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Super Mario Galaxy + Super Mario Galaxy 2
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Super Mario Galaxy + Super Mario Galaxy 2 review: The Switch 2 versions are the definitive way to play some of the best platformers of all time

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It is hard to overstate how magical the original Super Mario Galaxy felt when it launched on Wii back in 2007. Gravity-defying levels, soaring orchestrated music, and a sense of wonder that still stands out alongside the other staples in the platforming genre, almost 20 years later.

Platform reviewed: Nintendo Switch 2
Available on: Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2
Release date: October 2, 2025

In celebration of the Italian plumber’s 40th anniversary, Nintendo has re-released this classic alongside Super Mario Galaxy 2 on Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 in one enhanced package.

I was curious to see if these classics could shine just as brightly two decades later. The good news is they’re as magical as ever, offering the same incredible journeys now with gorgeous visuals and the ability to play the sequel on the go for the first time ever.

Cosmic performance

On Switch 2, both games look fantastic. Docked, you get crisp 4K resolution that makes every planet sparkle. Handheld mode delivers smooth 1080p visuals that feel perfectly tuned for portable play.

I encountered no performance hiccups across either adventure. Frame rates remain locked, load times are snappy, and the vibrant art style still feels timeless. These games were stunning on Wii, but the extra fidelity here makes them genuinely pop on modern displays, like my Samsung S90D OLED TV.

It is worth noting that Super Mario Galaxy did appear on Switch once before, as part of the limited Super Mario 3D All-Stars collection. That version didn’t reinvent the wheel, but it gave Switch users access to the game alongside Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Sunshine. Unfortunately, Nintendo no longer sells 3D All-Stars, an odd choice that has led to inflated prices on the second-hand market.

(Image credit: Nintendo)

This new Switch 2 release offers the same core experience, now enhanced with sharper visuals, better performance, and bundled alongside Super Mario Galaxy 2 for the first time on modern hardware. For fans who missed out on 3D All-Stars, or who simply want the most definitive way to play, this collection is a clear step forward.

The sound design has also aged remarkably well. Koji Kondo’s orchestral score is given room to breathe with a cleaner mix, and it feels cinematic in a way that very few modern platformers achieve.

Hearing the soundtrack through my Sonos Arc Ultra is a reminder of just how ambitious Nintendo was with these titles and genuinely brought me back to my childhood.

In my time playing this game, I’ve been listening to both games’ soundtracks on repeat as I work. In fact, as I write this review, I’m bopping my head to Gusty Garden Galaxy – gorgeous.

Galaxies intertwined

(Image credit: Nintendo)

The core adventures remain intact, so if you’ve played through either game recently, you might not want to jump back in. Nintendo has a solution, however, offering both games as a complete package or as individual titles, perfect for those who luckily own the aforementioned 3D All-Stars.

Super Mario Galaxy’s planet-hopping platforming eases players into its gravity-bending tricks, while Super Mario Galaxy 2 embraces creativity and challenge right from the start. Having them bundled together only highlights how well the sequel doubled down on experimentation.

Galaxy 2 adds Yoshi to the mix, alongside power-ups like the Cloud Flower and Rock Mushroom, each of which introduces new mechanics that feel clever even today. Returning to these levels reminded me how bold Nintendo was in the Wii era, layering complexity onto Mario without losing accessibility.

(Image credit: Nintendo)

Nintendo has added some small but welcome touches for this new release. In Super Mario Galaxy, there is an additional chapter in Rosalina’s picture book that fleshes out her story in a way longtime fans will appreciate.

Super Mario Galaxy 2 goes a step further with a completely new tale in its own picture book, offering fresh lore and a reason to revisit the Comet Observatory between levels. These are not game-changing additions, but they add warmth and make this edition feel more than a simple upscaled port.

