Gaming often comes attached with a stereotype of sitting at home on the couch, being lazy instead of getting out and moving. One gamer is inadvertently doing his best to push back against that idea by turning the classic Super Mario 64 into an energetic workout, with the help of some neglected Microsoft hardware.
The appropriately named YouTuber Super Louis 64, took a Microsoft Kinect device and programmed it to map his movements to the classic Super Mario 64 actions. Meaning that Louis had to physically jump to make Mario jump, and crouch to make Mario crouch, he used a Wii Joy-Con controller to read his punching movement, as well as handle the basic walking and running controls.
Probably the most impressive part of the control system was saved until last, requiring Louis to spin around repeatedly, to match the occasionally used in-game spinning and throwing move. Making this control system work across multiple levels of the game clearly took a huge amount of energy, particularly defeating Bowser with the aforementioned spinning and throwing.
This is not the first time that Super Louis 64 has used unusual motion controls to tackle games, using a Ring-Fit Adventure controller to play Dark Souls, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, and Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, as well as using a dance mat to play Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. In the world of streaming and YouTube, using unusual controllers has become an engaging way to bring life to older games and hardware, with other recent examples including YouTuber Jachael123 beating Minecraft using a MIDI keyboard, and fellow YouTuber Technoblade beating the game with a racing wheel.
Super Mario 64 remains popular almost 25 years after its release, and the classic title has been rumored to be part of an as yet unannounced "anniversary collection" of Mario games, coming out for the Nintendo Switch later in 2020. Despite selling 35 million units, it is fair to say that Kinect was not a successful piece of hardware for Microsoft in the gaming environment, with a low rate of game sales, and little public interest after the initial launch. However it has found a unique niche in educational and AI applications, adding motion and depth sensing capabilities for comparatively little cost. Now with the growing trend of adapting unusual control schemes, perhaps the once hugely hyped technology will finally see use with the kind major game series that previously passed it by.
However, hardware manufacturers shouldn't take this trend as a sign that gamers want them to shoehorn motion controls into games once again. Simply that it can be fun to watch the weird and creatively wacky ideas that gamers come up with.
Super Mario 64 is available for the Nintendo 64, and an "anniversary collection" release for the Nintendo Switch later this year has been rumored.
Source: Nintendo Soup