with Mario nowadays and will gladly release mediocre and half baked products that get immense praise just cause it is Mario, despite how soulless and substanceless they may be (mainly with the movie and Wonder).
Man people like me wanted creativity in mario games that was lacking. Wonder, odyssey, and the mario + rabbids games gave us that now your complaining that nintendo is being creative with mario again. You’re probably a new super mario bros and sticker star fan.
@@CameronRoberts-jh9mr The problem isn’t them being creative, the problem is them being poorly executed and half baked. A game can try many unique and original ideas, but if those ideas are either incredibly poorly executed or half baked, then it could very much ruin the enjoyability of a game. Super Mario Odyssey is far from bad (even if it isn’t my favorite), and I already explained why I hate Super Mario Bros. Wonder, but Mario + Rabbids legit has 99% of the enemy roster being the same looking Rabbids and yet it is considered creative? Granted that series has it’s own niche fanbase, but I am just personally not the biggest fan of Mario + Rabbids. I will admit, Super Mario Bros. Wonder had great potential to be an amazing game, but it was completely botched by just how poorly executed and half baked the entire game felt, with numerous aspects of it making it just an unfun gimmicky mess.
@@CameronRoberts-jh9mr Are you saying that Mario Strikers: Battle League is a creative masterpiece (just wondering, since that game is legit one of my least favorite Mario games period)?
I agree with most of what you said here, but 100%ing this game feels great, especially if you've never done it for other games before. The special world has a few fantastic levels, with a genuine good challenge. However, the poplin shops remove any sense of danger throughout the entire game.
It just depends on the person i imagine. I've fallen out of playing video games but wonder is the first game i played for hours and hours and got absorbed not wanting to put it down. Its the first game thats made me feel like that in a few years. I absolutely loved it
And that’s totally fine, like I said it’s not a “bad” game, just as someone who’s stuck with the series as long as I have it really fell short for me. My disappointment shouldn’t kill your love of the game. At the end of the day it’s still a Mario title which is quality pretty much all the time and it’s no shock for me that people would fall in love with the game. It’s a very charming game for sure
Gotta say, you addressed some of the game's major issues that nobody really questions. The reusing of mechanic ideas from other Nintendo platformers as Wonder gimmicks without making levels that feel based around them (in the way say Wario Land's are) is a really missed opportunity to make the game stand out. Also you're right, the head and hands boss design is so weak, they might as well have made the Bowser Castle a background boss or something similar to Yoshi's Island.
I completely agree with this review. Mario Wonder was definitely a fun game. I liked some of the ideas, and this game is definitely one of the more creative 2D mario games in terms of level design. However, once you get past the smoke in mirrors of the stunning visuals, it is a kinda of run of the mill platformer. The bosses are what really ruined the game for me. I accepted Bowser Jr because I know there were a lot of people that complained about the koopalings. But, what about Kamek? I thought Kamek would have been an amazing boss, especially with Kamek having magical power combined with the wonder power. But nope. Kamek just comes in to sprinkle some magic. I like the final boss, but it could have been more. Overall, I would give this game a 7.5 out of 10. I feel like it could have been more. Had it been more challenging, it would have been at least a 9/10 for me. Additionally, some of the levels and wonder abilities were basic. This game also felt kind of short in length, and corners were cut(W3 not having a boss?) I think this game would have benefited by having at least 2 more worlds.
Kamek is a good point, his magic mixed with the wonder abilities would have been insane! That’s a huge mixed opportunity, I agree… had the challenge been higher the game would have been much better to me for sure!
Yea the head and hands boss has literally been done to death… it’s been in pretty much every Nintendo franchise as a boss at some point. It’s one thing if it’s a mid boss or just one of however many bosses but it’s the final boss which makes it even more egregious
Super Mario Bros. Wonder is a game that most everyone seems to praise. To be fair, it _does_ address a number of flaws people had with the NSMB games, namely with the art style and the Koopalings. Six months after its release, I gave Wonder a shot. I like the game quite a bit, but it didn't take me very long to admit that I find the NSMB series a little bit better. Likewise, the original NES version of Super Mario Bros. 3 is untouchable as my favorite Mario romp. Your stance on difficulty was interesting. Wonder, in some ways, does feel a smidge easier than contemporary Mario games. I recall New Super Mario Bros. Wii having a decent difficulty spike in my time of playing it. Even Mario U Deluxe feels a bit challenging. While I agree with many of your points, it likely won't change the fact that most folks see this as a _real_ evolution of the franchise. Again, I like Wonder; it's very creative, but the four New Soup adventures holds a special place in my heart. New SMB Wii in particular is my second favorite 2D Mario after SMB3. Nice video.
