Super Mario 64 is one of the most famous games ever made and a memorable part of my childhood, albeit one that didn’t get resolve until the year 2024. I was on the fence about whether to even bother writing up a short review of this one, considering how exceedingly famous it is and consequentially how pathetically low my search engine result ranking for this game will be. Then again I have no readers, and nothing better to do so here we are. It turns out Super Mario 64 is a great game and still holds up pretty well (basic visuals not withstanding I suppose), with the exception of the camera. Everything else from level design, to the difficulty, to the soundtrack and even the controls has been done well. I’m actually surprised I never got the ending to be honest, considering the fact that getting the credits to play only took me… maybe a dozen hours?

Oh well, weird lapses in judgement aside I can safely reiterate that Super Mario 64 remains a great game with just the right amount of challenge across it’s 15 courses. The initial four are pretty easy and outside of some tricky parts where you need to shoot yourself out of a cannon with precision, there really isn’t too much challenge here. Once you start unlocking the latter stages however, things get a bit more challenging as the game loves to enforce some surprisingly precise platforming onto the player. One thing I should’ve mentioned earlier is that each of the game’s 15 courses contains 7 stars (no, not 6). When you enter a stage, you select which of these stars you are aiming for. These stars sometimes involve changing the level slightly, but generally there are 7 objectives within the stage. With two of these objectives always being “gather the 8 red coins” (that are scattered around) and gather 100 normal coins, however it pleases you. The remaining 5 stars will generally be hidden around the level, sometimes in the possession of bosses or requiring some environmental chicanery to unlock. To spice things up, Super Mario 64 locks segments of the overworld (Peach’s castle) behind minimum star requirements and locked doors. To unlock these doors, you’ll need to collect enough stars and then defeat Bowser. Each time you face off against the loathsome lizard is largely the same, although he gets new attacks with each encounter. For the standard 70-star ending, you’ll need to beat him 3 times across 3 separate levels. There are also 3 types of cap that can be obtained, each of which acts as a temporary power-up and requires you to activate a switch in one of the game’s many bonus levels. You’ve got a flight cap, a metal cap and an invisible cap which let you fly, walk in water (instead of swimming) and go through certain walls/objects respectively.

While these power-ups are cool, the main reason they work is that the game is able to successfully juggle some light puzzle elements with solid platforming and a mix of enemies and different objectives. Most of the time, these objectives aren’t too difficult. Yet the high quality OST track, balanced challenge and way that each stage successfully has it’s own theme makes the whole game a pleasant experience to play. These themes range from a water world centred around a ship that may or may not have sunk (depending on the star), to rainbow rides in the sky through to simple grassland courses and a desert level with an explorable pyramid. As for progression, the fact that you only need to gather a certain amount of stars, while having multiple courses unlocked at a time is a great idea. For the simple reason that it’s very hard to get stuck in Super Mario 64, with the range of stages available letting you focus on the ones that you actually want to do. Even the frustrating camera angles aren’t able to hold Super Mario 64 back, and the fact that you have essentially unlimited continues (at least if memory serves – the game isn’t particularly challenging) means it’s hard to stay mad at Super Mario 64. If you’re really struggling with a certain level’s obstinate platforming requirements, then you can always just jog on to another stage and come back to that one later. Plus as mentioned there are multiple hidden stages, and “free” stars given by talking to one of the various instances of Toad stuck in the walls. As such progression is nearly inevitable, yet the game is able to keep players playing due to the variety in objectives and solid control scheme which makes exploring the levels (and castle) quite fun.

To give some examples, one world (or course) can only be accessed by repeatedly “killing” a certain enemy, while others are hidden behind seemingly normal walls or are only revealed in a mirror. Some stages require you to stare at the ceiling, or enter an inconspicuous hole in a wall. Generally speaking the castle, while quite small in reality does a great job of making the whole experience feel like a unified whole. As for the stages, the modest changes that occur between each star do a great job of making them feel larger and more varied than they actually are. Plus having to track down secret stages to unlock the power-ups which are required for certain stars is a prudent move, as it forces the player to engage with exploring the castle even if they aren’t so inclined. Even smaller touches such as having the camera be controlled by a floating NPC (that you can occasionally see) or having Mario take a nap if you leave him alone for a little bit of time show that Super Mario 64 is a game that was made with a lot of attention to detail, in spite of the exceedingly modest polygon budget.

