Super Mario Odyssey

The player navigates the Seaside Kingdom as Mario, controlling a Goomba Tower using Cappy's capture ability.

A 2D zone in the Cascade Kingdom, one of many side-scrolling sections that imitate the gameplay and visuals of the original Super Mario Bros.

Super Mario Odyssey is a platform game in which players control Mario as he travels across many different worlds, known as "Kingdoms" within the game, on the hat-shaped ship Odyssey, to rescue Princess Peach from Bowser, who plans to forcibly marry her.[1][2] The Kingdoms in the game return to the exploration-based level design featured in Super Mario 64.[3][4][5] Each Kingdom has Mario searching for and clearing various objectives in order to obtain items known as Power Moons, which are the power sources of the Odyssey and grant access to new Kingdoms. Checkpoint flags littered throughout each Kingdom allow Mario to instantly warp to them once activated.[6][7] Certain levels feature areas called "flat" zones, where Mario is placed in a 2D side-scrolling environment similar to his appearance in the original Super Mario Bros.[8]

In addition to his existing moves, like triple-jumping and wall-jumping, Mario can throw his cap, the physical form of a hat spirit named Cappy, in multiple directions to attack enemies and use as a temporary platform.[6][9] When the cap is thrown at certain objects, enemies, or non-playable characters, Mario is able to take possession of them, referred to as "capturing", allowing him to use unique abilities. For example, Mario can capture a Bullet Bill to fly across large gaps, a Tyrannosaurus to trample things, a bolt of electricity called a Spark Pylon to climb up electric wires, and a tank called a Sherm to fire at enemies and break blocks for passage.[10][11] Some actions can be accelerated by using motion controls in the Joy-Con controllers, but the game is otherwise fully playable when the Joy-Con are attached to the Switch console.[12] Throughout the game, Mario can pick up coins, including purple ones unique to each kingdom, to spend on items such as new hats and outfits, some of which are required for completing certain objectives.[6] The game uses a health system similar to the Super Mario Galaxy games, although Mario has unlimited lives; the only penalty for dying is paying up to ten coins. The player can also collect items known as 'Life-Up Hearts' which grant three extra hit points. The game also features cooperative play, in which a second player takes control of Cappy and can attack enemies independently of Mario.[13][14]

The game requires a minimum number of Power Moons to be collected from each Kingdom to move onto the next, though these may be obtained from any source, making major objectives largely optional. Once Bowser is defeated, each kingdom is repopulated with more Power Moons.[15] Collecting enough Power Moons allows for additional outfits to be purchased and unlocks two bonus areas. One of these areas is a boss rush called Dark Side, with 250 Power Moons required to enter. The other is a level called Darker Side that combines many elements of the game, and requires 500 Power Moons to enter. In addition to this, there is also a level based on Peach's Castle from Super Mario 64 unlocked by beating the game. This level allows Mario to face harder versions of previously defeated bosses and earn additional Power Moons by completing in-game achievements.[16]

The game features a photo mode that allows players to use a free-moving camera to take and save screenshots, with additional options such as filters and stickers.[17][18] Use of the Odyssey-themed Mario, Peach, and Bowser Amiibo figurines allow for special in-game abilities and unlocking special costumes which are otherwise unavailable until after the player completes the game and collects enough Power Moons.[19] Other Amiibo can be scanned to provide hints to finding Power Moons.[20][16]

The game was updated in 2019 to be compatible with the Nintendo Labo virtual reality kit. In this mode, Mario must complete challenges in a number of Kingdoms to recruit musicians and give them instruments by completing tasks related to musical notes.[21]

Bowser kidnaps Princess Peach from the Mushroom Kingdom and takes her aboard his airship, intent on forcibly marrying her. Mario, also aboard, attempts to rescue her but is knocked off the ship by Bowser's hat and falls into the neighboring Cap Kingdom. With Mario gone, Bowser stomps on Mario's cap and lets it drift into the ship's rear propellers, shredding it to pieces. A piece of the hat is grabbed by Cappy, one of the Cap Kingdom's sentient hat-like creatures called Bonneters. The two meet, and he explains to Mario that Bowser also kidnapped his sister, Tiara, to be used as Peach's wedding tiara. Cappy joins Mario and takes the shape of Mario's cap, providing him with the ability to throw his cap and temporarily capture other creatures and objects and utilize their abilities. They travel to the nearby Cascade Kingdom, recover an airship called the Odyssey, and begin hunting Bowser down.

