Super Mario Bros. 3

Super Mario Bros. 3

NES - USA - 1st edition.

Developer Nintendo Publisher Nintendo Published 1988-10-23 Platforms NES, PlayChoice-10 Genres Action, Platformer Themes Action, Cartoon Series Mario, Super Mario Bros. Multiplayer Alternating co-op, Simultaneous versus Distribution Commercial

Super Mario Bros. 3 is an action platformer developed and published by Nintendo for the NES on 1988-10-23, and later emulated on several other platforms. The game is the third Super Mario Bros. title and continues the growing Mario universe. A remastered 16-bit version of the game was released for the SNES in Super Mario All-Stars and it was remastered again for the Game Boy Advance in Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros. 3.

In the game, Princess Peach has once again been kidnapped by Bowser, but this time his eight children will help prevent Mario from rescuing her. The game is themed as though it functions like a play on a stage, so power-ups are now based on suits and include the raccoon suit, frog suit, tanookie suit, and hammer bros. suit.

Personal

Own?	Yes. Two loose US Rev-A cartridges. Two manuals: NES-UM-USA-1★, and one without the cover.
Won?	Yes. No warps, all levels.
Finished	Mid 1990s.

My brother bought this game from a friend of his shortly after it came out in the States (early-1990, I believe). I remember seeing the box cover and being very excited to play the game. When we finally got it home and played it, I was blown away at how good it was. The game is both a technical marvel and very well designed. I pored over the manual, reading all about the new enemies, suits, and fixated on the "new weapon" of world 8. This game has since become one of my favorites and I view it as one of the best video games ever made.

In a sort of anachronism, I played Super Mario Bros. 3 before I played Super Mario Bros. 2, and before I saw the movie, The Wizard.

Review

10	10	9	8	10

Best Version: NES

— This section contains spoilers! —

Good

• The game has fantastic cartoon art style with each stage having its own unique theme and feel.
• The levels are nicely designed and have a huge amount of variety. Some stages use a traditional platformer style, some require good jumping skills, others are maze-like, some demand really good player control, etc.
• There are dozens of enemies, many of which are very interesting both from their look and movement patterns.
• Koji Kondo composed another wonderful soundtrack.
• There are all sorts of hidden aspects of the game to discover like white mushroom houses, treasure ships, hidden parts of the map, and so forth.
• The various minigames, Toad house, spade black, N spade block, etc. add more fun to the game.
• The Mario Bros. style multiplayer minigames add a competitive element to the game.
• The manual is very well made.
• The entire game fits into a mere 393,000 bytes! That is an insane level of coding efficiency!

Bad

• Some of the power-up prizes you get in your menu are pretty useless. The airship anchor is usually useless because you will have already cleared most of the levels in order to get to it, the music box prevents you from getting the prizes of the Hammer Bros., the star is so short-lived and most levels begin easy so it's rarely helpful, and Jugem's Cloud often results in you having to beat the level you skipped anyway when you next die.
• As a miniboss, Boom Boom is often too similar and too easy to defeat.
• Although there is some variety among Bowser's children, they too are a bit too similar for my taste.

Ugly

• Nothing.

Media

Box Art

• 

  The Japanese art shows Bowser, his children, and various enemies, all chasing Luigi, Toad, and Peach, and Mario in his raccoon suit. The ground uses the black and white tiles and the outer layout uses tiles as well. The typeface uses the jagged letters that appear in the game and later in Super Mario World. I love this art, but the cyan and orange tiles look awful.

• 

  The North American box ignores all of the original art except the smiling raccoon Mario, placed on a yellow field. The typeface is blue with a red shadow which looks great. The design is very similar to the North American Super Mario Bros. 2 box. Overall, I like it, but the Japanese art is more interesting.

• 

  The US back features a beta screenshot.

Documentation

• 

  Manual - Super Mario Bros. 3: Instruction Booklet.

• 

  Nintendo Power strategy guide.

• 

  Hot Tips for the Coolest Nintendo Games.

• 

  Advertisement - Spain.

Maps

• Maps

Screenshots

• 

  Corrupt world 1 due to cartridge tilting.

Graphics

• spriters-resource.com/nes/supermariobros3 - Graphics.

Fan Art

• 

  Fan art by Ohmonah.

Videos

Review - What's So Great About Gaming?

Gaijillionaire's Club.

Did You Know Gaming?

Glitches, tricks, secrets.

Retro Game Mechanics Explained.

Region Break.

Commercial - USA.

Commercial - Compilation.

25 things you didn't know about Super Mario Bros. 3.

Another 25 things you didn't know about Super Mario Bros. 3.

Speedrun progression, warpless.

Speedrun progression, any %.

Longplay - No warps.

Representation

Strong female character?	Fail	Peach is a damsel in distress, and Wendy O. Koopa's role as a boss is very brief.
Bechdel test?	Fail	Peach only talks to Mario. Wendy only talks to the reader of the manual.
Strong person of color character?	Fail	Every human is white.
Queer character?	Fail	There are no queer characters.

Credits

Role	Staff
Executive Producer	Hiroshi Yamauchi
Producer	Shigeru Miyamoto
Director, Game Designer	Shigeru Miyamoto, Takashi Tezuka
Assistant Director	Hideki Konno
Main Programmer	Toshihiko Nakago
Programmers	Kazuaki Morita, Toshio Iwawaki, Shigehiro Kasamatsu
Level Designers	Takashi Tezuka, Katsuya Eguchi, Hideki Konno, Kensuke Tanabe
Character Designers	Takashi Tezuka, Hideki Konno, Hiroyuki Kimura
Music Composer, Sound Effects	Koji Kondo

Titles

Language	Native	Transliteration	Translation
English	Super Mario Bros. 3
Japanese	スーパーマリオブラザーズ3	Supa Mario Burazazu 3	Super Mario Bros. 3

• MAME code: pc_smb3

Links