An absolutely AMAZING platformer for the NES, which seems to have successfully set up 2D Mario platformers in a way that we still use its formatting to this very day. Absolutely insane progress from 1985 with Mario Bros 1, and even Doki Doki Panic/Super Mario Bros USA in 1987. So much creativity and fun in its world building, and how it mixes what we loved from the original Super Mario Bros, as well as parts from SMB2, like the vertical platforming and themed world environments.

Controls are beautiful, and felt great on the NES. Game is an easier platformer for the system, but in all ways that make sense, such as controls being so tight and continues being unlimited. It's easier than other platformers just because it's finally fair in all ways, with really no blame on the difficulty being from the game being unfair. Super Mario Bros. 3 is genuinely such a creative and fun experience, I completely understand how it took over the gaming world for a bit there...

The one thing that keeps me from rating this masterpiece a complete 5/5 is SPECIFICALLY the first fortress in World 7. It's completely mandatory (unless you found the warp whistles, I guess) but it's entire level is based around needing to know the secrets like it's some extra bonus area you unlock from reading Nintendo Power. Look at this. I ran around completely confused out of my mind not understanding at ALL what I was doing wrong, and the level itself seems infamous to those who grew up with it, a lot of people just... dropped the game because they couldn't figure out that you're supposed to FLY TO THE GODDAMN CEILING OF COURSE!! I honestly would have probably been in the same scenario if not for us now living in internet-land. This is totally another Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake/original Legend of Zelda moment, where I WOULD rate this game 5/5 easily, if not for ONE part that absolutely blows my gasket off on how annoying/cruel it is. But in the end, that's just how I rate!

This was my first time beating Super Mario Bros. 3, and my first time playing it physically on the NES! I had a really, really great time overall, and absolutely feel myself morphing into one of those annoying SMB3 fanboys...fan..girls? Eh, whatever. Play this game if you haven't, either for the historical influence or just because it's really fucking good. If you go in with the mindset that you're playing a NES platformer from 1988, you'll have a fucking blast, I guarantee it.

4.5/5

Super Mario Bros. 3 feels like a better sequel to the original Super Mario Bros. than Super Mario Bros. 2 (The Lost Levels) ever was.

The overall presentation of the game has improved significantly over the last two Japanese titles, and also looks better than the American Mario 2.
On the topic of Mario 2 USA, Mario 3 decides to continue with that game's choice of environments, and make it so every world you visit has its own theme, like the Desert World, the Water World, the Ice World. And we even got new world aesthetics as well, like the Big-Small World and the Pipe World, which is totally not a crack joke, no sir.

The music itself is also pretty good. A lot of the tracks from this game have become quite iconic in the franchise, such as the Athletic Theme or the Airship Theme. Maybe they've been remixed a bit too much throughout Mario's history, but it isn't this game's fault.

In terms of gameplay, it feels like a natural evolution of the concepts introduced in Mario 1, with new power-ups for players to try, like the iconic Racoon Leaf or the funny Frog Suit.
The Racoon Leaf even allows Mario (or Luigi, I won't forget him) to fly temporarily, thanks to the new P-Meter this game has, which is built up by running for a bit.
The Frog Suit, while pretty funky to control on land, is extremely useful underwater... although the amount of levels that take place mostly in water is small compared to everything else, sooooo... I guess the Frog Suit can be good if you want to challenge yourself?

There are also other power-ups like the Tanooki Suit, or even the oh-so-rare Hammer Bro. Suit, which is so rare, I remember I couldn't really use it much on my original playthrough.

Just like the USA Mario 2, Mario 3 also has a wide variety of bosses, but none of the ones from Mario 2 return. Instead we have Boom Boom, who is pretty easy, and the Koopalings, which are totally Bowser's kids, I'm sure of it.
But they are fun to fight, each of them having their own moves, which brings more variety to the game, overall.

I would say my biggest gripe with Super Mario Bros. 3 would have to be the difficulty. It's all over the place, as some Worlds are definitely easier than others, like how I found World 4 to be easier than World 3.
The difficulty doesn't flow as well as Mario 1 and USA Mario 2, but at least it doesn't get as bad as the Lost Levels, so that's nice.

