Super Mario Bros. 1

Review made on: Aug. 16, 2000

Pictures were from SMBHQ

In 1988, Super Mario Bros. 1 also included Duck Hunt along with the Nintendo Zapper gun.

    During the 80's, rarely has a game provided such popularity and attention as the original Mario Bros. This game introduced the most popular gaming icon the world has ever known and Mario has starred in more games than any other character this industry has ever seen. Along with appearances in some non-Mario games such as Donkey Kong, Mario has become an instant video game celebrity. Also first introduced to the gaming scene were Luigi, Mario's beloved sidekick and Bowser, the gaming world's first real villain and Princess Toadstool, the Mushroom Princess whom Bowser has had captive. Never has a video game gathered so many memorable characters, who continued to thrive over the years. The story in Mario Bros. goes like this, Mario was called upon by the mushroom people to reverse Bowser's spell he had on them and save their beloved Princess. This game was a pioneer in its own right and was the very first platform side-scrolling game in video game history, and other games such as Megaman and so on can trace the genre's roots right up to the original Mario Bros.

In Super Mario Bros. 1, you can choose to play with Mario & Luigi or with just Mario.

    The gameplay is really simple, and there are basically two operations you can perform on the NES controller pad, the directional arrows move Mario around and the B or A button to jump or throw fireballs, if you're fire Mario of course! Mario just has to jump his way through the levels and at the end of every world, he has to defeat Bowser and save a mushroom guy until the last level, where the real Bowser has Princess Toadstool captive. Also, the one minor fault in gameplay is that there is no continues so if you run out of lives at the last level, then you have to start at level one again, aaarrrrggghhhhh!!!

After you complete the first and 2nd last level of any world, fireworks will give you bonus points.

    The graphics were great at the time and feature great sky blue backgrounds with nicely animated bricks and walls. But today the graphics look horribly horribly outdated, but in those days Mario Bros. was great in graphics, although could be slightly better. Remember we're talking about 1985, 1986 here and Mario Bros was near the top of its time period.

Do these look like trees to you?

    As for the games audio capabilities, the sound of this game was great, and easily recognizable, one of the most hummed tunes in all of video game history, in my opinion and some noises, such as jumping, killing an enemy, shooting a fireball, etc. were very well done. The sound was great, but was limited in selection and was quite repetitive as well.

Depending on how high you jump, you can earn a maximum of 5000 points after completing a level.

    There are a few bugs in this game, first it slows down at some points and the controller doesn't respond in a few instances if you jump forward, but otherwise its a glitch free game. But every game's got to have their own glitches and bugs right???

In this game it is possible to make Mario go up to the very top of the screen.

    As for extras, well not much to report on here, except for the bonus game Duck Hunt which came with the later Mario Bros. packaging. Other than this you can just collect extra lives or just finish the game again! So this is where Mario Bros. really lacks is the extras which make this game excellent but not perfect.

In the underground levels, there are many pipes in which you can enter.

Where's Mario?

    Overall, this is the game that started it all, it started the rise of Nintendo and revolutionized the gaming industry. But if you play this game several times and beat it, it tends to get boring after a while with limited extras, but this game is still a classic in its own right.

There are many warp zones in this game that will help you go further in the game.

At the end of each world, Mario has to enter Bowser's castle and save the "princess".

Ratings:

 

GAMEPLAY	9	Where are the continues when you need them?
GRAPHICS	8.5	Great graphics, near the top at the time, but Zelda was way better.
SOUND	8	Lots of memorable tunes, but the sound gets repetitive after a while.
VALUE	8	Great value, plus Duck Hunt was a nice packaging bonus.
BUGS	8.5	A few minor glitches but no game is perfect.
EXTRAS	5	Sorry, except for Duck Hunt, Nintendo did little to add any replay value to this otherwise great game.
CLASSIC?	9	Yes, an instant classic to Nintendo and platformer fans alike.
FUN FACTOR	8	This game is lots of fun but, after you've beaten it it offers nothing new.
OVERALL	8	An instant classic to any Nintendo fan's library of games, this game revolutionized the gaming industry, but skimps of the Lastability of the game.  This game gets a SEMI-CLASSIC award.

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