Leonhart collects, rates, ranks, and rants about every Star/Shine in 3-D Mario!

Yes, all 603 of them. That's right. I am a masochist, especially considering I'm going to be doing this for Mario Sunshine! I've never collected all 120 Shines in Sunshine, so this will be a first for me! I also haven't played Mario 64 and Sunshine in 7+ years, so this is an excuse to play them again!

Some basic premises I will be using for this playthrough: --I will fully complete each game before moving on to the next, and I will be playing them in order --I will be collecting all the stars as Mario, for the sake of consistency and the fact that all you get by switching to Luigi is bad traction (Boo Nintendo) --I will be starting each game from scratch to get the full experience and so I don't have anything I wouldn't normally have (such as the various caps already being activated in Mario 64), so I won't be using my fully completed save files from Mario 64 or either Galaxy. It won't change much, but either way, it's more satisfying to collect a completely golden star/shine rather than a clear one! --I won't be doing any sort of special challenges or anything of the sort, just straight up playing and collecting the stars/shines --I will also be keeping track of how many times I die collecting each star, including a running chronicle of all stupid deaths ("stupid deaths" being defined as something that happened because of me being careless, accidentally doing something wrong, etc. as opposed to dying because it's legitimately difficult) --In addition to rating and ranking each individual Star/Shine, I will rank each individual world as well

Keep in mind, my rankings will be completely subjective and made on the spot, likely with silly, irrational reasoning if I had a difficult time with it, so you probably won't agree with them!

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Mario 64 Stars 1-20
Bob-omb Battlefield Star #1: Big Bob-omb on the Summit

Ah, more nostalgia boosting! This one isn’t too difficult. It’s not hard to get up to the top, and the Bob-omb King dude is way too slow, and he doesn’t even hurt you if he throws you. I know it’s not meant to be difficult since it’s the very first star, but still, I don’t think I can rate this one very highly.

3.5/10

Bob-omb Battlefield Star #2: Footrace with Koopa the Quick

Oh man, to be honest, I hate races against the clock in video games, even easy ones like this. I always freak out when I do them because I’m always worried I’m going to screw up and lose. Didn’t happen here, and I beat Koopa the Quick by a lot. My time was 1:07, not bad, I guess. Again, pretty easy, but more of a sense of tension than the first star, so I’ll rate it a bit higher.

4/10

Bob-omb Battlefield Star #3: Shoot to the Island in the Sky

Uhhhh…Yeah, this one takes no effort. You just have to make sure you aim high enough to get onto the island (generally aim just a little above the treetop), and you got it. Just hit the box, and BAM! Star power.

2/10 (Note I will be reserving sub-2 scores for ones that are really bad or I really hate)

Bob-omb Battlefield Star #7: 100 Coin Star

As a general rule, whenever I played Mario 64, I would always try to get the 100 coin star on the same star as the 8 Red Coin one, for whatever the reason. It’s not too difficult to do here, although you basically do have to kill every enemy you can find and use the cannon to collect a bunch of coins that are in the air that you have to use for Star #5 (which I can’t get right now because of no Wing Cap). I did almost make the supremely stupid mistake of making my 100th coin one of those and have it materialize it midair, which I have done before and had to use the cannon to aim and hit it. Either way, not a bad star.

4.5/10

Bob-omb Battlefield Star #4: Find the 8 Red Coins

As far as Red Coin stars go, this is probably as easy as it gets. None of them are in difficult-to-find locations, and none of them are in really dangerous areas, except the one on the Chain Chomp’s post, which isn’t that bad if you run as soon as he barks and tries to bite you because you have enough time to get it and get out of range. So yeah, like most of the stars in this world, it’s pretty basic, so I can’t give it a high score.

3/10

Bob-omb Battlefield Star #6: Behind Chain Chomp’s Gate

This is probably the only one that I ever died on in this world back in the day. It’s kinda difficult in a way because of bad camera angles, and you’re trying to rush to get one butt stomp in before the chain chomp attacks again. It did hit me a couple of times because I was trying to get it done quickly and so I overstayed my welcome. Never died though. Despite creating a sense of tension, this one’s way too short and not difficult enough to give a high score to, so…

4/10