Super Mario World is an absolute classic, and is my favorite 2D Mario game due to it being one of my most beloved childhood games. I would always come home from school to play Super Mario World, the bright, cheerful aesthetic and music combined with the addictive gameplay always made me happy and left an impact on me to this day of being very much partial to the SNES, and sprite-based games. Eventually I would branch out and start playing Super Mario World Romhacks way back in the early 2000's as a kid. Romhacks like Kaizo Mario really opened my eyes to how much potential the mechanics of this game had, and Brutal Mario being my personal favorite, showcased just how customizable and adaptive platformers could actually be, it was an incredible experience. This is one of those games I play every other year, so I like to think I have a pretty deep understanding of this game. Today, I'd like to point my critical eye though and see just how good or bad Super Mario World really is.

First thing I think makes Super Mario World incredible is the World Map. Right from the first world, Super Mario World makes it clear that there isn't always one way to go when progressing. You start the game with a fork in the road, the path on the right clearly indicates it'll lead to the first castle, as well as teasing a few levels ahead, such as the first water level which I really enjoy. On the left however, it's a path that leads somewhere we cannot see yet, which adds mystery and curiosity on where exactly it will lead. Progression versus curiosity is a strong opener since either way, both choices are correct and will reward the player regardless. Curious players who decide to take the left path will make their way to the Yellow Switch Palace which will make every level after activating it that much easier by providing blocks that will prevent you from dying to pits or make certain sections easier, and also give you additional super mushrooms in the levels. Going this path also allows you to see the next upcoming World, which not only could excite the player for the future, but also present a great sense of scale in that the first world you're on is just a small island compared to the infinite possibilities ahead of you once you leave it. Even if a player decides to not take the left path, they're rewarded with faster progression which will allow them to leave the first world faster, allowing them to take in that sense of scale still just by comparing how much bigger and open the next world is compared to the island you were just on.

This stays true for the remainder of the game, as every World after this always has multiple paths that can lead to shortcuts, Switch Palaces, hidden levels, and of course, the Star Road. One thing I love about Super Mario World though is how they present striking landmarks to inform you that there might be an alternate route from the one you're taking. Take the pipe in the upper left of Vanilla Dome as an example. The pipe itself seems completely unreachable and potentially just a decoration, but its contrasting coloration and what pipes represent in Mario will make the player notice it and wonder where it'll go. Just as well, Donut Plains does something similar with more pipes and even a Boo House that seems impossible to reach, but since Donut Plains establishes Boo Houses as levels, it becomes immediately apparent to the player that they probably can reach it and be able to play it. However, even with these visual cues, it could be far too vague which levels lead where which could be very frustrating and demoralizing. Thankfully, this is not the case, as levels with multiple exits are marked with a red dot rather than a yellow dot, which is an incredibly important distinction that they establish early with Yoshi Island levels all being yellow dots and the World itself being incredibly linear. Even if you didn’t know what the red dots represented, their presentation alone should indicate some sort of difference that would be easy to distinguish with a bit of thought..

One of my favorite additions to Super Mario World though is The Star Road. Star Road is a secret World that has special teleports to other worlds you can find. Star Road also has five unique levels of its own that upon finding the secret exits for, will connect to another different teleporter. These teleporters can be used anytime, though some of them will lead to dead-ends, but give you a substantial clue to what levels have secret exits in order to unlock them which is a nice consolation and encourages replaying and thoroughly exploring more levels. However, one specific teleporter will actually lead you straight to Bowser’s Castle with the path unlocked for you, allowing you to finish Super Mario World in record time. Star Road by all means is the definitive evolution of Warp Zones from previous Mario games, though instead of just being some pipes, or a world select, they took the time and care to not only make it visually striking, but also give it unique levels that, while short, are very fun to play and find the secret exits to. It doesn’t end there for Star Road however, as by completing every level’s secret exit, you will gain access to a secret sixth teleporter which will lead you into the “Special Zone”. The Special Zone is the final challenge of Super Mario World, as the eight levels here are tremendously more difficult than any other level, even harder than Bowser’s Castle. While these levels are very hidden, I love their inclusion because the levels themselves justify putting so much time into this game, from the amount of effort it takes to unlock, to gaining the mastery of the game itself to overcome these levels. While it’s a staple now to have this sort of “secret final world” in Mario games, I feel like the requirement is less cumbersome from future incarnations, such as New Super Mario Bros. Wii’s 9th World which requires grabbing every star coin in a given world to unlock the correlated level. While it does serve the same purposes of putting in time and mastering the game, it also requires 100%’ing the whole game, whereas Special Zone only requires you find it to play it, which I vastly prefer. Also, I feel as though the final reward for completing the Special Zone is so much more interesting since it could allow someone to play the entire game again and get so much out of it. I personally don’t, but it’s enough to make it feel meaningful and worth doing, which I very much love.

