Mario is the king of video games.

We all know this.

Time and time and time again, Mario has just completely

fucking annihilated every other game on the market

and for the past 7 years, I think Nintendo has struggled

to live up to that impossible level of expectation.

With Odyssey, Mario is back to reclaim his throne. Right off the bat,

BOOM!

This sweeping orchestra just knocks you on your fucking ass and shoots your soul into the stratosphere.

You can turn into a Chain Chomp. Wham!

Go up the waterfall, turn into a fucking T-Rex! Come on!

Come on, how the fuck can you not be playing this game right now?!

There are influences from everywhere

but to dwell on them would be a disservice to Odyssey,

which is truly exciting because it's a whole new thing.

Every level functions as a platforming jungle gym,

while also serving as a hub to smaller more linear challenges.

You have so many options of traversal.

You can throw your hat and bounce off it.

You can roll down hills like a fucking lunatic.

You can triple jump, throw your hat, dive into it, bounce off, throw it again, dive...

You can capture a Hammer Bro, wait for his little bounce, then big bounce,

jump out of him, wall jump, dive on top...

There's so much crazy shit in here and yet Odyssey still feels like

it just barely scratched the surface of what its mechanics are even capable of.

So, I am now switching my most anticipated game...

from Mario Odyssey...

to Mario Odyssey 2.

Instead of squeezing the potential outta everything you can capture,

it's constantly moving onto the next idea.

Go up! *gasp* You can be a fork!

Oh mah god, you guys! You can be an electrical wire!

No way. You can be a Goombas!

Bye bye, Goombas! *giggling*

*GASP*

This is the greatest game ever created.

Odyssey revels in a rich sense of variety.

One moment, you're rolling around in this Tim Burton-ass moonlit hat world

and then the next level, you're zooming around a frozen desert as a Bullet Bill

collecting Purple Coins so that you can buy a cowboy hat for Mario.

[Mario]: Woohoo!

Every kingdom has its own brochure, its own atmosphere,

its own music, its own enemies to capture, and then after you beat the game,

every single level gets repopulated with even more challenges.

It's not great because you can become an onion.

It's great because once you become an onion,

you noticed how many possibilities you've just opened up now.

Look at this wall. If you want to, you can go in the pipe,

turn into 8-Bit Mario, goof around in here, jump out the top,

or you just go BOPBOPBOP. Hey, get on top just like that.

Odyssey is always indulging the player to play the game in their own way.

In fact, you only need 120 Moons to beat the game,

500 Moons to get the real ending out of a total of 830 of 'em.

Come on!

Now, not every single one of these Moons is a win.

Some of them are just sitting there and like

"Come on, really? That's a Moon?"

Likewise, some levels feel pretty tame compared to the wild originality of everything else.

But even in these less inspired levels, there are Moons here that will just floor you.

The obvious crown jewel of the game

is New Donk City, where I was actually born.

It's an incredible setting to just bounce around in,

and you can go off this taxi, swing on a streetlight...

The walk signals are coin blocks.

You can fling yourself between the skyscrapers,

drive around on this little scooter,

hop through a crowd of people...

Every alley, every building, every manhole has something for you to discover.

And it all culminates in this musical finale

which will go down as one of the coolest, most uplifting sequences ever in a video game.

Mario Odyssey is not at all what I expected but I loved it anyway.

It's the ultimate collectathon that is in equal parts comedic and wondrous.

It's the kind of game I imagine other AAA studios look at and go

"What are we even doing over here?"

It not only brings dozens of new ideas to the table

but executes them with a child-like whimsicality.

Even after you've think you've seen everything it has to offer,

the surprises continue to pile up.

For real, if you can play this game and not feel some kind of emotion come over you,

wipe yourself off, man, because you are DEAD!

♪ Super Mario Galaxy - Gusty Garden Galaxy ♪

You can be a tree!

[Outro]