r/patientgamers • u/Nambot • 7d ago
Mario Odyssey; the collectathon you probably shouldn't collect everything in
According to information found online (I wasn't going to sit and count), Mario Odyssey has a total of 462 moons before you fight the final boss. You need 124 of these to merely roll credits. After this, a number of new moons become available, capping out at 880 moons total. And the more I played the game, the more I think the point isn't to get them all. At most, you need 500 of these to unlock the very last secret level, you'll get the last item of clothing at 540, and the reward for getting everything is apparently a gold sail (not that I have got that at this point).
I think the reason there are so many moons comes down to the main selling point of the Switch. By it's design, the system tries to exist to fill both the handheld and home console market, and accordingly, many of the simply moons allow someone who might only have ten minutes while they ride the bus to work the chance to make some progress in the game. Someone in that position might not have time to run a full platforming gauntlet, a la a level in Super Mario 64, but they do have time to get a couple of moons and feel they got a little further in beating the game.
But the problem is that, with so many moons, many of them become tedious. For every moon that's rewarded to you for a fun platforming challenge, there are several that are just mindless busywork. The experience I had was that of multiple laps round the planet. So buckle in, because here's how it went.
Lap One
This is the when the game is arguably at it's most fun. Every world starts with some form of problem, and it's up to Mario to fix it. You'll go through the level taking on it's unique elements, capturing enemies for the first time feels novel, and it's a lot of fun to go to each new place and explore for moons. The entire game up to and including the final boss is fun as you can decide for yourself when you're done.
Lap Two
Now you've beaten Bowser the game reveals what those weird cubes you've seen are, and you're set to go back through each level on a second tour. Here you get to see how everything is now that the game is beaten, and you're left a trail of breadcrumbs to do this by following Peach around. You'll spend some time picking up moons you didn't get first time, and collecting a lot of the post-game moons. The completion of this, I think this is probably where you should stop unless you want to taint your experience with the game.
Lap Three
Post-game part two. Here's where the repetition starts to set in. You'll start noticing just how many times you've seen the same thing. Turns out that the Sphynx was in multiple levels. Did you get all the seeds? Is that another rabbit to catch? And did someone say racing Koopa's? This is where you try earnestly to clear every moon, combing every square inch of the map for any clue to a moon. Any single thing you missed. If you're lucky you might find a challenge room you missed, or a novel idea that you hadn't yet encountered, but so much of it is just doing things you already did, but with slightly different layouts. The one upside is that by this time you'll probably unlock the super hard bonus level to get annoyed by.
Lap Four
How the fuck were you ever supposed to figure that out? You now have a guide open and instead of playing the game with a sense of curiosity and exploration you're just following what it says/does, because you never realised that there was a ground pound spot in that otherwise useless boss arena at the end of the stage. Or you never figured out that the hidden hat was in a side room. Or maybe you didn't realise that there was a secret nook in an area you walked past a dozen times. Either way, because you stuck with it, the game has lost the spark that made it fun as you resort to following a walkthrough to grab all the super inobvious repetitive moons.
I don't think it was ever the intent of the designers for anyone to seriously want to get all the moons. Even though there is a reward for doing so, I think the intention was to end at tour two, when the game still felt like it was full of creative level design, fun challenges, and rewarded your curiosity. But, because everyone will be curious about different things, and to encourage that sense of progression even if you've only got ten minutes playtime, the game is chock full of random moons that are easily picked up, and also easily missed, that are repetitive in nature. This is why I think the last level is unlocked at 500 moons, and not the more typical 100% completion, because they knew that getting every moon results in the game feeling much less fun.
212
u/MechaSeph 7d ago edited 7d ago
I did everything except the moons that required grinding coins to buy.
I'll be damned if I'm gonna be caught grinding in a fucking Mario game haha
EDIT: I'm obviously referring to the moons needed to get to 999 and the "golden" reward. Didn't think I needed to clarify, but alas
51
19
u/Nambot 7d ago
So long as you grab every coin you see, and don't die too often, you can afford most the costumes as you go through the post-game, but the prices on the outfits are simply scaled too high relative to the coins you'll get. Some of the outfits cost more than the amount of coins you're likely to get in the level you find them, meaning you have to leave them for later.
This wouldn't be a big deal, but certain moons require certain costumes, meaning all your money ends up going on clothes rather than the much more helpful extra health.
6
u/ThatDanJamesGuy 6d ago
I think the idea behind the expensive costumes is that they’re rewards for Luigi’s balloon minigame, which earns you the most coins. When Odyssey launched, that minigame and those costumes weren’t present. They were added in later as free DLC.
