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r/truegaming, but I decided to post it here as well because I wanted to see if anything had changed on this post. I’d also like to add that I love Super Mario Odyssey. This might be my favorite 3D Mario game to date, and that’s an exciting statement, because 3D Mario games are among my favorite video games. In the following post I spend a lot of time talking about people who disapprove of Ulysses’ approach to collectibles, and I think it’s worth pointing out that I generally disagree with those people. But the reason I spend so much time criticizing this group is because I think their criticisms are valid, and I’m convinced that Bowser’s Fury has effectively responded to those criticisms by retaining and expanding on the essence of what made Odyssey so special.
In October 2017, Super Mario Odyssey debuted with a bang on the Nintendo Switch. Odyssey did not continue on the linear path that began with Super Mario Galaxy in 2007 and continued with Super Mario 3D World in 2015, but was praised in part for its return to a more open design reminiscent of Super Mario 64, which captured the imagination of so many gamers in 1996. Interestingly, The Legend of Zelda, as well as another very impressive Nintendo Switch game: Breath of the Wild, Odyssey had a long list of collectibles, 880 to be exact, which seemed to confirm the game’s place as Mario’s most content-rich three-dimensional release. Instead of Galaxy’s Power Stars and Super Mario Sunshine’s Shine sprites, Odyssey’s 880 collectibles are scattered throughout the game’s Kingdoms-like sandboxes in the form of Power Moons. Although the ridiculous number of collectibles completely overshadowed Odyssey in 3D, the 880 collectible moons allowed Odyssey to deliver on Nintendo’s promise of a hybrid system. Players who wanted to sit in front of the TV for hours were presented with a long list of objectives, while players who had very little time to go through Mario’s latest adventure, whether in dock or handheld mode, could make significant progress and collect a few moons in those brief moments. With so many moons in play, the chances of encountering one or two in a small time frame are generally high, and that’s one of Odyssey’s strengths, depending on your perspective.
In the years since its launch, however, the large number of moons has become a major criticism of the Odyssey. In his critique of the Odyssey, Joseph Anderson lays out this criticism at length, and as strong as his arguments are, the number of moons in the Odyssey clearly did not convince everyone. In fact, Anderson argues that there are many different moons that are of lesser quality than the other moons in the game, or rather, that there are categories of moons that are much easier to obtain than others, such as moons that can be obtained simply by reaching a certain point or moons that are simply in an easily accessible location, that all moons can be devalued in some way. Of course, to be persuaded by Anderson’s argument, you need to know whether you appreciate that all the moons you acquire are considered equal progress in the game, or if, on the other hand, you feel that the overall experience is diminished in favor of another group of players.
Perhaps a secondary collectible, above the purple Odyssey coins and below the Force moons like Breath of the Wild 900 King Seed, could alleviate this problem for people who share Anderson’s opinion. However, Odyssey is a game that clearly aimed to equalize the progress of all players via moons, or in other words, Odyssey clearly aimed to give all players the chance to see all the realms of the game, both without heavy investment during the game and no matter how much time two different players wanted to invest in the game. In fact, 3D Mario games generally seem to share this goal with Super Mario 64. You only need 70 out of 120 game stars to defeat Bowser, and Galaxy needs even fewer power stars, 60 out of 120, to see the end credits. Odyssey even went so far as to say that a player only needed 124 moons to take on Bowser. A second level of collection could probably undermine this goal by letting players choose their own time investment, rather than slowing progress between two different goals. The exception to this might have been the blue coins in Super Mario Sunshine, which allowed players to spend ten blue coins for a glowing sprite, but that’s probably what the Odyssey developers considered the implementation, since players in Odyssey have the same ability to buy moons, but with normal coins. The decision to use regular coins to buy moons is further evidence of Nintendo’s commitment to the Choose Your Own Time philosophy in Odyssey, as regular coins are infinitely available in the game. So instead of locking this purchase option to a limited collection, this choice allows players who want to see the rest of the game to do so. After all, the developers could take the risk that a timed player might come across a collectible that doesn’t allow them to work against Bowser, but that risk seems to contradict the central pillar of 3D Mario game design. So the second-order collection does not seem to be the answer to this criticism.
Instead, Nintendo seems to have answered the question itself with the release of Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury in February 2021. In some ways, Bowser’s Fury takes a more open-ended approach than Odyssey or any other 3D Mario game. Bowser’s Fury offers the player a relatively large map to unlock hubs, each containing about four platform level equivalents. This time it’s up to the player to collect the cat shiners. The levels can be tackled in any order, with each level containing five different cat shines that must be purchased. However, it is not allowed to collect all five cat shards in the first round of a level. On the contrary, this restriction encourages them to go to other centers and levels of the map. If the player returns to a previous level, they will likely discover that the level is populated with other enemies or the layout has changed slightly, and the missing cat glow usually becomes available. With only 100 cat lights, collecting them seems like a reasonable middle ground between playing out the level in Galactica and finding the so-called lower moon in Odyssey. In Bowser’s Fury, most of the player’s genius requires a more traditional platforming challenge, but coupled with a much freer approach to problem solving, as in Odyssey. Whether a player is clearing the playing field on the platform to get five pieces of shine or making the traditional run to the goal, the shine in Bowser Fury manages to be even where the moons in Odyssey were not. This format is ideal for Odyssey and older 3D Mario games. This is to accommodate those who feel that the Odyssey was littered with too many unnecessary moons.
The heart of the device seems to be a small amount of Cat Glitter. With fewer Shines, developers had to think more carefully about how they gave the Shines to the player, but the smaller size of Bowser’s Fury allowed Nintendo to focus on the many objectives needed to make the Shines shorter, but varied and generally quality parts of the gameplay. Fascinating, but this formula can easily be expanded in the future. There may not be 880 moons in the game, but the next full 3D Mario could have a staggering number of collectibles without the developers having to limit themselves to giving moons for every conceivable task in the game. Bowser’s Fury found a nice middle ground between those who loved Odyssey’s friendly approach to progression and those who felt it devalued the hunt for each moon. Ultimately, Bowser’s Fury seems to have proven that less can also be more, and in a world of triple-A games full of recycled content, that’s certainly refreshing.
Sources
Super Mario Odyssey review by Joseph Anderson:
Edit: Layout
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