Review Information
Game Reviewed Mario: Pipe Network, by Anther
Review Author Mors
Created Aug 2 2019, 1:49 PM

General Commentary and Game Overview
dont ask why im reviewing a 15 year old game i also dont know
 
Pros + Charming music
+ Polished UI
+ Weird creative ideas
 
Cons - Bad camera
- Aged level design
 
Impressions
Gameplay
6 / 10
Conceptually, this game is nothing special. It's just a traditional Mario game really. What makes it interesting is mainly how polished it is for its time. This game is from 2004, 15 years ago. That's VERY impressive considering how well the game controls and feels. I mean don't get me wrong, for today's standards they don't feel all that good, but again, this is from 2004.

I kinda hate the camera though, it starts moving the moment you turn and that doesn't feel good.

But it's not just a very polished Mario game from 2004, there are other things about the game that also stand out, Like all the weird gimmicks and design choices. For an example, you can break bricks as Small Mario. Why? I don't know, but you can. There are also no springs, just small bouncy mushrooms you can carry around. You can also be small Fire Mario. There are even upside down question mark blocks. You don't really see stuff like this in other fangames.

Unfortunately though, the level design is what actually breaks the game for me. Sure there are some creative ideas but it doesn't feel like the level design makes any creative use of them. It's also full of with repetitive and unfair sections.
 
Graphics
5 / 10
The graphics are either straight from SNW and SMAS, or just are heavy edits of them. They do look okay, and give the game a distinctive look, but they aren't anything special otherwise. The menus etc are very polished but they also do show their age.

The game also doesn't have a proper fullscreen mode, and when the window is maximized it doesn't keep the proper aspect ratio, making everything look stretched.
 
Sound
6 / 10
The music are MIDIs, as expected, but they all seem to be original and have a distinct style. They aren't the most well done MIDIs yeah but they are still very charming.

The sounds are, uh, well they are fairly standard for most of the time really. There are some weird choices but I guess they add to the charm as well.
 
Replay
3 / 10
Well, there's a save function, and it's pretty long-ish for an unfinished demo. That's that I guess.
 
Final Words
6 / 10
For a game that's 15 year old, this is pretty impressive.

But at the end it's still a 15 year old game.

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