Mario and Cappy explore the various kingdoms to collect Power Moons to fuel the Odyssey and battle the Broodals—a team of anthrophomorphic rabbit wedding planners hired by Bowser—who steal items including a dress, a cake, and a bouquet from each kingdom to set up Bowser's wedding. Eventually, they catch up to Bowser in his own kingdom; however, Bowser subsequently departs for his wedding on the Moon and leaves the two to fight the Broodals in their Mecha-Broodal. They defeat them and follow Bowser to the Moon.

Mario and Cappy fly the Odyssey to the Moon's surface and confront Bowser inside a cathedral. The two battle in the Moon's interior, where Bowser is defeated and Mario frees Peach and Tiara, but the cavern begins to collapse. Mario captures an unconscious Bowser and escapes to the surface with Peach and Tiara. Back on the surface, Mario prepares to propose to Peach, but Bowser regains consciousness and proposes as well. The two fight over her hand in marriage before an overwhelmed Peach demands they stop, and she boards the Odyssey with Cappy and Tiara. The rivals are both heartbroken until Peach tells Mario to come home with her. Mario boards the ship just in time, leaving Bowser stranded on the moon.

In post-game content, Mario and Cappy collect more Power Moons that were released from Moon rocks to traverse other parts of the Moon, known as "Dark Side" and "Darker Side", to complete other challenges. Meanwhile, Peach and Tiara travel the world on their own terms, and meet up with Mario along the way.

Yoshiaki Koizumi (left) and Koichi Hayashida (right) in 2013; they served as the game's producers.

Super Mario Odyssey was developed by Nintendo's Entertainment Planning & Development division, with additional assistance from 1-Up Studio. The game was produced by Yoshiaki Koizumi and Koichi Hayashida, the same producers behind Super Mario 3D World,[9][24][25] and directed by Kenta Motokura. Shigeru Miyamoto reassumed his role of what he calls the "Creative Fellow", and the developers gave him concepts and he gave feedback in return. According to Koizumi, Miyamoto "left us to our own devices quite a lot."[26]

Odyssey was designed to appeal to Mario's core audience—a departure from the series' then-recent focus on casual players; the game focuses more on dense, open-world exploration rather than the linear gameplay recent Mario games have taken, following instead the format of games such as Super Mario 64 or Super Mario Sunshine.[9][27][28][29]

According to Miyamoto, after Super Mario Galaxy and 3D World, linear gameplay was focused on less and the game would "go back to the roots, to Mario Sunshine". The game did intend to have camera control that was much easier to use than Sunshine, however.[28] The first concept that came to be for Odyssey involved Koizumi using motion controls; he pictured motion actions that the Joy-Con controllers could be used for, and the most natural fit was throwing an object. To create a sense of connection to this gimmick, Mario's own hat was the object chosen to be thrown.[30]

Design

Concept art of Cappy from The Art of Super Mario Odyssey

In an interview with Koizumi, he stated that every core gameplay concept was decided on very early into the game's development cycle, with the philosophy of creating an entirely new experience for the series; these ideas consisted of traveling between kingdoms, collecting Power Moons, and other settings.[26] Cappy was also created in the first prototype, and motion controls were built off of this.[31] Another goal was keeping the game running at 60 frames per second. Certain locations, such as New Donk City, contained realistic looks and humans; this design choice was to emphasize the feeling of a new location that is different from the normal.[26]