Thank you! Yea, people give wonder way too much praise but that’s the way things go with Nintendo games a lot, the newest one is always “the best one they’ve ever made” even when it clearly isn’t
I liked this game, but of course, it can have some problems, like for example, the soundtrack, but I'll talk about more, I liked the OST but there are some things that could have been better, For example, one of the Minigames music is straight up the Delfino Plaza theme from Super Mario Sunshine without at least being remixed, or the P switch button, they grabbed a royalty free music from Kevin MacLeod, they used to have their own music for this, the name of the music is Winner Winner, if someone wants to search The characters, Wario and Waluigi would have been cool, they made some colours of Yoshi a different character, still, they did different voices for everyone of them, and that was cool to me The bosses, they are very simple, but I liked Bowser Jr and Bowser's designs In the end, I think this game is cool, but hey, everyone has his own opinion and that's good
I very sick & tired of both nintendo & mario fanboy call mario wonder a masterpiece that has a major flaws with the lack of different boss, badges (some of them are useless.) search party level invisible block replacements, etc. Yeah, I honestly agree with disappointment you feel.
Dont forget that nintendo was actually creative with this game with new enemy's unlike a certain other new series. I definitely need to see the same enemy's over and over again. Right.
@@CameronRoberts-jh9mr At least that certain New series actually had more than the very bare basic returning enemies and didn’t just not have like 65% of the returning enemy roster for no reason, and at least the new enemies in that certain new series didn’t look like they were AI generated or were convicted mass murderers.
I enjoyed my time with the game, but as I’m growing up and not having as much time for games, I find that I don’t really have strong feelings about Wonder the way I do about games like Galaxy (which is obviously peak Mario). I think it’s what Mario needed at the moment, but for how much time and freedom the devs supposedly had, how did we end up with such subpar bosses? How did we end up with auto-easy mode Yoshi? How did we end up with no character specific abilities? That last one really bothered me. It’s like, why should I care that any of these characters are here if they all play the same except for the five characters that are locked to baby mode in an already easy game? Why should I care that Daisy’s here if she plays the same as Peach, Mario, Luigi, Blue and Yellow Toad, and Toadette? Some people say “Well some of the badges are based on those character abilities”, but that is a dogwater defense. For one, all characters can use those badges, so theoretically Mario can do Luigi’s jump and Toad can float like Peach. For two, these differences shouldn’t be locked away from the player when it’s been pretty much the standard, more or less, since forever. Also, that means if you want the characters to play how they always have, you can’t use any of the other badges present in the game. Not to mention abilities that every character used to have, like the crouch jump or the triple jump, being locked behind badges. It makes all the characters so homogenous, amounting to nothing but a skin and some voice clips.
This game feels like a massive overcorrection from the NSMB series. Yes, the aesthetic was getting old and yes the music was REALLY getting old, but the gameplay and level design was spotless. In fact, I’d honestly say NSMBU + NSLU has arguably the best level design and moment to moment gameplay of any 2d platformer underneath the incredibly boring production values. It unfortunately doesn’t get recognised very often and just gets lumped in with the rest, which is understandable as it is undeniably very iterative of previous titles. In spite of this, I think Nintendo themselves recognised U’s greatness as when you overlook wonder’s new art style and wonder flower gimmick, the levels themselves are honestly just more simplified and shorter takes on U’s style of level design, which feels like a missed opportunity. All Nintendo had to do was take their NSMBU skills and put them into a more ambitious title with much better visuals and music, maintaining the same multi-layered approach to level design that they perfected and introduce more inventive gimmicks that gel with the flow of the game - not get in the way of it (aka what they’ve always done…). Instead, Wonder only does part of that. It’s like Nintendo wanted to iterate on U’s formula, but couldn’t figure out how to innovate without completely changing or breaking the flow of the game. The result is a game that has a lot of variety and enjoyabilty on a first playthrough, but lacking in replay value since a lot of the unique gimmicks just end up getting in the way of the platforming… Like why do I have to collect a wonder flower for a level to start doing new things? Why not just have the level…do those things inherently? It’s like they designed the levels like a regular Mario game (only with less interesting design), then introduce a collectible that turns the game into something entirely different. There’s no real synergy here, or depth.
