Super Mario Bros.

aka: Mario 1, SMB, Super Irmãos, Super Mario Brothers
Moby ID: 7298
NES Specs
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Description official descriptions

The Princess has been kidnapped by the evil Bowser, and it is up to Mario and brother Luigi to save the day.

The first-ever platform adventure for the Mario Brothers has the player exploring level after level, with Bowser to contend with as the end of level boss. Power-ups include the Super Mushroom, which increases Mario's size and power, the fire flower, allowing him to shoot fireballs at enemies, and the ever-important starman for a short burst of invincibility.

Each level includes a bonus section filled with coins plus a shortcut through the level, plenty of bad buys and obstacles to get past, and an end-of-level flag, in which the higher the player grabs it, the more points are awarded to them. Certain levels also include warp points, which take the player to higher levels.

Spellings

  • スーパーマリオブラザーズ - Japanese spelling
  • 超级马里奥兄弟 - Chinese spelling (simplified)
  • 슈퍼 마리오브라더스 - Korean spelling

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Credits (NES version)

7 People

Directed by
Produced by
Executive producer
Assistant director
Programmed by
Graphics designed by
Original music by

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 88% (based on 57 ratings)

Players

Average score: 4.1 out of 5 (based on 453 ratings with 18 reviews)

Really good game.

The Good
This game is very good for its age and is still fun to play alone or with friends(personally I liked Luigi better), and you have to save the princess, Peach. The game can get repetitive sometimes but if that happens you can always use the secret pipes or passage ways.The game is fun fighting and jumping on the enemies and the ability to run saved me a lot of times when I was running short on time. This game is good but nowhere near Super Mario Bros. 3 or Super Mario World.

The Bad
Now that I am older it really feels outdated.

The Bottom Line
Its good fun to play with friends or alone to bring back the good memories. This game changed gaming after E.T. for Atari almost killed it. I end this review with a tribute the lovable song of the first level, second, and boss levels and hum them aloud to salute Super Mario Bros.

NES · by Ryan Johnson (3) · 2005

the great-grandfather of all platform games, and still a blast to play today

The Good
--> Simple, colorful, but effective graphics

--> Great music and sound effects (yeah, I know it's the NES, but what true gamer doesn't find themselves humming the SMB theme now and again?)

--> Great level design

--> Simple, fun gameplay, entertaining even to the day in the fact that it is simple and challenging simultaneously

--> Was revolutionary when released, nobody had ever witnessed anything like it, helped put Nintendo on the map

The Bad
umm.....hmm....can't say there is anything I don't like, a classic even to this day. If you haven't played this game you must have lived under a rock for your entire life, everybody and their sister has beaten this title at least once it seems.

The Bottom Line
A simple to control platform game that remains entertaining today, and served as the predecessor to a certain high speed hedgehog, tie-wearing ape, and countless others.

NES · by Ryu (50) · 2003

Number 1 reason to visit friends

The Good
The only game console our household ever had was a SEGA Master System. So I never got to play this gem at home. Luckily however some friends and acquaintances owned a NES and of course Super Mario Bros.!

I started playing Super Mario Bros. in the early nineties and it hadn't yet aged a single bit. And in fact if I play it now it still stands the test of time quite perfectly. Everything about the game is charming, the characters, the world, the sounds. And it all plays rather fluently. You can control Mario while in the air and he has to break when he has a lot of momentum. This makes Mario much more like a real character than some older games, where it felt much more as if you were just moving a sprite left and right. Mario has a great variety of moves which all have their uses in various puzzles and enemy encounters.

The graphics are quite amazing and very clear. Enemies have distinctive looks which allow you to quickly see what harm they might do and how to get rid of them. The sound is just as great with a tune worth remembering and the pleasant ping when you collect coins.

The Bad
The game can get rather frustrating. Especially when it comes to tricky jumps with low ceilings. It can be quite frustrating to die near the end of a level and have to do it all over again. Luckily there are quite some lives to be gathered so that you won't easily go game over.