Overall, Super Mario Bros. 3 is a great evolution of the 2D Mario Formula, and I understand why it gets a lot of praise. It was definitely one hell of a way to end Mario's journey with the Nintendo Entertainment System.

o GAME DESIGN Mais Limpo Já Feito que por algum motivo não me causa dores musculares só de completar uma fase


algum motivo: Super Mario Bros 3 é uma grande força de movimento que expressa 'celebração', celebração aos videogames em particular. uma peça onde o Mario tem como objetivo fugir do palco o tempo todo através das engenharias gamísticas que estimulam ele a ir pra frente -- não é um teatro jogável, é um teatro morto jogável

eu corri, eu pulei, eu flutuei, eu vivi. bom jogo.

i do think this game can be a lot of fun and has great platforming and i tried to play as many levels as i could no warp whistle or anything. i was thoroughly enjoying myself from like worlds 1-4 because the game just genuinely felt a lot of fun to play. but god by world 5 and onward there were just some levels that took a lot out of me and made me wanna stop playing for a little because of how annoying they were to play, especially when they love doing the puzzle levels that go on forever because you cant find a single block with a p switch or the right door to walk through because the level has 15 to choose from. there were still good levels from that point in world 5 and on, and i know i could have just skipped levels that werent required that i didnt like, but i felt like trying to experience as much of the game as i could. it just felt like at a point for every 2 or 3 levels where i was having fun there was one level that drove me insane whether it be because it was a puzzle level or just something with enemy placement or level design or whatever that i wasnt a big fan of

After SUPER MARIO BROS. 2 was essentially nothing more than a nightmare-difficulty levelpack, they took it upon themselves to REALLY go big on this one, and damn. An H-bomb explosion of creativity and ideas blown across an absolutely epic adventure that feels like it has about twenty times the content of its predecessors. To this day, it is dazzling in its scope, but it also suffers from a bit of bloat and hit-or-miss stuff, as anything this big (for the time) must. Not all the new core design choices are good (short stages but a trillion of them, no mid-level checkpoints, weird continuing), but plenty are (world map, inventory, bonus games), and the mechanics from 1 and 2 have been tuned juuuust a little bit to the point where playing is now a breeze, but it still feels so recognizably Mario that you barely notice a change.

It's an eternally top-tier platformer and introduced about 90% of the stuff that we now think of as Mario mainstays, so it's legendary no matter what ... but it also invented the thing where the mushrooms run away from you when they come out of the block, so it's not seeing a perfect score from me, fuck that.

Insane to think this originally came out only 3 years after the first game for how much it completely and utterly supersedes it, and might as well make SMB1 look like a prototype. SMB3 oozes personality and confidence with a more playful art style, a drastically more tightened up control scheme and freeform moveset for Mario, and generally much better ideas for challenge and experimentation in level design. I do think World 7 is a little stinky and World 8 starts to lean a little too uncomfortably into "can you avoid 10 different flying objects on screen at once" or "can you solve my maze" territory, but I'm happy that it only really starts to crop up around the end of the game rather than souring the entire whole experience. Just a genuinely great platformer and shows just how much Nintendo was at the top of their class at the time, considering how well this has aged compared to most NES games.

One quick note, it's more than a little silly that the NES original didn't have any save function for how much longer this game is too. It's less of a problem these days considering any emulator or modern re-release of it has save state functionality (and All-Stars/Advance straight up added saves), but still more than a bit lame. At the very least, the worry of running out of lives and having to redo the entire game is much less of a concern compared to the first or second game, if anything SMB3 is a little too eager to shower you in extra lives to make it through the entire game.

Depois de Pitfall, vem Super Mario Bros. Depois de Super Mario Bros, vem Super Mario Bros. 3. Depois dele, vem Sonic, e o resto é história.

É quase inacreditável o quanto eles conseguiram fazer no NES, como esse jogo se distancia de tantos do mesmo console, como ele parece ser uma grande evolução do gênero e da mídia.
Com tema teatral, cada fase te joga numa ideia, explora ela e termina. As vezes rápido até demais, as vezes a ideia não é tão boa, e os chefes são risíveis como sempre, mas o fato é que você vai de uma fase pra outra se aventurando nesse mundo simples, mas tão bem desenvolvido que esbanja criatividade e rejogabilidade. Infelizmente, não podemos voltar as fases e mundos concluídos para os experienciar com os diferentes power ups que variam muito a gameplay, e a falta de uma função de save também atrapalha. Sinto muito por quem tentar passar o mundo 8 pela primeira vez sem save states, ainda mais com os controles flutuantes do Mario que se um pouco melhores, seriam perfeitos.

