at least i don't think this has been brought up before anyone a big fan of the more recent mario games? i pretty much quit with Mario 64. Super Mario RPG is still my favorite mario game.
I just beat Super Mario Sunshine, the follow-up to Mario 64 and the predecessor to Galaxy. It was a pretty fun game though damn frustrating at times. The Mario 64 camera system was close to perfect but for some reason they F-ed it up in Sunshine. Sometimes you would get lost behind a wall or the camera angle would throw off your jumps and you'd fall to your death. Besides that it was fun game, though in a very non-traditional Mario setting. There were some really, really frustrating levels but they made you always want to come back for more. I've heard that Galaxy only improves on the previous games and fixes all the mistakes made in Sunshine. If I had to rank all the platforming Mario games, it'd go something like this- 1. Super Mario Bros. 3 2. Super Mario World 3. Super Mario 64 4. New Super Mario Bros. 5. Super Mario Sunshine 6. Super Mario World 2 7. Super Mario Bros. 8. Super Mario Bros. 2 9. Mario Bros. And Galaxy sounds like it could be right at the top though I've yet to play it.
It works just as well as any controller, you use the analog stick on the nunchuk to move around, and the pointer isn't neccesary but allows you to quickly pick up star bits and fire them at enemies.
Plus, it's needed on one of the levels to operate transport, you twist it side to side depending on which way you want to turn, and how sharply you want to move round a corner.
The Wii is awesome. I know you don't like sports but Wii Sports is one of the best games ever made and it comes free with the Wii. If you get one you also should buy Wii Play, which comes with an extra controller and costs 50, a controller alone costs 40, so you basically get the game for 10 bucks and it is full of fun minigames.