Wii controls reimagined

As someone who hasn’t played 3D All-Stars in nearly five years, one of my biggest questions going back to these games was how well the controls would translate to modern hardware. The original games were designed with the Wii Remote and Nunchuk in mind, leaning heavily on motion controls.

Best bit

(Image credit: Nintendo)

Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2 have some of, if not the, best video game soundtracks of all time. It has been a magical experience reliving my childhood through gorgeous orchestral music that makes me feel just like that famous scene from Pixar’s Ratatouille.

On Switch 2, motion is still present with the Joy-Con, but it feels far less intrusive than it once did. You can play comfortably in handheld, docked, or with a Pro Controller, and I found myself gravitating to the latter for longer sessions.

All you need to do is hold down ZR and use the gyro in the Pro Controller to pick up Star Bits. In fact, I much prefer it to the Wii experience, but that might be my cynical 30-year-old brain that no longer appreciates a gimmick.

A trip down memory lane

(Image credit: Nintendo)

The biggest compliment I can give Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2 on Nintendo Switch 2 is that these adventures feel as fresh today as they did at launch in 2007 and 2020, respectively.

The level design is inventive and playful, constantly surprising you with new mechanics that rarely outstay their welcome. Few platformers manage to strike the same balance of accessibility and depth.

Nintendo has not tinkered much beyond resolution, performance, and the new story content, but that restraint works here. The design is so strong that all it needed was a modern coat of paint.

Mario’s journey through the stars is still a cosmic marvel

While part of me would have liked to see some new content like we’ve seen in the past with the addition of Bowser’s Fury in the remaster of Super Mario 3D World, I’ve just enjoyed the simplicity of replaying these classics in 4k.

If you have never played Super Mario Galaxy or its sequel, this is the definitive way to experience them. And if you have, the combination of rock-solid performance, upgraded visuals, and new story content makes these experiences worth revisiting.

Few platformers feel as inventive, joyful, or downright magical as Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2. Nearly twenty years on, Mario’s journey through the stars is still a cosmic marvel.

Should you buy Super Mario Galaxy + Super Mario Galaxy 2?

Buy it if…

Don’t buy it if…

Accessibility

Not much to write home about in terms of accessibility. Both games include an Assist Mode, which increases your life and bounces you back from falls.

Settings allow you to change the way you interact with the camera via thumbsticks and motion controls.

It would’ve been nice to see more additions to accessibility, but it appears as if Nintendo has kept even the settings faithful to the originals.

How I reviewed Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2 Nintendo Switch 2 Edition

I played around 25 hours total, split between both games, and used my OLED TV for a full 4k experience. I played Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2 Nintendo Switch 2 Edition in a mixture of handheld mode on the Nintendo Switch 2 itself and on one of the best OLED TVs, the Samsung Q90D, using the Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller.

I had previously played both games on the Wii and had experienced Super Mario Galaxy on Nintendo Switch as part of Super Mario 3D All-Stars.

First reviewed September 2025

Super Mario Galaxy + Super Mario Galaxy 2: Price Comparison



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The 'Lego Batman' Devs Want to Make a New, Definitive Bat-Game
Gaming Gear

The ‘Lego Batman’ Devs Want to Make a New, Definitive Bat-Game

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September 20 is Batman Day, and what better way to celebrate the occasion than with a new video for his next big game?

WB and Traveler’s Tales released a behind-the-scenes video devoted entirely to the making of Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight. Revealed during Gamescom in August, the title takes players on the character’s journey into the superhero we all know, blending together different elements of his live-action and comics incarnations into a new spin on his origin and evolution.

The video doesn’t reveal anything new or insightful about TT’s approach to Batman—it’s made a lot of Lego games over the years, and Legacy of the Dark Knight is its fourth Bat-specific one—but it’s a solid eight minutes of the team swearing they’re doing their homework. The Batman and Dark Knight trilogy are both cited as key reference points alongside Batman: The Animated Series and a lot of comics.