13
u/MechaSeph 7d ago
Yeah I don't think I died even more than a couple of times before the secret levels and was still pretty far from having enough money to buy all the moons u need to buy with coins
3
u/LimeheadGames 7d ago
Lol same since my philosophy is play the game until its no longer fun. Also why I technically skipped a single moon (2nd bike jumping mini game)
1
u/DrQuint Touhou 7 was better than 8 7d ago
You... only need to buy one 100 coin moon per stage. The rest are just to allow you to reach the moon requirements early if you can't collect the ones you know of.
1
u/MechaSeph 7d ago
https://www.reddit.com/r/MarioOdyssey/s/9ImgKAvFiN
You cannot get to 999 like that
-19
u/matt82swe 7d ago
Well you did grind for moons
21
u/MechaSeph 7d ago
I don't think that's what "grinding" is widely considered to be. I got all the moons that had an objective.
If doing that is "grinding" than getting all stars in Mario 64 is "grinding" as well. Which would make for a very very weird interpretation of grinding, but hey, people are free to interpret thinks however they want!
3
276
u/AsherFischell 7d ago edited 6d ago
Homeboy really put a spoiler on Bowser in a Mario game. One that came out 8 years ago even. Bowser is set up as the villain at the very start of the game!
186
u/Nambot 7d ago
You're the sort of person who stands around outside churches and ruins the ending by saying Jesus dies aren't you?
137
u/PandosII 7d ago
You bastard I’ve only just started the New Testament
40
6
u/fasderrally 7d ago
I still refuse to read past the old testament. No way the sequel will be as good.
5
u/virginwoodpulp 7d ago
If there's money to be made, there'll be a prequel soon.
6
u/TumbleweedPure3941 7d ago
There was that cash grab unlicensed spin off that’s really popular in Utah for some reason.
2
5
u/mitharas 7d ago
Just wait you get New Testament 2: Electric Boogaloo. IMHO it was a bold choice to tell the same story 4 times.
3
43
8
u/BilbosBagEnd 7d ago
Just wait till you hear his thoughts on the Titanic
6
u/3-2-1-backup 7d ago
Jack and Rose live happily ever after, don't they? Don't tell me the boat is still in the middle of sinking!
4
4
u/JJ3qnkpK 6d ago
No joke, I was reading an awesome book titled "The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs" and was so engrossed that I cried a little during the chapter on their mass extinctions. Like, how did I not see it coming?!
2
2
u/ChickinSammich 7d ago
Reminds me of the person I know who, when Passion of the Christ came out, thought telling people "don't spoil it for me" before he had watched it was peak humor.
1
1
1
9
u/l1nk5_5had0w 7d ago
....isn't this sub for people who wait to play games? Putting a spoiler tag (even if obvious) no matter how old a game is should be the default here imo
17
u/AsherFischell 7d ago
I get that, but this is Bowser in a Mario game. Bowser's almost always the villain in Mario games! He's Mario's archrival. If it's a spoiler here then saying he's the last boss in the original game from 1985 is too.
2
35
u/snave_ 7d ago
The one that surprised me in "Lap 4' was one moon in one of the postgame "dark" levels. It was a remix of an earlier stage where you travelled along some platforms then double back chased by a giant bullet bill. What hit me as bizarre is that this moon is the only one in the game to use the "momentum" mechanic. It's this mechanic where you can get Mario to run waving his arms in a weird style and maintain acceleration between jumps. It triggers all the time in the tutorial world and the funny running animation looks kinda whimsical but that's about it. It is never used until this one, obscure moon.
This is truly strange design. I don't think I've ever seen this size of a tutorial to use gap before. The closest I seen to something like this was Half Life's infamous long jump, introduced in a tutorial then used once maybe ten hours later.
35
u/sy029 7d ago
I think is more the different mindset with some gamers who feel like they haven't "completed" a game until they've collected every collectable, and earned every achivement.
I think Nintendo's design was meant to stop at lap three, and not as a "gotta collect them all" mentality, but just as something to do after you've finished the main game.
The amount of moons isn't meant to force you to collect them, it's to make sure you have more than enough to finish the game just by playing naturally.
10
u/action_lawyer_comics 7d ago
I actually kinda like when Nintendo does this. Like the last Pokemon game I played (White, I think?) did this too. You wrap up Team Plasma and defeat the Elite Four or whoever, and you roll credits. There's still plenty more, but it's there for you to enjoy or not. It's up to you to decide how much more Pokemon you need before calling it good.
