Super Mario Galaxy: How it's going so far

Got Galaxy today! PLAYED IT FOR ALMOST SIX HOURS, and I've only had it for ten hours total... Yeah.



So then, the time has arrived. Almost one year after the Wii launch, Super Mario Galaxy is finally here. People have been waiting for this since Super Mario Sunshine, and some even longer than that. Unsurprisingly, anticipation is high. I'm not quite ready to write up the review, so here's how I feel about the game so far.

First of all, it's absolutely the best looking Wii game I've played, EVER. Better than Metroid Prime 3! The textures are beautiful, the reflections are amazing, the lighting is perfect, it's all too great!

Second, the story is perfectly Mario-like. Yes, they actually found a way to make Mario-in-space not sound completely idiotic. Sure, it's still your basic "princess in trouble, Mario must save her" storyline, but now it's in SPACE.

The sound is pretty awesome, too. The music (To my untrained ears) sounds like it was done by a live orchestra, and many of the tunes are masterfully remixed classic Mario tracks. Could use a bit more voice acting, though... A few grunts and scattered words just don't do it in this day and age. Although Charles Martinet is once again brilliant as Mario, no surprise.

The controls are amazing fine-tuned and responsive. Simply pointing at Star Bits (The game's ubiquitous collectible) causes them to fly towards Mario. Shaking the Wii remote to spin is pretty nice and non-gimmicky, amazingly. Several sections of the game require slightly different control schemes. You'll hold the Wii remote pointing up, tilt it on it's side and more. No matter what the situation, the controls deliver beautifully.

The gravity system is just mind-blowing. Jumping from one planetoid to another feels amazing, and the sense of distance and scale is spot-on. There's puzzles, boss battles and timed-jumping all throughout this game, and they're all executed beautifully. A truly masterful experience.

So, as you can see, Galaxy's pretty damn awesome so far. However, it isn't perfect, and I'll elaborate on where it goes right and where it fails on Friday with the full review. Until then, keep on gaming, and watch out for falling rocks.

The Duck Has Spoken.