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Super Mario 64 DS

Super Mario 64 was a revolutionary game. The Nintendo DS is, or at least claims to be, a revolutionary system. What could be a better launch title than a remake or the N64 classic? Well, an all new Mario platformer would have been nice, perhaps…but that’s beside the point. Here’s what you need to know – Super Mario 64 DS, a reworking of one of the best videogames ever, is a brilliant game. Certainly not as groundbreaking as the original though as, unfortunately, it will never have the same impact on the world as the original, but it’s still brilliant nonetheless. Mario belongs on DS. And all his multicoloured friends do too.

 

The graphics are much better than the original game though. Remember how blocky everything was? Everything is now much crisper, much smoother and much more refined – but then again, we expect that after 8 years of progress, don’t we? Though the visuals are sharper, when you first start your adventure the familiarity of the game will hit you instantly. You’re standing in exactly the same spot as you stood back in 1996. The same hills, the same trees and the same castle lie ahead of you. However the controls are different, the visuals are sharper and there’s an air of change about the place but, this is Super Mario 64, almost exactly as you left it all those years ago. And to be honest, it’s very good to be back.

But as you will notice, this time it isn’t Mario you’re controlling – that loveable green dinosaur Yoshi is the one under your control at first. You see, this time round, Mario, Luigi and Wario all came to the Princess’s castle, and now all four of them have gone missing, presumed kidnapped by fire breathing turtles. Therefore it’s up to Yoshi to head in after them and find out what happened.

 

Apart from a few basic changes in the storyline, the game itself is more or less exactly the same. A new room here, a few extra levels there, but in all honesty you saw it all eight years ago. It’s certainly not a bad thing to return to this wonderful playground-like world you left all that time ago, but it would be foolish to go into detail about a game that is nearly a decade old. Instead, let’s talk about how Mario and friends have adapted to their new home on the DS.

Let’s start with the two screens. The top screen shows the action, the bright, colourful, fully 3D world, Mario 64 with a new, glossy makeover and a lick of paint. The lower screen, the touch screen, shows a map allowing you fairly obviously to see where you are in the level and locate items like Stars and Red Coins. The touch screen also has two other uses – you can tap on-screen buttons to rotate the camera around your character, and you can also control the movement of your character by use of the stylus or thumb strap. This is where the first big change from the original steps in and slaps you in the face – there is no true analogue control. The stylus works fine, you can use the thumb strap if you want an almost-analogue feel, and you can stick to the standard D-Pad and buttons – but the lack of a true analogue stick irritates at first. Thankfully, you’ll soon get used to your chosen method of control, and once you get stuck into the game the control method doesn’t make a difference. The game does lose a little bit of its accessibility for it though– which is a shame, given how simple and then-revolutionary the analogue stick was at the time. It almost, almost, feels like a step back.