Isso aqui é a planta de tudo que veio depois nessa franquia, e é um ícone brilhante. Meu jogo favorito do console, que certamente explodiu muitas pequenas cabeças.

Probably the greatest NES game ever made, but this shouldn’t be a surprise, right? Super Mario Bros. 3 represents Nintendo at the peak of their creativity and technical prowess, with no competition in sight but still blowing the fuck out of everyone around them regardless. A peak so tall that not even Nintendo themselves have been able to make the climb since, at least for this sub-category of Mario games.

I’d rather not get hung up on what was “impressive for the time” since I wasn’t even a cell at its release and only played it years later from the early 2010’s and beyond, but this thing is just an absolute monster on every front. More mechanics, more abilities, more physics tricks, more tech crammed in the cartridge itself, all in 10 times the file size of the original Super Mario Bros. despite only launching a mere 3 years after that game. A save feature is the most obvious omission given its release window and massive campaign relative to other Mario games, but I have to believe they would have included it if they found it practical to cram into the cartridge. It’s an absolute marvel for the hardware, that much is clear, but I wouldn’t be singing its praises if it ultimately amounted to little more than a tech demo.

After a groundbreaking first entry and a successor that amounted to little more than an extra-challenging level pack, Mario 3 sets to evolve the series in every facet, from ancillary elements like the world map and progression, to the actual structure and pacing of the platforming itself. Where modern 2D Mario is most often concerned with the “introduce in safe space -> expand in challenging ways -> throw away idea and start fresh” cycle of design, it was really refreshing to go back to this one and see just how different R&D4’s philosophy was back then. Individual Worlds are still often differentiated by tone and trends in terrain like the repeated encounters with Big Bertha in World 3 or the labyrinth of pipes that make up World 7, but the actual meat of the platforming found in each stage is often ambivalent to the thought of gimmicks or setpieces.

If you asked me, I’d say the defining trait of Mario 3 is its density. Rarely in all of its 90 levels does the game ever give you a moment to breathe, frequently subjecting you to brief dopamine hits of platforming gauntlets to blast through before moving onto the next level. While in a lesser game this could lead to ideas passing right through the player’s subconscious, effectively getting tossed away and lost to the sands of time before you hit the credits, Mario 3 sidesteps this in some pretty clever ways.

Firstly, the game is pretty tough, at least by Mario standards. This is something I never considered as a kid growing up with Super Mario USA as my still-pretty-shitty version of Mario 2, but you have to understand that this is the developer’s follow up to The Lost Levels, not Doki Doki Panic. Mario 3 never gets anywhere close to the cruelty of that game, but this connection reassured me that no, I’m not just bad at the game, but Mario 3 was actually getting kinda tough. Since dead air is all but eliminated and fine control over Mario requires more skill than ever before thanks to the addition of P-Speed and the lack of extended tracks to easily get there, most moments take more mental input on average from the player to lock in on and get through, so even after getting through the game spread out over the course of a few days in-between impassioned sessions with Ninja Gaiden Black (a game that has occupied all available brain space this past month), I doubt any moment will stand out as alien to me when I revisit the game in the future.

Beyond the surface level difficulty, I think the biggest triumph of these levels is the brisk pace in which you get through them. Levels are frequently over and done with in under 30 seconds, and since no moment is wasted, it feels like less of a commitment to munch through them in quick succession after either a full reset or even just a game over within a world. I can absolutely see this becoming the type of game where I just boot it up for a few minutes to mess around in a few levels, only to get caught in its orbit and run through the whole thing in an afternoon, that magnetic sense of flow and pacing is something I find difficult to maintain in a ~3 hour game, but Mario 3 nails it with absolute grace. It’s revealing to me that this is the only(?) 2D Mario that features absolute no checkpoints within any of its levels, further lending to how sticky the full layouts of stages tend to be in the game. Turns out it’s way harder to remember small slices of geometry within a stage if it lands in the half you won’t have to play through nearly as often to succeed completely.

As you progress through each of the 8 Worlds and new arrangements of locales spring to life on the route to the castle, it always feels like a completely fresh journey awaits as soon as you land. The idea of bringing in a world map was probably born of the desire to bring more flavor to progression as well as to house your item inventory, two things that surely smoothed out the flow of play for a wider demographic of people, but surprisingly, laying out a route in disarray has a cool side effect on potential failure. The most obvious benefits to world layouts are the ability to hold secrets and skip levels, but it’s the wipe of progress that comes from a game over that really perked my ears up on this recent playthrough.

