Super Mario Galaxy 1 + 2 (Switch) Review

Nintendo has been bundling collections of Mario games for three of the four decades that Super Mario games have existed. They’ve always done something to change to suit the time they were re-released but always tried to keep them as they were. The Super Mario Galaxy 1 + 2 collection is no different, these are for better and worse the same games we got on the Wii, just updated to the system they’re on. However, the Wii was a very special system. It had a split controller, it had motion controls and it had pointer controls. The Switch has at least two of those and sort of does the last one. So can you bring a game to a system “as they were” if you don’t have all the parts required to keep it the same? Sort of.

Despite this release being a collection, there’s nothing at all really binding these games together. If you play them from a card, or download them they are two different menu items, there’s no menu joining them together, there’s no collection of artwork, behind the scenes features or anything like that. Each game has its respective soundtrack available from the title screen but otherwise this is just Super Mario Galaxy, and Super Mario Galaxy 2. 

Before we get any further, we need to point out that a version of Super Mario Galaxy already exists on the Nintendo Switch, even if you can’t purchase it new today. Nintendo’s already had a crack at this, and there are a fair number of graphical differences at least between the 3D All Stars version of the game and this port—more so if you’re on the Switch 2.

The good thing about Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2 is that they’re really good games, exceptional ones even, which is why Nintendo hasn’t had to do too much to them. We could all think about how much more they could do, but it’s surprising how well these games hold up all these years later without needing many tweaks.

For additional reading, since Vooks has been around forever, we have our original Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2 reviews from fifteen and eighteen years ago.

For how similar these games are, and despite people saying Super Mario Galaxy 2 just feels like an expansion pack of sorts, it’s interesting how differently they’re packaged. Galaxy is set up around a hub world, giving it a little more atmosphere than the straight world map of the second. Going back to these games now, after something like Super Mario Odyssey or even Donkey Kong Bananza, you realise how dated the whole “collect this many stars to progress” setup feels. At the time we didn’t know any better, but now it comes across as restrictive and an artificial brake on the game’s progression. And of course, being Wii-era titles, both games are full of constant interruptions, nagging, and tutorials. No, you take a break. 

Super Mario Galaxy 2 also famously had very little story in it. Nintendo’s gone back and fixed this by adding Rosalina’s Storybook to the second game, although its implementation feels a bit shoehorned. The story in a Mario game is never really needed, but it’s always welcome.

So how about Super Mario Galaxy 2 and Yoshi? Well, it works alright, nothing is ever going to replicate the actual pointer controls of a Wii Remote. Gyro controls are a decent approximation, but we were spoiled. Probably the ideal way to play the game is with Joy-Con controls. I managed to complete Galaxy 2 with a Pro Controller without much trouble, but I felt like I was fighting the pointer a lot that way too. In handheld mode you have the option of touching the screen, but with the heavier Switch 2 consoles, it just isn’t great—especially for the quick reflexes you need to control Yoshi’s tongue.

There was also confirmation from Nintendo that the game would have mouse controls. Sadly, these are only for the game’s co-star modes, where the second player becomes the cursor to help collect Star Bits. There’s a very small window in which children might find any value in these modes, and they’re really the only ones who would be interested in using them.

What did amaze me is how much of both games I’ve forgotten in the fifteen and eighteen years since their release. Of course, the great music and courses like Bouy Base, Battlerock, and Gusty Garden Galaxy will never leave my brain. Oh, and I still hate the spring power-up—so much.

Go back and find a video of either Galaxy game on YouTube and just marvel at how low-resolution it is, and yet, under all that pixelation is a wonderfully designed game with strong art. Now look at what we’ve got here—the same wonderful game, pumped up in resolution, for better or worse.

Even though both games look fantastic, there’s some weirdness in bringing them into the 1080p and 4K world. Nintendo has redrawn most of the textures, and most of it looks fine, but the cracks—where they haven’t—or odd lighting effects can break the immersion. On some stages, lighting interacts strangely with textures: from one angle it looks fine, but because you’re Mario in space, the lighting can make a texture appear flat or have a weird shine. There’s also an issue with colour depth, where gradients have harsh steps that make flat textures look spotty.

Most of the time, you have a tremendous-looking setup, with wondrous skyboxes and bright, beautiful galaxies to explore—but then something breaks, and it drags you out of it. It would have been great if Nintendo had spent a little more time fixing these issues, some of which existed in the original games but are just made worse now that we’re not looking through a composite cable.

That said, it’s still nice to see the game on Switch 2 in crisp, full 4K resolution, and for that, you can forgive many of the smaller issues.

Super Mario Galaxy is a special game to me. I got to play it at E3 2006, and it felt like an absolute revelation at the time—and all this time later, it still does. With Super Mario Galaxy 2, I honestly felt like I was playing it almost for the first time again, maybe because it stuck with me a little less over the years. However, a lot has changed with gaming and with Mario in the intervening years, and some things haven’t aged so well. Progression in Galaxy 2 can feel counterintuitive if you just want to enjoy yourself, and motion controls without a real pointer are never going to be as good as they could be.

Super Mario Galaxy 1 + 2 are tremendous games and remain among the best Mario experiences. The packaging here on Switch between the two games is a little mixed, with controls never quite matching the originals and odd graphical quirks that ideally should be fixed. However, the games themselves do all the talking, and playing them again is an experience you simply need to have.

Rating: 4.5/5

We reviewed Super Mario Galaxy 1 + 2 on the Nintendo Switch 2. Review code was provided by Nintendo.