Luigi's Mansion 2 HD, which was released some time ago HD), evoking the classic memories of many old players, this work that has had excellent performance in the 3DS handheld console, and now it has finally ushered in a remake that has been greatly strengthened in all aspects, but for some new players who have just come into contact with Nintendo in the Switch era, this IP may be a little unfamiliar, as a rare work in the Nintendo universe with Luigi as the protagonist, the overall style is significantly different from other series, and it may not be so eye-catching, but after an in-depth experience, you will definitely be attracted by its exquisite design。 In this issue, we will review the "Luigi Mansion" series and relive the adventure of that bizarre style together.
In fact, the name of this game is also very interesting, for a long time, due to the theme and translation and other reasons, many domestic enthusiasts called this work "Louie's Haunted House", but in fact, the original name of the game, Mansion, did not have ghost elements, perhaps by "Resident Evil" In fact, with Nintendo's consistent policy of targeting all players, it is impossible to create that kind of adult horror game, and the all-age rating logo on the cover of the three installments in this series also fully illustrates this, and this kind of content style with a dividing line is also an important factor in attracting players.
The original idea of Luigi House revolved around exploring a number of different rooms, similar to the dungeons of The Legend of Zelda, with Mario as the protagonist at the beginning, the team wanted the adventure scene to be a huge house, the early idea was a Japanese-style ninja house, and after a period of testing, the scene was adjusted to a dollhouse style, and the player always had to see the rest of the room through one of the walls, which was also one of the important features that distinguished it from other titles.
To bring out the light effects of the new NGC, the team focused on darkness and shadows to create a unique haunted house style, while tightly controlling the horror elements to meet the rating criteria. With the change of scenery, especially the addition of new elements of ghosts, Luigi was chosen as the new protagonist, and the team wanted a character with a somewhat cowardly appearance that would better complement the atmosphere of the game, and the brave and sunny Mario was not a good fit. Out of consideration for the experimental nature of the work, Nintendo positioned this work as a new series rather than "Mario's new Gaiden chapter", and only a few classic characters appeared in the game, which was actually often used in Nintendo's previous works, and many games with new gameplay styles would find second-tier characters as the protagonists to avoid the impact of the poor reputation of the work on the popularity of the characters.
The development of Luigi's Pavilion and NGC console hardware went hand in hand, and the game project was launched long before the new console was designed, and the decision by the top management to land on NGC instead of the previous generation N64 platform saved the development team a lot of unnecessary headaches, especially when it came to game controls, although the N64 enabled revolutionary analog stick operation, but it still did not meet the needs of the designers. The team wanted to use two analog sticks from the start, with the joystick as the core to reduce the number of other buttons, and on the original NGC grip, the C stick was too centered, which was reported by the testers to be uncomfortable to use for long periods of time, and then modified to make it wider. In addition to this, the dynamic lighting system was also a much-needed feature for the team, which was eventually added to the graphics processing chip.
The development team showed a lot of novel effects in the game, especially the restoration of the physical environment such as fire, water, ice, etc., the initial player operated the character in contact with the dust, using fixed animations, the team wanted to make it more interesting through dynamic interaction, so a programmer developed it for six months to achieve the function, another important special effect is the stretching effect of the ghost when it is sucked in by the vacuum cleaner, in addition to the motion capture technology that has gradually matured at that time, it has also been applied to Luigi's various movements.
The difficulty positioning of this work has also experienced some twists and turns, and the aforementioned abandonment of the N64 platform is that the user experience is too simple and boring due to the single-stick operation, but in the end, there are still two optional operation forms in the finished product. After countless tweaks, the team found the right balance, hoping that the game would only take a few hours to take care of newcomers, but there was also enough motivation for those core users to have the motivation to take on repeated challenges, emphasizing puzzle elements rather than item collection.
Louigi Pavilion Entering the later stages of development, it became the most important first-party launch game on the NGC console, which also made the development cycle very tight, and there was some debate between designers and programmers about what features might not be implemented, but at the end of the development, many interesting designs were added, such as Luigi's whistle and humming, and his ability to call out to Mario, as well as a call from a member of the team suggesting to strengthen the player's goal of finding Mario, and even adding a more immersive buzz to the slightly uninteresting soundtrack。 The team wanted the end product to not be intimidating to players, and that the innovative content would showcase the new console well, and that the gameplay style would be unique like never before, rather than a parody of so-and-so.