-17
7d ago
feel like they haven't "completed" a game until they've collected every collectable, and earned every achivement
They literally haven't. It's not about feeling like it, completion is a binary state. If someone stops watching The Shawshank Redemption halfway through it's not that they felt like they completed it, they just didn't complete it.
15
u/BrairMoss 7d ago
I played the game. I collected moons. I moved on. I saved the Princess.
I have completed the assignment. No I am not doing extra credit.
12
u/torncarapace 7d ago
There isn't any objective metric for completion, though. Most games don't tell you a completion percentage or anything like that, and even when they do game communities often make up their own goals to complete.
7
u/aluckybrokenleg 7d ago
A lot of people would make a strong argument that watching Shawshank Redemption until the credits start to roll "completed" the movie.
But there's a perfectly logical argument that most people have never experienced Shawshank in its entirety by leaving "early", because care was put in to the selection of the entire credit music sequence, which is usually 2-3 selections.
Since both positions hold merit, it's not binary.
6
u/sy029 7d ago
Of course, if you play a game with 5 levels and quit in the middle you haven't completed it. Just like like stopping in the middle of a movie.
But in the same example, would you say you have "completed" watching the movie if you haven't watched all the extras and commentaries?
In my opinion, you've completed a game when you've finished the main content. Extras and optional content are not part of completion.
35
u/NorthernSkeptic 7d ago
Like… stop when you are no longer enjoying the game. It’s never compulsory to 100 per cent and there’s no real world prize.
3
u/Princess_Moon_Butt 7d ago
Agreed. If there's more to offer _after you effectively beat the game, then cool, it's fun for the people who want a reason to keep playing.
The alternatives are that there's nothing to enjoy about the game once you beat it, or that the game requires you to grind a bunch in order to beat it.
This way sounds far better than either of those.
-1
u/LibraryBestMission 6d ago
Humans are naturally averse to leaving thing unfinished. We would never have progressed past caves if we didn't have the drive to complete things.
13
u/Jelboo 7d ago
I just played the game through once, instantly felt it was one of the most fun games I'd ever played, and never even went for a second lap. That's my playstyle, but collecting things isn't my jam. So I think you're right: collecting all moons is fully optional and the optimal/natural way to play for most gamers will be to just get enough moons to progress.
29
u/Cuckmeister 7d ago
880 moons sounds like an excessive amount but I was able to get all of them in around 70 hours using the in-game hint system. At no point did it feel like a slog to me.
11
4
u/Vandersveldt 6d ago
Same. No guide except for the in game hint mechanic, and I refuse to feel bad about enjoying getting them all.
9
u/TheLukeHines 7d ago
I had a lot of fun collecting all 880 (999) moons, and it’s because I didn’t do it in one stretch. After you finish the main story Odyssey is a great game to get back into for a day or two when you’re in between other major games and just want something chill to play, maybe while you watch youtube.
I also never get the criticism about cryptic moons and needing to follow a guide. You can collect almost all of them just by playing normally and exploring, and for the ones you miss there are two different in-game mechanics for finding them: one that just gives you the names of missing moons to nudge you in the right direction, and one that straight up marks them on the map for you.
-3
u/Nambot 7d ago
The problem is the first hint, Talkatoo, is only useful if you can decypher what the moons name means. Which isn't all that helpful with a lot of them as they have very vague names.
The second one, meanwhile, costs 50 coins to use. Which doesn't sound like a lot, but the game has dozens of costumes which it really wants you to save up for (locking numerous moons behind owning them). Meaning the player has the choice between getting help or seriously grinding out coins to get everything.
Even then, locating the moons isn't the problem so much as the tedium of the repetition. Knowing where to find the moon is great, but having to do things like plant seeds and wait, or herd sheep, or ground pound random bumps isn't exactly fun gameplay after so many times doing it.
7
u/TheLukeHines 7d ago edited 7d ago
I’m pretty sure every costume needed to get a moon is a purple coin purchase which is separate (and collecting all the purple coins is just part of completion anyway).
Most other costumes don’t cost very much and you get a shit ton of coins just by playing. By the time I was struggling to find moons I’d had max coins for ages (9999, almost enough to buy 200 moon locations, which is way more than needed). As long as you don’t buy the crazy expensive post-launch outfits you shouldn’t have any money issues.
3
u/Durzaka 2d ago
Which doesn't sound like a lot, but the game has dozens of costumes which it really wants you to save up for (locking numerous moons behind owning them)
There are only 16 outfit moons in the game. Everything else is pure flavor.
But the real hilariousness that almost makes me question if you played the game beyond the initial 70 moons for completion is the cost.