Finally someone comments on how flat and terrible the level design is and how bad the wonder events are. They should've just removed the completely or made them mandatory instead of implementing them in a way that both feels repetetive and hinders the level design due to being able to skip them and the level being abruptly ended because the wonder event was supposed to be the conclusion. Once you look past the admittedly good artstyle you see that its just a generic platformer with a big budget and long development time.
I never have liked 2D Mario and don't even hold SMW in high regard. Yes, most of Wonder is spectacle, but with how boring 2D Mario normally is it's incredibly needed. I don't find past 2D Mario games challenging to begin with, legitimate quality 2D platformers are what we have Donkey Kong for. With that in mind, just for wow factor alone, Mario Wonder is one of if not the best 2D Marios in my opinion because the bar is set so low by this series.
You know, I kinda agree with you. But I still like Mario wonder, bcz if you compare this game to other platformers in two/three past years Mario will be better. And I played this game alongside spiderman 2 and it brought way more fun to me
The game is ridiculously beautiful for what it is but I found the power ups insanely underwhelming. Like fire flower gets grandfathered in obviously but the bubble and elephant were really meh power ups. Drill is like a meh+ For me nothing beats the Feather from SMW.
Only 2D mario games worse than wonder are 1 land and the new series. Wonder is better than those 2D Mario games but not as good as 3 or world. Wonder tried and in my opinion succeeded where as the new series did not after the first. Mario 1 is rough in comparison to wonder and same with land. Great video still.
I'm glad you made this video. I get so sick of Nintendo fans defending every mediocre, low effort title they put out. Keep speaking facts. Wonder is not a good game.
@@colinjackson-xn9ro, quit being a nintendo or mario fanboy. IsaMariaUu has a own opinion of how the statement of super mario bros wonder. It’s close, but not as good as smw or nsmb. look, I’m not a nintendo enthusiast even i have a switch lite, the last mario game was a fan game, Super Mario Crossover before i switch to arcade compilations like Sega, Taito, Capcom, Namco & Konami, but i’m like real car racing game as well.
Oh for sure at the end of the day it’s Mario and Mario games are great, it just in comparison to other games from its own series it’s disappointing and a little lazy. Though usually when it comes to Nintendo games even a half assed attempt is usually better than most AAA games nowadays
This review is spot on. At first I was blown away by the spectacle and visuals but as you articulate really well, the game just settles into a predictable, easy, underdeveloped rhythm that’s super unsatisfying.
I revisited NSMB Wii for the first time since 2009 after beating Wonder and was shocked by how much more challenging the game is, and to be completely honest, how much more memorable and clever the level designs were. ESPECIALLY the castles which are true tests of skill and feel like the developers are trolling you. It’s clear the designers saw the super guide as a means of upping the difficulty and asking more from the player.
Also was lucky enough to replay Super Mario Bros 3 on Famicom over Christmas - the world map of that game is a masterclass of adding an extra layer of strategy on top to give the player a chance at navigating a difficult game. MUCH smarter than Wonder’s “choose a level” world map which doesn’t have any strategy to it and takes away agency from the player.
What makes 2D Mario games special is how the developers always achieve a lot with a little. Like adding wind to a desert level. Or making a level out of ice blocks with fire breathing piranha plants everywhere. Or that star coin in NSMB Wii where you have to freeze a penguin and ride its corpse over a gap. This creates unforgettable moments which were replaced by shallow spectacle/gimmicks in Wonder. It also really bothered me how the designers in Wonder continued the spell out the optimal jump route with coins well into the final levels of the game, and how it still counts as having collected a giant purple coin if you die afterwards, negating the whole point of them (challenging your consistency)
I couldn’t agree more, seriously Wonder was all glitz and glam and very little substance. Definitely a game that makes it feel like the Switch is on its way out, something to put on the console to make sales because “Mario”.
