Mario isn't worn out, the games are still enjoyable. The only thing I don't like about new Mario games is the difficultly. They are so obviously designed to be casual and not at all tough. Compared to Super Mario World and Super Mario Bros 3, New Super Mario Bros is a walk in the park.

At least Super Mario 3D Land was really tough at the end.

It's not really fair comparing anything to the difficulty of SMB3 because that usually relied on just knowing the levels so damn well. I know I mention it every time SMB3 comes up, but those World 8 Supertanks are rediculous.

The 2D series have gotten quite easy. The 3D Mario games are still consistently challenging, though; remember Mario Sunshine?

Also Galaxy 1 & 2 were both pretty difficult towards the end.

I've never played Mario Sunshine but I have played and completed Mario Galaxy 1 and I have to agree, I did find it difficult.

It seems like the newer games just give you more lives. A lot of the level design in NSMB Wii was pretty unforgiving.

I agree, I think I racked up a couple of hundred lives on Super Mario 3D Land. (Forgive me if you can't go that high, I may be thinking of another game).

I don't even know what that is. I thought the Mario Land games were for the old Gameboy? 3 digit numbers didn't exist in the 90's anyway.

I almost bought a plain ol' Wii this week to play Monster Hunter Tri. I'm kind of addicted to that series. I didn't end up buying it, but I might get a Wii U for MH3G or whatever it's subtitled.

Where you been man?

As far as I know Super Mario 3D Land isn't related to the Mario Land games. Makes sense considering how easy the former is compared to ML.

Mario Land was just stupid and that's that.

Whaat!? Super Mario Land 1 and 2 were great games!

They were okay, just really short and stupid. Probably the worst of the 2D Mario games.

I still don't understand why the invincibility theme was the Can Can...

Honestly, under an European point of view, I think the console is too much expensive for what it is, especially the Basic Pack.

The Premium pack costs 50€ more than Basic, and it contains a whole lot more stuff that separately cost way more than the difference, and this doesn't make any sense. If the buyer of Basic pack desires to get the accessories later, it ends up spending much more. I think the buyers from the American continent are making a much better deal for the console, the prices I would rather suggest if we do a currency convertion. For me the Basic pack would be worth 200€ and the Premium one between 250€ and 300€.

The Wii U looks ugly.

What are these "accessories" that come with the premium pack? I haven't heard of this.

I heard thery're making an Xbox 360 alternate controller for the Wii U, is that part of it?

The Wii U Classic Controller is sold seperately for 50€.

The Premium pack will carry stands, charging cradles, Nintendo Land, 32 GBs of storage, sensor bar (...).

That all sounds like stuff the regular console should come with. The Wii came with pretty much all that and had a flat retail cost of... I'm not sure. Cheaper than that.

Nintendo you are tearing me apart

The Wii at release was at 250€, and it was just a single box coming with everything it should come. There were no Basic or Premium packs what's over. I think for its time the price was quite nice, I found the console revolutionary back for those days. Wii U didn't amuse me a lot.

The Wii you look ugly

I just hate the way the controllers look.

Mario itself is a good franchise. I've only played the NSMB DS game, and it was reasonably good. Didn't get any other version though since they're all relatively similar and can't compare to SMB3.

Galaxy 1 and Galaxy 2 are fantastic games. The difficulty works well, since the first few stars are easy, but the comets and green stars make it a lot trickier.

The main issue for nintendo of recent times is the gravitation towards social networking, DLC and multiplayer. Nintendo has very little history with this, and so will have to work extra hard to turn their singleplayer franchises into social games. Or a Galaxy spin-off with a level builder perhaps.

Nintendo needs to get their heads out of their asses and realize that motion control really isn't that amazing.

I think the biggest problem is how the motion controlling got much used in casual gaming. There are very few games on the Wii that really make good use of the motion controls. But the worst examples are on Kinect: all the games experience problems with the full motion control. I think the Kinect is an interesting idea, but too early on its time. It is a technology that needs to mature a lot in order to work well.

The best Wii games either didn't use motion controls or gave you an option to turn them off.

The Wii U Game Pad is actually a really nice controller despite it's looks. It's not awkward to hold and I think the motion controls work much better then a Wii Mote.

And as for the Wii U classic controller, I haven't used it. But I can just imagine it will be just like any other controller.

From what I hear it's comfortable to use. I'd quite happily use it to browse the net (like using an iPad), and of course playing it without the TV has its own benefits.

As previously and handsomely stated
An example of this outside of Nintendo is the PSP. Developers didn't seem to know how to work a solid 3D game together that implemented the Analog nub until much later in the handheld's lifecycle, and pretty much every game after that point was AMAZING minus the shovelware.
Nintendo is alienating a lot of customers by making these putrid accessories necessary later on. Oh, you want to use the Virtual Console? HAHA FAGGOT HOPE YOU HAVE A GAMECUBE CONTROLLER. Oh, can't find one? Well how about this 40$ controller that is shaped like something sensible? Better yet, we'll package them with games that need them to charge you even more! Hurrah. EET PRIINTOO MONEY

On release in Canada I think the Wii was 300$, then went down to 270$ then 250$ within the year. If you bought it on release and decided to invest in all the accessories neccesary to play games (Wii fit board, classic controller, motion control plus). You were looking at an investment on par with or over and above the cost of a 360 or PS3. Nintendo are sneaks.