I haven’t even gone into gameplay yet, Super Mario World’s gameplay is amazing. Mario controls like an absolute dream, combined with the SNES graphics, this game not only plays perfectly, but looks fantastic. Every innovation from Super Mario Bros. 3 is here, as well as some new inclusions like Yoshi, the Cape Feather, and the spin jump. Yoshi brings a lot of unexpected depth to Super Mario World, as Yoshi can eat enemies and spit out shells. Koopa shells of different colors give Yoshi different abilities and attributes, such as shooting fireballs, gaining a stomp, or even wings. Yoshi provides you with an extra hit, but he’ll run away, forcing you to chase after him and remounting him to stop. A lot of the time he’ll run into a pit and that’ll be the end of it, but it does require some skill to get him back if you lose him, which is a good negative to have since Yoshi provides you with so much utility You can use Yoshi to gain a lot of extra height on a jump if you think you can’t make it, and is even used for a secret exit or two which rewards the player for learning it. There’s even some niche mechanics utilized as well, like Yoshi being able to eat objects through walls which is also used for a secret exit, which is really clever and makes use of the programming very well. Yoshi cannot enter castles or boo houses, or any level with an anti-Yoshi sign at the start via a cutscene, which I like because becoming too reliant on Yoshi can make this game even easier than it already is. There’s even different colored Yoshi’s that will provide the same ability no matter what shell is eaten, but can only be found in Star World usually, giving Star World even more benefits. Very rarely however, you can find a pair of magic wings in question blocks that you can grab as Yoshi to turn him into a Blue Yoshi. Blue Yoshi is arguably the best one since any shell consumed gives him wings, and wings pretty much allow you to skip levels with ease, as well as find secrets in the skies.

Speaking of wings, the cape feather is the only new power-up in Super Mario World, and is only one of four in the entire game, the others being the Super Mushroom, Fire Flower, and Invincibility Star. It’s definitely arguable Super Mario 3 had the better selection of power-ups, but the cape feather has so many applications, I think the depth it brings to the table is just about equal to Mario 3’s power-ups. You can spin with your cape to deal with pretty much any enemy with ease, but cannot reflect projectiles like it can in Smash Bros. The cape also allows you to fall slower than normal, providing much more control on where you land, and being able to make longer jumps. There is one capability however I think trivializes the entire game a bit too much, and that's flying. In Super Mario Bros. 3, the Super Leaf granted flight upon filling your P-meter and you’d be able to fly for a little bit before you stopped and would float back down. The only time the Super Leaf could fly through an entire level was if you had a “P-Wing” which made your P-meter full at all times for an entire level, essentially letting you fly over it without any issues. The caveat was once you used the P-wing for one level, the effect would go away, reducing it back to just a super leaf in the next level. In Super Mario World, this isn’t the case, with enough practice, the Cape Feather’s ability to fly is endless. You can fly over any level without a ceiling with very little effort, as long as you had a cape feather. It makes so many levels feel so meaningless when you can just fly over everything, it becomes especially bad as a crutch if a level is too hard or feels unfair, you can simply grab a cape feather, practice a bit, and skip the level. That is until you reach a boo house, castle, or most of Vanilla Dome since these levels have ceilings that pretty much disable the ability to fly over them, which is great. Had every level allowed you to skip it by flying, Super Mario world could feel really meaningless and boring, but I think they strike the balance really well here having enough levels that prevent you from doing that. There’s also levels that won’t scroll up for you while flying, which makes the visual cue for timing your flying harder, but unfortunately doesn’t stop you entirely from doing it, but makes it a bit harder which I can appreciate. Overall, the cape is certainly flawed a bit, but I think the amount of mechanical depth it has that is really pushed in Romhacks is incredible, and I think in the original game, it’s a bit over-tuned, but not fully compromising, definitely the largest flaw in the game. Though I will say, mastering the cape is incredibly satisfying, and I quite like the idea of having to get good with it compared to the Super Leaf in Mario 3, though even the Super Leaf has its difficulty curve with utilizing the tail swipe effectively since it’s so small.

