Nintendo’s 2002 Mario game starts as a vacation on Isle Delfino and turns into community service: Mario is blamed for the graffiti that Shadow Mario has smeared across the island. He cleans it up with FLUDD, a water pack that sprays, hovers and later launches him into the air, and collects Shine Sprites along the way. If you own the game, Nagori lets you play it on iPhone and iPad.
What you need
- An iPhone 12 or newer, or an iPad with an A14 chip or newer, with iOS 17.6 or later.
- Nagori from the App Store. Your first game is free.
- A disc image of your copy of Super Mario Sunshine:
.iso,.gcm,.rvz,.cisoor.gcz, or a.zipor.rarcontaining it. The game fits on a single disc.
No BIOS file is needed.
How to play Super Mario Sunshine on iPhone
- Install Nagori from the App Store.
- Copy your Super Mario Sunshine disc image to the Files app, in iCloud Drive or On My iPhone.
- Open Nagori, tap + and select the file. Add GameCube games from inside Nagori: the Files app’s Open in menu doesn’t hand formats like
.rvzand.gcmto Nagori. - Find Super Mario Sunshine on the GameCube shelf and press Play.
- Switch to a touch layout with two sticks. The default Standard layout has no stick at all. Pause, open Settings → Touch Layout and choose Twin Sticks or DualShock, the two layouts with a second stick for the camera. With a controller connected, you can skip this step.
Controls
Mario moves with the control stick, and the camera turns with the C-stick, which Nagori puts on the right stick. A jumps and R works FLUDD. If the jump button sits where your thumb doesn’t land, open Edit Layout in the pause menu and move it or make it bigger.
With a controller, A is the bottom face button, B the left one, X the right one and Y the top one. Z is on the right shoulder button, and L and R are the triggers. Press the left stick to open Nagori’s pause menu.
The triggers matter in this game. On the GameCube, R is analog: a light press sprays while Mario keeps moving, and a full press plants his feet so you can aim. In Nagori, L and R register as full presses, so you always get the planted spray and can’t spray while running.
Saves: memory card and save states
Super Mario Sunshine offers to save after each Shine Sprite you collect, and writes to the memory card. That card works in Nagori as it did on the console. It stays inside the app, though: it isn’t in the Files app, isn’t part of Export Saves and doesn’t sync to iCloud.
Nagori adds two things on top:
- Quit any time. Leave the app mid-level and Continue puts you back exactly where you were.
- Save states. Pause and choose Save before a hard stretch, like the secret courses where Shadow Mario takes FLUDD away and you’re left with your jumps, or a red coin challenge. If it goes wrong, Load and try again. Nagori keeps your last four saves per game.
Keep saving in the game as well: a save state may not load after some Nagori updates, while the memory card save stays.
Best settings
Open the pause menu and go to Settings → Quality. GameCube games work an iPhone hard, and this setting trades frame rate for heat:
- Low keeps the device coolest, at a lower frame rate.
- Medium, the default, is the place to start.
- High gives the smoothest motion and is meant for the newest iPhones and iPads.
Precise jumps are easier with smooth motion, so try High on a recent device and step down if it gets hot. Full Screen stretches the picture to fill the display.
What isn’t available
- Spraying while running, because the triggers register as full presses (see Controls).
- Higher resolution. Nagori shows GameCube games at their original resolution, without upscaling.
- Rumble. The controller doesn’t vibrate in GameCube games.