Rather than simply wiping all your progress, Mario 3 slowly peels back the world with shortcuts and new routes that open after passing certain milestones or using specific items, with the distinction that main number levels will still be reset when all lives are depleted. If you had to start fresh each time in a challenging section of the game, it could potentially lead to repeated runs becoming more exhausting to play through. While I personally enjoy gauntlet challenges in games as I find them to be interesting tests of endurance when done well, it can get tiring pretty fast (unless, again, you’re as suffocating as say, NGB).

With the middle-ground approach found here, I think it more easily satisfies all types of players rather than catering to one side of the fence. After tearing down a fortress you can start skipping levels you may have already completed, but crucially, they still remain open if you want to go back in for power ups or extra lives. If game overs had truly no downside, walls of progression could potentially drain you of all your resources and become all the more frustrating to push through when you have nothing left to fall back on, but here, you always have time to rethink your approach and plan for your next attack. Alternatively, if your nuts are fat you can always smash your head against the wall more quickly by going straight to these tougher sections, ultimately leading to a faster pace and more rewarding level completions. While it admittedly comes into play mainly at lower skill levels (let’s not kid ourselves, Mario 3 isn’t that hard of a game all things considered), it’s still a consideration I greatly admire. And besides, high level players still get to enjoy the simple pleasures of the map, such as the increase of tension late in the game or the joy of cleaning out an entire screen of content without heavy failure.

While the advent of 3D titles as well as later 2D Mario games are clear canvases for expression from the big N, always keeping this series fresh some 40 years on, so much of their success is owed to this game in particular. You could say the existence of a level hub and level skipping are probably the traits Super Mario 64 are best known for on a wide scale, but they weren’t designed fresh for that game, they started here. It’s not just a case of a game introducing cute ideas for later games to perfect - though a compelling case can and has been made that Super Mario 64 is one of the best to ever do it - it’s a case of a game truly perfecting every pillar of design it tackled. I’m not sure I’ve played another 2D Mario (or maybe Mario in general) that feels so alive and well-realized as this. Beyond its influence for future games, beyond how impressive it stood for the time, beyond how important it is culturally, it nails perhaps the most important trait of a game like this. It’s just really god damn fun to play. For my money, it passes with flying colors and soars into the skies of perfection. It’s Super Mario Bros. 3, man.

By 1988, Nintendo was pretty much ready to leave behind the lives system that had become such an integral part of video game identity. Having limited continues was an imported concept from arcade machines that didn’t really suit home console gaming in the first place, but it was the most convenient way for developers to work around the lack of save features of early generation hardware, as well as the relative brevity of the games due to their software restrictions. This rings especially true for action-oriented games like platformers. The first Super Mario Bros. is a prime example for this and arguably had the most accomplished implementation of this design philosophy at the time. Nintendo had no reason to fix an issue and at first glance it doesn’t look like they tried. You still start your adventure with a limited number of lives, the game still resets you to the beginning when you’ve lost them all, and there is still no save feature to be found whatsoever. However, once you start playing, you’ll quickly realize that this time, the developers really do not want you to run out of lives in the first place. The game throws so many possibilities to obtain extra lives at you that it sometimes felt like I was being showered in 1-Ups.

Every three completed stages net you at least one live guaranteed, and up to five if you time all your final jumps correctly. Incidentally, the most natural way to finish the stage already coincides with the perfect timing, so most players are going to get the best results more often than not. Additionally, Spade and N-Spade Panels with mini-games are sprinkled regularly between levels to give you even more chances for extra lives and other bonusses. The card mini game in particular is very simple to memorize as it does not reset after a failed attempt. Hidden 1-Up Mushrooms are much more common than in previous games and several levels can even be exploited to get infinite lives, with some of the easiest and most obvious methods available in the entire series. And even if you lose all your lives, the game still cleverly lets you preserve progress via unlocked shortcuts in the overworld.