Interestingly, the game starts with a young Bruce Wayne the evening before his parents are killed, then transitions over to his time training in the League of Shadows—something previous games like Arkham Origins and Arkham City have touched on through nightmare sequences or DLC.

If there’s one thing the video makes clearer than ever, it’s that the Arkham games really do cast a long shadow over Batman. Combat, using the Batmobile, and even grappling around Gotham all look very similar to how they were in Rocksteady’s franchise. That may end up working in the game’s favor, since as James Gunn notes, Lego is all about creativity regardless of age and skill level. What excites him most about Legacy is its potential to help players who’ve “never experienced Batman in a personal way get to play this game and have their own connection to him and the DC universe.”

Taking the gameplay and material from films and comics, then putting them in an all-ages gloss may be the smartest play for a character DC hopes to eventually reinvigorate on the big screen while still playing to his dark and gritty strengths. We’ll see how that fares when Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight comes to PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch in 2026.

Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.



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The Sonic Rush games on Nintendo DS are getting a "definitive" PC release care of boisterous fangamers
Game Updates

The Sonic Rush games on Nintendo DS are getting a “definitive” PC release care of boisterous fangamers

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A group of fangame developers have taken it upon themselves to make a new Sonic Rush game for PC, combining the previous Sonic Rush games for Nintendo DS into one “definitive” remastering, with extra stuff and some apparently overdue fixes. Seems bold! I missed the Rush games back in the noughties, but I do like me a Sonic. Here’s a trailer for Sonic Rush Rerun.

Watch on YouTube


“The idea behind this remaster is to take the greatest strengths of the Sonic Rush trilogy, crank them up to 11, and combine them together to bring this game formula to its PEAK,” explain the developers in the blurb. “We want to make a definitive version of Sonic Rush for PC with additional content and to fix the problems with the original game.” I assume they’re calling it a “trilogy” in light of the general conviction that Sonic Colors is an unofficial third Rush game.


I like the energy here, but I fear I must break off this report to deliver an agonising Old Man appraisal of something that has been bugging me for years. PSA game developers: the “up to 11” line is not supposed to be repeated sincerely. It comes from 1984 rock band mockumentary This Is Spinal Tap, in which there’s a scene where lead guitarist Nigel Tufnel shows off his custom amp, which has a volume setting with 11 levels, but isn’t actually any louder than an amp with 10 levels.


It’s supposed to be a joke about meaningless exaggeration. But because humans are forgetful, perishable sacks of meat, and perhaps because videogame-adjacent humans especially tend to venerate numbers like gods, I keep hearing the phrase “turn it up to 11” uttered with what sounds like full seriousness.


I don’t know if there’s some kind of central marketing authority I can appeal to, here, but please can you all knock it off, because whenever I read these words in press releases, I feel like I am taking crazy pills. If nothing else, game developers, the nature of the joke means that you don’t have to stop at 11. You can turn it up to 12! You can turn it up to 13, even! First one to turn it up to 13 in a press release gets their game an automatic 13/10. Or would do, if we had a scoring system. See, I always give myself an out.


Anyway, back to Sonic Rush Rerun. The project lead is MelohRush, who got into fan animations because he played Sonic Frontiers and thought it needed “an extra punch of style”. These youngsters! So impetuous. According to his portfolio, he’s worked on *grits teeth* 11 Sonic projects to date.


He’s joined by lead programmer Crimznraze, lead modeller Ozark and a small village of modellers, programmers, level designers, animators, sprite artists, composers, sound designers, voice actors, writers and graphic designers. It’s a tidy production. You can find some music for the game’s soundtrack on the Youtube page.


Sonic Rush Rerun has no release date. Thanks to Jeremy for spotting it and lobbing it into the friendly sausage machine that is our news Slack. As ever with fangames, its eventual launch rests on Sega’s willingness not to sue the pants off the creators for breach of copyright. Sega have proven pretty relaxed on this front, as large corporations go, and have reaped the fruits in the form of a lively community of Sonicmakers, busily engineering forms of hedgehog-based entertainment poor Yuji Naka never dreamed of in 1991. Some have gone onto work for the Blue Blur directly.



