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| Super Mario | |
|---|---|
 Logo since 2011 | |
| Genre(s) | Platform |
| Developer(s) |
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| Publisher(s) | Nintendo |
| Creator(s) | Shigeru Miyamoto |
| Artist(s) |
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| Composer(s) | |
| Platform(s) | |
| First release | Super Mario Bros. September 13, 1985 |
| Latest release | Super Mario Bros. Wonder October 20, 2023 |
| Spin-offs | Luigi Yoshi Wario Mario Kart Mario Party Paper Mario Mario & Luigi |
Super Mario[a] (also known as Super Mario Bros.[b] and Mario[c]) is a platform game series created by Nintendo starring their mascot, Mario. It is the central series of the greater Mario franchise. At least one Super Mario game has been released for every major Nintendo video game console. However, there have also been a number of Super Mario video games released on non-Nintendo gaming platforms.[1] There are more than 20 games in the series.
The Super Mario games are set primarily in the fictional Mushroom Kingdom, typically with Mario as the player character. He is usually joined by his brother, Luigi, and often by other members of the Mario cast. As platform games, they involve the player character running and jumping across platforms and atop enemies in themed levels. The games have simple plots, typically with Mario and Luigi rescuing the kidnapped Princess Peach from the primary antagonist, Bowser. The first game in the series, Super Mario Bros., released for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1985, established the series' core gameplay concepts and elements. These include a multitude of power-ups and items that give the character special powers such as fireball-throwing and size-changing.[2]
The Super Mario series is part of the greater Mario franchise, which includes other video game genres and media such as film, television, printed media, and merchandise. More than 380 million copies of Super Mario games have been sold worldwide, making it the fifth-bestselling video game series, behind the larger Mario franchise, the puzzle series Tetris, the Pokémon video games, and first-person shooter series Call of Duty.[3]
Gameplay[edit]
 | This section needs additional citations for verification. (December 2021) |
The objective of the game is to progress through levels by defeating enemies, collecting items and solving puzzles without dying. Power-up use is integral to the series. The series has installments featuring both two and three-dimensional gameplay. In the 2D games, the player character (usually Mario) jumps on platforms and enemies while avoiding their attacks and moving to the right of the scrolling screen. 2D Super Mario game levels have single-exit objectives, which must be reached within a time limit and lead to the next sequential level. Super Mario Bros. 3 introduced the overworld, a map of nonlinear levels that branches according to the player's choice.[4] Super Mario World introduced levels with multiple exits.
3D installments in the series have had two subgenres: open world exploration based games and more linear 3D games with a predetermined path.[5] Levels in the open world games, 64, Sunshine and Odyssey, allow the player to freely explore multiple enclosed environments in 360-degree movement. As the game progresses, more environments become accessible.[6] The linear 3D games, Galaxy, Galaxy 2, 3D Land and 3D World, feature more fixed camera angles and a predetermined path to a single goal.
Playable characters[edit]
The series often features the option to play as characters other than Mario, usually Luigi. Earlier games have offered an alternating multiplayer mode in which the second player controls Luigi on their turn. Luigi is often only playable by player one in a second, more challenging iteration of the base game, such as in The Lost Levels, Galaxy 2, New Super Luigi U and the special worlds in 3D Land; these feature lower gravity and reduced friction for Luigi. Later games allow four player simultaneous play. Playable characters other than Mario and Luigi have included Toads, Peach, Yoshi, Wario, Rosalina, Miis, Toadette, Nabbit, Daisy, and Bowser Jr. Characters are sometimes differentiated by special abilities. Super Mario Maker includes costumes that depict many more characters (Super Mario Maker 2 includes only a Link costume).
