New Super Mario Bros.

With this being the first 2D Mario platformer in over a decade, Nintendo had the challenge of making sure that this brought a exciting new twist on a long dead format. This game clearly does that. The feeling of playing through the various individual worlds with a minimap similar to SMB3 returns, with mini castles containing Bowser Jr instead of koopalings. A new addition to the game is the red flying block, which as well as your normal Super Mushroom and Star the potential to drop one of the three new powerups - Blue Shell, Mini Mushroom and Mega Mushroom. All of these are solid powerups, with the Blue Shell giving you a large amount of speed and the ability to travel like a koopa shell, the mini mushroom letting you access closed off areas and run on water, and the Mega Mushroom giving you a temporary feeling of invincibility as you run through the level, destroying pipes and blocks. Another strong point are the bosses at the end of every world. With the exclusion of Worlds 1 and 8, which both have Bowser as a boss, every other world has a unique boss. You have returning characters such as Petey Piranha and Monty Mole

É redondinho, o que é de se esperar. Tem algumas (poucas) fases que se destacam em criatividade e level design. Mas o grau de simplicidade é tamanho que fica difícil diferenciá-lo de outros da série.

É como pegar os elementos mais essenciais de Mario e colocar num jogo, sem incluir mais nada. Se sobra polimento, falta personalidade.

While I think this game does a lot right for the series, taking the beautiful graphics off the shelf, it is probably as generic a Mario title as it gets and just feels like a lazy mishmash of all the series tropes into one game. Great presentation though, and some of the later worlds are a lot of fun but I feel some of the platforming elements could have been done a lot better. Mario's enhanced abilities like triple jumping and wall sliding are definitely welcomed and fun improvements in parts, which makes this game very addictive. Great music at least, some of the best of the series.

As a platforming game serving as a throwback to classic 2D Mario, it's good! Keep in mind that when this came out, the last 2D Mario game (not counting games starring other Mario characters, like Yoshi's Island or Wario Land) was in 1992, with Super Mario Land 2: Six Golden Coins. So it was a fresh change of pace to see classic Mario gameplay again! However, it feels very much like a quick handheld spinoff game rather than a real attempt to improve and innovate the 2D Mario series.

In this game's simplicity, I would say that its gameplay is mostly a throwback to the original Super Mario Bros, which I suppose is true to the title. However, the level themes and world map system from SMB3 are back, along with Super Mario World's secret exits and item reserve feature. Unfortunately, the world maps aren't built together like in World, and the cannon system of transporting from world to world is a lot less satisfying than the secret map paths in World, which doubled to make Dinosaur Land feel cohesive. The level design is also less creative and simply fun than SMB3, and for that matter, this game is missing all of that one's new powerups. There are a few interesting new powerups, and tricks from the 3D games (namely the wall-jump and triple jump) are added to modern things up a bit, which does lead to interesting challenges at times. These challenges are sorely needed, as even when I was 8 year old this game was a cinch to finish. Nonetheless, I can remember the wall kicks being fun to pull off.

Along with wall jumps, the new Mega Mushroom and Mini Mushroom are just so much fun. Stomping through a level crushing everything in sight is satisfying on a basic level, but playing as a tiny Mario that can run on water and jump higher (but with fucky momentum!) adds an interesting new direction to gameplay. And the Blue Koopa Shell is such a cool powerup, I'm a little shocked they didn't come up with it before. It's awesome to just slide around killing every enemy and breaking every block in your path, and in the color-swapped uniform of your main foes no less.

Now I mentioned that as a platforming game this is a solid experience, but if you decide to play it as a platforming+exploring game by attempting to collect all the Star Coins or find every secret exit, you're going to run into some problems. Some of the secrets are just so obscure, you are not finding them without an online guide. Many of them suffer from requiring a powerup, which sounds like a cool idea...only a lot of times, the powerup you need to get to the secret exit isn't in the damn level! So if you need a Mini Mushroom to get to a tiny pipe, you're going to have to win them via easy-to-fuck-up slot games at the Toad Houses (another returning feature from SMB3) or replay a level where you can find one. I had to replay World 1-4 so many damn times to find the Secret Exits!

I gave up trying to find every Star Coin once I got to World 7, by which point they start being hidden in such annoying places, it's not worth the trouble. It's especially not worth the trouble considering the "reward" for doing so is extremely paltry. My advice is not to waste your time with the Star Coins, all you need them for is a few secret levels and Toad Houses in case you really suck at this game. You shouldn't suck at it though, because until around World 6 where the challenge increases to "lower average", the game is pretty easy.

This is a fine game for Mario fans, and if you really like 2D Mario gameplay, go for it. But NSMB Wii and NSMB U are arguably better than this in every way, except music--this game has some great tunes. This one does have the benefit of being a short title if you're looking for something to pick up and play, and it's certainly packed full of secrets, including two whole "secret" worlds! Just don't expect the magic of the mighty Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World.