Luigi won a haunted mansion? And Mario’s trapped inside? You have to find him!
- JP release: 14th September 2001
- NA release: 18th November 2001
- EU release: 3rd May 2002
- Developer: Nintendo
- Publisher: Nintendo
- NGC Magazine Score: 90%
- Mods Used: Widescreen Code, Texture Pack
For a launch title, Luigi’s Mansion was an odd choice. It’s a child friendly horror themed game starring the brother of Mario, and isn’t the kind of game you see people buying consoles for. I got a GameCube on launch day (with the EU’s later but bigger launch line-up) and didn’t buy any of Nintendo’s own games with it. I kind of dismissed Luigi’s Mansion altogether, although much later I played Luigi’s Mansion 3. Going back to the original, I’ve realised I definitely missed out.
In Luigi’s Mansion, Luigi has won a mansion in a competition. Mario, being suspicious, checks it out first and ends up disappearing. While exploring the mansion, Luigi bumps into Professor E. Gadd, a ghost hunter that passes on his special ghost hoover to Luigi, as he feels too old to do the physical work himself. It’s up to Luigi to capture all the ghosts and rescue his brother.
Going straight from Nintendo 64 games to Luigi’s Mansion, the leap in graphics is incredible. There’s so much detail to Luigi and the entire world feels alive and animated. The detail on the Resident Evil-style door unlocking animations (which can be unlocked) is a marvel when hands were extremely rouge throughout the N64’s entire life. Lighting is also a key concept of the game, with Luigi’s torch being a weapon to stun ghosts and casting great shadows.
Luigi’s Mansion follows a tidy room-by-room structure. When you enter a room, the lights will be off. You’ll need to find the ghosts in the room and defeat them (sometimes they’re already in the open, other times it takes a bit more effort). The lights will turn on, but it’s not over: there’s a boo hidden in every room (although you can’t find them in the starting rooms until you accidentally free them all), and you’ll need to find and defeat them – although they can also flee, so you’ll need to follow them through the mansion to capture them.
The game’s true brilliance is in the portrait ghosts, which you’ll encounter throughout the mansion. These will often ignore Luigi until you figure out how to startle them. You’ll have to analyse the room and their actions to solve the “puzzle” of each book. There are some hints available, you can use the Game Boy Horror to scan rooms in a first person mode and scan the ghost for a vague clue, or read books you find throughout the mansion for some hidden details. They don’t tell you the answer, but instead guide you into thinking up the right idea.
As you interact with the environment and defeat ghosts, you’ll find money, coins and gems scattered around. These don’t provide upgrades, but are instead linked to a scoring system. Even if you don’t care about scores, it’s still compulsive to try and get as much as you can, searching every nook and cranny to find hidden secrets. The notes also flutter around beautifully, thanks to the game’s wonderful cloth physics, and it’s just lovely to see a shower of money.
The ranking system was Nintendo’s plan for the main criticism of Luigi’s Mansion at the game: the short length of it, so a way to encourage replays was added into the game. As a big launch title, I can understand the complaints, but playing it now and the shortness of the game is actually in its favour. There’s also a slighter harder mode unlocked at the end of the game, although Nintendo weren’t entirely happy with what made it to the game at launch.
However, the GameCube was released a lot later in Europe, which gave Nintendo a bit of extra time to tweak things. The Hidden Mansion is mirrored in the PAL version of the game, and retains the original darkness of the original (the normal mode was brightened up a bit in Europe). In this version, harder ghosts appear earlier, there are more ghosts in some rooms and some of the boss fights are tweaked, which gives a much bigger incentive to play through this version as it’s more than just ghosts with more HP.
Luigi’s Mansion truly is a wonderful game that still stands up today. It’s full of charm, especially with Luigi nervously humming the wonderful theme tune, and the entire mansion feels like a living place. While it was a poor choice for a launch game, it’s still a great game.
Fave
Put simply, Luigi’s Mansion is a living cartoon. Yes, we probably said much of the same thing about Super Mario 64 all those years ago – but the difference with Luigi’s is the detail. When you see Luigi shiver with fright as another Boo appears from nowhere behind him, watch a ghost stretch and deform as it’s sucked into the hoover’s nozzle, glimpse a golden coin bouncing and spinning as it skitters across the floor it hits you that – in the right hands – a console of GameCube’s power can create the kind of visuals that actually add real personality to the game.
Mark Green, NGC Issue #67
Remake or remaster?
It’s a massive shame that only Luigi’s Mansion 2 was remastered for the Switch. It really should have been a combination of both games. And even if one were to be chosen, this one is much closer to Luigi’s Mansion 3.
Official Ways to get the game
There is no official way to buy Luigi’s Mansion, but it will be playable via the Switch 2 NSO service.
Europe
Japan
North America
Re-Releases
2018: 3DS Remaster.
GameCube Games by Date
2002: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
2003: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
2004: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
2005: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
2006: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec
Luigi’s Mansion is the only one in the series I ever bothered to finish. I think it’s shorter length helps it there. I found the other two games too long.
The European Hidden Mansion is so strange, it’s so much harder then the other versions, and the third boss even has a completely new mechanic that’s not used anywhere else!
It’s also the only way you can get an A rank, BTW. Good luck!
Luigi’s Mansion is the best classic Resident Evil game.
Phenomenal game… that came out at the wrong time. When everyone wanted a huge “proper” Super Mario 64 sequel, they instead get an intentionally short n’ sweet and highly replayable adventure game. It was a game that flied completely in the face of industry trends, and that was not by accident. Nintendo were making a concieted effort, even back as far as 2001, to avoid the current industry trend of chucking more and more gameplay length and production values into their titles; with ballooning budgets and more and more FMVs; as evidenced by the many early GCN era interviews of the day (like this one). Games like Pikmin also followed the same philosophy, of making shorter games that were designed to be highly replayable.
And really, that works completely to Luigi’s Mansion’s benefit. It’s a very replayable game; that encourages repeat playthroughs where you continue to get better and better ranks. It’s a big part of why I keep coming back to it, and why I enjoyed it much moreso than its 3DS sequel (Though LM3 does manage to top this one).
BTW, @Cube, I’m disappointed that you didn’t make any mention of the excellent 3DS remake, which makes good on the original GCN version’s promise of stereoscopic 3D support! Not even a mention of the GCN’s hidden S3D support? Or the S3D screen that was shown at E3 2002 and never made public knowledge until a sudden Iwata Asks 3DS interview 9 whole years later!?
Luigi’s Mansion is one I never got to try. I never really felt the pull for it when I was younger (that was a time where longer games and broader content were more highly valued). These days, I appreciate its strengths so much more, and I’d love to give it a try.