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Original Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater voice actor says playing Snake was "the definitive role in his life"
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Original Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater voice actor says playing Snake was “the definitive role in his life”

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David Hayter – the original voice behind one of gaming’s biggest characters, Snake – says portraying Hideo Kojima’s stealthy creation “was the definitive role in [his] life”, and if he was asked to reprise the role, he’d be “down” to voice him again.

In an interview with Inverse alongside fellow Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater voice actors Lori Alan and Cynthia Harrell, Hayter – who was dropped from the role and replaced by Kiefer Sutherland for the fifth instalment, The Phantom Pain – called it “the definitive role in [his] life”.

Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater – Launch Trailer | PS5 Games.Watch on YouTube

“Anytime they ask me to be Snake, I’m in,” Hayter said. “It’s the definitive role in my life. It’s so complex and so profound, and there are so many different aspects to both him and Big Boss. So anytime it comes up, I’m down.

“I get so many people coming up to me now saying, I just got into Metal Gear last year because of the Master Collection, and it’s so cool to see 18-year-old fans and younger kids discovering it for the first time,” the award-winning Hollywood writer added. “A great game should be like a great movie or like a great album – it should live on. And a lot of times, because consoles and technology change, a lot of great games disappear. And so I’m just grateful that Konami is behind this in the way they are.”

That said, if given the opportunity, Hayter was candid enough to acknowledge he wouldn’t have minded re-recording some of Snake’s lines for the remake.

“I do feel that I’m a little better of an actor now than I was then,” he admitted. “It was fine back in the day, but I would have loved to bring some of the knowledge that I’ve picked up over the past 20 years to it. But you don’t want the controller lines to be better acted all of a sudden, because that’ll take you out of the game.

“I’ve been working in Hollywood for quite some time now,” he added. “This is a beloved franchise, a huge world with massive worldwide appeal. So I’m never surprised when something like this comes back. But I didn’t anticipate it would be this. But to start with, Snake Eater is very cool, because it’s generally considered the pinnacle of Metal Gear.”

We recently learned that Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater has brought back the secret Guy Savage mode. But it wasn’t made by Konami alone – Platinum Games, perhaps best known for its Bayonetta and Astral Chain series, is responsible for the surprise action minigame.

Connor had a great time with Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater, awarding it five out of five stars in our review, writing: “A legend is brought back to life with Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater, in a surprisingly sensitive remake from Konami featuring developers from the original.”



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An ork warlord with a metal jaw delivers a speech
Gaming Gear

The teams behind two of Dawn of War’s big overhaul mods are working to update them for the Definitive Edition

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One of the low-key most exciting changes in Dawn of War: Definitive Edition is the shift to a 64-bit exe, which makes it a more stable platform for modding. Dawn of War is beloved for its sense of scale, and being able to expand that even further with massive numbers of enemies on screen and even more factions is the promise of mods like Unification.

If you’re all keyed-up to install Unification right away, however, maybe hold off on that a minute. You might encounter a few problems, like not being able to pan the screen left or right with the cursor, or graphical issues with the Unification campaign map. Over on the Unification Discord, a modder called Kekoulis, Shogun of Unification, has explained the team is waiting for the Definitive Edition to be patched before releasing an update for the mod.

The schedule for that has moved forward, however. Relic had communicated that the Definitive Edition’s second patch, planned for September, would be the one to wait for. Now it’s looking like the first major patch will include the fixes modders are waiting on, “So we will wait for that to test and see if we can release earlier than the 2nd major patch”, Kekoulis writes. “We have already made some progress on updating the UI as well as the rest of the elements, so the patch is proceeding as planned.”