On September 14, 2001, "Luigi Yokan" was officially released in Japan with the NGC console, with Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka as producers, Hideki Konno as director, and Issey Todaka and Shinobu Nagata as the music composers.
In this work, Nintendo's number one character Mario disappeared unexpectedly, and his younger brother Luigi entered the mysterious mansion in order to find his brother, and after meeting the hey doctor, he got the core prop ghost vacuum cleaner, which players can use to suck in ghosts and fight back into the painting, there are a lot of fire, water, and ice puzzle solving elements in the scene, and finally defeat the boss and successfully rescue Mario.
The core content of the game's experience in addition to the vacuum cleaner is Nintendo's ancestral handheld, this time called Game Boy Horror, through which Luigi can obtain various information in the mansion, use navigation functions, view items, check rooms, and even tell Luigi which room key he has like in Resident Evil, in addition to a teleportation-like function that allows players to save their progress.
The mansion in this game is full of surprises, and most of the time it is eerie and dark, unless the player clears the ghosts, many rooms will also have treasure chests or keys after they are completely cleaned, so that Luigi can continue to explore. There are five floors including the basement and the rooftop, and players will start from the foyer, where they must complete specific objectives to enter the other floors, and each floor has a boss waiting for you to challenge.
After the player clears the game, Luigi will use the money collected in the process to build a new mansion, with different levels of luxury, which is actually like the clearance rating of "Resident Evil", with a total of eight levels from A to H, the highest level A needs 100 million, and the lowest level H only needs 5,000, which also reflects the aforementioned design concept that is easy to clear but worth repeating the challenge, fully taking care of newcomers and masters. At the same time, after clearing the customs, the hidden Western-style mode will be unlocked, and the difficulty of the game has been significantly improved, so that hardcore fans have more room to play.
With the exception of Super Monley Ball and Wave Race Blue Storm, Luigi Pavilion was undoubtedly the brightest star, and was widely praised by gamers after its release, eventually selling 3.6 million units worldwide, which played an important role in the rapid adoption of Nintendo's new hardware. On October 12, 2018, the original remake was released, and surprisingly, the previous generation 3DS was not chosen for the Switch platform, and new features such as multiplayer games were added in addition to enhanced graphics.
Despite its success, Luigi Pavilion was still unable to shake the status of the Mario and Zelda series, and it did not develop further on NGC consoles until March 20, 2013, when the sequel, Luigi Pavilion 2, was released on the 3DS handheld, and catching ghosts and collecting treasures remained the core experience of the game, but this time players could experience multiple different scenarios instead of focusing on a single mansion like the previous game. This work commemorates the 30th anniversary of Luigi's debut, and has sold 5.44 million units worldwide, continuing its previous performance.
On October 31, 2019, Nintendo launched "Luigi's Mansion 3" (Luigi's Mansion 3) on the latest Switch platform, which officially comes with Chinese Simplified, and many new players are exposed to this series from this work. This time the scene of the game came to the hotel on the 16th floor, with a richer layout and collection content, this work still continues the previous core gameplay, Luigi defeats the ghosts by operating the classic prop vacuum cleaner, solves well-designed puzzles, rescues Mario, Princess Brigitte, Toadio and other companions, in addition to the main story mode, there are multiple mini-games, which are very suitable for local or online multiplayer entertainment.
"Luigi Pavilion 3" took the series to new heights, with a FAMI score of 33, an IGN score of 8.3, and the 2019 TGA Best Family Game, with global sales exceeding 12 million units, and is fully qualified to enter the ranks of Nintendo's top titles. It is worth mentioning that in the "Super Mario Bros. Movie" to be released in 2023, there are also elements related to "Luigi House".
Today, the Luigi Pavilion series has become an indispensable and important part of the Nintendo universe, and although it was originally conceived as a test of the waters, with the development of a few games, it has created its own unique user experience, not only creating an indoor adventure for all players, but also fully demonstrating Luigi's weak appearance and brave personality. With the release of the new remastered version, we are sure that we will see more exciting content in the future.
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