Super Mario Galaxy keeps making me want to eat it

Mario stars always evoke positive feelings. That's their whole deal. You complete the level and feel the achievement. Success. Relief. But only in the Super Mario Galaxy games do they inspire a strange feeling that some video game objects inexplicably evoke: hunger.

This is not the case with other 3D Mario games. The stars were introduced in Super Mario 64 and went through several redesigns under different names in the following years. But whether you're talking straight stars, moons, or glow, none are as appealing as the rewards Mario unlocks in Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Galaxy 2.

Power Star Evolution

Mario collects a star in Super Mario 64.

Let's take a star trek back down the rainbow path. In Super Mario 64, the Power Stars look sharp, as if they were punched out of sheet metal and then sprayed bright yellow. It's still exciting to collect them, but that was an earlier era and the polygons that made up our games were much more distinct.

Super Mario Sunshine approaches the gold standard with Shine Sprites. They have a pleasant roundness similar to a doubloon. But they also look like a sheriff's badge. Less starvation and more anxiety over the legal trouble Mario finds himself in this game thanks to his evil doppelganger Shadow Mario.

Power Stars are mostly replaced by Power Moons in Super Mario Odyssey, although the true article returns at the end of the game once you unlock the Mushroom Kingdom area. They aim to replicate the look of the originals in Super Mario 64 and therefore retain their sharpness. So aside from small cameos in the spin-offs, all we're left with is the Galaxy games. And these are by far the tastiest looking Power Stars of all.

Why do the stars of the galaxy produce delicious food?

Mario grabs a star in Super Mario Galaxy on Switch.

It's hard to explain what makes Galaxy Power Stars so delicious. My hypothesis is that it is a confluence of artistic choices and technological possibilities. These particular Power Stars would only appear at that particular moment.

First, all the jaggedness of the 64 and Sunshine designs has been sanded away. Galaxy and Galaxy 2 hit the Wii era and Nintendo had its polygon game on lock. They look so round, and since the best foods are round—pizza, burgers, the third thing that's actually good for you—the stars' luscious plumpness feels right at home on the buffet table.

A cake, a bucket of chicken, a pint of Ben & Jerry's, a mug of hot cocoa—seriously, all the best foods are round.

Something about the period flowery lighting also adds to the effect, where a bright white light seems to shine at certain points on the stars, softening to gold and then shading to dark brown. It's the closest Mario stars have ever come to looking like chocolate coins or Easter bunnies wrapped in gold foil.

There are other foods that remind me of stars. They look like lemon jelly. They look like chicken soup. This bloom effect makes the edges darker than the center, kind of like the crust on a pie or the slightly burnt pastry on the edge of a danish where the cheese caramelizes slightly.

Honestly, maybe it's just the cheese. Perhaps the range of colors visible on the Galaxy's Power Stars reminds me of cheese. Slightly burnt on the edges, melted and gooey in the middle. This is not where I thought we were going. But Mario looks like the guy on the pizza box, so I think he should appreciate some processed cheese. Case closed.