I've been enjoying this game quite a bit more since hitting the lake kingdom. I just got to
It doesn't feel as consistently fresh or exciting as Galaxy did, and I think my favorite parts are still those micro challenges that pop up from time to time through doorways or rockets. Some levels go on too long and many don't seem to practice a single idea the way I would like.
has done the best job so far of introducing an idea and demanding the player improve his skill with the concept by continually ramping up the challenge. But that's like, literally one of the last things you do in the story and it's disappointing how brief many of the challenges are and how low the skill ceiling is to clear them. I hear post-game is more difficult, but that seems like an awful lot to get through before coming to the good stuff.
(sort of like 3D Land!)
I have been collecting all coins and moons possible per stage—maybe I would feel less friction if I rushed through the story. But then, I still have all those easy moons to go back and collect for completion.
I've also had some trouble with the camera and my ability to judge Mario's relationship to other objects in a few spaces. I don't recall having so many moments in a Mario game before, certainly not since Sunshine. Maybe it's the nature of the world design and the 3D camera. It's been occasionally frustrating feeling like I am going places where the camera can't keep up. It's sometimes difficult to know if I'm off the main path and the game is discouraging me from exploring a certain way, or if it genuinely has trouble orienting the player during certain segments. I recall a moment in the wooded kingdom where Mario is meant to fall down a long way, nudge himself into a crevice before death, and then jump across two rotating wheels to reach a moon. I must have missed the jump from the second wheel to the moon platform a good two dozen times before clearing it because the camera wouldn't settle into a position that communicated what height I needed. I know I bring some of the frustration on myself—I could take the process slowly, and set the camera in the best position for each step. After every jump I could resettle it and maintain a clear view for each leap. But that's not how I want to play. It's more fun to keep moving and bound forward without nursing the camera. In wide open spaces it's fine to use player-controlled POV to navigate. Platforming sections are best suited to a camera that presents the ideal view without player input. Maybe my discomfort is irreconcilable. Maybe it's a conflict between what I seek out of games and the design philosophy behind exploratory Mario.
Overall I am having a good time. I understand the cap jumps pretty well now and have been getting along much better, reaching areas early and leaving the main path quite often to search for secrets before the game would normally allow me to do so. So many of the worlds are beautifully crafted, with Nintendo placing rewards in out of the way nooks and crannies for players who have come to grips with the nuance of the cap abilities. It's really something. You rarely feel like you are out of bounds. They've anticipated so much.
I was surprised by my ranking in the bounding minigame. I scored 59 seconds, checked the board and saw i was something like 6,000th. The other minigames so far have me ranked at 25,000th or lower. I know it's not much but I felt a twinge of pride for scoring in the top few thousands.