Most of these bonus lives, however, are in secret areas or boxes however and finding those is kind of random. After a couple playthroughs you know how to find a lot of the secrets, but then you actually don't need it so much anymore. It was a great conversation topic in the 10 years after its release, though!

The Bottom Line
I doubt there are many gamers who've never player Super Mario Bros. or one of its sequels, so there is not much left to say.

By the time I first touched a console Super Mario Bros. 3 had already been released and that game always had my preference over the first. But that doesn't mean that it isn't one of the best games ever created. There is very little about this game that isn't absolutely amazing. This is one of those games that everybody, both young and old should have played at least once in his life, because it'll never get old.

NES · by vedder (70685) · 2008

[ View all 18 player reviews ]

Discussion

Subject By Date
It seemed like a weird idea for Star Wars also... Pseudo_Intellectual (66274) Jan 31, 2008

Trivia

1001 Video Games

The NES version of Super Mario Bros. appears in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die by General Editor Tony Mott.

Cereal

Super Mario Bros. was popular enough to have a breakfast cereal based on the game called the "Nintendo Cereal System", and was co-packaged with Legend of Zelda cereal. The sweetened corn bits were in the shape of Mario, Koopa Troopa, Goomba, Bowser, and a Super Mushroom.

NES supplement

For a time, Super Mario Brothers was the game packaged with a new NES system, along with the Zapper Light Gun and the game Duck Hunt.

Parody

Joe Dixon released a spoof version of Super Mario Bros. in late 2002. It replaces Mario, Toadstool, and the enemies with characters from South Park.

Sales

According to the Guiness Book Of Records, as of 2003 Super Mario Bros. is the best-selling video game of all time, with a total of 40.23 million units sold worldwide, as of 1999. The whole Mario Bros. series has 26 games and sold over 152 million copies since 1983, according to Guiness.

It is widely believed that the billionth game unit sold by Nintendo was Super Mario Bros..

TV series

Super Mario Bros. was popular enough to have a TV cartoon based on it in the late 1980's-early 1990's. It starred "Captain" Lou Albano as Mario, and Danny Wells as Luigi in the live-action segments, and animated Mario cartoons Monday-Thursday (Friday was for cartoons based on Legend of Zelda).

Awards

  • EGM
    • November 1997 (Issue 100) - ranked #2 (Titles That Revolutionized Console Gaming) (NES version)
    • February 2006 - #1 out of 200 Games of their Time
  • FLUX
    • Issue #4 - #66 in the "Top 100 Video Games of All-Time" list
  • Game Informer
    • August 2001 (Issue 100) - #2 in the "Top 100 Video Games of All-Time list"
    • October 2005 (Issue 138) - one of the "Top 25 Most Influential Games of All Time"
  • IGN
    • #1 Game of All Time (or revolutionary graphics and gameplay at the time of its release)
  • Official Nintendo Magazine
    • Greatest Nintendo Game
  • Power Play
    • 1987 - Best NES Game '87
  • Retro Gamer
    • October 2004 (Issue #9) – #24 Best Game Of All Time (Readers' Vote)
    • Issue 37 - #23 in the "Top 25 Platformers of All Time" poll
  • The Strong National Museum of Play
    • 2015 – Introduced into the World Video Game Hall of Fame

Information also contributed by Big John WV, Guy Chapman, Mat Neuteboom, Maw, Mumm-Ra, PCGamer77 and sgtcook

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Kartanym.

Wii added by Corn Popper. Nintendo 3DS added by ResidentHazard. Wii U, Arcade added by Michael Cassidy. Game Boy Advance added by Guy Chapman. Nintendo Switch added by Kam1Kaz3NL77.

Additional contributors: PCGamer77, Jeanne, Guy Chapman, chirinea, Alaka, Vaelor, gamewarrior, LepricahnsGold, Patrick Bregger, sgtcook, Thomas Thompson, FatherJack, lightlands, SoMuchChaotix.

Game added September 28, 2002. Last modified March 16, 2024.