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Back in the day, my preferred wide-scale overhaul for Dawn of War was the Ultimate Apocalypse mod, which is also having some issues with the Definitive Edition—in particular with the UI. Its maps also look rough compared to the upscaled originals. Fortunately the team currently in charge of that mod is also working on a compatibility update.

The same can’t be said for the Crucible mod. Its creators have put together a lengthy document detailing their issues with the Definitive Edition, and said on their Discord that, “Right now there are only a few minor positives to moving to DE, and multiple major negatives, so on balance we will continue modding legacy DOW until DE is up to scratch.”

Finally, since apparently enough people have been asking the Unification team about the recently announced Dawn of War 4 that they’ve had to post a reply. Kekoulis, Shogun of Unification, has made it plain they won’t be adapting Unification to the next game in the series. “Aside from the fact we do not even know the state of that game and how it will be, you are asking us to redo 10+ years worth of work in a new game,” Kekoulis writes, “which will be less known and will have different aspects. The home of Unification is DOW1, especially with DE.”

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Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War - Definitive Edition removes all possible barriers to playing one of the greatest strategy games of all time.
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Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War – Definitive Edition removes all possible barriers to playing one of the greatest strategy games of all time.

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Hurtle back through space and time with me, will you, to my living room sofa in 2005. Hunched over, Ork-like and sallow, I used to balance my laptop on one of those nesting coffee tables that was a tiny bit too small, a squeaky little bluetooth travel mouse on the even smaller one beside it. It got so uncomfortable at one point I had to give up on the luxury of my squishy wrist-pad mouse mat, and just wedge a whole cushion under my arm instead. All that for another few minutes running my army around the corners of the map, looking for the final building to demolish, any straggling xenos I’d yet to expunge.

Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War – Definitive Edition

  • Developer: Relic Entertainment
  • Publisher: Relic Entertainment
  • Platform: Played on PC
  • Availability: Out now on PC (Steam)

The original Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War is one of the all-time greats of real-time strategy. It’s Relic Entertainment, an RTS powerhouse, approaching if not outright hitting its utmost peak, the three brilliant expansions it developed in-house (plus Iron Lore Entertainment’s Soulstorm later on), arriving at just the same time as its equally superlative first Company of Heroes. To look back on that time now – an early teenager, surfing the early-ish, pre-algorithmic internet, playing a favourite genre in a pomp we’ll probably never see again – is to summon that phrase which increasingly feels like the defining cliché of life as an older millennial. We didn’t know how good we had it.

Anyway, I’ve got that out of my system. Back to the grimdark violence of the far future! Dawn of War was and is brilliant because it is just frightfully silly. In writing that, I can hear a thousand mouths cry out in pain, as I think the Aspiring Champion put it. For many, Warhammer is serious business. But not me. Ye olde editor of mine Martin Robinson used to describe 40K as like Tonka Toys for grownups, as if the little models were something you’d imagine smashing together while making duf-duf-duf noises and giggling with glee. I’ve never been able to see it another way since – no faction captures it more than the flag-bearing Space Marines, being all domed shoulders and coned shins and big, cool trucks. Dawn of War was intricate and keenly balanced and vast, but it was also simple. What if you could play your goofy pre-teen imagination, and what if doing that was awesome?

Here’s a trailer for Dawn of War – Definitive EditionWatch on YouTube

Dawn of War – Definitive Edition, which has just released, was more than enough of an excuse to return. As a remaster it’s a pretty low-key one. For everyday users arguably the biggest fix is the one made to the previously clunky choose-your-resolution options on start-up. There were no good options, for anyone not playing on a monitor from 2005 (Dawn of War and the first expansion, Winter Assault, are 4:3 aspect ratio for instance, and Dark Crusade onwards just stretched-out versions of that), where now it scales nicely all the way up to 4K.