Which isn’t to say that the game is flawless, because that would just be silly. Every game has flaws, except maybe for Tetris. In Super Mario 64’s case, there are three that stood out to me. One that’s quite inconsequential but still bizarre is the way in which the game just resets how many lives you have every time you save and exit the game. It’s not a huge issue, but if you’ve gone out of your way to gather 1-ups and extra lives then… too bad! The game doesn’t care, and if you leave the game and come back to it then you go back to having 4 lives in reserve for some reason. Another issue that’s more of an issue is the way in which Mario can’t just turn around if he’s in motion, even if it’s a very slight motion. This isn’t a big deal, but for precision platforming it makes the game more of a pain than it has to be. If Mario is still, then moving back will cause him to turn around and move backwards. If he is dealing with the slightest bit of motion, then he will move forward in a radius and then start moving backwards. When the platforms are oh so small, this can and will cause you to fall off them (and probably die). Again a relatively small issue, but one I wanted to mention. Alongside the game’s biggest issue, which is a somewhat annoying camera. For the time the camera was fine, but by modern standards the lack of full rotation and fondness for awkward angles make platforming a chore sometimes. As mentioned, some of the platforming is exceedingly precise and with the inclusion of momentum physics and important of hitting a jump at the right angle or speed having an inconsistent camera can be a real issue. Even relatively basic areas like the boss fights against Bowser or jumping up a pyramid in the desert stage can really screw with the player, setting them back a bit. Does the camera ruin Super Mario 64? Of course not, but it’s by far my biggest gripe with the game.

But notwithstanding those modest issues, Super Mario 64 is just a great game. It’s a 3D platformer that shows everyone else how it’s done, with a solid colour palette, smart stage design (some levels even change based on how you enter them), memorable soundtrack, varied enemy roster, deft handling of an overworld that’s fun to explore and an intuitive control scheme. In conclusion then, this review is pointless but you should still give Super Mario 64 a go if you haven’t already tried it. There are plenty of small touches that truly make it something special, and even if you don’t get that far then you’ll be able to enjoy the first few stages which are all fun to play and do a good job of letting you just get on with the game. Those who can stick with Super Mario 64 will find a rewarding platforming experience, that isn’t afraid to force you to explore a level of repeat a particularly tricky jump to get the reward.

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Before delving into what makes Fire Emblem 7 such an enjoyable game, I’m just going to mention two things that may be deal-breakers for the uninitiated or even those who are looking to play this game after experiencing some of the newer games in the series. Firstly much like the newer games, Fire Emblem 7 has a decent amount of RNG or Random Number Generation involved, as every attack will have a chance of missing and a chance of inflicting a critical hit. Even if a lot of enemies won’t have a chance to inflict one of these crits (which are worth x3 the normal amount of damage inflicted), the bosses and certain enemies definitely will. Plus there’s always a chance that your guy will whiff their blow, leading to you either taking more damage than expected or possibly dying. So far so XCOM, but then much like XCOM Fire Emblem 7 throws another spanner into the works by making it so that the death of any character aside from your trio of plot-critical lords is a permanent death. As such your options are either to play through the game with the spectre of perma death always looming over (almost) every single character, or you can take the slightly more cowardly route by resetting the game every single time a character dies – which of course means that you’ll need to play through the level from the very beginning. No matter how you slice it Fire Emblem 7 can be a brutal game, and while I don’t condone it I can understand why both Nintendo and Intelligent Systems decided to make the permadeath optional in later games.

