10 • It's unbelievable how one can feel nostalgia for a game they've never played before, but I think it perfectly encapsulates the feeling Mario Galaxy manages to evoke: it's the best Mario game to date and quite possibly the greatest platformer of all time.

Each and every galaxy is so thematic and unique, to the point of all of them becoming memorable, tied together by the incredible Comet Observatory hub world that actually feels like a living and breathing 'home', and the fact it lightens and livens up more and more as you progress through the game is such an incredible touch.

The levels themselves are all so masterfully crafted, they're a constant bombardment of new and fun ideas; even the boss fights and water levels, traditionally weaker points in 3D Mario games, are really engaging in Galaxy. The game never once rests on its laurels, it just keeps the excitement coming at any given minute through perfectly paced difficulty that easily breezes from challenging platforming to really engaging boss fights. As dunkey said, «a lesser game would crumble under the weight of so many ideas, but Mario Galaxy nimbly glides through them like the matrix, introducing one mechanic that leads to another which later merges with the previous idea to create a new more exciting combination».

Mechanics wise, it feels phenomenal to play, with super tight, precise and responsive controls, and a massive step-up compared to its predecessors; sure, the moveset is far more limiting and not as broken speed-wise, but it's also not as broken clunkiness-wise, and I much prefer the carefully fine-tuned movement of this game over the unrestricted freedom of previous entries, not to mention it perfectly fits this game's far more linear level design compared to previous entries.

All this benefits even further from the Wii remote, whose point and motion features feel extremely natural, tailor-made for this game and (perhaps surprisingly) not gimmicky at all, to the point of making the Wii one of my favourite consoles to play on, despite never owning one during its heyday.

The graphics are stunning, particularly when played at an higher resolution through emulation, to the point where it's hard to believe this is a Wii game and not a Switch one, which makes the game hold up perfectly today and into the future; a great sense of style and art direction is timeless and will always prevail over any attempt at realism.

Nintendo didn't need to get an entire orchestra blasting such triumphant music, but boy am I glad they did: the soundtrack is absolutely another of this game's many highlights, with so many iconic and compelling melodies that fit each moment so well, blending perfectly with whatever is happening on screen, be it relaxing exploration or an high intensity boss fight.

Despite all this, and despite being a terrific game all around — it even has a story! and a pretty charming one as well, even if rather simple, with Rosalina instantly becoming the best character in any Mario game —, I think where it truly shines is in the aesthetic: it's pretty hard to pinpoint what it is exactly, but there's just something magical and wondrous about Mario Galaxy, every single part of this game is so perfectly interwoven with one another, combining to form such a one-of-a-kind package that I don't think we'll ever see anything like it, even from Nintendo themselves.

Truly a work of art, the genre's masterpiece, and one of my favourite games of all time.

8 • The forefather of the modern precision platformer and an absolute joy to play.

The setting, characters and 'story' are really charmful and exhibit Edmund McMillen's iconic humour. The gameplay is refined to a tee and feels really responsive: the (regular) levels are a blast to play through, achieving a great balance of short length and hardcore difficulty that keeps you hooked to the screen for every ten-second attempt, while the boss fights are chaotic, frantic and overall pretty fun. The optional content (dark world, warp zones, etc) is far too punishing for my personal tastes, but the main game more than stands the test of time, even if Celeste has dethroned it as the greatest precision platformer of all time.

It has achieved cult classic status and for very good reason.