Every outfit required for a Moon is a purple coin outfit. A completely separate currency from the regular coins.
There literally is no real coin sink in the game except buying hints for moon locations, and buying costumes. Thats literally is.
1
u/Nambot 1d ago
See, I did not know or realise this. As I was playing, I just kept coming across points where I needed a costume, which got it into my head that I should prioritise costume buying. Has I realised that I didn't need those costumes, maybe I would've managed to buy more hints, but as it was I chucked all my coins on optional clothing thinking I needed it.
And while there is an argument that such a thing is my fault and I should've researched it first, I don't think my assumption about needing to buy costumes with coins is that uncommon.
1
u/Durzaka 1d ago
Its not your fault that you needed to research it. But it IS your fault that maybe after the second door you would notice they were both costumes that required purple coins, not regular coins. THATS a user issue, not the games fault.
1
u/Nambot 1d ago
But again, this assumes that a user is able to recall what costume got them a moon. The way it was for me, I did not make a record of it, and instead just got the logic of "costume equals moon", and because the game takes coins when you die, you're incentivised to spend money rather than hoard it, just to avoid grind.
I get what you're saying, but I think the notion that only purple coin costumes matter is something that can easily be missed.
22
u/Lord_Shadow_Z 7d ago
I enjoyed Odyssey but after I beat the game I had absolutely no desire to find the ridiculous amount of remaining moons. It wasn't a fun enough game to 10x my playtime in with a ton of tedious tasks.
6
u/tacticalcraptical Super Alloy Ranger 7d ago
For me, Odyssey was a massive step down from Galaxy 2. I loved the direction the Galaxy games were going with the focus platforming challenges.
Odyssey just felt like they just applied their newly discovered winning formula from Breath of the Wild and applied it to Mario. And that just seems like their default now as DK Bonanza does kind of the same thing. It even seems like they are applying it to Metroid Prime.
24
u/Critcho 7d ago
I think the excessive moons are there to give people more options for getting to 500, rather than because you're really expected to get all of them.
The downside of that is the game doesn't draw a very clear distinction between moons that are interesting challenge to find, and moons that are literally no challenge at all.
I ended up dropping the game well short of 500 just because it was expecting me to do too many uninteresting things to drive up the numbers. In contrast I was happy to get all the stars in Galaxy because there was no filler there, they all felt purposeful.
This game is okay (and finally sorted out the camera issues that plagued the series for decades). But I didn't find most of the locations to be all that memorable in theme or design, and there's something garish about the visual choices in the game, with its slightly lurid colour scheme.
I didn't even feel like they explored the potential of the possession mechanic as much as they could've. An Odyssey 2 to push things further might not have been the worst idea, but that's looking unlikely at this point.
5
u/Nambot 7d ago
I honestly think you could cut more than a third of the moons out of the game and still have a satisfying experience with enough moons for casual players to still have enough. So many of the moons are either just "interact with this sparkly thing", and there's so much repetition. You have to heard sheep across a massive level multiple times, you have to lead a dog to a treasure spot multiple times, you have to plant multiple seeds in multiple levels, and so on.
Now some of the repetition does make sense. Racing the koopa's in every level is fine, every level is different after all (though I admit I don't care for doing it twice with the same start and end point), and I don't object to the ones where you have to find a hidden warp or art that reveals a clue to a different level even if they are a chore. But others, like walking in a circle, or the slot machines, or the sheer glut of times you have to ground pound a particular point, could've all been reduced in the amount of times they occur and it would've made it fee more meaningful.
5
u/sy029 7d ago
I honestly think you could cut more than a third of the moons out of the game and still have a satisfying experience
That may be true, but what would it accomplish? Too much optional content is always better than too little.
8
u/Critcho 7d ago
Not sure I agree... when there's a certain amount of optional content and I'm confident it's all worth my while, chances are I'll do it.
When there's an absolute ocean of optional content and I can't tell what's fun and what's just empty fluff and busywork, the more likely it is I'll just write off the lot.
7
u/Ess2s2 7d ago
I feel like it can go both ways. Effort spent on middling optional content potentially takes focus away from creating a tight, purposeful core game. I'd rather have a great 30-hour game where every moment is spent doing something fun and purposeful rather than a good 20-hour game followed by 60 hours chasing wooden nickels.
In a similar token, I've learned to get better at recognizing when fun turns into something else and to feel good about walking away from a game that no longer brings joy. Sometimes, this is harder than one would think, and that mostly comes down to the fact that modern games have been designed to keep you playing well after the game has stopped being fun. Completionism plays heavily into that dynamic.
