If you read my post about the Lost Levels, then you already know the story behind the original Super Mario Brothers sequel. Nintendo thought the original sequel was too hard for America, and they decided to release the game only in Japan. This decision put Nintendo in a tough situation. They wanted to release a sequel to most popular video game of all time as soon as possible, but they didn't have much time to develop a brand new Mario game. So Nintendo decided to take a game that was already released in Japan named Doki Doki Panic and replace that games characters with Super Mario Brothers characters. They also included some other minor changes to the game to make it seem like a Mario game, but for the most part it was just a copy of another game.
So what is the story behind this Doki Doki Panic remake? This story is a different from the typical Mario story that consists of Bowser capturing Princess and Mario fighting through 8 different worlds to save her. In this game we have Mario, Luigi, Princess and Toad all fighting their way through a world of dreams called Subcon to defeat its evil leader named Wart. Wart is an evil toad that has an army named the 8-bits and generals named Birdo, Mouser, Clawgrip, Fry Guy and Tryclide. So how did Mario and company even get involved in saving the Subcon world from its evil ruler Wart? The answer is that they were called by the Subcons to save them from Wart and get back their dream machine. I think it's safe to say that this is the craziest adventure Mario will ever go on.
Playing this game today brings back old memories of when I was a kid. This game is pretty difficult, and when I was younger I had a real tough time getting through this game. I still remember going nuts when I beat the game for the only time in my life. Playing the game now is a bit disappointing since I know the background of how the game came about and seeing how bad the gameplay is in it. Also, the controls are really tough to handle in this game, and it gets annoying that you have to pick up an enemy and either throws him into another enemy or off a cliff to kill him. This is a lot different from other Mario games where you are supposed to stomp them into the ground.
Even though it wasn't the most fun game to play, there were some things I liked about Super Mario Brothers 2. I liked how big the worlds were in this game. It's more fun to have the ability to progress vertically throughout some levels and not always more forward horizontally like in the previous games. I also liked the health meter in the game. The health meter will appear in future Mario games, and I didn't realize that this was the first game to feature it. I also liked how some levels had secret paths that allowed you to get to the end of a level quicker. These secret paths aren't obvious and they reward you for exploring certain areas of a level that you don't have to go through to get to the end. I also enjoyed how each level had a mini boss at the end of the level. It's more fun to defeat a boss to progress to the next level then just climb down from the top of a flag pole.
There were some things about this game that really bugged me. First off, I found it really annoying that the main way you get extra lives in this game is through the slot machine mini-game at the end of levels. I feel this adds an element of luck and not skill to obtaining extra lives. I know that it takes skill to get the coins so that you have more chances to earn extra lives, but it is incredibly annoying when you get 12 chances for an extra life and come up empty. I also find it annoying that after each level your health meter goes back to 2 full diamonds when you had 4 in the previous level. Why should I lose the extra health diamonds? I should be rewarded for making my way through an entire level with a full health meter. It's not like the next level doesn't have plenty of opportunities for me to lower my health meter. Trust me; once you get to world 5, there are a ton of opportunities to lose diamonds from your health meter.
Overall, I felt that the difficulty of this game is very challenging, but not to the degree of the lost levels. This isn't really a bad thing since the Lost Level's difficulty in my opinion is a bit too hard. As I mentioned earlier, the game starts to get hard in World 5. I had to play this world a few times to get used to each level and figure out how to get past certain obstacles. Also, besides the last level of the game, I would say the next hardest level is 5-3. This is the first true hard level to get through, and the boss, Clawgrip, at the end of the level is not easy to defeat. I would even say that he is harder to beat than Wart. So after taking some time to get past World 5, I made it to World 6, which isn't any easier. Each level in this world was very challenging, and took multiple tries to get through. The good part about this world is that the boss at the end is Tryclide. Since you already faced him at the end of World 2, it's not too hard to defeat him again the second time around. World 7 is the hardest world in the game, but there is one less level! Both levels are tough and challenging, but level 7-2 is definitely the hardest level in the game. It is a maze level, but not like the maze levels in the previous Mario games where you have to follow a particular pattern to make it through. In this game there are multiple doors you must go through to find your way to Wart. There are many different paths you can take, some will get you to Wart right away, others will make you defeat a ton of enemies and get past many obstacles to get to Wart. After you figure out the maze and get to Wart, you now must catch and throw 7 vegetables at his mouth to defeat him. You catch the vegetables from the dream machine that Wart has taken control over. You also have to avoid the bubbles that he is throwing at you. I am not making this up, this is how you beat the final boss in Super Mario Brothers 2. After you defeat Wart, you have saved all the Subcons from captivity. Below are some pics that I took after I defeated Wart.
After playing this game, it has left me with mixed feelings about it. I did enjoy playing it as a kid and also now, but it just doesn't feel like a true Super Mario Brothers game. I'm not saying that every Mario game needs to follow a certain formula and I also don't think that Mario games shouldn't take chances, but when you play this game it just feels different. Looking back you can guess that Nintendo felt the same way by looking at how Super Mario Brothers 3 gameplay matches the original Super Mario Brothers. Still, this game does have some good qualities to it, and I don't think it should be ignored when you talk about Super Mario Brothers games. Also, I think peoples view on this game depends on how old they were when this game came out. If you weren't born or old enough to play video games before Super Mario Brothers 3, you probably don't like this game. It's just too different of a Mario game, and you have more options of Mario games to play. On the other hand, if you played this game when the only other Mario game was the original Super Mario Brothers game, you probably have spent a lot of time playing it. I looked at a ton of user reviews of this game, and it seems that most people agree with my review of the game. Super Mario Brothers 2 just doesn't feel like it should be considered one of the great Super Mario Brothers games, and it is just a bridge between the first game and Super Mario Brothers 3.
The next game on the list is Super Mario Land. This game was released for the Gameboy hand held device making it the first portable Super Mario Brothers game. This game will continue the trend of having the end boss be someone different than King Bowser. The boss may be new, but the worlds and enemies follow more of a Mario tradition. This game will be a bit shorter since Gameboy games can't contain as much data as Nintendo games. Unfortunately, the game will also be less colorful due to Gameboy games colors only being different shades of puke green. Either way, I'm excited to move forward in this project, and get to a game that I played and beat a million times on car rides as a kid.
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