May 15, 2006: What's New is Old Again
by Diamond Feit
Nobody likes to feel left out. I knew this before I moved to a foreign country with its own distinct language and culture but after decades of living in Japan, I have become all-too-familiar with the struggle to fit in. If it weren't for social media feeding me constant reassurances that my opinions rule, this physical isolation might devolve into a debilitating condition.
As silly as this sounds in hindsight, I experienced a similar sense of isolation when video games went all-in on 3D graphics around the turn of the millennium. Witnessing arcades and the time-tested craft of pixel art dismissed as relics of the past really stung. I loved 2D games and kept playing them regardless of what critics and platform holders insisted was the future of the medium, but I found myself with fewer options as publishers devoted more resources to pursuing the promises of new technology.
Even Nintendo veterans like Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka\u2014who helped define the 8-bit era of game design\u2014worked to re-imagine classic characters and experiences in three-dimensions. Mario's days of progressing from left to right on a single plane were over; now he had dialogue to deliver, dynamic mission objectives, and a talking backpack for some reason.
Seeing these shifts play out in game magazines and on the young internet, I found myself growing disillusioned by the entire affair. I did not reject 3D graphics on principle; by this point Resident Evil and Grand Theft Auto III ranked high on my list of favorite video games. My objection lay in the apparent erasure of entire genres in favor of polygon-based environments because of the sales potential. This motivated me to revisit 2D classics via emulation rather than spend any time (or money) on new games.
20 years ago, two major changes drew me back into the hobby which I feared had left me behind. First, Nintendo remodeled the DS handheld console as a slimmer, more compact device called the DS Lite\u2014although I had been so out of touch that I doubt I knew the regular DS even existed. Second, the company broke with recent tradition by releasing an original 2D Mario game. They even made sure everyone understood it was a new game by calling it New Super Mario Bros.
Lest we forget, Mario took a hiatus from side-scrolling action games when Nintendo launched their new 3D console in June of 1996. Super Mario 64 brought Mario and his core abilities of running and jumping into a three-dimensional open-world. Yet even prior to that revolutionary adventure, Mario's 2D outings became less and less frequent in the 90s as he spent most of his time and energy on the Game Boy.
In fact, Nintendo seemed eager to reign in Mario during this time period while promoting his co-stars to leading roles. You'd think the Super Mario Land series would necessarily feature Mario prominently yet his rival Wario took over beginning with the third game. Yoshi's Island, the 1995 de facto sequel to Super Mario World, likewise relegated Mario to passenger status on the back of his dinosaur pal.
This means that from 1991 until 2006, fans of the 8-bit Super Mario tetralogy had precious few options when it came to new 2D games. Instead, Nintendo chose to re-release or outright remake those four classics for the company's latest hardware platform. Examples include Super Mario All-Stars for the Super Nintendo, Super Mario Bros. Deluxe for the Game Boy Color, and the Super Mario Advance series for the Game Boy Advance.
That last item proved particularly significant as Nintendo's 2D revival in the early 2000s coincided with the 20th anniversaries of the Famicom and the original Super Mario Bros. In a 2009 conversation with Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, Shigeru Miyamoto noted that the company had essentially split the Mario fandom. \"There were now two different strands to the Mario series: there was the Mario that had developed in step with consoles as they had become more advanced, and there was also the basic Mario that anyone could play,\" Miyamoto said. \"When I talked about this with Tezuka-san, he said: 'Right, if we make another one, it should be a side-scrolling Mario.'\"
The decision to return to Mario's roots warranted much discussion. \u201dOne could ask: 'Why are you making a 2D side-scrolling game now?'\" Miyamoto said, \"And then the counter-argument would be: 'We can use 3D polygon graphics, but by making a side-scrolling game, won't we be appealing to a larger number of people?' So we decided to make a Mario that made a fresh start by returning to its core principles. That's why we put 'New' in the title.\"
New Super Mario Bros. opens with Mario and Princess Peach strolling in the Mushroom Kingdom just outside the grounds of her royal residence. A mysterious cloud forms above the castle and starts striking the tower with repeated bolts of lightning. Mario runs off to investigate but it was all a ruse to draw his attention away from the Princess. Bowser Jr.\u2014the canonical offspring of the villainous King Koopa introduced in Super Mario Sunshine\u2014leaps out of the bushes to snatch Peach and make a run for it.
That little reptile boy (whom nobody liked) dashes off the edge of the screen and onto the World 1 map, stopping only once he reaches the safety of his own fortress. Mario chases after Peach but naturally he has to take the long route; each red dot on the map represents a stage he must complete before moving forward. These area maps resemble those of Super Mario Bros. 3 rather than Super Mario World as the Worlds lack any visible connections to one another.
The only indication of how many Worlds exist sits on the DS' lower screen which diagrams Worlds 1 through 8. Mario does not necessarily tackle these Worlds in numerical order, as Worlds 4 and 7 lie off the primary path. Mario needs to unlock hidden Warp cannons or find alternate exits to change his trajectory. Players can instantly access any World once they have been discovered by tapping on the touch screen, making it easy to check previous stages for anything they might have overlooked.