One of the main aspects considered was the Switch's capabilities of portability and TV docking, which affected how the game could be played. Motion controls were also implemented, being able to use the two controllers in each hand. The developers were careful in making sure the game was fun to play in these distinct ways. To bridge the two, the game was balanced to allow gameplay in short bursts or long sessions to satisfy both fields.[26] Kenta Motokura mentioned at an interview at E3 that the game was made possible to play in these two ways; the player has the choice of either following a set storyline or can find power moons simply by exploring.[31] They also made sure each platforming stage had numerous ways of completion.[30]

A game the designers considered when designing Odyssey was the sandbox video game Minecraft. They initially believed a game that had camera movement would be difficult to use amongst children, but they later passed this as sufficient due to Minecraft's popularity and excessive use of camera control.[32]

Setting and characters

"Mario has always been a hat-wearing character, but because of the new action involved in this hat, we decided to make it into a character" ... "Part of it was we wanted to have someone Mario would go on this adventure with" ...

Director Kenta Motokura, 2017 Time, interview[31]

The developers constructed prototypes of gameplay gimmicks or platforming stages first; from there, they would discuss what kind of setting or theme the prototype would best fit within, and the locations would be constructed second.[30] Thirdly, the locations would be taken and more ideas were designed specifically for them.[33] The game's locations were built around the themes of journey and surprise, according to Kenta Motokura. The kingdoms have purchasable souvenirs to help make them more relatable and easier to connect to. Since the kingdoms were also open-world areas, the developers filled them with diversity and small details to give them a sense of empathy by making the player feel connected to them. Each kingdom was based on personal experiences from the designers, and they built off these locations by experimenting with how Mario could interact with them. The ability to take in-game screenshots was also considered by the team to be a natural fit.[33]

Koji Kondo, the series' sound director, in 2015

Cappy was created into a character a little later after the hat throwing mechanic was introduced because the developers wanted a "buddy" to travel alongside Mario.[31] The developers prioritized the city environment when selecting which environments to represent in Odyssey. They wanted a familiar aspect from the series to anchor players in the novel setting, and so chose Pauline, a character who first appeared alongside Mario in Donkey Kong, to be the mayor of New Donk City.[34]

One of Odyssey's in-game locations recreated for E3 2017

The game was teased via the Nintendo Switch console announcement trailer in 2016;[40][41] in January 2017 during a Nintendo presentation, Odyssey was formally announced to be in development, and was followed shortly after with gameplay footage.[42] A section at E3 2017 was themed around New Donk City, and was filled with kiosks that allowed people to play a demo.[43] The announcement at E3 2017 was the most popular part of the presentation on social media and was considered the best part of the show by other attending developers.[44][45] Critics also noted the game's density of secrets and noted the format of open-world exploration.[9][46]

Two weeks before the game's release, Nintendo uploaded a Broadway inspired promotional music video of "Jump Up Super Star!", which featured live-action dancers alongside a CGI animated character of Mario.[47] The song was released on the digital music storefront iTunes shortly after and became one of the top 40 best sellers in the United States.[48][49]

The game officially released October 27, 2017,[50] alongside Amiibo of Mario, Peach, and Bowser in their respective wedding attire.[51] In addition, a limited-time Odyssey themed Nintendo Switch was released, containing the console, Joy-Con reminiscent to the color of the character Cappy, a Switch console carrying case, and a Nintendo eShop digital download code for Odyssey.[52] Later that December, Nintendo partnered with food manufacturing company Kellogg's to release a limited quantity breakfast cereal ⁠—"Super Mario Cereal"⁠— in the United States. The back of the box contains an NFC tag that can be scanned like an Amiibo toy, which provides exclusive in-game extras.[53]

Super Mario Odyssey received critical acclaim upon release. As of 2022, review aggregator Metacritic ranks Odyssey as the joint third highest-rated game of all-time.[54][lower-alpha 3] As of April 2021, OpenCritic ranks Super Mario Odyssey the highest of all time of all games on all platforms.[79]