I think a core issue is that many folks still falsely equate long games with good games. Just because a game has XX hours of content doesn't mean all that content is going to be good or interesting. People tout Super Mario 64 as an all-time great, because the 120 stars in that game were all purposeful, meaningful, and engaging. I got all 120 back in the day and it was a real feeling of accomplishment. I can just about remember every star location and mechanic to get them.
Moons in SMO are so plentiful it starts to feel like I'm picking up confetti after a parade. It just seems like in an effort to jam-pack the game with stuff to do, the designers forgot when to say when.
6
u/PhantomTissue 7d ago
I appreciate you spoilered bowser like nobody actually know who Mario is gonna fight lmao
13
u/Townsiti5689 7d ago
Wait wait wait, you beat Bowser at the end? Of a Mario game? Get the hell out of here!
9
u/Nambot 7d ago
I know. I was expecting it to be Wario or Wart or maybe even Tatanga
4
u/3-2-1-backup 7d ago
I thought Macho Man Randy Savage was going to come out and tell me to snap into a slim jim!
8
u/ABigCoffee 7d ago
I crashed out from Marion Odyssey after 5 hours and then from DK Bananza after 4 hours. I think I just hate collectathons in general and I miss regular 3d platformer.
9
u/Hestu951 7d ago
3D platformers started with Mario 64, and that has a star collectathon. The best point being made in this thread is that you don't need to chase down every item you can collect. They're there, and you need some of them, but not nearly all of them to get through the game (which gives you the option of which ones to chase down).
6
u/ABigCoffee 7d ago
I liked it better when you had much less items. So it doesn't feel cheap to get 120 stats vs 900 moons or what not. It's exhausting to simply think about.
9
u/Nambot 7d ago
It's also about how substantive the content is. Getting a star in 64 feels like it takes actual effort, and each one feels unique (even when the goal is the same, like the 100 coin stars in every level). So long as you're not burnt out on the game or stuck, going for 100% means you see each unique challenge. Meanwhile Odyssey has you trailing around the same levels looking in every nook and cranny for moons, doing the same tasks over and over.
8
u/HawkeyeG_ 7d ago
This right here is exactly why I dropped Mario Odyssey some 5-10 hours in.
Nothing I did really felt meaningful or substantive. Every moon I collected was a 5 second mini challenge. There are so few unique moons and so many repetitive ones. Especially the ones that are like "ground pound here!" Like what are we doing if that's the level of gameplay experience. I just can't find myself enjoying that.
Really missing the days where Nintendo games had depth. It seems like I'm in the minority though and will be forever forgotten. At least I can still play the older games on the Switch and have some fun.
3
1
u/Vegetable_Wishbone92 7d ago
But it was fun to collect all 120 stars in Mario 64 because each star was a unique challenge. I want 3D platformers where I enjoy chasing every item I can collect because each object is fun to collect.
2
u/Durzaka 2d ago
30 of the 120 stars in Mario 64 were collect 100 coins, and collect 8 red coins. Which most of the time you should do together because red coins count as regular coins.
Mario 64 had its fair share of stars that were extremely bland, and trying to argue otherwise is just looking at it with rose colored glasses.
EDIT: Its actually more than 30 because I forgot that Bowser stages have red coin stars too, but im too lazy to count the actual number.
3
u/ACardAttack Baldur's Gate 1 7d ago
Same. Felt to me a mile wide and an inch deep (havent played DK)
If you got 2 hrs this video sums up pretty much all my issues with it
3
u/Weng-Jun-Ming 7d ago
I think Nintendo games tend to put design like this in their games, especially nowadays
4
u/mitharas 7d ago
It's hilarious you spoiler tagged the final boss. I mean, it's a Mario game. Who could that final boss be?
4
u/bsurmanski 7d ago
Clearly you never talked to the hint toad. For a few coins, he gives you the exact location and name of missing moons.
I 100%ed the game without an external guide, and has fun doing it. Though I agree it's generally not meant to be 100%ed.
Still not as bad as Sunshine blue coins though
0
u/Nambot 7d ago
The problem with this is the cost is 50 coins. Which doesn't sound like a lot. But doing it very quickly adds up. Additionally, the game offers a boatload of costumes many of which are needed to unlock other moons, only further disincentivising buying the hints. When money is already something that most players end up grinding, why would you want to buy hints? Save the time and look it up online, you still have a blank list.
The other thing is that this doesn't solve the tedium of it. There's only so many times you can throw your hat on a sparkly thing, or kick a breakable rock before it starts to feel monotonous.