Power-ups and transformations[edit]
Mushroom power-ups appear in almost every Super Mario game. The most iconic of these is the Super Mushroom.[7][8] The Super Mushroom increases the character's size, turning them into a "Super" variant, and allows them to break certain blocks. When hit by an enemy, the character reverts to their smaller size instead of losing a life.[7] When the character is in their "Super" form, most blocks that would contain a Super Mushroom instead offer a more powerful power-up such as the Fire Flower. The Super Mushroom is similar in appearance to the Amanita muscaria, with an ivory stalk below a most commonly red and white (originally red and orange) spotted cap. Created by chance, Shigeru Miyamoto stated in an interview that beta tests of Super Mario Bros. proved Mario too tall, so the development team implemented mushrooms to grow and shrink Mario.[9] Different variants of mushroom power-ups appear in the series. For example, Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels introduces the Poison Mushroom, which causes damage when collected; and New Super Mario Bros. introduces the Mini Mushroom, which shrinks the character to miniature size; and the Mega Mushroom, grows the character into a towering, invulnerable giant who destroys enemies and the environment by running through them.[10]
Super Mario Bros. 3 introduces suits to the Super Mario series, many of which are based on animals or Mario enemies. The Raccoon Suit (provisioned by a Super Leaf) and the Tanooki Suit each provide the character with a tail that enables flight. In addition, the Tanooki Suit lets the character spontaneously change into an invincible statue for about five seconds. Super Mario Bros. 3 includes a Hammer Bros. suit, which allows Mario and Luigi to throw hammers as projectiles to defeat enemies at a distance. Other suits in later games in the series include the Frog Suit, Penguin Suit, Cat Suit, Boomerang Suit, and Bee Suit.
Projectiles[edit]
The flower power-ups let the player character shoot projectiles. The Fire Flower, introduced in Super Mario Bros., transforms the character into a Fire variant who can throw bouncing fireballs at enemies. Galaxy is the first 3D Super Mario game to have the Fire Flower. In Land and Maker 2, the Superball is a bouncing ball obtained from a Super Flower, which the character can use to defeat enemies and collect coins. The Ice Flower transforms the character into an Ice variant who can shoot balls of ice as projectiles similar to those of the Fire Flower; they freeze enemies in blocks of ice that can be used as platforms or thrown as projectiles, as seen in New Super Mario Bros. Wii and New Super Mario Bros. U.[11] In Galaxy, the Ice Flower turns Mario or Luigi into ice and lets him walk on lava or water for a limited time by freezing the surface. Lastly, New Super Mario Bros. 2's Gold Flower lets Mario or Luigi turn bricks into coins and earn bonus coins for defeating enemies.
Koopa Shells serve as a major projectile in the series, featuring since the original game. The character can throw them to defeat enemies, collect coins, and activate the functions of blocks. Power-ups are available for Yoshi to breathe fire in World, Yoshi's Island, and 64 DS, breathe freezing air and spit seeds in Yoshi's Island, spit out enemies in the World games, and spit juice in Sunshine. Other power-ups let the character throw bombs, boomerangs, and baseballs and shoot cannonballs. In Odyssey, Mario can possess characters, some of which can launch various projectiles. Flying shoot 'em up gameplay also appears in the series. Mario pilots the armed Sky Pop biplane and Marine Pop submarine in Land. The Koopa Clown Car, aircraft of Bowser and the Koopalings, can sometimes shoot fireballs in Maker.
Ridable animals and vehicles[edit]
Apart from automated objects in levels that may transport the player character, certain ridable animals and vehicles have appeared that the player controls. Mario's dinosaur friend Yoshi has appeared as a mount to the player character in several Super Mario games since Super Mario World. In Yoshi's Island and 64 DS, instead of the player character merely riding on Yoshi's back, Yoshi is the player character. Yoshis generally have abilities including eating enemies, flying, and breathing fire. Miyamoto had originally wished for Mario to be able to ride a dinosaur in Super Mario Bros., but this wasn't possible due to the technical restraints of the system.[citation needed] Poochi is a dog featuring in Yoshi's Island who Yoshi can ride. Plesiosaurs Dorrie and Plessie can be ridden by the player characters in 64 and 3D World respectively,[12][13] with Plessie serving a larger role in Bowser's Fury.[14]
Various vehicles that the player character can control have also appeared. These include a magic carpet in 2, flying clouds in several 2D games, submarines in Land and Yoshi's Island, an airplane in Land, a helicopter, train, and mole tank in Yoshi's Island, cars in Yoshi's Island and Maker 2, and the Koopa Clown Car aircraft in the Maker games.
Blocks[edit]
Most items in the Super Mario series appear from item blocks when hit, which originated in Super Mario Bros. and have persisted throughout the series, where the character hits a block to receive either coins or power-ups. Variations include those that are invisible until hit, advice dispensers, produce another block, move, frozen, contingent on a switch, bouncy, etc. The propeller block lets the character spin up into the air and slowly descend, and the Gold Block generates coins through running. A single block is the unit of measurement in the design of Super Mario levels.
