Did you ever look at Super Mario 64 and wonder what it might have looked like if it was closer to the Super FX2 Chip in graphics? Well, someone did as they made this, Super Mario 64 Low Polygon Edition. This is a hack for PC’s of the Super Mario 64 game thanks to the decompiling of the original game code.
What was old is new again thanks to less detail. It is strange yet familiar. We have been here before but not like this.
However you want to look at this, I think of this version of Super Mario 64 as almost a liminal space of sorts.
Removing the textures and breaking characters, enemies, levels, down to their minimum polygon counts has an interesting effect.
Everything is the same, but it feels fundamentally different. It feels “off” slightly. It is still Super Mario 64, just different.
Coins are squares, Bobombs are cubes, Bowser has a super creepy look (he has no eyes), it is just weirdness all around. For some that may be freaky, for others it may be reason to push through to see more.
Which gamer are you?
Nintendo would never release this so fans did. Since the game code for Super Mario 64 was decompiled and made available online, A LOT of hacks and mods have been getting made for the Nintendo 64 classic title.
While not as prolific as, say, Doom and its mods and hacks, this is still cool to see in action. Considering how protective Nintendo is, I cannot link to the source code or a download of this mod. Google is a great option for those wanting to research how this was done.
There are other first party Nintendo games that got the decompile treatment as well. Majora’s Mask, Banjo-Kazooie, Golden Eye 007, and Perfect Dark also got decompiled, but are a lot less popular among modders.
What do you think? Too freaky to play or just right?