With that out of the way, Fire Emblem 7 is one of my favourite games for the MIGHTY Gameboy Advance (GBA) and a fantastic game that I think anyone with some patience will be able to enjoy. It’s a Turn Based Strategy (TBS) game that borrows heavily from RolePlaying Games’s and as such can also be considered as a Strategy RPG (SRPG), with both the player and the enemy in the form of bandits, cultists and other ne’er-do-wells moving all of their units one at a time during their respective turn. For the player each character is a unique unit with some custom art, a backstory, their own inventory which can hold up to 5 items and their own skills split into 8 categories which each increase as they gain levels. For the enemy they have hordes of disposable grunts to be used at will, with many levels causing more enemies to spawn in during certain turns and often from an irritating angle which will force you to take considerable care when using your more fragile units. All units in the game are split into various classes, each of which can use a handful of the game’s weapon and spell types and due to the game’s balance each class is therefore good against certain other classes but in turn weak against others. The first piece of the puzzle is the fact that weapons and magic both fit into a triangle system, with axes beating lances, lances beating swords and swords beating axes – while arcane magic beats light magic, light magic beats dark magic and dark magic beats arcane magic. Then you’ve got the fact that different classes (and by extension characters) not only have different amounts of movement points, but these classes also tend to empathise certain skills at the expense of others. Heavily armoured knights and generals have high defence and attack for example, but have low resistance making them weak against magic and low speed which means enemies can often get two blows in. Mages on the other hand have relatively high resistance and can attack at a slight distance, but are weak against physical attacks and generally have modest amounts of health. The intersecting nature of these classes ensures that no one unit is strong against everything, so you need to use your entire squad as a team lest your favourite unit get dog-piled and ground down by the enemy.

Then just when you think you’ve got everything in hand, the game’s inventory system pops up to nag you. The trouble is, while there are myriad weapons within the game each weapon can only be used a certain number of times before it breaks. Remember how you can only hold 5 items on each character? Well that means that you’ll need to factor in your weapon and how many hits it can dish out before it breaks, lest your unit be weapon less and thus unable to hurt a fly during the middle of a large skirmish. Before you ask, no you can’t repair items for most of the game (and when you can it’s only via a rare staff that in turn can only repair 3 weapons before it breaks) meaning that you’ll probably want to carry spares around. Then as if that wasn’t enough, you’ve got classes that can carry up to 3 weapon types and you’ve got to consider how the quality of certain weapons/spells. You see not only do you have multiple weapon types, but you have multiple weapons within each type alongside some rare weapons which are effective against certain types of enemies. Generally speaking weapons go from Iron to Steel to Silver, with each type of weapon only being usable by characters with a high enough level in that weapon type. Oh and the better weapons not only cost more but can be used less before they break. So it’s entirely possible that you’ll have a character with a Steel Sword, a Steel Lance, backups for each and then a unique weapon such as the Axereaver which inverts the weapons triangle (i.e. it’s a lance that’s good against axes but weak against swords). It all gets somewhat complicated very quickly, but that’s part of the fun and it’s a good way to ensure that you’re invested in finding new loot before it’s pilfered by enemy thieves and to go out of your way to rescue villages before they’re pillaged by enemy bandits. If it’s all sounding a bit much then don’t panic, as you can store (temporarily) un-needed items with your supply convoy after a certain point in the story.

Due to all of this Fire Emblem 7 can be a complex game of cat and mouse as you manoeuvre your troops around, dodging enemy reinforcements (or funnelling them towards the right units) while you consider which weapons to use. This gives the game a nice feeling of depth and outside of the occasional piece of absolutely terrible luck, the game is well balanced and most deaths really are your fault – you MONSTER. As alluded to above there are also ways to gain new items outside of buying them from shops which appear in some levels, such as by killing enemies (who automatically drop any items they have in their inventory that are coloured green), stealing items from enemies with your thief, by visiting friendly villages before they are ransacked by enemy brigands/pirates and even by recruiting units to your side. Yes that’s right, some levels contain enemies which will “give you” a hint at the start of most missions via their dialogue with other units that reveals that they know one of the characters on your team. If you can get this unit into melee range with that named enemy, then you’ll be able to convince them to join your team and to stop aiding the bad guys. Of course this inherently involves some risk as now your unit is in melee range of that unit, which might place them in a sticky spot. And as if all that wasn’t enough, you might also be in a mission with a named friendly NPC (who appear as Green units) who has to be chatted to before they end up suiciding themselves by charging the enemy. These interactions are themselves often quite sweet and involve an abrupt change of heart on the part of the enemy, with many of these recruitable characters being powerful indeed. Or you can just kill them because you are a MONSTER.