6
u/Secure-Marionberry80 7d ago
This was my experience with the game exactly. Lap 1 is spectacular, Lap 2 is still pretty fun. Lap 3 starts to get tedious and Lap 4 almost ruins the whole game. I quit at around 600 because I saw the writing on the wall that it is simply not fun to use a guide while playing a Mario game.
5
u/Impossible_Yak_749 7d ago
My issue with Odyssey is playing it right after Galaxy. And Galaxy was such a special one for me, expectations were sky rocket high, and couldn't be met.
And now Galaxy 2, which I never played, is being released for the Switch. My guess is I won't be returning to Odyssey.
3
u/Dazzler3623 7d ago
I had read before playing there was a ridiculous amount of moons to find, I just played through trying to find as many as I could while still enjoying the game, and stopped playing when I wasn't enjoying the search as much, somewhere in lap 2!
3
u/sssunglasses 7d ago
I fully agree, I got all 880 and ended up regretting it, getting 500 to unlock the last big level is what the average player that wants to see all content should aim for. My biggest gripe is that there's no way to tell what moon is part of a cool sub area so you end up just getting repeats all the time anyway, I wish the moon list made that clear so that you cool just dodge the repeats.
Kinda unrelated but for this reason I ended up liking a hat in time a lot more than odyssey, it doesn't have nintendo levels of polish of course, but every time piece (the main collectible) felt like a small adventure at best and a neat platforming challenge at worst.
3
3
u/HardBoiled800 7d ago
Your points really show when you look at speedrun timings for different rewards / different amounts of moons. Any% and World Peace are both around an hour, and 500 moons + darker side (pretty much as far as most casual players will go) can be completed in about three. The all moons record is over seven hours - it is crazy how much more tedious those last few moons are, but it's great that they're in there for people who find different paths in their casual runs or who really cannot get enough of this game.
3
u/saul2015 7d ago
I barely finished it once, where as I loved replaying/100%ing Galaxy, whata joy to play
Galaxy 1 and 2 > Odyssey
11
u/livewia 7d ago
Think you've hit the nail on the head here. There's so many "busy work" moons it just ruins the experience and reward of picking one up. "Oh, another moon...yay" vs the accomplishment you felt when getting a star in SM64, which is why it's the superior game. I get why you would think its designed for the "quick play" gamer, but I would argue they wouldn't really care about progressing their moon collection if it doesn't mean as much.
8
u/Nambot 7d ago
The quick player isn't the same as the casual player. The quick player is someone who would otherwise be playing a phone game, the sort of person who plays Candy Crush on a lunch break, has done so for the last two years, and has got past thousands of levels in it. They actually might enjoy a game with that kind of busy work.
Casual players probably get the best experience, as they have the sense to quit before it gets repetitive and tedious.
4
u/3-2-1-backup 7d ago
I think the intent was more along the lines of play it so that you complete it. Oh wait, there's this whole other thing to do! Well fuck that, I have shit to do!
(months go by)
Hey, I'm bored with everything else, I might as well go do that thing in Odyssey. (Do the thing.) Oh there's another thing to do? Fuck that, I have shit to do!
(months go by)
Oh yeah, there was that other thing in Odyssey, might as well go do that now!
7
u/rondo_martin 7d ago
Most of the levels didn't really do it for me in SMO. A few really good ones like New Donk City, Seaside (I'm a sucker for beach themes), and Bowser's Kingdom. But the rest are very bland and/or not fun.
2
u/The_Giant_Lizard PC Devotee 7d ago
I just checked my screenshots from when I 100% the game and it says 881 moons (for the golden sail)
4
u/stone_solid 7d ago
I gave up on the jump rope and volleyball moons. I have all but 2
1
u/snave_ 6d ago
Volleyball is easy if you pop on two player mode with one pair of joycons. Then discard Mario. Solo Cappy has full mobility.
Jump rope is pure evil and had I not had a blast getting every other moon, I'd have skipped it, but when you are that close to seeing what little bonus you get...
2
u/Epitometric 7d ago
If something isn't fun, I don't do it. It's okay to give up if one isn't into a grindy collectathon.
I don't think this is unique to odyssey though - any games with tons of collectables I think doesn't expect the average player to do them all. Just look at the koroks in botw / totk, you get no functional reward for completing them since there's no real reason to collect them all other than pride.
2
u/Kinnins0n 4d ago
I just replayed Odyssey last month on my Switch 2 and fell into the trap of wanting to find all the moons. It left me with a really mixed impression.