Of course, an abundance of extra lives does not negate difficulty and there are still plenty of challenging courses in Super Mario Bros. 3. But for the first time, a difficult section does not automatically turn into an absolute roadblock for progression until you overcome it. Not only does the game offer far more multiple routes and shortcuts inside the levels themselves, but it also extends the same principle to the game as a whole. The addition of the overworld map often gives you the option to choose between branching paths and sometimes permits you to skip certain levels altogether. Many of the remaining mandatory stages can also be bypassed with overworld items like the cloud, the Music Box, or the P-Wing, if you know how to use it properly. Most importantly, the new item inventory allows you to tackle the same level differently each time. Having multiple Power Ups makes their advantages much more context sensitive, like how the frog costume is specifically designed to facilitate movement in underwater stages. All this leads not only to much easier but also more individualized playthroughs. The game wants you to see everything it has to offer, but at the same time lets you decide to a large degree which of its parts you want to engage with. All subsequent Mario platformers embraced this open and welcoming approach to game design even further, but it was already fully articulated for the first time in this installment thirty-five years ago. The whole concept is so antithetical to the lives system that it makes me wonder why the series kept using it to this day, even though lives have ceased to be a relevant aspect of the experience for decades.

Whatever the reasons may be, Nintendo’s willingness to let players skip most of the content speaks volumes about the team’s confidence in their game design. You may be able to bypass many of the challenges, but the developers know that if you enjoy the game, you’ll most likely want to discover everything it has to offer. If anything, the reduced pressure from the fear of losing progress by dying increases the players’ willingness to engage with the game. There are too many great ideas to mention, but I think what impressed me the most is how Super Mario Bros. 3 constantly questions and reinvents the notion of what a Mario level can be. The first game had some variety in its level structures, namely in the underwater courses and Bowser’s Castles. But that variety pales in comparison to sheer creativity that is on display here in any single given world. There are horizontally and vertically structured stages; levels that let you move freely and levels where you are being moved on predetermined paths; courses that rely on speed and others that have timing-based challenges; linear gauntlets and levels that are structured more like open ended spaces to explore. Some stages even break entirely with the familiar structure of obstacle courses and play more like convoluted labyrinths or veritable puzzle boxes. And while many games have a lot of different mission types that still always play out in the same way, here every element is affected according to the structure of the level. Like how respawning enemies pose a very different kind of challenge in maze-like levels than in linear courses, or puzzle boxes give you an infinite number of Power Ups since they are usually required to reach the finish line. You simply never know what the next level has in store. And by drastically reducing the fear of losing, curiosity and the joy of discovery can finally take over to become the main driving factors for making progress.

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I played this about three decades later, and I can definitely say that it truly lived up to the hype. Super Mario Bros. 3 is the magnum opus for the NES, expanding the world and character for the iconic video game character while proving to the world that Mario remains relevant for years to come. While Super Mario Bros. is a revolutionary title that created this behemoth of a franchise as we know it today while saving the American video game industry after the disastrous Video Game Crash of 1983, followed up by a bizarre sequel, Super Mario Bros. 3 expands on the Mario formula and introduced many elements that became main staples in future games.

It added an overworld, giving us a series of stages and giving us the option to play them out of order in certain areas. Its diversity of levels is where Mario 3 shines as all of them are split into eight distinct worlds, like a world where everything is giant, a world that contains a whole lot of pipes, or a world filled with lava and darkness. These worlds bring variety, and in some instances are still unique to this game alone which is one of its biggest strengths. With new adventures mean new enemies Mario has to encounter, and in this case, the Koopalings. Serving as Bowser's underlings and their names being inspired by music artists, they are the main bosses for the first seven worlds trying to prevent Mario from approaching the Koopa King himself. In future 2D Mario entries (specifically NSMB series), they seem to be a safe bet for bosses that might've been overdone when we got to NSMBU, but at the time, they were unique and varied and brought something new to the table, and the same goes for items. Every item in this game is fun to utilize and is great for uncovering hidden areas and secrets, like a raccoon suit that has a tail attack and can fly depending on the speed or a frog suit that makes it easier to swim underwater, or obtaining hammers that can break rocks in the overworld. While I haven't uncovered some, it's great how we use these items to our advantage, creating room for experimentation, and encouraging replayability, and that's what Mario 3 feels like, a room for experimentation and new ideas that paid off in the end.

Mario feels great to control here, and for NES platformers, this is one of the easier ones. Now to be fair, this is a huge game compared to previous Mario outings, and it can still be a challenge when approaching later levels, but nothing unfair. No more limited continues, instead, getting a Game Over will result in the player replaying the levels again in the world you're currently on, and in the case for me, it was mostly World 7. With the number of levels it has, it can be kind of nerve-racking trying to survive with the limited amount of lives, but I persevered.

Super Mario Bros. 3 is one of the best games released on the NES and one of the most influential titles in the series. With its innovations like a non-linear map and new power-ups, it laid the foundation for subsequent titles to follow. A game that turned a Japanese toy maker to a global video game giant, and one that has significance in gaming history.