In each stage, the basic gameplay harkens back to Mario's earliest appearances with only two buttons controlling his actions: One button jumps, and the other covers running, handling objects, and attacking with fire if he's powered up. Later additions to his repertoire like the Spin Jump from Super Mario World or the Backwards Somersault from Super Mario 64 are gone, although he can Ground Pound to slam downwards and break certain blocks if he's powered up.
The biggest change to Mario's movement options is the new Wall Jump. Whenever he falls next to a vertical surface, pushing the D-pad towards the obstacle will create friction that slows his descent. Pressing jump in this state sends him leaping away from the wall in the opposite direction. This enables him to kick off of walls to gain extra height or, if two surfaces are close together, lets him bounce between them to climb straight up.
Yet when it comes to 2D Mario games, reaching the goal and celebrating your victory is only half the fun. The rest lies in the array of new abilities that come from the power-ups scattered throughout the land. The classic Mushroom, Flower, and Star all return and work exactly as you remember, although Nintendo grounds Mario in New Super Mario Bros. by denying him any means to fly.
Expanding Mario's magic arsenal this time around are the Blue Shell, the Mini Mushroom, and the Mega Mushroom. That first item might sound like the notorious Mario Kart weapon that hunts down the race leader, but this version gives Mario a hardened shield when he crouches\u2014similar to the Hammer Suit in Super Mario Bros. 3. Beyond this defensive maneuver, it also lets Mario tuck himself inside and slide around if he has enough momentum. Once engaged, Mario's body has the offensive properties of a Koopa shell, breaking blocks and knocking out foes on contact.
At first glance, the Mini Mushroom seems like the opposite of a power-up, as it dramatically shrinks Mario and robs him of any other abilities he might have equipped at the time. In this pint-sized state, his reduced mass prevents him from stomping on enemies or carrying any objects. However, his featherweight status also lets him jump higher and run along the surface of water. Special tiny pipes\u2014which often lead to shortcuts or alternate stage exits\u2014are also only accessible in this most petite form.
On the opposite spectrum, the Mega Mushroom does just what you'd expect, embiggening Mario to titan stature. In this nigh-invulnerable form, Mario demolishes nearly everything he touches from other creatures to bosses to the level geometry itself. It's a temporary condition but while active, a Mega Meter at the top of the screen fills up as Mario lays waste to his surroundings. When the Mega Mushroom expires, the Meter rewards him with an amount of 1-Up Mushrooms relative to his destructive performance.
In addition to its in-game applications, the Mega Mushroom also served as a kind of Trojan Horse for the New Super Mario Bros. development team. They knew that screenshots or footage of Mega Mario in action would immediately capture the attention of potential players. Again speaking to Iwata in 2009, Miyamoto said this eye-popping addition would offset the \"understated\" nature of a 2D game in 2006. \"If you include that enormous Mario,\" he said, \"the rest of the game can be as old-fashioned as you like.\"
Whatever internal misgivings Nintendo might have had about releasing a two-dimensional side-scroller in the 21st century, New Super Mario Bros. performed better than anyone could have anticipated. The game sold over 30 million copies across all territories, making it far and away the most popular game on the Nintendo DS. Indeed, it also outsold any game released for the 3DS, including its own 2012 sequel.
Crucially, New Super Mario Bros. demonstrated that the audience for conventional, easy-to-understand games remained a viable force in the marketplace. Whether you were old enough to remember the NES or your first console was an Xbox, you could enjoy the simple pleasures of breaking bricks, collecting coins, and sliding down a flagpole. It also rekindled a love of games in lapsed players who felt jaded by recent trends in the medium such as myself.
In May of 2006 I had just returned to New York from a year of studying abroad in Japan. My time there didn't include as much gaming as you'd might expect\u2014I had a language to learn and I met my future wife\u2014but I certainly appreciated the ebullience of arcades compared to the United States. With my graduation and a likely move across the Pacific looming, I knew I had to spend the next 12 months or so reducing my possessions to the essentials.
As if on cue, I started seeing advertisements for Nintendo's new hardware and their first 2D Mario game in over a decade. Despite my limited income as a college student, I went directly to the Nintendo World Store in Rockefeller Center and treated myself, figuring that a portable system would be a perfect fit for my travels.
To a not-so-young adult like me, New Super Mario Bros. gave me everything I could have wanted at the time. The stages were short enough that I could complete them on the go but dense with secrets to the point that I eagerly sought to replay them. Including two entire Worlds that Mario normally skips past acted as a lure compelling me to go back until I found out how to enter them.
The much ballyhooed new power-ups underwhelmed me, especially the Mega Mushroom which sounds more fun than it is. I appreciated the catharsis it granted whenever the game's regular difficulty confounded me, but I found the emotional high of barrelling through walls and enemies came with diminishing returns. At least the other two additions each facilitated exploration in their own way: The Blue Shell forced me to think like a Koopa and the Mini Mushroom tested my prowess in finding and navigating tight spaces.
20 years later, I still have my misgivings about the video game business, but there's no question that I retain my love for the medium itself. 2D or 3D, on a train or in my living room, I am always ready to hang out with Mario and flatten an obnoxious reptile child\u2014with or without mushrooms.
Writer/podcaster/performer Diamond Feit has written professionally since 2009 and contributed to Retronauts since 2018. Look up feitclub on social media or visit Diamond's lofi website.