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| Super Mario Brothers Reviewed by Pirate Yoshi Over-view: The game that started many things: the life of the NES, the career of the world's most popular mascot (as more than a mere plumber), and the big break Nintendo needed to become the industry leader. I now review for you Super Mario Brothers, for the Nintendo Entertainment System. In case you've never played it (fat chance). Graphics: 4/10 Obviously, I can't be comparing today's good graphics with 1985's good graphics, but I'm willing to throw a bone to Super Mario Brothers here; as we later saw, the NES was capable of some very fine images, and Super Mario Brothers wasn't exactly one of them. However, for being the first NES game, it was surprisingly stellar, in comparison with the games before it--Pacman, Donkey Kong, Space Invaders, and Pong, to name a few). Therefore, I measure its graphics as below average, but not awful. Sound: 6.4/10 Ah, yes. The familiar music that started it all. Super Mario Brothers is very well put together in the region of sound, with the infamous bouncing toon that has existed for twenty years and the sound effects that we all remember and love: the bop of a brick, the plip of kicking Koopa shells, the hollow sound of a warp pipe in use, the item block ring, the 1-up twinkle... The reason I docked SMB a bit was because of the repetitiveness of its music; as much as I love the theme, the game *could've* had some additional tunes for other levels (besides the castles, which sounded rather monotinous, too). Controls: 10/10 As far as I see, the controls were flawless for the original Super Mario Bros. Mario was easy to control, with a high jump, a quick sprint, and an unnatural ability to curve his leaps in midair to better arrange himself for a landing. I have no problems with the control scheme, and the buttons are well made use of. Nintendo already had this catagory down back on NES, and they still tend to do well in this catagory. Challenge: 9/10 Like any game, this title, too, becomes much easier with practice. Years of practice have gone by for me, and now I would be more tempted to drop this score to a six or seven, but thinking of the amount of time I've spent playing and all the lives I've lost, I can't help but slap on something harder; this is a hard game, folks, and nobody's going to whiz right through it on their first try. I believe Super Mario Bros. deserves a nine in this catagory, as it *can* be beaten with relatively little trouble, but only after lots of trial runs and game overs. Replay: 9/10 Who would ever have thought that the first NES game would be reincarnated over and over again, on GameBoy and in Animal Crossing, and no doubt it will continue to be in the future. The reason it has yet to truly sink under from the gaming world is because of its replayability; Super Mario Brothers is a fun game to play, EACH AND EVERY TIME! To this day, I enjoy playing Super Mario Brothers! Granted, not as much as I did ten years ago, but this game's got kick, and I just don't seem to get tired of playing through again... With a second, more challenging quest, lots of warp zones, ways to get 99 lives from one enemy, and trying to navigate your way into the infamous "Minus World", I find Super Mario Brothers a very pleasurable experience each time I plug in my NES to play (or visit Animal Crossing...) Gameplay: 9.8/10 This is a primary example of what a true platformer plays like. In some ways, I find the original Super Mario Brothers to be wildly innovative; in other ways, I consider it the standard game by which others are measured--it is what is expected. Honestly, I think it lies somewhere in between; SMB was the first of Nintendo's games to utilize a scrolling screen, which was major when the game was released, and it made use of hidden shortcuts and mystical surprises yet unheard of at the time. Things like warp pipes that could take you to strange new places, often filled with treasure, were a delight to use, and finding hidden blocks with items in them was a blast. The level design, in particular, is fantastic; this is what I truly consider to be superb design, and it's apparent a lot of thought went into the placement of each individual enemy, block, or obstacle. The levels are challenging, yet fun to try and race through; often times, several tries must be taken to surpass an especially tricky spot in the stage, such as a high jump or a low leap over a pit with overhanging blocks threatening to bump you down from above. The traps in the castle were set up in very strategic places, hoping to nail Mario in a moment of panic, and the variations in level styles, from being in caverns to under the sea to hopping on giant mushrooms to a frantic level-long Lakitu chase, kept the action fresh and exciting. The reason SMB doesn't receive a 10 is because I felt that some other ideas could've been incorporated somewhere along the way, such as some more difficult combinations of traps and enemies. However, Japan's Super Mario Brothers 2 was just that, so I guess Nintendo made note of this in the long run. **Story: .2/1 Okay, so the story was not much, and later on in the series, Nintendo more or less stopped trying to put some background, and just let the game progress forwards instead. In Super Mario Brothers, however, the plot was Princess Toadstool's being kidnapped by the nefarious "sorcerer king" (give me a break!) Bowser. Although the sorcerer bit was stripped from the series by Super Mario Bros. 3, the storylines never improved much from this, always coming back to Toadstool (Peach) being stolen away by Bowser. Still, a story is a story, and the idea of this simple plumber traveling through the Mushroom Kingdom to battle the over-throwing Koopa Troop is worth one-fifth of a point, I guess. **Multiplayer: .3/1 Honestly, there's not a whole lot of multiplayer here, since only two players can play, and only taking turns. If one player is superbly better than the other, it might not be until six worlds later that the second player gets to finally try the first level--and die on the first enemy, giving the controls back to player one to skip through another two worlds in his turn. Later on, in Super Mario Bros. Deluxe for GBA, this was adjusted so that BOTH players were able to play at the same time, which would've made a nice touch on the original. However, players is players, and SMB allowed two to compete against each other to get to the end of a tough level first, or finish the game perhaps, so points are given. Graphics: 4/10 Sound: 6.4/10 Controls: 10/10 Challenge: 9/10 Replay: 9/10 Gameplay: 9.8/10 **Story: .2/1 **Multiplayer: .3/1 Total Score: 8.7 Score Explanation: Actually, I'm a bit surprised that SMB got as low a score as it did--I credit it to the graphics--but I feel the individual catagories are weighed fairly, perhaps even a little optimistic. But, then again, I assume you're reading just to see the numbers, rather than determine whether or not you want to go buy this game...because if you do, you're a little too late.... |