Wonder is fine but certainly disappointing. I might be biased as NSMB wii was my first Mario 2d game but, it was better and more memorable. NSMB got a lot of shit for Nintendo just practically repeating them but they did have a good solid foundation.
A better alternative for my taste is actually Newer super Mario bros wii (not an official game). That game had a lot of what I was actually looking for. 1. Interesting and unique world map, areas progression, subversion and 5 secret worlds. Like a lot of inspiration from older games (mario world, mario Galaxy, mario kart and more nostalgia) and interesting and unique combinations. 2. Music solid, unironiclly listen to some of it (castle and fire theme for example). 3. More unique levels and power ups, also levels are longer and more challenging 4. More levels! (wonder was damn too short and easy) 5. Cool bowser boss (that bridge theme song solid). While there might be more things that one might want to evolve like design (which wonder did) or adding an actual story. For someone who is looking for more challenging and unique modern Mario experience in my opinion its the best and my favourite.
I would hope Nintendo will take inspiration from that game.
I love the peachette slander
I loved game but the replay value is trash. Can’t make another save file and 100% game literally no point playing ever again.
Yea the lack of multiple save files is just such a weird move.. I don’t get it. I’m right there with you brother, as soon as I beat it, I had zero desire to go back to it.
This begs the question, How The F**k Was Most Other Non-Nintendo Games Like Sonic Superstars Has 5 or More Save Files While Mario Wonder Wasn’t.
I dont agree because its extremely easy to create new profiles for multiple save files.
@@CameronRoberts-jh9mr no, you have to make a another account to add a user, so the lack of multiple save states in one user on mario wonder is a baffling decision & literally no point playing in the replay value ever again.
If you disagree with his opinion about the lack of multiple save states in one user, then that’s fine, but i don’t think that i replay the entire level all over again.
I’m so glad I’m not the only one who feels this way about Mario Wonder. I played through almost every 2D Mario game because of how hyped I was for when Wonder would release, but when the game came out and I 100 percented it I felt pretty disappointed by it. This game just doesn’t feel anywhere near as replayable to me as most of the other 2D Mario games do, and heck, even NSMBU DX felt more replayable to me. 100 percenting this game felt more like a chore than in any of the other 2D Mario games, and the level design seems to focus more on spectacle than platforming challenge like you said. Even the Special World levels in NSMBU felt more challenging than the ones in Wonder except for the very final special level in Wonder. I know most people got tired of seeing the Koopalings in 2D Mario games, but I feel like this game could have made their battles more interesting with the Wonder Flower gimmick, and they would have been better than having Bowser Jr. as the boss battle each time. And speaking of boss battles, it’s disappointing that Worlds 3 and 5 don’t have boss battles at all. The final boss battle also felt a bit silly to me and didn’t feel that intense or intimidating. I also think the Search Party levels (especially the first one) are some of the worst designed levels in this game.
With all that said though, I still think this game is alright and definitely isn’t a bad game by any means, and I still had fun during many parts in it. I also appreciate that this game at least tried to be different and innovative from every other 2D Mario game, and the physics for the characters in this game are some of the best physics in any 2D Mario game, though I hate that there’s no option to map X as the run button since using Y to run and B to jump feels uncomfortable for me when playing in handheld mode which is how I play all of my games on Switch.
Absolutely, it sort of blows my mind that all I see about Wonder is just everyone praising the hell out of it, seriously… it was nominated for GoTY? Like what?….. it just feels so half baked in some regards, like you said it’s not a bad game at all, but it just doesn’t stack up to past games in the series. Had this game had the visuals but played like NSMB or SMW it would have been an absolute masterpiece but i definitely feel like they sacrificed a lot of gameplay for the Wonder gimmick.
@@DontMindJoeThe main explanation imo is they had to rush the game out at the end so it would come out at the same time as the movie or too late in the switch’s lifecycle before switch 2, because there is no way none of the devs noticed the wildly different world lengths (W1 and 4 have about 14 full length levels while 3 and 5 only have about 6 or 7) or the lackluster (or just lack of) bosses, to me this is just sad because at its best (W1 and 4), it’s genuinely one of my favorite game of all time, but most of the other worlds just feel like plain missed potential
I wish they made it more of a puzzle platformer. Use freeze bubbles in the air to create a icey/slippery floating platform to get across a large gap. Idk, things like that, havjng to use various powerups to beat challenges, almost like injecting mario with a little bit of a zelda dungeon quality.
