How I fell in love with Super Mario Galaxy

As a child, I enjoyed spending my time playing video games. I found it to be a form of escapism, as well as a wonderful experience where I enjoyed my time trying to beat this game. I had only ever played PC games like Harry Potter games, or minesweeper up to this point. This all changed in 2008 when my family bought a Nintendo Wii, which was the first video game console I had ever owned. So when we set it up after moving, my parents, siblings and I sat down to play the first game for this iconic system: Wii Sports.

Yeah, I admit, I set this story up to seem like Super Mario Galaxy was my first game played on the wii. That wasn't the case, but it became my favourite game simply months later. I was visiting one of my neighbours houses when we decided to play some games on the wii. She pulled out Super Mario Galaxy, and asked if i had played it before. I told her that i hadn't, and she asked if i wanted to play it with her. We were both 9, and my experience with video games were quite limited at the time. A few minutes later I was greeted with a game that quickly infiltrated my brain by the senses that overwhelmed me. The blaring music that I heard had a hold on me that would never let go. There was just something about the atmosphere of outer space that was aesthetically beautiful to me to the point where I never got tired of simply staring at the sky in this digitally rendered world.

The game has a simple premise: Bowser has attacked the mushroom kingdom and somehow acquired a UFO (which is never mentioned how but my child brain didn't think about the logistics of that, I just thought it was super cool) and kidnaps the Princess. Mario manages to catch up but is forced out, being blasted into space. The next thing the player sees is the small grassy planet where you wake up, and the music is soft, and welcoming. We quickly get accustomed to the movement, which is unique compared to other 3D Mario games, since Gravity plays a large roll in gameplay mechanics. The story slowly moves along, and you meet the mother of the Lumas- small star space creatures who assist you on your journey. Your mission is to recover all the grand and power stars that Bowser has stolen in order to build his new castle in the centre of the universe. The gameplay and music certainly elevate this experience, as the player gets to utilize new power-ups, like the Bee mushroom, which allows you to become a bee and fly- and the ice flower- which not only lets you shoot ice out of your hand, but also lets you walk on water and create ice platforms below your feet. Granted- not everything here is perfect. Sometimes the camera can be annoying when it stops you from seeing enemies and platforms you need to reach- and certain power -ups ( I'm talking to you Spring mushroom!) are not used often, and are hard to use at times.However these flaws are not nearly enough to ruin this game at all. But all these elements are not the reason why i fell in love with this game.

It may sound stupid, but the reason I love and still love this game is because of all the memories it gave me growing up. I would rent the game from my local library to play it for a week, and would enjoy just running around and listening to the music. I would talk about the game with my friends at my new school since I had recently moved, and used the game to try and build connections with some of the other kids that were there. It wasn't escapism so much, but a feeling of warmth that drew me to this game. A few years later they made a sequel, and although I enjoyed this game, and have lots of fond memories playing with a very close friend of mine- Super Mario Galaxy was the first game that grasped my heart and helped me grow my love of not only Nintendo Games- but video games in general, and I will forever be grateful for this game for that.