Or rather, "cooperative" action. NSMBWii may actually prove to be the most challenging Mario ever.
Something as simple as jumping to another platform can be a perilous, life-or-death situation in NSMBWii, because while you're trying to make a straightforward jump, everyone else is bouncing off your head, getting in your way, maybe even picking you up and tossing you into a pit. Maybe without even meaning to! That's just how it goes in this game, it seems: Everyone knows how to play Mario, but everyone plays a little differently, and when those conflicting styles collide it all turns into a giant mess.
But it's a fun mess. In fact, after several 1UP editors demoed NSMBWii today at Nintendo's offices, we all agreed: Mario games are universally fun, and this Mario game captures that essence in a new and wonderful way. We were constantly stumbling over one another, scrolling the screen so far that other players died, knocking one another into holes and lava, screwing up each other's advanced tactics, and basically making a grade-A wreck of things. And we had a great time doing it.
NSMBWii takes the anarchic fun of a party-style game and funnels it into a classic, retro-tinged Mario game. Yet unlike certain other Nintendo franchises that have taken on a more casual-friendly "anyone can play" feel, NSMBWii doesn't seem to have been compromised in the process.
Mario may not have the most hype of any game this holiday season, but something tells me that when the dust clears, it'll be the one game that everyone owns. And deservedly so; it looks genuinely, sincerely fantastic.
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