Ah, Cool Cool Mountain. My old friend.
Super Mario 64 is a game I personally revisit at least once a year just to touch base with, and every couple of years or so to actually heartily get into for a 120 star playthrough. When games had to grow up from a 2D plain to the open world of 3D so many developers found themselves lost and how to make it work.
Before we get to Cool Cool Mountain though. Let’s list things that we can argue Mario 64 pioneered
- Mario controlled great. A 3D platformer were you can pretty much always guarantee your skills and matched with Mario’s abilities.
- The dynamic camera and your ability to control it are superb. Some hiccups you’ll learn to deal with over time, but considering this game has a whole new Z axis to contend with unlike the easy to follow 2D games of the past, you have to hand it to Lakitu (or Nintendo).
- Level design. Sure it’s cliché for Mario or most platformers to offer you “Sand world”, “lava stage”, “water level”, etc… Nintendo wins no prize for themes, but the way they made each world fun to explore and play around within, again nothing before this wowed you quite so much as you stepped into each new world.
- Goals. This one sort of fits with the above, and it’s arguable how much Nintendo is due credit, but platformers and adventure games before this were all about just getting to the end of the level, or killing a specific foe(s). Instead with Mario 64 one simple formula for progression would not of cut it. Instead we have a plethora of tasks; puzzles, races, mini bosses, collectibles, secrets, fetch quests, and an ever growing mastery of Mario’s parkour credentials.
For a generation afterwards and beyond, we still had 3D platform adventure games coming out that struggled to get the balance right. Games that would miss a vital ingredient to what made this game genre great, and yet Super Mario 64 launched alongside the Nintendo 64 and said “here’s the blueprint from here on out”, and made the N64 feel very much like the PlayStation should be very worried (unfortunately for Nintendo that story didn’t quite pan out).
Cool Cool Mountain is one of the earlier world that will open up to you in Super Mario 64. Costing only a mere 3 Power Stars to get in.
Once inside you’ll find yourself a top a mountain amidst plenty of snow. Your first suggested objective would be to hop into the hut in front of you and make your way down to the bottom of the mountain through a secret slide and netting yourself a star for doing so. Although just because it’s suggested doesn’t mean you have to, or will. The temptation to just explore and get your bearings for this new snowy land is high though, so you can potentially chase down one of the other stars for the stage in doing so.
Along with the slide, and the music (both the stage theme and the slide theme), the other most characteristic memory from this stage is the mother penguin and her lost baby. The simultaneously annoying yet cute cry the penguins make, and the fact that 9 out of 10 people probably threw that baby off the cliff side on more than 1 occasion because human behaviour without consequence is a curious thing…
Whilst Cold Cold Mountain isn’t the only Snow world in Super Mario 64 I think it goes without saying that it is the more memorable of the 2 overall. Though I could potentially cover the whole Mario hat loss saga next year or another time…
Don’t forget that Super Mario 64 DS is a pretty decent remaster of Super Mario 64. It adds new characters with unique abilities, and a further 30 stars to collect. Originally on the Nintendo DS it was a hoot, but not quite as fun to control with only a Dpad or touch screen options to work with. Thankfully if you play Mario 64DS on a 3DS you’ll have the circle pad in your hand and have a much better time (once you get used to holding R to run). Those DS mini-games were fun too.
Check Amazon out below and nab a copy if you want some portable Mario 64 in your life (buying it pre-owned is your best option), or alternatively hook your N64, or get it on the Wii or WiiU’s Virtual Console services. The WiiU even has Mario 64 DS as an available option too.
After Mario Galaxy 2 offered us “Thwomps Fortress” re-imagined, I can dream that one day Cool Cool Mountain will be brought to life blessed with graphics and techniques of whichever generation of console it gets the treatment for.
Also, Mario 64 Speedruns are amazing. Here’s one from “Siglemic” from 2014’s SummerGamesDoneQuick.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qM278YSN2s