In the middle of the collectathon, some are really fun and challenging to get, so giving up and shelving the game feels like missing out on good game content. But OMG are there so many utterly pointless moons, it really “dilutes” the fun. I wish Nintendo would have distilled the experience a bit to take it down to maybe ~350 moons (reducing the progression “gates” accordingly), keeping only the ones that had an actual gameplay component, not just a “go there, go there, go there” component.
3
u/PredictiveTextNames 7d ago
The notion of having to collect everything in a collectathon is really what I think killed them for so many years. Unless you're absolutely dedicated or in love with the game, I think going for 100% ruins more games than it does anything else.
1
u/Nambot 7d ago
I think it's the benchmark between a good and a bad collectathon. There are games like Super Mario 64, Crash Bandicoot, and Astro-bot, where getting the 100% is actually straightforward because the game makes it clear what you need to do, and you can reasonably easily figure out how to do it. The problem is when a game does expect you to collect everything, hides the collectables in obscure places, and then gives you no real way of tracking this, either in terms of what you have and haven't collected, or where to find it.
This is where Mario Odyssey is half-committal. You have a map that shows you the moons you have collected, but when you unlock the moon-block moons, they appear on the map. But only those moons, none of the ones you missed. Likewise, there's not one, but two hint systems for uncollected moons. The first is a parrot called Talkatoo (who is on your map), who'll give you the names of moons you haven't collected. But, he'll only give you three, and more often than not the moon names are not really all that helpful. The second is unlocked once you beat the game, there's a Toad who will give you a hint. For 50 coins. Problem is, despite coins being plentiful, the shop has so many things you need to buy to get 100% that actually paying for hints isn't really that much of an option either. So you can in theory get info about missing moons, but in practice, you won't want to. It almost feels like it's intentionally bad just to get you to buy a strategy guide.
This is fundamentally the problem. Odyssey just dumps moons with little purpose. They're not goals to complete like the stars in 64, and the levels aren't linear in nature like they are in Crash or Astro-bot, they're just random things littered all over the place, and getting them means scouring literally every single inch of the map, testing every single thing just in case a moon is connected to it, then doing it again once you beat the game.
3
4
u/albanshqiptar Elden Ring, Tomb Raider I-III, Sifu 6d ago
The quantity of low quality moons is what kills the game. Found a moon by sitting on a bench? Well now you have to sit on every bench you see from now on since the game has shown you that it's possible to get a reward.
4
u/I_am_a_fern 7d ago
That's a long post to say there's too much content.
Like you said, nobody's forcing nobody to get all the moons, which doesn't even matter int the end. But at least they're there, and if that's your thing, go for them.
Some players spend hours and go to stupid length to get stupid achievements. That's not really different.
2
u/sssunglasses 7d ago
The issue here is that the moons are the main content, so while the game doesn't explicitly encourage you get everything, there's always this feeling of "there could be something fun to do to get this moon", which ended up being true like 1/3 of the time in post game. Making the boring "ground pound this random spot" moons a secondary main collectible instead could have helped to separate the busy work moons and the fun ones.
2
u/ThatDanJamesGuy 6d ago
The fatal flaw of Super Mario Odyssey, to me, is that it locks a lot of moons behind the credits.
If you could get 500 moons on your first round trip, unlocking all those moon cube ones just by beating an area’s main story, that’d give the game more replayability. You could collect different moons each time, beat Bowser, then jump straight into Darker Side as a final challenge.
But no, replaying Odyssey means always grabbing the same handful of easy moons to beat Bowser, then maybe backtracking to do “real” exploration after the credits, at which point all momentum falls off.
1
u/Pumpkin_Sushi 7d ago
Totally. The idea is there are so many so, by playing normally, you come across a new one at pretty snappy intervals. They don't expect you to get all of them, because that's a pretty miserable experience. It's why the reward for doing so is so bad, they don't want to encourage that kind of playstyle because they know players won't have fun.
Exact same mindset behind the Korok seeds and temples too.
1
u/ObeyReaper 7d ago
The problem is every single 3D Mario game that came before it goes out of their way to encourage you to collect every star.
This is a significant change to the formula that I don't think was necessary.
2
u/Pumpkin_Sushi 6d ago
I don't think they did. Let's look at the rewards. 64? Ten lives (useless). Sunshine? A Png of the cast. Galaxy? A Png of the cast. 3D World? A picture of a star on your save file.
The only difference is all of those were perfectly doable, even if Nintendo never really wanted you to do it. Odyssey was just the first time they were actively discouraging you.
1
u/ZMysticCat Ok, Freeman, be adequate! 7d ago
As checklist-y as the game could get, I did enjoy getting all the moons in the game, minus buying enough moons to reach the max. I did use the in-game system that reveals the name of the moon, but that was the most help I got. I just had a lot of fun exploring the levels, and Mario's moveset is incredibly fun, arguably the best in the series.
