Fire John Teti
Why are A.V. Club game reviews so bad? It makes no sense. The outfit is pretty solid elsewise, but, when it comes to video games, I really get the impression that they don’t play them.
Enter John Teti’s review of New Super Mario Bros. Wii. Now the game, I’ll tell you right now, isn’t a home run; it’s solid Mario jumpy fun, but it’s not exactly an all-time great, and it has its share of problems. A proper review — written by a capable writer who has actually played the game — could explore that, tell you what the problems are (in a nutshell: the control for the "shake" actions is super sensitive and goes off when you don’t want it to, Mario really really likes to wall jump all the time even when you don’t want him to, and some levels are much too crowded in multiplayer), and give you an honest appraisal of what to expect from the game. Instead, we get garbage like this:
Maybe Nintendo auteur Shigeru Miyamoto finally got tired of making Mario games. His schoolboy enthusiasm is mostly absent from New Super Mario Bros. Wii, which instead bears the weariness of a kid in detention. You can almost see Miyamoto sitting at his desk, sneaking furtive glances out the window as he goes through the motions of the formula one more time: Bowser kidnaps Princess Peach, Mario puts on some silly outfits, coins are gathered, many turtles are slaughtered, the end.
Alternative hypothesis: Shigeru Miyamoto didn’t make it. Yep, about three seconds of Google work confirms that it was in fact directed by Shigeyuki Asuke. Good job knowing what the fuck you’re talking about, John.
And, hey, question. Does it mean anything to say that a video game "bears the weariness of a kid in detention?" Answer: no it does not. That is garbage. That is garbage writing, John Teti, and you should be embarrassed.
The game introduces a few fresh design twists and rehashes a slew of old ones. One of the few bright ideas is a mode in which you rescue Toad—the princess’ mushroom-hatted retainer—from already-completed levels, providing enticement to play through stages a second time.
One of the best parts of the game, according to John Teti: rewards for playing the same levels over and over again! I’m with him here. I mean, hands up, everybody who doesn’t like grinding? Yeah, that’s what I thought. You all love it too.
Elsewhere, the execution is lacking. Dinosaur sidekick Yoshi shows up early but mostly disappears, the Chuck Cunningham of New SMB Wii.
An obscure Happy Days reference? Fuck the heck is wrong with you? You do realise this isn’t 1975, right? Though I suppose I shouldn’t overlook the possibility that you dropped way too much acid and haven’t come down yet. That would explain this review.
Also, by the way? Yoshi continues to show up throughout the game. As you’d know if you played more than the first few levels.
The fire flower has an inferior new brother, the ice flower, which freezes enemies in ice blocks—one of the mustiest tropes in platformers.
You know what sucked about Doom? How inferior the rocket launcher was to the pistol. I mean, the rate of fire was so much slower! And how about those musty explosions? It’s been fucking done, id.
Those are small disappointments; the deeper problem with New SMB Wii is its muddled construction.
Translation: Since I only played the game for five minutes before I wrote my review, I can’t really tell you anything else about it. So I’ll write a few more paragraphs full of nothing.
Previous Mario games set the standard for 2-D game design because their worlds had wit.
That is a theory, I suppose. In rebuttal, I’ll suggest that perhaps they set the standard for 2D game design because of their gameplay. But, sure, I guess it could be because those trees in the Forest of Illusion were witty as fuck.
Miyamoto would introduce a simple new device, like a switch that turned blocks into coins, and as subsequent levels played out, he would explore that device with a Charlie Chaplin-esque sense of charm and surprise.
New Super Mario Bros. Wii: contains that device.
New Super Mario Bros. Wii: was not directed by Shigeru Miyamoto.
Charlie Chaplin: doesn’t have a fucking thing to do with any Super Mario Bros. game ever made.
New SMB Wii doesn’t inspire delight; its worlds are disjointed and strangely lifeless.
I was pretty inspired with delight on quite a few occasions. Like when I noticed that most of the mobs move and act in time with the background music, complete with hops or kicks or whatever every time there’s an orchestra hit. Or when I got to pretty much any of the worlds for the first time — the giant wigglers in world 5 aren’t life-ful? What about the mountain made out of pipes? The crazy clouds in world 7? Or those walking, stretching piranha plants in world 4? Come on. This game has a lot of "life." Which I guess you don’t know, since you played three levels and called it a day.
Where are all the Koopas and Goombas?
Try looking in the levels. I’m serious. Yes, world 1 is pretty easy and empty — it’s kind of the "training" world. The later worlds are fucking choked with koopas and goombas. The fact that you don’t know this betrays the lack of time you spent playing the game before you wrote your review. For which you should be fired.
The vibe sometimes resembles Myst more than Mario.
The what? Seriously, dude. You can’t just skip playing the game and write a bunch of nonsense words and think nobody will notice. How about you can talking about the game’s vibeology for a while? And anybody who draws a comparison between New Super Mario Bros. Wii and fucking Myst has clearly never played either game.
The culprit may be the much-touted multiplayer feature. You can now have up to four characters (Mario, Luigi, and two Toads) playing through a level at the same time, which is chaotic fun. Chaos only sustains itself for so long, though—few will have the patience to play the entire game this way—and true cooperative multiplayer is practically impossible, since the characters are always stumbling over each other in the tight confines of the screen.
I dunno; the wife and I managed it alright. I guess we just spent enough time with it that we learned how to play. For example, you need to coordinate actions so you’re not both trying to make the same jump at the same time. I mean, yeah, if you don’t want to do that, you certainly can play the game as a big free-for-all mess. You just don’t have to. John Teti, of course, does not know this and cannot tell his readers this, because he did not play the game.
And since all of the game’s worlds need to accommodate four characters, they often feel too spacious and empty for a single lonely Mario.
World 1, yes. Try playing more of the game, dumbass; it gets harder. I defy you to tell me that these two levels are too spacious and empty. Good lord.
The Mario series has always offered such brilliant big ideas
Get ready for a whole bunch of bullshit:
the rich, non-sequential structure of Super Mario World
Super Mario World: the only game ever to have a level select screen. John Teti glosses over the fact that New Super Mario Bros. Wii uses the exact same "structure" that Super Mario World did. Or maybe it’s just not as "rich?" This is why weasel words are awesome: say something with no meaning, and you can’t ever be wrong!
the groundbreaking use of 3-D space in Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Galaxy
Mario 64, sure, but I’m not at all sure that "being in 3D" still counted as a "brilliant big idea" by the time Mario Galaxy came out. You know, in 2007.
that it was easy to ignore the repetitious nature of their underlying format.
Alternative hypothesis: they had good gameplay.
The lack of a strong concept in this game brings that decades-old sameness to the fore and makes New SMB Wii the least essential Mario title to date.
Notice how, since John didn’t play the game, he’s stuck making some idiotic "feel" complaint his closing salvo? His low grade isn’t because the game doesn’t play well — which he has no idea about — but simply because it doesn’t feel right. The concept, she is not strong enough!
Also, "least essential" is an utterly meaningless and terrible criticism. You, John Teti, are bad at your job and should be fired.