I wish the powerups were a necessity rather than optional. Maybe u keep powerups even ij small mario mode too. Would have to change some gameplay stuff to make it work but i wish they would have went further with the experimentation.
I really really love this game, but I’m glad you shared your thoughts and I agree with a few of your points too! Especially in terms of difficulty; I was hoping for a good challenge, especially later on, but I don’t think any level took me more than 20 lives to beat, and most only took a handful.
It’s absolutely not a bad game! No hate towards anyone who love it! I love certain things but overall I just couldn’t bring myself to love it more than some of the older games.
That's super valid!@@DontMindJoe
I can only imagine an og at nintendo saying , you guys can do whatever you want , but i need the floating head with hands to be in the game , its literally everywhere , that one person is obsessed , its literally everywhere !!! That aside i agree with all your points , especially the music ill add that it doesnt really feel like mario music , aside from that one theme from sprcial world map , ill also add the fact that the backgrounds of the levels are really weird ? They really tried to stary from the overworld , desert , oasis , forest poison ...etc , kind of themes , but it starts from ok to wth is this , sometimes the level backgrounds become unsettling , some of the world map themes are wth like the world of trials its just weird to look at and doesnt make much sense , it would have been way more cool if they made like a grassy mountain world map with goats windmills instead of whatever that was , great video thank you for saying what you had in mind ,
I think overall they were so obsessed with the aesthetics that the core gameplay took a backseat, Wonder is a beautiful game but I see what you mean, they really tried to make the lands unique sometimes to its own detriment. Thanks for taking the time to watch my video I’m glad that it sparked this conversation! I appreciate your input!
I will never understand why they keep putting nabbit as a playable character in mario games. who is dying to play as nabbit? why not someone like wario? but really my biggest problems with this game for me was the difficulty, it was way to easy and the fact that nintendo plays things way to safe these days. I can tell they really wanted to make this game accessible to everyone except for Mario veterans like me. While I mostly agree with you when you say mario is for kids, Miyamoto has said a couple times that he doesn't consider mario a mascot only for kids and that he also wants mario to be a game that even your uncle could enjoy (although as far as im aware he doesnt really have much input on the newer mario games).
Previous mario games were designed so that veterans could also enjoy, not only the new comers. The difficulty of the games would increase the faster you went for example. But its clear with mario wonder that they didnt have veterans in mind, and that it was pretty much made for kids. (talking flowers, colorful artstyle, easy,) Yoshi is adored by kids, so even though we complain that he is baby mode, it makes sense that they would do this.
I had more fun with the nsmb series if im being completely honest.
Not liking this as much as the NSMB series really shouldn’t be the roast people act like it is. For how bland the presentation was in those games, they are incredibly well designed platformers.
In fact, I’d say NSMBU + NSLU is arguably the best 2d platformer there is if you only focus on gameplay and level design. Really felt like a culmination of Nintendo’s skills in many ways. If only it got the production values it deserved, especially being a console launch title.
I feel like Mario in 2022-2023 has easily been the worst it has been in the whole franchise. Stuff like Mario Strikers: Battle League, The Super Mario Bros. Movie, and Super Mario Bros. Wonder all felt incredibly disappointing and barely had any of that Mario charm or substance the series is known for. The fact that Super Mario Bros. Wonder barely has any returning enemies and all of the new enemies are either abysmal or forgettable is just incredibly sad. Oh, and did I mention the fact that 3 of the 4 Mario games they announced for 2024 are remakes and the one game that isn’t barely even feels like a Mario game at all? Yeah, safe to say that Nintendo is barely trying with Mario nowadays and will gladly release mediocre and half baked products that get immense praise just cause it is Mario, despite how soulless and substanceless they may be (mainly with the movie and Wonder).
Man people like me wanted creativity in mario games that was lacking. Wonder, odyssey, and the mario + rabbids games gave us that now your complaining that nintendo is being creative with mario again. You’re probably a new super mario bros and sticker star fan.
