Mario is back! Not that he ever left, of course. In fact, for a brief moment during the GameCube era, there was a danger that Nintendo's main man was becoming a little over-exposed.
Yet although Mario will return in two new Wii games there is no way that anyone will accuse Nintendo of milking Mario this time. You see, with New Super Mario Bros. and especially Mario Galaxy 2, Nintendo is giving the fans what they want. More proper Mario adventures.
Before N64 came along, Mario would appear in multiple classic adventures on one console. On the NES you had the groundbreaking Super Mario Bros. which was followed by two more Mario Bros. games. The SNES era brought in Super Mario World, Yoshi's Island and a couple of Mario spin-offs in Mario Paint and Mario Kart.
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However everything changed with N64 - Mario 64 was the only true Mario platformer on the console as Mario starred in far more spins-offs than adventure games. Of course, there weren't too many complaints as we also got the Paper Mario series, another brilliant Mario Kart game and the plumber's two best sports games in the original Mario Tennis and Mario Golf.
On GameCube it was a similar story but the standard dipped. Super Mario Sunshine Mario Kart Double Dash were both very good but didn't live up to their predecessors while the plumber starred in more sports games (tennis, golf, football, baseball), a dancing game and four Mario Party titles. Were we getting too much Mario?
Of course Mario has starred in his fair share of spin-offs in the Wii era - Mario Strikers Charged Football, Mario Party 8, Mario & Sonic At The Olympic Games - but who cares when we've got another Galaxy to look forward to? Mario's main adventures are undoubtedly his most memorable games and with Galaxy 2 we're moving out of the one adventure per console era which is what every Nintendo fan wants.
It's not just Mario who is making a return as Link is also making a comeback in another Zelda adventure. If you asked any Nintendo fan before E3 what they'd most like to see, most would say another Mario or Zelda adventure. It's not that Nintendo fans don't want to try out new games with new stars but Mario and Zelda adventures pretty much guarantee great gaming experiences and with games costing in excess of £30 you can see why people stick with what they know.
It is great to see the pair of them return on Wii and while I wouldn't necessarily want a new Mario or Zelda adventure every year (that could spoil the excitement) I'm so happy that I don't have to wait five years for the plumber's next platformer.
How about you? It seems ridiculous to ask you if you are looking forward to Mario Galaxy 2 (of course you are!) so I'll just ask you what you'd like to see in Super Mario Galaxy 2. Let the ideas flow...
I thinks that bringing back the mini games would be a great idea...
Alsos, multiplayer (proper multiplayer, mind) would be an awesome addition. Even if it were only after you collected all the stars again and unlocked luigi, that you could now do co-op with him...
I agree that power-ups like the fire flower should eb unlimeted time, only when you get hurt or whatever would they go, but also more of the old power ups of super mario bros. three would be the best!
