Review Information
Game Reviewed Super Mario Starshine (Demo), by LongLiveLuigi
Review Author Willsaber
Created Jun 14 2015, 7:11 AM

General Commentary and Game Overview
Super Mario Starshine (Not to be confused with Super Mario Starshine, Super Mario Starshine, Super Mario Starshine 2, Super Mario Starshine 3, or Super Mario Stardust) is a linear 2D platformer based around getting from point A to point B. Unfortunately, I must say I didn't go in with high expectations. Not just because of the less-than stellar reception in the comments section, but also because when reading the plot, I came to the realization that it makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.

The basic idea is that Mario "successfully subdued" Bowser, and this was the "primary" reason why the Mushroom Kingdom had been "abnormally quiet" as of late, and why it was "basking in relative peace". The plot is clearly trying to be be deeper than it really is, but that's forgivable. What really bothers me is the part that's actually relevant to the game. The fact that Bowser isn't attacking the Mushroom Kingdom resulted in the power stars falling into the hands of "numerous strangers". I cannot, for the life of me, see the connection between the kingdom being stirred up, and every random Joe not having a power star.

Fortunately, Princess Peach happens to know who has every star. So she gives Mario a list of the people who have one (one of those people must've been thin air, because the second star had no owner), and he treks out into far away corners of the kingdom to get the stars back. Lucky for Mario, Peach must've magically teleported notices to the people who have the stars, because they know to expect Mario. Maybe I'm over-thinking it, but if she could alert them of Mario's coming, couldn't she just get them herself. Whatever.

The concluding line of the intro is, "The journey will be perilous". This is because only 60% of the kingdom is actually land. Bowser must've really shaken things up before his ultimate demise, because the kingdom is practically a cluster of floating islands! Oh, there's also a ton Bowser's minions derping around. Don't be confused, though, it's just a Hello move: Bowser has nothing to do with the plot.

All in all, it's a rather lackluster game. The controls are terrible, the GUIs and HUDs are less than novice, the graphics clash (some of them not being all that great to start with), the world is un-believable, the game forces a save on you right as you start, and a myriad of other issues.
 
Pros - Has some rather nice Mario animations, considering that it's Super Mario World styled
- The map screen's level name pop-up has a neat effect with the text
 
Cons - The intro Font not good (H looks like W, and there's a ton of anti-aliasing)
- The intro doesn't make any sense
- There is no diagonal walking animation on the map screen
- The map is extremely bare
- The map hud is really bad
- Pressing Shift opens the [boring] pause menu, but Enter closes it
- The controls and physics are terrible
- The sprites clash with every other sprite
- The hud is boring and un-intuitive
- Some of the music loops poorly
- Fireballs get stuck in walls
- The camera bad
- The in-game NPC text font is different from the intro's
- Saving takes awhile
- Two of the "level start" sounds play when you select a level
- The Ice Flower works differently on different enemies
- Block hit boxes are HUGE
- The end of demo splash screen is not a foreground
- The map collisions are bad
- You can shoot three fireballs with the Fire Flower
- No falling animation
 
Impressions
Gameplay
2 / 10
Well, it's what you'd expect from any other generic Mario platformer. Except worse. You jump with the up key, you pause with Shift (but to select anything in the pause menu, you use Enter), space uses your power-up, the physics are completely static and way too tight, and... ugh...

Really though, the level design is so easy that you won't find you run into issues with the physics very often. I didn't write notes on my exact thoughts on the three levels, but speaking from memory, they re-used the same level-design mechanics again and again, and MAN is it flat.

There are four enemies: the Goomba, the Koopa, the para-Koopa, and the Spiny. There's nothing new about them, they just function like they do in any other Mario game.

This is the kind of game speed-runners would love, because there are so many issues with the collisions that minimalizing the time you lose off of hitting any solid object is quite a challenge.

There are also a number of graphical glitches, such as when you hold down the left and right arrow keys at the same time, or when you die (the entire death animation is basically a graphical bug).

When you first look at the main HUD, you'll notice a star coin count, a meter in the top-center, and three classic Mario icons. Contrary to what you'll probably think, those Mario icons actually don't represent your life count (there aren't lives in this game), as almost every other Mario game has them serve, but rather, they are your health. And that random default-Gamemaker bar in the center is filled a bit every time you grab a coin. Once you grab twenty coins, it will fill up and you get another Mario icon.

The block hitboxes are ENORMOUS. If you jump within a foot of a brick, it will break, regardless of whether or not Mario actually touches it. I think I've only touched a little over (under?) half of the major issues and oddities in the gameplay, but you should get the point. This engine is not salvagable.
 
Graphics
3 / 10
There's a ton of really awesome, unique, and skillful art in here! And then, there's... Super Mario World. While there are some really neat edits of the Super Mario World Mario (they give him NSMB poses), the rest of the Super Mario World sprites are just as bland, lifeless, and shapeless as they were in the original game. There isn't a clear theme as far as the graphics go. It's pretty much just, "This looks cool, so I'll use it!"

The main menu has a lot of what I like to call "gloss". That is when you take something, and apply a bunch of pretty effects to it in an attempt to distract from the actual quality of the art itself, which is a pretty common technique to be used among amateur artists. Not only does it look bad, but this gloss really isn't used anywhere else, so it clashes a lot.

The HUD is indescribably boring, so I can't really go into detail with it. It's mostly just some Gamemaker drawing functions scrambled together with little to no context.
 
Sound
4 / 10
The sounds are all re-used. There's no custom music in here, but it doesn't need it. It would really just be wasted effort on a game like this. Some of the music loops poorly because there is dead-space at the end which needs to be cut off. I think if it wasn't for that, I'd give this section a five.
 
Replay
1 / 10
I replayed this so that I could figure out how many coins it takes to get a new piece of health. If you beat the game, it will tell you that the next demos will have three playable characters (which I'm assuming comes with a slight story update, as it was quite clear that only Mario goes on this journey).
 
Final Words
3 / 10
When you beat the game, a message will pop up saying that if this demo is positively received, a new demo should be out shortly. If that is true, there will not be a new demo.

Comments
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Astrakitu
Jul 4 2015, 5:39 AM
Intro font? He kinda used Showcard Gothic for that, which is clearly not a good font standard for a Mario game. It's just too generic...
 
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