The last addition Super Mario World added was the Spin Jump. Spin jumping allows you to jump onto dangerous hazards and enemies by bouncing off them rather than dying, you can also destroy yellow bricks underneath you if you’re big Mario. Spin jumping to me was an amazing idea because it now allows you to jump on enemies like spinies without having to break all of your momentum to slow down and jump over them like hurdles. It helps level pacing, and adds much needed variety to how you tackle obstacles in this game which I think makes this game stand out a bit more. Interestingly, spin jumping on an enemy you can normally jump on crushes them, but you immediately land afterward, you aren’t able to jump off them to gain extra height and momentum, so the spin jump rewards you especially for using it on the correct enemies as well, which helps the balance of both jumps being consistently useful in different scenarios. Spin jumping also has less jump height which is another interesting difference. On obstacles such as the buzz saws, Mario can continuously jump on them with the spin jump, but it requires finesse as well, as you need to keep readjusting to the moving object in question to keep bouncing on it, but spin jumping onto something usually pushes Mario around some, so you really have to make minor corrections every time you bounce off to ensure you don’t die or mess-up, once again, it’s just a minor detail that makes spin jumping incredibly fun, but also requires effort to get good with, it’s not always the best universal option, but when it is the solution, it’s not so simple that you can relax or be neglectful, you really got to pay attention. Yoshi’s boots have the same attributes as the spin jump as well, though the bouncing effect seems a bit more severe, making it a bit harder with Yoshi specifically.

A lot of the new enemies in Super Mario World are very iconic, so much so they’ve been staples in the series ever since. Though their popularity is one thing, what they bring to the table for the game itself is more interesting. Charging Chucks to me are the most interesting new enemy introduced as they have many different variants that make each encounter with one interesting. From triplicating themselves, to throwing different sports balls at you, some of them have unique one-time attributes like the whistling Charging Chuck underwater that wakes up the sleeping Rip Van Fish. You have the underutilized Banzai Bill that really demonstrates the SNES’s capabilities, but also just the potential extent to the size of enemies. You have a lot of very popular enemy debuts here as well like Fuzzy, Wiggler, Magikoopa, and Monty mole, each with their own unique mechanics like Fuzzy following lines, Wiggler getting mad when you jump on it, Magikoopa being able to turn blocks into something different, and monty mole that jumps out of the ground and walls to surprise you. A lot of the level design becomes so much better having these enemies present since it can completely change how you approach a level, and a lot of enemies will have a higher priority to dispose of, which gives levels more depth. Overall, there isn’t a single new inclusion in Super Mario World as far as enemies that feel poorly integrated, or just unbalanced, they’re all great and fun to interact with.

A lot of the music in Super Mario World is awesome, but the level theme is actually always the same song, just with different instrumentation and tempo. It’s a lot like Luigi’s Mansion in that regard actually, and I don’t think it’s a negative. While it is the same song every level, the vibe always changes to fit the theme of the level it’s played in, so it makes it come off very differently every time, and because it’s done so well, it doesn’t feel repetitive, uninspired, or bad, it works really well. Without that though, the world themes are all amazingly well done that really enhances them a lot. I specifically really love Vanilla Dome, Forest of Illusion, and Valley of Bowser the most.

There’s really not much left to say really. While I didn’t go into too much of the staple gameplay of Super Mario World, that’s because at its core, it’s still Mario. I much prefer talking about what the game added to the formula that made it (for the most part) a better, more refined experience. While not everything is to its benefit, I think Super Mario World is an utterly amazing game worth playing. A lot of people I know write off this game in favor of Super Mario Bros. 3 which is such a shame because I think a lot of what Mario 3 introduced was improved substantially here, like the World Map and the amount of different routing choices you have to explore and complete the game. While I don’t think the power-ups are better, I do appreciate the attempt to make a power-up with a skill curve only for the reward to be far too good for the game’s own good. Yoshi was a phenomenal addition, and spin-jumping helped Super Mario world increase the enemy variety a lot more without having to compromise the pacing of levels too much which was another plus. Overall, I think if you’re looking for a game to get into Mario with, I’d easily recommend this one because it’s not too difficult of a game, certainly easier than any previous Mario game, but the charm is unmatched, and it’s just an incredibly fun game with a whimsical and really bright aesthetic. It makes you wanna keep playing it, and can put you in a good mood if you’re feeling down, I know it has for me many times over the years.

Thank you all for reading! It’s been close to three months since I’ve written any reviews. I’ve definitely been in a slump as far as video games go, and I’ve definitely been busier than before, but I’m definitely getting back into things by writing this review. I have since restarted Final Fantasy IV in hopes of finishing it this time. I've also been gearing up to play some other games like VA-11 Hall-A, so please look forward to those reviews and more this year. I also just want to say thank you everyone for the support lately, I’ve broken 60 followers and over 400 combined likes on my reviews, so thank you all so much for that. I’ll try not to fall into another slump this year, but do forgive me if things get a bit slow here and there. Thank you all for reading, I’ll see you in the next review!