Extra lives[edit]
Player characters can gain extra lives in most of the games. The 1-Up mushroom was introduced in Super Mario Bros., with the term 1-up subsequently being used generically in other video game series to refer to extra lives. In the monochromatic Super Mario Land and Super Mario Land 2, instead of a differently colored mushroom, the 1-Up is shown as a heart. Super Mario World introduced the 3-Up Moon. 1-Ups can also be earned through collecting a certain number of coins or playing minigames.
Invincibility[edit]
Invincibility is an effect first appearing in the three Super Mario Bros. games, where it is granted by a "Starman",[15][16][17] an anthropomorphized, flashing star. The star has also been named the "Super Star" in the two Super Mario World games as well as the New Super Mario Bros. games[18][19] and the "Rainbow Star" in the two Super Mario Galaxy games. Picking up the star makes the character temporarily invincible, able to resist any harm. Use of the item is accompanied by a distinctive music track that appears consistently across most of the games. The player character flickers a variety of colors – and in some games, moves with increased speed and enhanced jumping ability – while under the Star's influence. While invincible, the character defeats any enemy upon contact with it. In Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island, the star gives the normally immobile baby Mario the ability to run as well as become invincible. In Super Mario 64 and 64 DS, invincibility is provided when the character becomes metal or intangible. The Mega Mushroom provides temporary invincibility with the addition of giant size and environment destruction (see Power-ups and transformations).
Collectibles[edit]
Super Mario level design traditionally incorporates many distributed coins as puzzles, rewards, and guidance through the level. Coins are often found floating in the air in groups. Most Super Mario games award the player an extra life once a certain amount of gold coins are collected, commonly 50 or 100. Several coin variants exist, such as silver coins, dragon coins, star coins, and more. In 64, Sunshine, Galaxy, and Galaxy 2, coins replenish health (and air, when the character is underwater). In 64 and Sunshine, collecting 100 coins in a level results in a Power Star or Shine Sprite respectively. There are also stages in that game reward a Power Star for collecting eight red coins in a level, worth two normal coins each. In 64, a blue coin is worth five normal coins. In Sunshine, blue coins act as a side quest when brought to the Delfino Bank and for every ten blue coins deposited, Mario will earn a Shine Sprite. In the Galaxy series, after finishing each game once, stages unlock where Mario or Luigi can collect 100 purple coins to earn a Power Star. In Galaxy 2, they can also be used to feed some hungry "Luma" characters that can turn into either an item or another planet.
The games often feature other tokens found in levels to progress in the overworld, most frequently with the visual motif of a star. They are typically situated in locations that are not readily found or reached, or awarded for completing stunts, or objectives given by NPCs. They include the Power Stars in Super Mario 64 and the Super Mario Galaxy games, Shine Sprites in Super Mario Sunshine and Bowser's Fury, Star Coins in the New Super Mario Bros. series and Super Mario 3D Land, Green Stars in the Galaxy games and Super Mario 3D World, and Power Moons in Super Mario Odyssey. In Super Mario Land 2, there are six Golden Coin tokens that must be collected to finish the game.
Warp Pipes and Warp Cannons[edit]
The Warp Pipe is a common method of transportation used in many of the Mario series games. Warp Pipes are most often green but also appear in other colors (early games included silver pipes, newer games have introduced red, green, blue and yellow pipes), and have many uses in the series. Warp Pipes can also contain enemies, usually Piranha Plants, and sometimes launch the player into the air (most commonly seen in the New Super Mario Bros. series). In early Mario games such as Super Mario Bros., special, well-hidden areas known as Warp Zones contain pipes that allow players to skip several worlds (handfuls of levels) at once.[20] In the New Super Mario Bros. series, pipe-shaped Warp Cannons work similarly to the Warp Zones of the earlier games and are unlocked by finding secret exits in levels. Cannons appear in most of the 3D games in the series starting with Super Mario 64. The character uses the cannon by jumping into the barrel, aiming themself and being fired at a distant target. This allows the character to progress through a level or reach otherwise inaccessible areas.