I think I finished it? idk lol.

Solid level design, great amount of power ups and good variety in level gimmicks. I like the Koopalings even if they are piss easy to beat.

It's one of the better ones but I don't think it's my favorite.

O melhor: Esses sprites: https://i.imgur.com/lJtyAFa.gif
O pior: Para um jogo tão criativo, as boss battles poderiam ser mais variadas
Satisfação: Atravessar fases de airship ou tank apenas voando com uma P-Wing

Por muitas vezes citado como um dos (senão o) melhores jogos de todos os tempos, Super Mario Bros. 3 é um jogo atemporal, seja em sua versão original de NES ou algum dos remakes (apesar que essa versão tem um charme difícil de alcançar). É muito impressionante o salto dado do primeiro jogo (e todos que foram influenciados por ele) para o que é feito aqui.

A jornada por cada um dos seus oito mundos, todos muito distintos entre si, é fantástica e cheia de segredos. A inclusão de um inventário e os vários itens especiais trazem uma profundidade interessante sobre como abordar cada estágio. Há elementos que podem passar totalmente batidos pra muita gente que terminar o jogo mas dão uma sensação de descoberta muito boa quando explorados.

Tem muito jogo no NES que é difícil rever hoje em dia sem algumas (ou várias) concessões. SMB 3 se mantém como um exemplo de level design e inventividade que torço ver em Super Mario Wonder.

It's hard for me to believe this is an NES game. When it first came to 3DS virtual console I bought it and didn't think too much of it at the time. But I was fool. The level design is immaculate and there are so many neat things and shortcuts in almost every single one. Basically every single level has its own theme and idea that goes hand and hand with the world theme. Like Pipe Land having a level where you assend through a pipe structure or giant land having giant versions of more generic theme. The world map is also cool and goes hand in hand with the item reserve system where you can hold hammers to break rocks and make your own shortcuts, music boxes to put enemies to sleep and just warp whistle to other worlds. The controls feel lovely as well, flying with the raccoon suit is a joy and I love sliding down a slope and jumping with increased momentum. This is probably my favorite NES game. The best games are where everything fits together like a puzzle and this game does that well.

Easy contender for best game ever made; a standout reason as to why gaming as a whole is so impactful, special, and important in the grand scheme of things. The level of creativity! The colours! That music! It's all engrossing and immediately sucks you in, and then you see a map to the world with different paths and realize that not one playthrough of this is going to be the same. You are going to explore and find other stuff, and while it's nowhere near the level of other Mario games due to hardware limitations this is still where it started.

Incredibly well designed from every angle too. This was NES? Even back then Miyamoto and the folks at Nintendo must have been wizards. And the sheer amount of powerups here allows for a bunch of experimentation and makes you wanna keep coming back for more. It's just delightful and while there are probably "better" Mario games, this is my absolute favourite and will always hold a special place in my heart.

It's a great 2D Mario game and it's an actual miracle that they got it running on the NES of all things but I personally don't see how people could consider this to be the best 2D Mario game or even the best Mario game period. The idea and theme of the whole game being this show with the platforms being part of the set is really cool and creative. Levels are your typically Mario game levels but I feel like most of the levels don't take advantage of the game's gimmicks and power-ups like Super Mario World or even some of the NSMB games. The boss fights are pretty lacklustre and repetitive with only minor variations between the bosses. The artstyle I would consider to be the best out of the four NES Mario platformers, having more detail than the previous two but still keeping the simple charm of the designs. Overall it's a very good platformer with a lot of fun and creative ideas but I wouldn't say it's the very best in it's series.

Magic, eh? It's really something playing the first three Mario games back to back. Seeing how they progress over the years. Obviously, 2 has a bit of an exception, but it still fits in perfectly.

But playing through each level, you really appreciate the meticulous effort put into to building the game. The stages, locations, level types, all fit perfectly. And while it does get frustrating in the later levels, it never stops being fun. It's definitely the pinnacle of platforming games on the NES, and a game I've played to death on the All Stars cart, but like 2, I'd never beaten the original until now. I remember getting up to Dark World as kid when playing it at my cousins house, but getting absolutely railed on those first couple of levels on world 8. Well I'm not a stupid kid any more. I'm a stupid adult, who just beat Super Mario Bros 3 on the NES.

Next up is Super Mario World, I suppose. I can only wonder if its any better than this (I'm lying, it's one of my all time favourite videogames).