Wide range of moves

Before this, we were all used to Mario just getting new power ups and gaining abilities through collecting things. But in Mario 64, Mario has a lot of different jumps and moves you can use all the time. There's now a double jump and even a triple jump. You can jump off walls. There are sideways cartwheels, backlips, long jumps, ground pounds, crawling, punching, kicking, and slide and sweep kicks.

It was a huge change from previous Mario games where all you did was pick up an item and gain an ability. You were handed all these cool moves that were extremely helpful in the game, and you never lose them, even if you take damage. It added a lot of depth to the gameplay.