Will give you battle league though
@@CameronRoberts-jh9mr The problem isn’t them being creative, the problem is them being poorly executed and half baked. A game can try many unique and original ideas, but if those ideas are either incredibly poorly executed or half baked, then it could very much ruin the enjoyability of a game. Super Mario Odyssey is far from bad (even if it isn’t my favorite), and I already explained why I hate Super Mario Bros. Wonder, but Mario + Rabbids legit has 99% of the enemy roster being the same looking Rabbids and yet it is considered creative? Granted that series has it’s own niche fanbase, but I am just personally not the biggest fan of Mario + Rabbids.
I will admit, Super Mario Bros. Wonder had great potential to be an amazing game, but it was completely botched by just how poorly executed and half baked the entire game felt, with numerous aspects of it making it just an unfun gimmicky mess.
@@CameronRoberts-jh9mr Are you saying that Mario Strikers: Battle League is a creative masterpiece (just wondering, since that game is legit one of my least favorite Mario games period)?
@@MontyMoleLoreMasterno, he's saying that he is happu with the fact that you put Mario strikers:battle league
Just as you said about the visuals I was like "this game looks amazing!"
they literally had tatanga and wart as great candidates for bosses but nooo Nintendo was being a bit cheap unfortunately ☠️
I agree with most of what you said here, but 100%ing this game feels great, especially if you've never done it for other games before. The special world has a few fantastic levels, with a genuine good challenge. However, the poplin shops remove any sense of danger throughout the entire game.
It just depends on the person i imagine. I've fallen out of playing video games but wonder is the first game i played for hours and hours and got absorbed not wanting to put it down. Its the first game thats made me feel like that in a few years. I absolutely loved it
And that’s totally fine, like I said it’s not a “bad” game, just as someone who’s stuck with the series as long as I have it really fell short for me. My disappointment shouldn’t kill your love of the game. At the end of the day it’s still a Mario title which is quality pretty much all the time and it’s no shock for me that people would fall in love with the game. It’s a very charming game for sure
Gotta say, you addressed some of the game's major issues that nobody really questions. The reusing of mechanic ideas from other Nintendo platformers as Wonder gimmicks without making levels that feel based around them (in the way say Wario Land's are) is a really missed opportunity to make the game stand out. Also you're right, the head and hands boss design is so weak, they might as well have made the Bowser Castle a background boss or something similar to Yoshi's Island.
I completely agree with this review. Mario Wonder was definitely a fun game. I liked some of the ideas, and this game is definitely one of the more creative 2D mario games in terms of level design. However, once you get past the smoke in mirrors of the stunning visuals, it is a kinda of run of the mill platformer. The bosses are what really ruined the game for me. I accepted Bowser Jr because I know there were a lot of people that complained about the koopalings. But, what about Kamek? I thought Kamek would have been an amazing boss, especially with Kamek having magical power combined with the wonder power. But nope. Kamek just comes in to sprinkle some magic. I like the final boss, but it could have been more. Overall, I would give this game a 7.5 out of 10. I feel like it could have been more. Had it been more challenging, it would have been at least a 9/10 for me. Additionally, some of the levels and wonder abilities were basic. This game also felt kind of short in length, and corners were cut(W3 not having a boss?) I think this game would have benefited by having at least 2 more worlds.
Kamek is a good point, his magic mixed with the wonder abilities would have been insane! That’s a huge mixed opportunity, I agree… had the challenge been higher the game would have been much better to me for sure!
LOL! "Your Final Boss is basically Andross." Gave me a chuckle. Andross so great 1st time round. Now, so overdone
Yea the head and hands boss has literally been done to death… it’s been in pretty much every Nintendo franchise as a boss at some point. It’s one thing if it’s a mid boss or just one of however many bosses but it’s the final boss which makes it even more egregious
Super Mario Bros. Wonder is a game that most everyone seems to praise. To be fair, it _does_ address a number of flaws people had with the NSMB games, namely with the art style and the Koopalings.
Six months after its release, I gave Wonder a shot. I like the game quite a bit, but it didn't take me very long to admit that I find the NSMB series a little bit better. Likewise, the original NES version of Super Mario Bros. 3 is untouchable as my favorite Mario romp.
Your stance on difficulty was interesting. Wonder, in some ways, does feel a smidge easier than contemporary Mario games. I recall New Super Mario Bros. Wii having a decent difficulty spike in my time of playing it. Even Mario U Deluxe feels a bit challenging.
