Retro Review: Super Mario Bros. 3

The first in a series of reviews of games from classic game consoles going back to the NES. The first game I'm going to review is Super Mario Bros. 3 for the classic grey box known to many as the Nintendo Entertainment System. Here we go.

What could be said about SMB3? It's widely considered to be the greatest game ever on the NES. The classic Mario storyline is still in play here: save Princess Peach from the evil clutches of Bowser. It took the formula from the original Mario and got rid of the ideas from Super Mario Bros. 2 (aka Doki Doki Panic). And what came out of that was a living legend of a cartridge. Sure, the crappy movie 'The Wizard' was just an advertising campaign for it, but that is what fueled the fire of popularity that this masterpiece was going to get. It has eight worlds like the original Mario, with bosses at the end, instead this time its the seven Koopa Kids Iggy, Wendy O. Koopa, Morton, Roy, Lemmy, Ludwig von Koopa, and Larry Koopas; with you fighting Bowser in the end. This game also introduced some classic Mario enemies like Thwomp, Paragoomba, and Dry Bones.

Another thing that makes this game epic is the amount of secrets it has. Referring back to 'The Wizard' again, at the end in the game tournament, when Jimmy, Lucas, and Mora are playing Super Mario Bros. 3 for the first time, Jimmy reaches the first castle in World 1. At the end, right before you fight the Koopaling, Jimmy had the Racoon Suit on. He flew up over the ceiling and went to a secret room and got the Magic Flute that warped him to World 4. There are two more hidden flutes in the game for a grand total of 3 magic flutes. Warp pipes can lead you to rooms with the elusive Tanooki suit that lets turn into a statues if you hold down on the D-pad long enough.

My favorite world in this game is World 4 when everything's giant. Come on, who doesn't want to see a giant Goomba? The levels can be very tricky at times, especially in the sixth, seventh, and eighth worlds. One level in the sixth world, you have to fly up in a certain spot while holding a Koopa shell to beat a level. The final world is really hard if you're not careful enough. There's all these sidescrolling screens with tanks that shoot cannonballs, Bullet Bills, and the occasional Bob-Omb.

The power-up system is also cool. You still have the classic Mario power-ups like the Mushroom, the Fire Flower, and the Starman, but they added new suits such as the Frog Suit which lets you swim better in water and jump higher, the Hammer Bro. Suit which makes you throw hammers, and you can hide inside your shell to protect you from damage, the Racoon Suit which lets you break blocks woth your tail, and can make you fly if you run for a long enough time, and the Tanooki Suit which has the same effects as the Racoon Suit, but this time, you can turn into a statue to protect yourself from getting hit. There's also the P-Wing, that lets you fly across the whole stage. What's good about these power-ups is that you can save them and use them for later when you feel like you need it.

There are also fun little minigames, like card flipping, when you match two cards, you get whatever the picture represents, say I matched two Fire Flowers, I get a Fire Flower, etc. There's also a sliding picture game, where three parts of a power-up are sliding across the screen in different directions, and if you match the complete picture, you get a certain number of lifes depending on how powerful the power-up is.

So, in conclusion, Super Mario 3 offers a great gaming experience for any gamer of any age and skill. It offers fun, exciting gameplay, the classic story, and a great challenge.

I give this masterpiece of gaming a perfect 10/10.

i would rather not give any game a total of 10/10, but this game deserves it!
good review, check out mine!

"I love the Powerglove, its so bad."

SMB3 has to be one of my favorite games of all time, this is why I love the wii so much. I get to download all of my favorite games from the past.

I also did a classic review if you want to check it out, Ninja Gaiden 2 The Dark Sword of Chaos (NES).

awesome game

Sweet, dude. SMB3 should be on every Top 10 Games of All Time list, no doubt. I've got a blog where I'm gonna post reviews of games, most of which will probably be retro. Here's the URL if you're interested.

[url=elkinfencer10.blogspot.com/]elkinfencer10.blogspot.com/[/url]

I give this game actually a 9.9 myself.

It loses .1 because Kuribo's Shoe is only used in 1 level.