There’s a prettifying effort that’s been made to textures, lighting, shadows and the like – the type of thing that you notice the first time you play the new version and then immediately forget. That’s a compliment, if a back-handed one: the nature of these kinds of upgrades is that, while noticeable side-by-side, in practice the new one simply bumps your memory of the old clean out of your head. I must’ve played the original Dawn of War for hundreds, maybe thousands of hours; within about three with Dawn of War – Definitive Edition my subconscious has already decided that’s just how it always looked.

Image credit: Relic Entertainment / Eurogamer

Naturally, of course, it isn’t. Go back to the original again and you’ll be blown away by just how claustrophobic the level of zoom is with the camera. Or how greedy the UI’s taskbar is, taking up the entire bottom edge and what must be close to about 20 percent of your entire screen. These are little snags you didn’t even know were snags, sanded off and 2025-ified for modern consumption. Plenty of old bugs have been tidied up too.

The headline for the true nerds is the move to a 64-bit version of the game from the previous 32-bit. I’m not going to even attempt to get all Digital Foundry about this but the top-line point here is that it’s a major boon for the modding scene, adding extra headroom where modders would previously come up against hard limits to RAM usage. Part of the justification developer Relic gave for this specific type of somewhat limited remaster, in fact, was that it “didn’t want to break anything” modders had made for the original, as design director Philippe Boulle told some guy called Wes at IGN.

Absolute state of this lad. | Image credit: Relic Entertainment / Eurogamer

The headline for me, meanwhile, is that I once again have a reason to play this game again – and a functional, borderline thriving online community to repeatedly lose to once more. (Anyone who ventured onto old DoW servers in recent years would’ve encountered one of about nine, five-star-rated experts who still lurked there, and who were often very nice, in that Warhammer shop assistant way, as they absolutely obliterated you in about 45 seconds flat.)

I started up my playthrough here at the very beginning, with the first Dawn of War’s main campaign. This lasted a few pleasantly xeno-purging missions until I had one of those who am I kidding moments, and turned straight to the conquest mode of Dark Crusade – one of the very greatest RTS campaigns of all time, and a mode I’ve personally replayed so many times, on so many chunky laptops after school, or friends’ parents’ PCs when attempting to jank together some rudimentary LAN party, that even the tutorial voiceover guy’s weirdly impeccable enunciation is burned into my ears. This mode is just magic. Put a conquest mode in everything, I say (and realise I’ve also said before).

Memories… | Image credit: Relic Entertainment / Eurogamer

In saying that, I realise I’m trying to sell you on it. And in realising that I’m landing on something else. The other big millennial realisation that is forever destined to haunt us, as it’s done to every generation before. A lot of people are about to experience this thing you’ve always loved for the first time today. I like that one much better. So much has been said and written about the demise of the RTS. And indeed of Relic, a sensational developer that’s gone through the ringer like so many others in recent years. Now’s your chance to remind yourself what they were all about; or to realise it for the first time. If you’ve never played Dawn of War – hell, if you’ve never played a real-time-strategy game – this is the time to do it.

Dawn of War is grim, jagged, frequently some shade of sludgy grey, green or brown. It’s also campy, emphatic in its spectacle and quite happy to be bizarre. It’s a game where teching (or turtling, as some call it) can be genuinely viable, letting you pile up defensive turrets and mines, pack choke points (all great strategy games must have choke points!) and outlast your enemy’s assault as you bide your time through unit upgrades. As can rushing to a specific unit or upgrade for some niche, edge-case means of assault, like teleporting a builder over a chasm and having them construct cloaked buildings right under the enemy’s nose. It’s a game you can take very seriously, with a real competitive edge, or likewise not even a little seriously at all, giggling at line deliveries and old quotes you’ll find yourself muttering to friends years later. And all of it’s just drenched, dripping, squelching away in peak, secondary school oddball fantasy. I refuse to play this game and be sad about the state of the RTS, to feel sorry for what we’ve lost or what could’ve been. Instead I’m simply glad to have it at all. I say get your big fancy power armour on and wade in, like the rest of the Emperor’s finest.



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