Andrew Webster of The Verge thought that the structure of the game lent itself well to the portable nature of the Switch, which players could play for either long sessions in order to follow the missions, or in short bursts while collecting "Power Moons", which the author compared to the "shrines", or hidden mini-dungeons, which were scattered throughout Breath of the Wild.[6] Despite the praise, Webster noted that the motion controls "felt frustratingly imprecise", preferring the accuracy of standard controls.[6] The ability for Mario to turn into his 2D Super Mario Bros. form in certain constrained segments was compared to the puzzles featured in The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds,[8][80] while VentureBeat made note of the game's similarities to the Sonic the Hedgehog series.[81] Edge praised the inventiveness of the game's new ideas and the risks Nintendo had taken to deviate from the established formula of Mario games, which they believed had paid off. They likened the game to Super Mario 64 and called it the spiritual successor that had previously not yet been achieved. The magazine also complimented the introduction of Cappy and the capturing mechanic, which they called the most versatile ability in the Mario series to date, and enjoyed how the ability allowed Nintendo to reinvent a number of their favorite gameplay activities.[58] Famitsu gave the game a score of 39/40, the same as Super Mario 64 and the highest score for a 3D Mario game since then.[61] Perfect 10/10 scores were also awarded by IGN and GameSpot, who both praised the game's originality.[69][64]

In contrast, Ian Dallas, the creator of What Remains of Edith Finch, gave Super Mario Odyssey a lukewarm review. He explained, "My problem with Super Mario Odyssey is that it's not actually satisfying to finish. This is not to say it isn't worth playing; it absolutely is. I just don't think it's worth finishing".[82] Phil Hornshaw of Digital Trends gave the game 4/5 stars, saying that "Mario's first turn on the Switch is fun, but lacks the innovation and creativity of Nintendo's best." Hornshaw also noted that the "Controls and camera can be imprecise" and "frustrating".[83]

Entertainment Weekly and Giant Bomb both ranked the game second in their list of the "Best Games of 2017",[84][85] and GamesRadar+ ranked it fourth on their list of the 25 Best Games of 2017,[86] while Eurogamer and Polygon ranked it third on their lists of the "Top 50 Games of 2017".[87][88] Ars Technica ranked the game as their Game of the Year,[89] while The Verge named it as one of their 15 Best Games of 2017.[90] Readers and staff of Game Informer voted it as the best platforming game of the year,[91][92] while the former also voted it as Game of the Year, along with Best Nintendo Game.[93][94] EGMNow also ranked the game at #4 in their list of the 25 Best Games of 2017.[95]

The game won the award for "Best Switch Game" in Destructoid's Game of the Year Awards 2017.[96] It also won the awards for "Best Platformer" and "Best Original Music" in IGN's Best of 2017 Awards,[97][98] whereas its other nominations were for "Game of the Year" and "Best Switch Game".[99][100] It was also nominated for "Switch Retail Game of the Year" and "Overall Game of the Year" by both reader and staff votes in Nintendo Life's Game of the Year Awards.[101][102] The game won the Game of the Year award at the National Academy of Video Game Trade Reviewers award event, where it won all but one of the categories it was nominated for.[103][104] Odyssey also won the awards in IGN's Best of E3 for "Best Platformer", "Best Nintendo Switch Game", and "Game of Show";[105] and in Destructoid's Best of E3 for "Best of Show".[106]

The song "Jump Up, Super Star!" debuted at number 33 on the Billboard Japan Hot 100 for the week of November 11, 2017.[107][108] In Japan, the song reached No. 1 on the Japanese iTunes Store.[109][110][111][112] On the US iTunes Store, the song debuted at 25 in the "All Genres" category.[110][113] Kate Higgins performed "Jump Up, Super Star!" live at The Game Awards 2017 ceremony.[114][115][116]

• Official website