As for the characters themselves they can all be described as charming archetypes, most of whom are suitably simple to understand for a game with modest pretensions to being a full RPG but who are still entertaining enough to justify their screen time. You’ve got nervous and naïve knights, gambling obsessed swordsmen, men of duty, men who are just in it for the sheer THRILL of adventure and much more besides. Ultimately you’ll be able to find a few characters that you enjoy, as while most of them are relatively shallow each of them feels like a D&D character and you’ll inevitably have your favourites. These characters are then able to propel a story that is likewise fairly simple, but which definitely has it’s moments and which manages to create an Arthurian feel of a world which has it’s noble lords and wicked villains, it’s power hungry despots and it’s wise sages. The whole game is brimming with charm and character, even if almost all of it is told through plain unspoken text (with a little bit of fantasy tweaking and dated verbiage) and static imagery. Of course there are a few exceedingly short cutscenes, but due to the limitations of the MIGHTY GBA the game is limited in how it presents itself. Fortunately it more than makes up for these limitations via some great artwork which is occasionally used to great effect in showcasing how the world appears through the eyes of it’s characters.

Further complimenting the occasional piece of high definition artwork (Relatively speaking, it is the GBA after all) is a great art style for units and gameplay which is simultaneously easy to read but still looks great in spite of the system’s limitations. Units may only be made out of a handful of pixels, but both the animations and art design is excellent and makes the game visually pleasing to the eye. Critical hit animations are stylish without feeling overlong, each class feels unique and I’m always surprised by how much a simple colour pallet change or slight tweak can make a character or enemy feel unique. As for the music, it’s also great in spite of the system’s limitations even if the number of tracks and their length is fairly limited. You will be hearing the same battle theme again, and again and again but fortunately each theme is handled well as is instantly recognisable. Fire Emblem 7 is therefore a great example of how much can be done with a limited amount of headroom and is an exceedingly efficient game in the way that it’s able to contain close to 40 unique levels, a full OST with around 30 tracks, almost the same amount of units and myriad weapons/spells all in one exceptionally small package.

Then when you reach the end and face off against the final boss, which is a total pain in the butt btw, the game gives you a charming ending screen which explains what each character does after the world has been saved. By that point you might think the game is over, as you’ll have encountered many characters, plenty of dialogue and wrapped up close to 30 levels. But then the game reveals that actually you’ve got an extra route revolving around Lord Hector that you can playthrough (who is otherwise portrayed as Eliwood’s stalwart pal but doesn’t have much autonomy). Oh and if that wasn’t enough then you can also replay Lyn’s route (the first 12 levels) and Eliwoods route (the other 18ish levels) in a newly unlocked Hard mode which is even more challenging. As such the game that has pretty much everything including great art direction, a solid difficulty curve, plenty of strategic head-scratching and a surprisingly good plot with charming characters reveals that it has plenty of replayability too. Oh and did I mention that there are multiple levels that only appear if you meet specific requirements, such as completing a level under a certain amount of turns, killing a fleeing enemy or by “rescuing” a hostile unit that would otherwise try and kill you? To see everything you’ll need to play through both the normal Lyn & Eliwood route, then the Lyn & Hector route and you’ll need to do both while meeting these hidden objectives. Fortunately you can always check a guide to see what’s needed, but I’ll warn you now that knowing how to unlock a hidden stage and actually unlocking it are not the same thing and some of them can be quite challenging to unlock.

In summary then Fire Emblem 7 is a game that can be challenging, complicated and occasionally unforgiving but which is nevertheless a fantastic game brimming with charm and content. There’s always a twist awaiting the player, whether it’s a new enemy type, a new plot development or a new hidden stage and while the game can occasionally be frustrating it’s almost never unfair. Every mechanic compliments each other nicely and the game excels with it’s solid gameplay, great visuals and charming cast of characters. Ultimately Fire Emblem 7 is a game that anyone can enjoy and one that I would highly recommend to anyone, although these days copies can be expensive as this was always a relatively niche series (at least until Awakening encouraged you to have babies with your waifu which caused every weeaboo in the world to become a gushing fanboy). If you see this game in the wild be sure to pick it up, and if you can’t afford it then just know that you can’t really afford to let Fire Emblem 7 pass you by either, so do what you have to (*cough* emulation *cough*) to experience it for yourself.

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