Minigames[edit]
Many games in the series feature minigames supplemental to the platforming gameplay, usually offering the chance to win extra lives or power-ups. Super Mario Bros. 2 and 3D World feature slot machines. Super Mario Bros. 3 and the New Super Mario Bros. games contain Toad Houses that host skill- and luck-based activities such as shell games. The Land games feature end-of-level minigames for acquiring extra lives. The Battle Mode in the All-Stars version of Super Mario Bros. 3 and the Advance series of remakes all feature versions of Mario Bros. as a minigame. Yoshi's Island enables a minigame when certain conditions are met when completing a level. 64 DS contains over 30 minigames that can be accessed independently of the original mode of play. 3D World contains Luigi Bros., a version of Mario Bros. with two Luigis, and the Switch version of 3D World includes Bowser's Fury, a 3D platformer of smaller size in one enclosed environment.[citation needed]
Music[edit]
Much of the original Super Mario Bros. music and sound effects have become iconic to the series and incorporated into modern games. The original Super Mario Bros. theme, composed by Koji Kondo, has become one of the most well known video game themes around the world.[21]
Super Mario Galaxy, released in 2007, became the first game in the Super Mario series to feature orchestrated music,[22] which would return in its sequel and other subsequent games such as Super Mario 3D World.[23]
Development[edit]
| 1985 | Super Mario Bros. |
|---|---|
| 1986 | Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels |
| 1987 | |
| 1988 | Super Mario Bros. 2 |
| Super Mario Bros. 3 | |
| 1989 | Super Mario Land |
| 1990 | Super Mario World |
| 1991 | |
| 1992 | Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins |
| 1993 | |
| 1994 | |
| 1995 | Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island |
| 1996 | Super Mario 64 |
| 1997 | |
| 1998 | |
| 1999 | |
| 2000 | |
| 2001 | |
| 2002 | Super Mario Sunshine |
| 2003 | |
| 2004 | |
| 2005 | |
| 2006 | New Super Mario Bros. |
| 2007 | Super Mario Galaxy |
| 2008 | |
| 2009 | New Super Mario Bros. Wii |
| 2010 | Super Mario Galaxy 2 |
| 2011 | Super Mario 3D Land |
| 2012 | New Super Mario Bros. 2 |
| New Super Mario Bros. U | |
| 2013 | Super Mario 3D World |
| 2014 | |
| 2015 | Super Mario Maker |
| 2016 | Super Mario Run |
| 2017 | Super Mario Odyssey |
| 2018 | |
| 2019 | Super Mario Maker 2 |
| 2020 | |
| 2021 | Bowser's Fury |
| 2022 | |
| 2023 | Super Mario Bros. Wonder |
1985–1995: 2D origins[edit]
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Super Mario Bros., the first side-scrolling 2D platform game to feature Mario, was released for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1985. It was derived through collaboration by Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka as a successor to the 1983 arcade game Mario Bros., which starred two characters: Mario, the titular character that first appeared in Donkey Kong as the original player character and its sequel where he was a final boss, and Luigi, who first appeared in Mario Bros.[24] Super Mario Bros. established many core Mario elements, such as Goombas, Koopa Troopas, Bowser, Peach, and its three power-ups: the Super Mushroom, increasing the character's size and providing an extra hit point, Fire Flower, allowing the character to throw fireballs as weapons, and Super Star, granting temporary invincibility. The "Super" in the title came from the integration of the Super Mushroom into the game.[25] The brothers Mario and Luigi must rescue Princess Toadstool/Peach from Bowser/King Koopa in the Mushroom Kingdom. The game consists of eight worlds of four levels each, totaling 32 levels altogether. Though the worlds differ in themes, the fourth level is always a fortress or castle that ends with a fight against Bowser (or one of his minions disguised as him).[26] Super Mario Bros. is one of the best-selling video games of all time.[27]
Super Mario Bros: The Lost Levels (known as Super Mario Bros. 2 in Japan) is the first sequel to the original Super Mario Bros. It uses the Super Mario Bros. engine, with additions such as weather, character movements, and more complex levels, altogether yielding a much higher difficulty. The game follows the same style of level progression as Super Mario Bros., with eight initial worlds of four levels each. At that time, this sequel was not released outside Japan since Nintendo of America did not want the Super Mario series to be known to players outside Japan for frustrating difficulty. It remained inaccessible to a steadily broadening market of American video game players, becoming stylistically outdated by the time the Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2 could be eventually delivered to America.[28] The game later debuted outside Japan in 1993 as Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels in the compilation game Super Mario All-Stars for the