Super Mario Galaxy 2 is a 2010 developed and published by for the . It was first announced at and is the sequel to 2007's . It was released worldwide in 2010. The story follows as he pursues the Koopa King, , into , where he has imprisoned and taken control of the using Power Stars and Grand Stars. Mario must travel across various to recover the Power Stars in order to travel to the center of the universe and rescue Princess Peach.
The game was originally planned as an updated version of Super Mario Galaxy, known as Super Mario Galaxy More. However, it was later decided that the game would be expanded into a fully fleshed-out sequel when the development staff continued to build upon the game with dozens of new ideas. As such, development time expanded to two and a half years. Among the new additions are dynamic environments, new , and the addition of .
Upon release, Super Mario Galaxy 2 was met with critical acclaim, and was considered an improvement over its already-lauded predecessor, with its creativity, gameplay and technological improvements over the original receiving high praise, although its high difficulty, in comparison to its predecessor, received some criticism. It is frequently considered by critics to be one of the and is one of the with over seven million copies sold worldwide.The gameplay of Super Mario Galaxy 2 is similar to , with a focus on platforming based on and around 3D , grouped into levels known as . Planets and galaxies each have varying themes, sizes, landscapes, and climates. The player controls Mario (or later in the game, his brother , though using him is optional), who has special abilities such as the "Spin" attack, long jump, , and a variety of . As in the original, the objective of the game is to travel to the various galaxies and collect Power Stars, which are awarded by completing levels and accomplishing tasks and are used to gain access to later levels. The game retains some gameplay mechanics introduced in the original, such as the blue Star Pointer that allows the player to collect Star Bits and shoot them at enemies, levels that restrict movement to a 2D plane, balance ball levels, and gravity-reversing background arrows
