Editorial: New Super Mario Bros. Wii Vs. ‘Splosion Man
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XDAO AWESOME
on January 27, 2010*This was originally found on my blog at Powrdup.com, but I didn’t have a game to review this week so I figured I could extend one of my editorials to here to see how it goes.*
I want to keep this simple.
‘Splosion Man is a better game than New Super Mario Brothers Wii.
I would love to just leave it at that, but people would consider this an “outrage”, so I suppose I can explain myself. ‘Splosion Man managed to do what NSMBW didn’t; it’s fun as both a single and multiplayer game, while being challenging and different in both modes. ‘Splosion Man essentially extends upon the wall jumping mechanic found in Mario, where you can explode up to three times to continuously get more height. You need to solve puzzles, overcome obstacles, and be skilled in doing so at the same time. ‘Splosion Man isn’t forgiving. You either grasp it or you don’t, and your skill as a platformer fan will shine through the more you play. You must have timing, or you will lose, starting with the very first few levels.
The multiplayer co-op is the real reason that it’s a better game, however. NSMBW allows you to play in single-player together, completing levels that are identical as if you played them alone. There really is no “teamwork” to be found, since you don’t need to help each other complete the levels. In ‘Splosion Man all of the puzzles are re-done, so that you must work together and be in sync with your timing to complete ridiculous obstacles and complete crazy jumps. It makes the single and multiplayer feel like the same, but separate products. New Super Mario Bros. Wii NEEDED this feature. It really needed to enhance co-op play, but instead Nintendo just threw in multiple players without thinking of a way they could expand upon it. Weirdly enough, The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords is a perfect example of how to make an old formula feel fresh and work wonders outside of the single-player atmosphere.
Nintendo just needed to take a page out of their own book, but missed the opportunity.
New Super Mario Bros. Wii does win in a few areas, though. The level design is excellent and varied, unlike ‘Splosion Man, which reuses the same backgrounds/puzzles in different ways (although you could argue that the design is better within them). Playing NSMBW in single-player holds its own against ‘Splosion Man as well, but is still a bit on the easy side in comparison. This really could come down to every little aspect you can think of.
I want to clarify that I really like New Super Mario Bros. Wii… in single-player. Even if it’s a bit on the easy side, the design is fantastic once you get rolling and kicks the DS version to the curb. With that said, I stand firmly behind my statement that ‘Splosion Man is a better game, at least to a seasoned platformer genre gamer. It has the challenge, timing, co-op, and mechanics all down. Oh, and not only that. Did I mention that ‘Splosion Man and NSMBW are about the same length, but ‘Splosion Man is only $10?
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Written and Copyrighted by Shawn R. Wedick – POWRDUP.com
2 Responses to “Editorial: New Super Mario Bros. Wii Vs. ‘Splosion Man”
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