Yes, this blog entry is late this week. I have an excuse.
I never claimed it was a good excuse though. Super Mario Galaxy is, however, an awesome game. It's great fun, slightly addictive, and a great example of a simple game that works well without being overcomplex.
Now there's nothing in the game thats fundamentally new. Platforming in 3D was done in Mario 64 and Mario Sunshine, as-well as the Tomb-Raider series and many other games since. Even the format of many small levels you keep re-visiting to find different stars in was from Mario 64.
What about gravity and planets? Well there were 2D scrollers on the NES that had ways of swapping gravity. In 3D? Variable gravity was a great feature in Prey, and Zelda had areas with magnetic boots that were tantamount to the same thing. Planet and platform hopping in 3D is reminiscent of the previous Mario games, and the likes of Monkey Ball and DK Jungle Beat. I may concede that (as far as I know) this is the first game I've seen where can jump between platforms in 3D and quasi-float round them due to gravity.
Mentioning DKJB, I should point out that quite a few things seem to have migrated into the Mario franchise from that game - including (or perhaps especially) enemies. This seems sad, as there were plenty of SMB enemies that could be used, but they seem to continually become dropped and the existing ones are now more caricatures of their original forms from the earlier games, and, annoyingly, becoming easier to kill as the games evolve.
For example:
At least boo's can't be trivially killed now.
Anyways, I seem to have digressed. The point is, it is a fun game, and just when you think you've seen all the formulaic things it can throw at you, it adds just one more new thing to try out / see / do. Green stars, tricky (but much overrated ;)) trial galaxies, hungry stars, hidden stars, power stars, Luigi stars, comets, rabbits, goomba's, planets shaped like a Yoshi head...it's all there :).
The sound track is also stunning. Apparently it's live-recorded orchestra and disc-streamed. A very good move, and it really sets the mood, especially given a lot of the music are 'Mario classics' but re-recorded very nicely.
And now, CSI is on...normal service may resume next weekend...or I may talk about card magic.