A New Galaxy for Mario

Yes, I took a flyer on a game based off the old classic. You know what? This game didn’t disappoint. Super Mario Galaxy was fun for everyone who played it at my apartment and those who played it at Pfieffer’s house (at least I didn’t hear him complain any – I only heard his fiancé complain that I took the game and hadn’t given it back yet for her to play it).

Basically, in terms of hit versus flop, Mario is a can’t miss. Personally, I haven’t run into a Mario game that really sucked. In fact, I just recently bought the Mario Kart for the Wii. (post to come in the future)

The feud between Bowser and Mario continues in space with different galaxy’s to travel to and fight for the rescue of Princess Peach. Each galaxy is similar to the different worlds of Super Mario 3 but with the new age 3D Mario as in Super Mario World 64. The best and most unique part of this game by far is the ability to run around the world – a small sphere with gravitational pull in outer-space. I don’t think I can accurately describe this without taking a lot of the prestige out of it.

You travel by star cannons that launch you to the galaxy/planet/world where you go through a standard Mario type level. Afterwards you get a star, which magically transports you back to the starship where you call home until you save Peach and the Universe. There are different observatories that you unlock as you go, meaning you can use different star cannons to go to different galaxies to retrieve stars. The more stars you get, the closer you get to powering-up the starship to travel to the center of the universe to rescue Peach.

The game may seem to be getting long after you collect the 30th star, but it definitely isn’t a game you can pass in just single-digit hours of game play, making it worth a 50 dollar purchase – or just use GameFly and send it back when you are done, with no late fee, just like Pfieffer and I did.

I recommend this game if you liked Mario for the 64. It adds a little spunk to the classic game. Although I never looked into it, there seemed to be the possibility of co-op play – maybe something for you to look into if you check out the game.

- Focko

If you've played one, you've played them all...

Next game up on the list, is NBA Ballers: Chosen One. I am a fan of the old NBA Jam, and NBA Street games, so it drove me to wanting to rent this game and check it out. After playing a couple quick games and getting used to the controls, I feel the need to start the "Story Mode" of the game.

Starting out is a type of NBA Inside Stuff TV set, where some guy sets up the whole "Chosen One" theme. He gives brief talks about absolutely nothing before different chapters of the game. The idea is that you start off as a nobody, and look to build up street cred, and to hopefully make it into the NBA. So I started off playing a variety of different chanllenges in the different areas of the story mode. There are some interesting games that vary from 1-on-1, 2-on-2, or even 3-on-3 games, that have unique rules (slam dunks only, no fouls, etc.). This is fun at first, but after playing it for awhile, gets really boring and monotanous.

They really make the point that NBA players are like greek Gods walking around everyone else. Every time when playing on a new court, there is a huge entrance video of that courts star NBA player (usually the boss of that level). Whenever they come out to the court, the crowd goes nuts, and it shows them at like 80 different angle to make sure you know who the crowd is reacting too. I find it funny that the crowd always makes a big deal about who it is, regardless of who is in the crowd. Example, Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, and Dwight Howard are in the crowd hanging out, then Joe Johnson makes an entrance via the helicopter pad right outside, and comes to the court with a posse and everyone goes nuts.

I know that is a minor detail, and it doesn't affect the gameplay, it just adds to the feeling that the game really doesn't have a "storyline" at all. Your character never talks, nobody ever talks to him, nothing happens off the court. This makes it prety hard to develop any time of "story", it's just pointless games, one after the other. So if you like these types of NBA Jame type games, I would reccomend renting this, definately not buying it.