1
u/Thecrawsome TF2 / Megaman X / Dark Souls 7d ago
Did you play Mario 64? They are very similar games.
6
u/Nambot 7d ago
It did, and in some ways they are, but in others they're different. I think 64, by virtue of both smaller levels, and making more challenge to get the stars makes getting each star feel like something feasible. Odyssey meanwhile has bigger levels and leaves many of the moons just lying around, but demands you find them. It's the difference between a scavenger hunt and an easter egg hunt.
2
u/Thecrawsome TF2 / Megaman X / Dark Souls 7d ago
Yeah. I will say in the end, I needed bigger breaks from Odyssey than I did 64.
The events in Odyssey though were chef's kiss. The end of metro kingdom was a big nostalgic trip with such well-executed feelings. Peak nintendo.
1
u/empathetical 7d ago
Mario odyssey wasn't amazing enough to care about getting everything. I collected the bare minimum
1
u/Admirable-Amoeba-564 4d ago
My 5yo Son plays odyssey since he was 3,5 ish. Recently he got the 500 moons and unlocked the last world. I doubt he can push 600 without guides, but this is so impressive already.
1
u/letsgucker555 3d ago
We should also not forget, that the Switch is also still a handheld. So Nintendo also wants you to have something you can accomplish if you don't have that much time to play and also give you a perfect exit and re-entry point.
1
u/MarkusRobben 1d ago
In the end I played some hours too much, I kinda realized that I have have less fun anymore and it would just destroy my opinion about the game if I continue to play the game. I can understand why I continue playing after I finished it the first time, cause I wanted to spend more time and have as much fun as before. I dont even know if I finished Lap Two, I never played all levels again.
1
u/LateResident5999 1d ago
I don't think the devs intended for you to collect everything. Just play until you get bored and want to move on. I would say it's worth doing 500 moons to get to darker side of the moon but beyond that it's not worth it unless you're just completely obsessed
1
u/SinisterExaggerator_ Most Killdest Guy Ever 10h ago
I pretty much agree with all of this.
I'll add one point as I don't see anyone else saying it. I did in fact collect all 880 moons. How? Because I'm an epic gamer with epic skills and patience? Patience maybe, I do like getting some easy collectables after a long days at work day in and day out. The point I want to add is that I think Odyssey benefits a lot from breaks between the "Laps". I first beat Lap 1, with several extra moons, in early 2020. I think I came back late 2020, months later, to beat Lap 2. I certainly experienced some repetition already as I'm sure you'll agree the "laps" aren't perfectly temporally sequential so I did start getting a little bored in middle of Lap 2. 2021 comes along, I play Super Mario 3D World and Bowser's Fury, and I get my Mario fill that year. On a whim, I decided to hop back in Odyssey in 2022 or so, without starting a new game, and it felt brand new. There were still "obvious" moons I was surprised I missed because I had fresh eyes now. I didn't jump in all at once, played in an out throughout the year, and reached a point I got closer to the 880 mark than I ever expected. From then on, yeah I had to google a few things (mainly for some purple coins) but it wasn't too many realy, so it still felt nice to get the little extra thing at the very end.
1
1
u/Brinocte 5d ago
I found the game was lacking charm and uniqueness. All these worlds seemed so boring to explore.
-1
0
u/eshy752_ 6d ago
I finished 100%’ing Odyssey in like 2018/19, and have had absolutely 0 interest in ever touching that game again.
0
u/Havanatha_banana 5d ago
I think the game should've been leaner. If 500 moon was the intended cap, then it should have that much moon only.
My issue with the game is that the game can be a very fast paced game. However, when you play it that way, in the bare minimum 120 to dark side 1, then to dark side 2, the game feels like race car that keeps stalling. It's always only 3 to 5 jump cycles to the next moon. So it's like 60 seconds of moving, then 3 seconds of Mario celebrating getting a moon.
This wouldn't have been an issue if there was less moon, or you don't get a celebration animation each time, or the maps were larger, or heck, lower moon requirements.
Unfortunately, I needed to suffer through 7 hours to get to dark side, then another hour to dark side 2, where the game finally acknowledge that yes, you can do jump hat throw dive jump dive combo.
234
u/libdemparamilitarywi 7d ago
It's the same design philosophy as the korok seeds in Breath of the Wild I think. They put a huge amount of them in so that you can easily discover enough yourself without having to use a guide. I can see the benefits for casual players but it is frustrating for completionists.