Nintendo has assembled a veritable dream-team for the development of New Super Mario Bros. led by Takashi Tezuka, the man responsible for titles such as Super Mario Bros. 3, Super Mario World and The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past – all amongst the best 2D games in history. The team appears to have thoroughly examined what made the previous Super Mario games work, and then stripped out many of the superfluous additions that have been made to the series since 1985. There’s no complicated plot and only a handful of power ups, but the design and execution of the game is full of Mario charm and Nintendo magic. You could say that New Super Mario Bros. is exactly what the title states.
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Looks familiar
New Super Mario Bros. begins with a very basic introductory scene, where Bowser Jnr. summons a storm to attack Peach’s castle in order to lure Mario away. He then promptly snatches Peach, catching Mario’s attention. Mario gives chase, only to be stomped down into his not-so-super form, but continues in pursuit of the younger Bowser. It all happens in the space of about 20 seconds, but it’s the most appropriate way to begin the game. At the start of each world, he’ll run to the nearest castle – Mario will be required to make his way through each stage to the sub-castle, and once he defeats Bowser Jnr. there, the bugger will run off to the main castle, where you’ll face an intense boss encounter. Beat the boss and he’ll run off again – repeat until you make it to the end.
There’s a distinct feeling of consolidation in New Super Mario Bros., with the play mechanics taking inspiration from Super Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros. 3, and Super Mario World, but also incorporating some of the new moves from Mario’s 3D adventures. Nintendo’s amalgamation of these Mario game elements is not an incomprehensible mish-mash, like many other games that pinch bits from others – in fact, it’s a seemingly ideal aggregation of previous Super Mario efforts, yet feels quite fresh. The simple two-button control style of the early Super Mario games returns, but within this simple control scheme lay many more advanced moves – butt stomps, wall jumps, triple jumps and more.
Some fans were a little unhappy to hear about some of Nintendo’s simplification of Mario elements for New Super Mario Bros. Yoshi is nowhere to be seen, Mario cannot fly and the number of power ups is greatly reduced, but the experience doesn’t seem to suffer from these losses. There are a few new power ups; the blue shell which will allow Mario to slide across levels like a Koopa Troopa, the mini mushroom which will shrink Mario to allow him access to spaces which he could not previously breach, and the super mushroom, which turns Mario into a Godzilla-like giant, allowing him to crush anything in his path, be it enemies, platforms or warp pipes – you name it and he can probably break it. A couple of the classic power ups still remain, like the Fire Flower and Star Man, and players are able to store one power up, which can be activated by tapping the touch screen.
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Mario smash!
Perhaps the most outstanding feature of New Super Mario Bros. is the level design, which again reflects the melding of various elements from previous Super Mario titles. Players will encounter a variety of different levels – horizontal, vertical, underwater, forced scrolling both vertically and horizontally, and even more unconventional level types featuring things such as bouncy mushrooms, crazy bending mushrooms and all manner of weird and wonderful things that very few developers are able to pull off effectively. Many levels have a number of secret exits which will lead to hidden levels, as well as a number of collectibles – 3 giant coins in each stage, and a hoop which will trigger 8 red coins. The giant coins will allow players to buy their way onto new paths, which lead to new levels and the toadstool houses, which hold power ups and 1Ups.
The world map is set up much like Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World, where players will encounter a number of levels, a sub castle, more levels and then a main castle. The game also has objects on the map that float around, like the red item box and the Hammer Bros. Starting a level while you are on top of one of these objects will them to appear at the start of the stage, rather than in a self contained stage like the third Super Mario title. Progression is slightly different to previous titles; the game is set up to allow players to bypass levels and even entire worlds. There are 80 levels in the game, but you’ll only see about half of these if you take the direct route through the game.
A number of new enemies have been added to New Super Mario Bros. – some are entirely new, like the Broozer, Sushi, Unagi, while others are modifications or super-sized versions of existing enemies. Many of the classic enemies return, as well as a number of newer foes from Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Sunshine. Each of the castle stages has its own boss; the sub-castle pits you up against Bowser Jr., while the main castle will have its own unique enemy. Unfortunately, these bosses aren’t quite up to the standards set by other Mario games, but they’re still fairly good; some even pay homage to previous encounters.
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Boo and Chomp have both put on a bit of weight since the last 2D Mario game
The only weakness that really stands out is New Super Mario Bros’ difficulty. It may well have been a compromise to make the game more accessible, but it is certainly the easiest Mario game to date. The long term value of the game is really debateable – anyone could breeze through the game’s main path in about 6 hours, but in doing so, one misses over half of the game, including two whole worlds. The game does have a bit of supplementary content – all of the mini-games from Super Mario 64 DS make an appearance and a two-player competitive mode has been added. The two player mode is quite simple; players chose one of 5 stages, with one player as Mario and the other as Luigi. The aim of the game is to get 5 stars – they’ll appear randomly in the areas of the stage, and it’s essentially a race to get to the star first. If you’re not one for running after the stars, you can jump on your foe or hit him with a fire ball to make him lose his stars, and take them for yourself. The stages themselves wrap around, making the action even more hectic.
Nintendo has made a number of distinct style choices that set the visual design of New Super Mario Bros. apart from its predecessors. The most obvious of these is the change from sprites to 3D models for the game’s characters. This brings the look of the game into line with the more recent 3D iterations, but it may upset some purists. Regardless of whether you have rose tinted lenses fused to your eyeballs, it is still easy to appreciate what Nintendo has achieved with the game’s graphics – vibrant colours, detailed backgrounds, smooth animation and a framerate that never skips a beat. The soundtrack is a mix of old and new Mario tunes, perhaps owing to the fact that Koji Kondo was in more overseer role, rather than producing the sound himself. Many of the sound effects are recycled from the SNES era, but the vocal antics of Charles Martinet also make an appearance.
It’s not easy to put a final score on New Super Mario Bros. – while the game kicks the crap out of everything else currently available on both current generation handheld systems, it’s over a little too quickly. Some might argue that the game doesn’t have many innovative features, but in reality, all one really needs is a fun game, and fun is something that New Super Mario Bros. has truckloads of. The game manages to deliver what feels like a fresh experience, despite the fact that many of the elements can be traced back to earlier entries in the series. It’s great to see that Nintendo still has plenty of ideas for 2D versions of the Mario franchise, and we wait with baited breath to see what they can do in the future.
DS games are fairly cheap, which is some motivation, and some are online, which is really cool. 
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