While I agree with many of your points, it likely won't change the fact that most folks see this as a _real_ evolution of the franchise. Again, I like Wonder; it's very creative, but the four New Soup adventures holds a special place in my heart. New SMB Wii in particular is my second favorite 2D Mario after SMB3.
Nice video.
Thank you! Yea, people give wonder way too much praise but that’s the way things go with Nintendo games a lot, the newest one is always “the best one they’ve ever made” even when it clearly isn’t
I liked this game, but of course, it can have some problems, like for example, the soundtrack, but I'll talk about more, I liked the OST but there are some things that could have been better,
For example, one of the Minigames music is straight up the Delfino Plaza theme from Super Mario Sunshine without at least being remixed, or the P switch button, they grabbed a royalty free music from Kevin MacLeod, they used to have their own music for this, the name of the music is Winner Winner, if someone wants to search
The characters, Wario and Waluigi would have been cool, they made some colours of Yoshi a different character, still, they did different voices for everyone of them, and that was cool to me
The bosses, they are very simple, but I liked Bowser Jr and Bowser's designs
In the end, I think this game is cool, but hey, everyone has his own opinion and that's good
I had no idea about the P switch music thing… that’s interesting, I’ll have to look into that
Yeah, I saw a comment that said the P switch thing and looked it up, it seems it's true
I very sick & tired of both nintendo & mario fanboy call mario wonder a masterpiece that has a major flaws with the lack of different boss, badges (some of them are useless.) search party level invisible block replacements, etc.
Yeah, I honestly agree with disappointment you feel.
Don’t forget about that abysmal enemy roster as well (seriously, this game probably has one of the worst enemy rosters in the whole series).
Dont forget that nintendo was actually creative with this game with new enemy's unlike a certain other new series. I definitely need to see the same enemy's over and over again. Right.
@@CameronRoberts-jh9mr At least that certain New series actually had more than the very bare basic returning enemies and didn’t just not have like 65% of the returning enemy roster for no reason, and at least the new enemies in that certain new series didn’t look like they were AI generated or were convicted mass murderers.
@MontyMoleLoreMaster how do they look Ai generated
I enjoyed my time with the game, but as I’m growing up and not having as much time for games, I find that I don’t really have strong feelings about Wonder the way I do about games like Galaxy (which is obviously peak Mario). I think it’s what Mario needed at the moment, but for how much time and freedom the devs supposedly had, how did we end up with such subpar bosses? How did we end up with auto-easy mode Yoshi? How did we end up with no character specific abilities?
That last one really bothered me. It’s like, why should I care that any of these characters are here if they all play the same except for the five characters that are locked to baby mode in an already easy game? Why should I care that Daisy’s here if she plays the same as Peach, Mario, Luigi, Blue and Yellow Toad, and Toadette? Some people say “Well some of the badges are based on those character abilities”, but that is a dogwater defense. For one, all characters can use those badges, so theoretically Mario can do Luigi’s jump and Toad can float like Peach. For two, these differences shouldn’t be locked away from the player when it’s been pretty much the standard, more or less, since forever. Also, that means if you want the characters to play how they always have, you can’t use any of the other badges present in the game. Not to mention abilities that every character used to have, like the crouch jump or the triple jump, being locked behind badges. It makes all the characters so homogenous, amounting to nothing but a skin and some voice clips.
This game feels like a massive overcorrection from the NSMB series. Yes, the aesthetic was getting old and yes the music was REALLY getting old, but the gameplay and level design was spotless.
In fact, I’d honestly say NSMBU + NSLU has arguably the best level design and moment to moment gameplay of any 2d platformer underneath the incredibly boring production values. It unfortunately doesn’t get recognised very often and just gets lumped in with the rest, which is understandable as it is undeniably very iterative of previous titles.
In spite of this, I think Nintendo themselves recognised U’s greatness as when you overlook wonder’s new art style and wonder flower gimmick, the levels themselves are honestly just more simplified and shorter takes on U’s style of level design, which feels like a missed opportunity.
All Nintendo had to do was take their NSMBU skills and put them into a more ambitious title with much better visuals and music, maintaining the same multi-layered approach to level design that they perfected and introduce more inventive gimmicks that gel with the flow of the game - not get in the way of it (aka what they’ve always done…).
