Review Information
Game Reviewed Super Mario Generations (Release Demo), by OssieTheOstrich
Review Author Yoshubs
Created Feb 26 2020, 11:55 PM

General Commentary and Game Overview
Super Mario Generations is a Sonic Generations inspired fan game created by Ostrich101. It delivers an okay experience, but has way too many flaws to be fun and enjoyable most of the time. The game has great potential and can be a good game but, as of this demo, I'm a bit worried. Here's my review:
 
Pros + 2 Playable Characters
+ Music choices are good
 
Cons - Controls in general are lacking a lot
- Level Design is all over the place
- Tiles and sprites look off most of the time and are style mixes
- Themes are bland and unoriginal
 
Impressions
Gameplay
4 / 10
The gameplay in this game lack a ton. Classic Mario's controls have many flaws, for example, when you jump, moving backwards is really slow, meaning you can fall in pits if you jump in the wrong direction. Speaking of pits, the enemy AI in Modern Mario's stages is really janky, and at times, they can glitch and flip indefinitely. They can also stack on ledges and push you off into a pit, which can be annoying. It feels like the enemies should have some kind of difference, and shouldn't instantly chase after you even if they're at the other end of the stage. I personally think they should have a detection system, where they roam until disturbed. Back to controls, they feel really stiff and not at all responsive. For example, Mario's run doesn't feel like a run at all. Also, at times, when jumping under a block I randomly do a flip. I thought this was either a triple jump or a side-jump, but, I could never replicate it outside of tiny spaces. Moves like the ground pound feel slow, and the long jump is just not needed in the type of level design this game has. Oh, yeah, level design. Sometimes, it just feels like random chunks of land (Super Mario Land's level, for example, where there were just triangles at the bottom of the screen). Other times, it's clear there was an attempt to integrate a gimmick into the stage. Once again using the Modern Super Mario Land stage, the second segment involved wind boosting you into walls, where you would recover using the wall jump. It just feels weird at times, and after that section, the enemy AI gets in the way again when you have to wall jump onto a semisolid but there's always going to be an enemy directly above you because they are chasing you. Back to the controls not responding, the menu seems to not respond and it felt really weird to get through the first time. Overall, not a good experience.
 
Graphics
6 / 10
The style is appreciated, but, I don't think it's very good. The colors are overly showy, and after getting used to the game, the real world and my computer just felt really weird to look at. In addition, corner tiles and such are cut off in levels, which just looks weird. The palette is very strange at times as well, and I don't like the sprites or the shading. For example, the text is hard to read at times. Effects just randomly show up when sliding and crouching, which is just strange, and at times, pausing the game just feels like something that's only a graphic, as it doesn't really pause the game. Finally, for "iconic stages" of Mario's past, I'd expect them to be distinguishable. Unfortunately, they all feel like New Super Mario Bros stages and don't at all make me nostalgic for it. The only one I recognized was Lost Levels' 1-1. Not much to say on this though, so I'll leave it at that.
 
Sound
8 / 10
The sound choice is alright, there's nothing special about it really. It's fairly high because it's mostly just public assets like remixes of themes and such.
 
Final Words
4 / 10
Overall, a really buggy mess that isn't fun to play, looks bad and feels like it has too much wasted potential.

Comments
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OssieTheOstrich
Mar 4 2020, 6:29 AM
I think if you play the recent feedback demo on the forums you'll have a better time with it, as the art, controls, and level design (thanks to Langton for his help with those) are a whole lot better, and a whole lot of bugs have been removed.
 
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