MFGG - Mario Fan Games Galaxy

Review Information

Game Reviewed	Mario & Luigi Superstar Platformer, by Ultramario
Review Author	CM30
Created	Sep 2 2015, 3:46 PM

General Commentary and Game Overview

If Mario & Luigi Superstar Platformer was released... in about 1995, it would be seen as a somewhat decent quality game. Because to be honest, that's exactly how old fashioned and simplistic the gameplay is. It's about as deep as an old flash game.

But with that said, what is the game? Why is it so terrible? Let's find out shall we?

Pros	The graphics look decent and don't clash The music is initially decent The game isn't utterly unplayable
Cons	It's got zero gameplay depth. Three enemies, three levels (that repeat), no special moves... Music gets very old fast It's basically an arcade game from the 80s with semi modern graphics

Impressions

Gameplay 1 / 10	Dated. That's the best (and nicest) way to describe this game. Put simply, you jump on Goombas and Koopas. Kill them all to reach the next level. And there are exactly three stages, one of which adds Thwomps into the mix. In the 90s (for flash games/fan games) or 80s (for home consoles), this wouldn't be so bad. That's what pretty much every crappy game was like in the era. A tiny amount of actions played over a couple of levels with simplistic enemies and controls and not a lot of depth to it. Problem is, this is 2015. Games in general have moved on significantly since the days when Space Invaders, Pac-Man and Donkey Kong were brand new, so a game which not only plays worse than those but has less content and ideas... is not really worth bothering with any more. And it also lacks another key aspect that a lot of better, also simple games have; randomness. In a lot of old school games, level designs and ideas are somewhat random or procedurally generated to make the game feel different each time you play. I mean, look at Flappy Bird. Simple mechanics, but the constantly changing level design means you never end up able to complete it by rote. This game does not have this. It has three levels that repeat for eternity. Hence once you've played those, why bother again? Nothing changes, you're just going to blast through level after level til your patience runs out. Add how atrocious the level design is (it's all enemy spam on flat platforms placed at random across the screen), and it's not good. It does have a few nice extras (playable Luigi with somewhat different physics), co-op multiplayer... but why bother with it? Who would WANT to play this game with a friend?
Graphics 5 / 10	The player characters, enemies and levels are from Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga and work nicely together. Bit weird for a platformer (2.5d platforms make judging jump distances/height a bit harder than it should be), but it works. The menus on the other hand, look awful. The title is some text on a grey background with Mario & Luigi sprites, which looks like it was done in Microsoft Paint. The scoreboard looks no better. So... average, because the levels look okay.
Sound 2 / 10	Both the music and sound effects are from Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga. Makes sense, doesn't it? Well yes. Problem is, the variety is non existent. We have one song, the battle song. This gets old after one stage, let alone three or more. And the sounds are repetitive too, since there's just one of each. Basically, you'll want to turn down the volume after about 2 minutes.
Replay 3 / 10	You can go for a high score, if you want to, and there's co-op multiplayer. Both are made pretty much entirely pointless by how boring and lacking this game.

Final Words

Mario & Luigi Superstar Platformer would have been a decent game... for 1990s era Newgrounds or 1980s era Atari systems. But it's too boring and simplistic for modern audiences, and its premise has been superceded by just about every other Mario fan game out there.

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