Instead, Wonder only does part of that. It’s like Nintendo wanted to iterate on U’s formula, but couldn’t figure out how to innovate without completely changing or breaking the flow of the game. The result is a game that has a lot of variety and enjoyabilty on a first playthrough, but lacking in replay value since a lot of the unique gimmicks just end up getting in the way of the platforming…
Like why do I have to collect a wonder flower for a level to start doing new things? Why not just have the level…do those things inherently? It’s like they designed the levels like a regular Mario game (only with less interesting design), then introduce a collectible that turns the game into something entirely different. There’s no real synergy here, or depth.
Finally someone comments on how flat and terrible the level design is and how bad the wonder events are. They should've just removed the completely or made them mandatory instead of implementing them in a way that both feels repetetive and hinders the level design due to being able to skip them and the level being abruptly ended because the wonder event was supposed to be the conclusion. Once you look past the admittedly good artstyle you see that its just a generic platformer with a big budget and long development time.
I never have liked 2D Mario and don't even hold SMW in high regard. Yes, most of Wonder is spectacle, but with how boring 2D Mario normally is it's incredibly needed. I don't find past 2D Mario games challenging to begin with, legitimate quality 2D platformers are what we have Donkey Kong for. With that in mind, just for wow factor alone, Mario Wonder is one of if not the best 2D Marios in my opinion because the bar is set so low by this series.
You know, I kinda agree with you. But I still like Mario wonder, bcz if you compare this game to other platformers in two/three past years Mario will be better. And I played this game alongside spiderman 2 and it brought way more fun to me
Wonder is absolutely fun, despite its flaws, it’s certainly a fun game
The game is ridiculously beautiful for what it is but I found the power ups insanely underwhelming. Like fire flower gets grandfathered in obviously but the bubble and elephant were really meh power ups. Drill is like a meh+
For me nothing beats the Feather from SMW.
i think the graphics and animation blinded fans to this game's mediocrity
Absolutely
@@DontMindJoe i wrote that at the 18 minute mark and then you said the same thing at the 20 minute mark
Great minds think alike
Only a Joe video can make me stop avoiding spoilers (I'm too lazy to buy the game)
Ha ha ha ha, well I’m glad that you bypassed your no spoilers rule for little old me, I don’t deserve it Dom lmao
Fireeeeee videooo🥳
I got the whole gang on here, hyping me up
Only 2D mario games worse than wonder are 1 land and the new series. Wonder is better than those 2D Mario games but not as good as 3 or world. Wonder tried and in my opinion succeeded where as the new series did not after the first. Mario 1 is rough in comparison to wonder and same with land. Great video still.
NSMBU is amazing. I’m tired of people lumping those games together. Some are legitimately great.
I'm glad you made this video. I get so sick of Nintendo fans defending every mediocre, low effort title they put out. Keep speaking facts. Wonder is not a good game.
THAT’S IT. I’M CALLING NINTENDO AND THEY WILL GET JOE BIDEN TO IMPEACH YOU. NINTENDO IS BETTER THAN YOU.
@@colinjackson-xn9ro, quit being a nintendo or mario fanboy.
IsaMariaUu has a own opinion of how the statement of super mario bros wonder.
It’s close, but not as good as smw or nsmb.
look, I’m not a nintendo enthusiast even i have a switch lite, the last mario game was a fan game, Super Mario Crossover before i switch to arcade compilations like Sega, Taito, Capcom, Namco & Konami, but i’m like real car racing game as well.
the goat himself!
No your the 🐐 look at those biceps
Let’s goooo😁😁
I love you Joe ❤️
I love you too Dennis
you kinda sound like charlie day
also great vid!
Thats an honor, huge Always Sunny fan so I’ll take it ha ha, thanks for checking out the video glad you enjoyed it
this game is total garbage.
I wouldn’t go as far as to call it total garbage but it’s certainly not as great as the 2D Mario’s that came before it.
Very overrated platformer, still great though.
Oh for sure at the end of the day it’s Mario and Mario games are great, it just in comparison to other games from its own series it’s disappointing and a little lazy. Though usually when it comes to Nintendo games even a half assed attempt is usually better than most AAA games nowadays