Well I did it – or should I say “We Did it” my girlfriend and I finally finished the co-op version of New Super Mario Brothers for Nintendo Wii. This Super Mario Brothers game takes us away from the 3D style that they have been using recently and pulls us back to the side scrolling that we all used to love on the NES and SNES versions. Don’t be fooled, however, just because it is old school side scrolling doesn’t mean it is watered down or any less fun to play. **Please note that I am reviewing this game from the standpoint of going through it on co-op mode which allows you to do some different stuff and also presents unique challenges, especially in the game play arena.
Game Play (8/10)
We were impressed – although not from the onset. It took us a couple of levels to get the hang of things, especially because there is so much you can do and interact with on the map. The game introduces a couple of new Powerups which include the Snowballs (an icy version of the fireball powerup) and a helicopter head which is just straight up awesome.
The helicopter is practically necessary to beat some levels which makes the game challenging and not quite as fun, especially if your partner has a helicopter and you don’t. There are tons of hidden places on the map to explore, and you must wisely use your Powerups if you want to collect all the Star Coins and completely beat the game.
The biggest drawback to playing on co-op mode is that more often than not, you will harm your partner if things get too crazy. Be careful not to advance too far ahead of your partner or they will get smashed and lose a life. Be careful about throwing turtle shells because those will usually find your partner instead of a Goomba or Hammer Bro. Also, you find yourself jumping on your partners head a lot, which reduces their ability to move around the level and resulted in a number of unnecessary deaths for us. Another big drawback is that when a person either gets injured, dies, or receives a powerup, the screen temporarily freezes which can often result in a partner missing a jump or getting hit by an opponent. In my opinion, they should have done away with the temporary freeze when playing co-op.
You can choose to pick up co-op play anytime you want. You can play through every level but the last one and then have another player join you, or you can have them join you for the middle levels only or from start to finish. Each time you fire up the game, it gives you the option of how many players to include, so you aren’t SOL if you start a co-op game and then that person never comes back to play with you.
Playing in co-op mode allows you to have a better chance at completing some levels though, so don’t disregard it completely. For example, when one of you dies, and the other lives, as long as the person who died has extra lives remaining, they will be able to re-join their partner. They float around in a bubble until popped either with their partner’s head or a thrown object such as a fireball or shell. A player can choose to place themselves in a bubble which protects them from harm in case they find themselves in a bad spot or coming up a little short on a jump. One player has to remain “playing” meaning not everyone can bubble at once (because someone has to be around to pop them). You can strategically “Bubble” to make it past tough parts of the game where 2 people jumping around on the screen prove to be too much. We did find that you can save yourself some trouble by “staggering” your lives so you don’t have to start a world over if you are forced to use a continue. If both of the players reach 0 lives at the same time, you will have to go back to your last checkpoint (usually the start of the world or the last castle you beat). If you both find yourself with one life, however, one player can bubble and the other player can die which will only force one of you to continue and you can resume the game from your current level. Seems like a glitch to me, but a pretty handy one at times. When in co-op mode, if you can time your “Butt Bombs” to hit the ground at the same time as your partner, you will kill everything on the screen (unless it’s a boss, then it will only damage them slightly).
Overall, the game was crazy fun to play which is why it gets an 8/10
Graphics (7/10)
I don’t know what you can really expect on this front. Some of the 3D Mario games weren’t that exciting to look at and having a side scrolling game like this doesn’t allow you to do much graphically. They did a good job with the worlds, however, and incorporated what they could graphically. Some levels contain hidden areas covered by clouds that you can jump through and wisp away.
The animation of some of the characters is cool too (for example, the opponents on the screen will pause and dance with the music, forcing you to concentrate just a little bit more). The way the characters interact with the environment is pretty standard. I wasn’t blown away by any of the graphics, but if that’s why you bought this game in the first place, then you’re doing it wrong.
Controls (8/10)
The controls take just a minute or two to get used to. They utilize the Wii-mote very well in my opinion, by not forcing you to use motion controls hardly at all to beat levels. A slight flick of the wrist allows you to pick up objects on the ground such as frozen enemies, turtle shells or barrels. You must use the motion sensor with the helicopter Powerup to activate it.
There are some portions of the level that can be controlled by tilting the Wii-mote back and forth, but they are not that common. Nintendo did a great job of basically allowing the gamer to sit back on their couch, hold the Wii-mote sideways and get the old timey feel of having an NES or SNES controller in their hand.
The only glitch I saw was due to the way that the Wii-mote must be held in order to play the game. Your left hand is covering the motion sensor part of the controller and if you move your hand, sometimes it will think that you flicked the controller, causing you to do something you might not have intended. In beating the entire game, I only saw this 2-3 times, however.
Challenge Level (8/10)
I have played quite a few Mario games in my day, and this was one of the more challenging ones. There are 8 worlds (a ninth gets unlocked, but you can’t do anything in it once you collect all the star coins from each world) which provides more than enough gameplay time. The levels are long and require a pretty good amount of skill to complete. Many times, the Powerups provided in the level are the only way to pass, so you must be careful not to get damaged by an opponent. Going through with a partner reduces the challenge in some ways, but increases it in others.
For example, if one person has fireballs and the other has nothing, the second person can hang back while the first clears out all the enemies. Other times you must work together in order to pass, making sure you communicate and share Powerups wisely. There were quite a few levels that took more than a handful of tries to complete. I’m not a professional gamer by any means, but I thought the game was pretty tough.
Replay Value (8/10)
This game has quite a bit of replay value, mostly because you can unlock other levels by collection all of the star coins in each world. Upon completion of the game (first 8 worlds), you unlock a 9th world. You can browse around, but really can’t do anything until you gather all of the star coins in a particular world.
This means that you have the opportunity to play 8 extra levels after beating the game (1 for each world). There is also enough hidden stuff to explore (just beware of the time running out), to keep you entertained for hours. I could see you playing through this on co-op, playing again to gather all the star coins, and then possibly playing through on single player which is pretty good value for your dollar.
About the Author: Aaron Garcia is the owner of All Sports Talk, a sporting news blog. You can follow him on Twitter @allsportsnet and stay up to date with his daily news.
