This is one of a very few games I can get my wife to (pay and) play for more than a few minutes. The upgraded, faux 3D visuals are great, the controls are as spot on as ever, and the mayhem that comes from playing it with someone else is incredibly fun. The level design is excellent, imaginative, with a perfect balance of challenging sections and more relaxed stretches that allow the chubby plumber and his lanky brother to catch their breaths. It's polished, and lovingly crafted, though it is by no means revolutionary--the only novelty is really the co-op/competitive play--but that is one heck of an improvement. So far I've only completed the first world level, but I can see how this game would have a better replay value than the original; the co-op makes the levels fun and unpredictable--sometimes there's a benefit to having someone to boost you up to a too-high-to-reach-on-your-own coin or platform, sometime the players just end up tripping each other up with funny consequences.
The cons for this game are the omission of online multiplayer--not a big deal, since Mario games have always been more fun when the players are physically in the same room; and the second is that players 3 and 4 are both toads, making them hard to distinguish during frantic play. Really not a big deal at all.
This game is definitely worth the purchase, whether you liked the original platformer and would like to revisit it with updated graphics and additional play mechanics, or just simply looking for a fun game to play. [...] [...].
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Wow-wow-wow - Amazon censored my issue with the pricing?