Through the various games, cultural references, and even a
movie that would best be forgotten, Mario has solidified his presence as an
iconic character in video games. In
fact, the success of Mario’s games helped lead to other great games, including
my all-time favorite game: the original “Super Smash Bros.”, which I will most
certainly blog about at some point.
In all honesty, I never played the original Super Mario
Bros. until this class. At first, I
found Mario’s movements to be sluggish compared to the newer games, which
created distaste for the game. After
some more play time, though, I realized that I was just ill acquainted with the
controls and game format. I began to
play exceedingly better once I adapted to the style of the game, and the game
became exponentially more fun.
Super Mario Bros. is ridiculously entertaining. After making it fairly far into the game, I
discovered that I enjoyed analyzing the scoring methods more than actually
playing the game itself. Because of
this, I spent a great deal of time playing and re-playing the first level in
order to discover the best way to maximize points. By a long shot, the best way to accomplish
this is to sprint the level with only a single pause: to grab the first mushroom. By doing that, I was able to achieve a score
slightly above 27,000 points, which I have only seen surpassed by those using
an emulator.
Another exciting addition to the game is the warp pipes that
are located in Level 1-2. As I stated
previously, I had never played these games or even known much about them, so I
actually discovered the warp pipes on my own!
This game is understandably considered one of the greatest ones of all
time, and considering the enormous fun that I had with it more than 20 years
after its release, I can understand why.
If you watch Family Guy, you will laugh.
Mario 3: “The Journey is the Destination”
I had, in fact, played Mario 3 previously, so I was already
acquainted with several of the game’s features and additions from the original
Mario. However, for some reason, I had
no idea that there were warp whistles. I
did not feel so silly once I did some online research and discovered that they
are virtually impossible to find unless your name is Jimmy. Of course, using the warp whistles to beat
the entire game is a little cheap; this clip from CollegeHumor illustrates that
point:
Even still, the addition of other features (different layout
of the background, additional types of suits (even though the raccoon and frog
suits look ridiculous, they are quite useful), and the inside-games that
include a roulette-type wheel and mini-boss challenges) made the game playable
for longer periods of time. More than any
of these things, it was very useful to have an overhead map between each stage,
and then, the actual action could occur in the platform-style. This allows for gamers to grab a meal in
between levels or to just take a break, which is a much-needed feature for the
modern gamer. Even though this game is
more fun to play than the original, it is still Super Smash Bros. > Super
Smash Bros. 3 due to the greater overall originality and creativity that Super
Smash Bros. possessed.
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