New Super Mario Bros. Review

That's right, Mamma Mia Mario is back and in a new side scroller game for the Nintendo DS! We are all excited, yay. And it's a side-scroller! Yes, the first Mario side-scroller in about 15 years. Wow!

Well the game starts off with Mario and Peach walking along, minding thieir own business, when a giant strand of lightning hits Peach's castle. Mario goes to investigate and one of Bowser's close relatives comes and snatches Peach behind Mario's unawaring back. So, as usual, Mario has to go through 8 worlds of cartoony levels to save her from the hands of the Bowser family.

Now, from the name, people suspect this being a remake of the original Super Mario Bros. for the NES, but they would be partly wrong. It does indeed have some aspects from the 1985 game, but it also has many features from all of the other Mario games (well, the ones with story lines such as this) incorporated right in. And there are flags at the end of every level that you jump on like the 1985 game which we all like to see.

In the game, Mario has many power-ups. He has his usual shroom with the flower power, but there are a few more new ones. You have the Mega Mushroom which takes you and puts you about 10 times bigger, enough to fill the whole screen. In this form, you can kick some serious booty. You just walk into things and they get destroyed. It's a really good power, but doesn't work for all levels as you can get stuck. There is a Blue Shell which turnes Mario into a turtle and when he runs fast, he turns into a shell and can destroy any enemy in his way, and finally, there is the Mini Mushroom. This mushroom makes you a little pint-sized Mario. This power is sort of useless sometimes, but most of the time, it's helpful. You are able to jump higher, and......umm.......that's pretty much it. Well the creators put in some little mini fun rooms to play around as a little Mario and collect coins and all that. Now all of these powers are great, but I would have liked the power of the feather (flying) and racoon power and stuff like that a lot in the game.

Oh how there are so many secrets in this game, oh man. You even have to unlock two of the worlds, World 4 and World 7. You unlock areas such as one-up mushroom house thingies, new levels, here and there a secret passage way to get ahead, and other things such as that. It's really fun to find these secrets, as they are in many levels.

The graphics are great for a DS game. Very flashy and cartoony. This one feature will keep you glued to the DS' screens for hours and hours. Very nice.

There is a lot of variety, either being a new form of level, or new enemies which keeps the game rich and exciting. But occasionally, you'll find levels that are nearly the same. But still, they are usually spread out and don't take away much of the fun factor.

Luigi is nowhere to be found in this game unless you play the new multiplayer game Mario vs. Luigi or if you type in a special code. (The code is, at the file selection menu, hold R + L at the same time and select your file by pressing A while holding R + L the whole time to unlock Luigi. You must do this every time you want Luigi.) So I was a little disappointed that he wasn't a choosable character at the beginning.

One problem I found was it really doesn't use the touch screen in the main game mode. All it does it tell you how far in the level you are, how many points you have, what world your in, lives, how many of the three big coins you have, and a power-up you have in holding, that's it. I know it sound like a lot, but you only press the power-up and the menu options. Now at the main menu screen, there is a mini-games section, but it has the same exact mini-games as the ones in Super Mario 64 DS. I didn't like how they used them over again, but it takes the hassle out of switching cartridges to play them on Super Mario 64 DS, but still.

If you play and not unlock most of the unlockables, you'll find the game to be extremely short, one to finish in a weekend, easily. But besides that, overall, this game is fun, and pretty easy. I really enjoyed unlocking some levels and using the new powers. Very fun, addictive, and good for the kiddies. Super Mario World gets 4.5 giant Marios smashing everything in a level to save the princess out of 5. Mamma Mia, Zam, out.

OH NO!!! OBESE KIRBY GHOST, NOOOOOOO!!!!