The Gaming Experiment

When I think of my favorite games of all-time, one game in particular always seems to pop up, Nintendo’s classic game, Super Mario Bros. 3. It hit North America in 1990, and what a fantastic game it was. SMB3 was, obviously, the third game to come out in North America though there was a game called Super Mario 2: The Lost Levels. The game featured both Mario and Luigi, in the epic quest to save, not only the princess, but also the leaders of the seven stages that Mario must fight through. This was a game that my brother and I probably played for a year straight, beating it countless times, and really having a blast with.

At the time, the graphics were great looking, and the overall gameplay was fun. There were your standard power-up, the mushroom (makes you bigger), the flower (throws fireballs), and the super leaf (which gives you the ability to fly, with a run-up first). Though, there was a different take on level warping in SMB3, there are three warp whistles that, depending on when you use them, will give you the opportunity to warp to one of three levels. The ‘story’ is pretty shallow and almost non-existent aside from the castles at the end of each stage where you actually save the stage leader. But the story isn’t why you played SMB3, it was the creative stages, fun platforming, and some challenging stage bosses.

One of my favorite worlds was the Giant world, where everything was bigger, the enemies, the bricks, and the coin/power-up blocks. I would usually use one of my whistles to get me to stage 4. It was always fun grabbing a giant red shell and chucking it at another giant baddie. Though stage 4 was my favorite stage, there was always a lot of varity that made the game keep moving, from a more normal grasslands type of stage (Stage 1) to a desert stage (Stage 2) and even a stage in the air (Stage 5 I believe). The final area (stage 8) was dark and hellish with fire and ragged rocks. But it was a lot of fun before you were able to beat Bowser.

Most older games don’t normally stand the test of time. They are unable to hold up graphically, and the gameplay issues that were not an issue when the game was first released, now with gameplay advancement, now stand out like a sore thumb. There was no save function when SMB3 came out, and that fact never stopped my brother or I from jumping right in from the beginning, leaving the console on while we ate dinner, played outside, or got stuck is really a testament to how good this game really is. A couple weeks ago, I bought SMB3 on the virtual console and it was just as fun to play as I ever remember, call it nostalgia, call it whatever you’d like, SMB3 is one of my all-time favorite games. That game came out 18 years ago…wow.

P.S. watch the The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3 show. Classic.