Captures:
So, the more interesting captures in the game I’d say are the cheep cheep, uproot, hammer/fire/fryingpan bros, tropical wiggler, shiverian racer, gushen, lava bubbles, Pokios, bowser, and yoshi.
Overall my remark on the captures is they’re mostly pretty one-note and not that interesting, which I honestly should have expected since before the game came out. Trying to make a ton of things deep usually doesn’t work as well as adding more depth to a few things (better to go multiplicative instead of additive). All the captures suffer in that they can only use 2 buttons, B/A and Y/X, since ZL/ZR are used to release the capture. So all the captures are pretty simple, and I’d say the ones that are most interesting are the ones that do something unique with their control scheme, despite their limited button count.
Cheep Cheep let you move freely up and down underwater, which I think is fairly cool in a Zone of the Enders kind of way. Can also spin to go faster and attack. If directed out of the water, they can jump higher out of the water than mario can alone, giving them a unique utility in that regard.
Uproots are pretty cool. Instead of jumping, they grow taller. Then, when the button is released, they snap their legs up to the top, and do an itty bitty jump. This means they can touch anything up their entire length while grown up, and can walk off ledges and jump up overhangs. It also means you need to be careful of their feet when grown up, which is an interesting consideration to have which jumping normally does not.
The hammer bros are neat mostly because their standard form of movement is jumping, and you can jump out of their jump, giving them a sort of double jump. Also they hurl their respective weapon in a random arc in the general direction their facing, which can be kind of annoying when it doesn’t cooperate, but it feels kind of cool to use.
Tropical wiggler are unique, extending themselves across gaps, carrying their length along like it’s a flexible rope. Similar to the uproots, they’re vulnerable along their whole length, and their sections are usually designed around this, creating a unique “platforming” challenge, like those old games where you need to draw a line across an area without letting the line get hit until it’s done.
The shiverian racer can be kind of interesting. To go fast, you gotta bound every time you hit the ground, and keep steady control over which way you’re going, as well as the angle of the ground you land on, which can be an interesting combined challenge.
Gushen are mildly cool. They can jet along the water extremely fast, but also adjust their height in the air, practically flying above the water, much like a cheep cheep does underwater, except to descend they need to drop like a stone. They can also hit things by either getting above them, or pointing away from them, both of which can be tricky to manage, since you’re affecting your movement at the same time as you do this.
Lava bubbles are kinda basic, their big deal is that they can jump really high, and only move in lava, so their levels tend to be about jumping between puddles of lava. They don’t have much air control either, so you need to build up speed to get a good jump with them, and you generally have a lot of commitment. It’s also cool to aim for the tomatoes to make new puddles to jump into. The cookatiel fight with the lava bubble is really neat, platforming onto blobs of lava suspended in the air.
Pokios are really cool. They’re kind of a play on the poles and forks which were featured in the game before them, but they’re much cooler. They can attack with their spear beaks, but also poke into any soft wall and flick themselves in any direction up or along the wall, giving them very unique platforming challenges. Their moveset is deep enough and has enough potential that you could probably build a whole game around them and it would be pretty decent. To use them well, you need to carefully time when you poke into the wall, you need to flick accurately and move in the air to get around corners, while still orienting yourself towards the wall so you can peck into it. Using them effectively is a real challenge, and they get a few really nicely designed sections. It also helps that they can redirect bowser’s bombs like billiards balls and do a spin attack with their spear beak, also a motion control air stall.
Bowser is basically Strider. He can attack while running, triple jump, and shoot fireballs. Honestly, on review, his section is better mostly because it has some neat level design, rather than because the capture is particularly interesting, though the capture does go hand-in-hand with the levels, placing blocks in your way that need to be attacked to get past. Also the falling boulders, ground falling out on you, and rolling rocks help make it interesting. There’s a lot going on all at once, and you’re expected to keep moving while dealing with it.
