(Original posted on October, 2013)
Released 2012, 3DS
I should start by pointing out that Super Mario Brothers is just about my favorite video game series. Although I messed around with Pac-Man and Donkey Kong a few times as a toddler, I would forget about them moments later. However, I can still clearly remember becoming hooked on games with my first time playing Super Mario Brothers on the NES. After having my mind blown from moving a person in the TV through huge worlds, each subsequent release has been a big deal to me. While I’m not yet man enough for the Famicom’s “SMB2: Lost Levels,” I’ve conquered pretty much every other Mario platformer from the original on the NES until 2012’s New Super Mario Brothers 2. Bringing all that experience, I’ll say now that this is a very good game when judged on its own, but once the inevitable comparisons to past Marios surface, the emotional floods from nostalgia and expectation can make it difficult to enjoy NSMB2 for what it is. I’ll try my best to keep a level head in discussing it…
Just from looking at the box, one would expect the game to be very experimental, with its emphasis on coin collecting and new, gold-themed powerups. While it’s hilarious to see what the hammer brothers do after hitting them with a golden fireball, disappointingly, the coin gimmick essentially gives the player unlimited lives and does very little else in taking the series in a new direction. The other most noticeable feature of the game is it’s attraction through nostalgia; bringing back the raccoon tale from SMB3 and the Reznor bosses from Super Mario World. You can take a powerup or a boss from what many would call two of the greatest games of all time, but level design and mechanics are what really counts…
Compared to past games, the general level design, especially in the beginning, is uninspired, unpolished, unattractive and unmemorable. Yet despite that, the game still has a dozen or so brilliantly constructed levels that are as great as anything you’ve played in the past and make it worth a look. Here are some highlights:
- Mushroom World-A and the gorgeous level 3-5 take me on a trip to Yoshi’s Island in how you interact with the physics and obstacles.
- World 3’s Castle feels like it was built for Super Mario World.
- Level 4-C does everything it can to be creative with the “fuzzy” enemies and is just plain fun.
- Level 6-3 gives off the most ethereal atmosphere in the game, while feeling like a complete re-imagining of level 1-2 from the original Super Mario Brothers.
- Level 6-4 would have fit perfectly within Bowser’s Land in Super Mario Brothers 3.
- Star-1 is wonderfully stylish and also captures the original Super Mario Brothers “feel”.
- The cannon dash levels are the biggest innovation to the game’s mechanics and borrow Mario 3’s unique style, sadly there are only two such levels.
While I loved those levels, they are gems within a larger collection of duds. The game DOES constantly try to introduce new mechanics and ideas, but doesn’t execute them well enough to leave much of an impression. Also, some small details will disappoint obsessive Mario fans such as me.
- For anyone who’s spent some time with SMB3, who doesn’t remember constantly amusing themselves with the “crouching float” move while in a tailed-suit? Despite the blatant nostalgia-bait, that wasn’t included with the NSMB2’s raccoon powerup.
- Playing a 2D Mario, it’s easy to imagine that you’re actually holding a NES or SNES controller. Well, you may finish the game before fully adjusting to the 3DSXL’s uneven d-pad placement in relation to the buttons.
Unlike other games in the series, merely passing a level isn’t too challenging, leaving much of the game’s meat in collecting the star coins. A “collect-a-thon” can be fun when the levels are consistently replayable, fun to explore, and constructed with careful consideration, which I can’t describe NSMB2 as possessing. Many of the star coins are hidden in totally inconspicuous areas. For example, level 5-5’s first star coin only appears after making a dangerous and completely unnecessary leap onto a bill blaster. This particular bill blaster is not the first one to be encountered in the game. As a player, why would I be compelled to consider jumping onto it to discover the secret it holds? There are many other instances where hidden vine blocks have to be hit in order to get access to a gold coin. While making this criticism, I must point out that early this year I collected all the star coins in Super Mario Land 3D, without a guide, having so much fun my head nearly exploded. Besides the main game, the coin-rush mode attempts to bring a new sense of urgency, but over the dozen times I tried playing it, I quickly found myself with the urge to move on to something else.
While I never liked the general look of the NSMB series, the DS version has a few very pleasant moments.
- The “depth of field,” 3D effect is a bit overdone and benefits from slider adjusting at times, but it at least offers something to set it apart from previous other games the series.
- The tendency towards 3DS games being highly saturated in color works out great for the flame effects.
- -The final Bowser fight, not only quite long and tense, finally puts the 3D effect to good use. Plus, I’ve never seen Bowser be more of a jerk than in this game! I had to laugh out loud over the absurd cruelness of what he does!
- Giving some of the enemies a “Halloween” makeover was a great idea, as were the blue goombas from the original making a return.
Aside from some nice touches such as those, the game suffers from the same indistinct and inconsistent graphics seen in each “New” title. Rather leaving some detail to the imagination, the screen is sometimes overcrowded with bland scenery. The worst graphical offense is an instance where a low-color, simple vine sprouts right next to a plastic-like pre-rendered mushroom platform. The ending theme is surprisingly excellent. The rest…is cut, possibly remixed from older NSMB titles. I couldn’t tell either way, which is a disappointment in itself.
If you’ve read this far, I might as well go on a brief tangent. Ever since Super Mario Brothers, I knew I preferred games far more than movies. Because of that, I’ve only recently discovered the first two Rambo films. Rambo: First Blood was amazing. After fifteen minutes of rapidly escalating tension, the action gets going, and you want to jump up and down for the rest of the movie…kind of like playing a great Super Mario game. Rambo II was a different story; it took me 45 minutes to get emotionally invested at all. Afterwards, there were some moments that brought out laughter, anger and joy. Once the movie had me on the edge of my seat for several minutes, but as a whole it was a bore with rubber snakes and bizarrely acted scenes. Still, the first movie was so great that I had to watch it once at least, good or bad. That’s just what NSMB2 felt like.
Even if this game isn’t as great as those before it, there’s still just enough magic that a veteran to the Mario series will need to give it a shot. However, if you pay Nintendo’s $40 asking fee, you may suspect Bowser swooped in on your wallet just before kidnapping the princess.
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