One of Nintendo's marquee titles for the Wii console is when the red plumber was sent into outer-space in Super Mario Galaxy. It is one of the most ambitious 3D games in the Mario franchise, utilizing the many aspects of the Wiimote controller in its gameplay, combined with unique platforming challenges and a variety of planets. Not only is Super Mario Galaxy not only one of the best-selling titles, it is a fondly remembered adventure for many fans.This game got a few re-releases over the years, one through the Nintendo Selects collection, as well as a digital download on the Wii U eShop. Plenty of fans even saw modern, albeit limited-time ports, of this game in the Super Mario 3D All-Stars collection released on the franchise's 35th anniversary. This collection had Super Mario 64, Super Mario Sunshine, and Super Mario Galaxy bundled in a single package for Nintendo's hybrid portable console, the Switch. This isn't the first time fans had wanted a portable version of Super Mario Galaxy, as seen with the famously spread rumor of a Nintendo DS version of the game back in the mid-2000s.Even with a very convincing trailer, these rumors turned out to be a hoax. Despite that, some fans are creating their own DS version of Super Mario Galaxy, with the first gameplay footage of this project being released last year. It showed off an entirely ground-up remake of Super Mario Galaxy, with its own custom engine that was designed to be played on the Nintendo DS' hardware. While progress has slowed down, the first public demo of this demake has been released for fans to enjoy.
This first demo is available for download on the team's Discord server, which contains a couple of levels from the original game. A video by CometObservator shows off the Mario Squared Galaxy and Hurry Scurry Galaxy levels, both being short affairs that require the player to collect certain objects in order to obtain one of Super Mario Galaxy's Power Stars. The creators have done a lot of work to create the feel of the game being constrained to the handheld hardware, evidenced by its low poly look and compressed audio.
One of the members of the team notes that a lot of progress on this Super Mario Galaxy fan-project was being worked on in their free time, which is why there has been slow progress. The team felt they could at least release the currently final ROM for fans to try out. They noted, however, this demake of Super Mario Galaxy is still in beta, acknowledging that there are unfinished levels, bugs, and incomplete optimizations.