Super Mario Sunshine AKA Slime Cleaning Simulator

Continuing on playing all of the games from Super Mario 3D All Stars, the second game I play is Super Mario Sunshine, released on the GameCube back in 2002. This was the only game I have not actually played prior to my purchase of this compilation of Mario games for the Switch. I am happy to say that I enjoyed Super Mario Sunshine and the game deserves its place as a celebrated Mario 3D platformer, despite its noted criticisms. Just as an FYI, I beat the main game of Sunshine, but I did not get every single Shine Sprite.

To talk about the things I liked about the game, I liked the tropical theme of the game, which made the game feel quite cheery for me. Because of this, I could not help but have a smile on my face while I was making my way through the levels. The tropical theme also made the visuals and the graphics pop, and if that was what GameCube graphics looked like, then I must be getting old because the graphics looked nicer than I expected. I know that many people did not like the addition of the FLUDD, and admittedly, it does feel weird looking at a talking robot water pack on Mario's back. However, I liked having the FLUDD as I could make Mario do some different maneuvers that you could not do in other Mario 3D platformers. The new maneuvers helped to make the gameplay feel a little bit fresher. Lastly, Super Mario Sunshine was an overall good and fair challenge. I want to give a particular shout out to the no-FLUDD levels, as you have no choice but to rely on your platforming skill.

Now, let us talk about the things that I did not like about Super Mario Sunshine. Although you now have the ability to freely move the camera around Mario (instead of switching camera angles in 64), I still feel like there was no improvement in the camera placement since Super Mario 64. There were still difficult jumps and tight spaces where the camera works against you. Sometimes, the camera will go through walls, or move around while you are trying not to fall off a ledge. Super Mario Sunshine was also the first Mario game to really embrace voice acting, and the voice acting (especially of Princess each and Bowser) did not age well at all. I know that Peach had some small voice acting lines in Super Mario 64, but the amount of voice acting was miniscule compared to Sunshine. Last thing I want to mention is that trying to get all of the Shine Sprites was much more of a tedious chore than getting all 120 stars in Super Mario 64, so I did not go for it.

Overall, Super Mario Sunshine is a solid Mario platformer, and does not look out of place with the other celebrated Mario 3D platformers. I hear many gamers say that Sunshine is the worst Mario 3D platformer, but that is like saying Sunshine is the worst pizza you have ever had. All pizza is good. Sunshine was still a lot of fun to play, just as Super Mario 64 was.