Welcome to another edition of Retro Corner Reviews and here we take a look at the original Mario game on Game Boy. Among the releases that launched with the system, Super Mario Land was the first portable title in the series. The game didn’t get directed by Shigeru Miyamoto but instead was produced by the late Gunpei Yokoi, the creator of the Game Boy. SML released in August 1989 along with other launch games such as Tennis and Tetris. It helped the portable have a killer app next to Tetris and would become a huge seller for the handheld. In the theme, Mario travels to a neighboring country to the Mushroom Kingdom called Sarasaland where an alien named Tatanga kidnaps the princess. The princess is not Toadstool but instead Princess Daisy that rules over Sarasaland. Tatanga has hypnotized the citizens of the kingdom, and his plan is to unwillingly marry her. Mario must travel through the kingdom and save Princess Daisy from Tatanga’s evil plans. The gameplay and graphics are taken back to the original SMB and have many similarities to the NES Mario titles. At the time, this was a graphical powerhouse compared to others on the Game Boy that year. It had detail that wasn't even presented in the series' console lineup like backgrounds. Gameplay The gameplay has the original format of the first game with the point system, coins and powerups. The 1up Mushrooms have been replaced by hearts that gives the player an extra life. Nintendo was able to combine gameplay styles of the NES Original and the American SMB2 into one as it works perfectly. Even though Mario’s basic abilities got reduced, the powerups weren't useless this time. The traditional Super Mushroom, Fire Flower and Starman came back. An upgrade feature got added to the Fire Flower and the fireballs now bounce off the walls and collect coins. Honestly, we weren't expecting the fire balls to bounce around especially when I first played this in the 90s. I can see why Nintendo abandoned the concept in the later games even though it wasn't a bad idea. As mentioned, Nintendo does bring some concepts from the American sequel as SML continues the trend with creating levels of various themes. I also love the shoot'em up stages as they were a nice change from the usual ground levels. Each stage also reflected the areas' themes playing to the terrain’s advantages. Despite the exploring mechanic being disregarded, the simple format of moving from the start to the end actually felt organic once more. The bonus mini game returns from the American sequel and this time you can get more than just extra lives. The idea of “shoot’em up” being in Mario felt strange but surprisingly it was the best thing about the gameplay. It’s unfortunate that there are only two of these which is why adding extra worlds could’ve benefit from this. That’s also the first time we saw Mario operate multiple vehicles. The bosses’ challenges being different from the other was a step in the right direction. In the second image shows Mario jumping from boulders thrown by Hiyoihoi the ruler of Easton. I found these enjoyable to have a different challenge to the boss then simply running underneath them. Yes, you still have to reach the button like in SMB1 but throwing in different ways to do so was a nice feature. I do have a few critiques and to begin it's with the bosses getting beaten by going to the other side of the screen behind them. It reminded me of the fake Koopas from the Original title that relied on the same tactic of beating them. At least the bosses attack differently from each other and don't have the same tactics as the fake Koopas. There isn’t much to the portable platformer aside basic and textbook level design from the console titles. Most who owned a Game Boy would have to wait until Super Mario Land 2 in 1992 to get an SMB3/World style game. It’s when we would finally get that full-fledged Mario game to take on the go. There also weren't enough levels considering Nintendo should have made two more worlds instead of four. One of the annoying things is the fact there are only two "shoot'em up" stages. As already mentioned, they were a nice change up compared to the ground stages when it means having fun shooting down enemies. That is why they should have made six worlds rather than four because adding two more goes a long way. Something new like a mountain and a tropical environment would’ve been ideal. The theme for SML was exotic and these ideas would work as places in Sarasaland. Rating: 9.1/10 Graphics/Presentation With Nintendo's new handheld system being released in 1989 many wondered whether the portable could produce good visuals and sound. The graphics boost a returning art style from SMB while providing detailed environments and characters. The bad guys also have an exotic appearance similar to SMB2 but are taken further in their design. With enemies such as those moving statues with the big heads, sphinxes, status heads with wings, spiders and jumping bugs have exotic features. Even the bosses have the same design, and each reflects the theme of these lands. For the environments, they combined the styles of the previous games to render their features with the areas matching. An improvement to the series was additional detail being placed in the backgrounds. Whether it's the pyramids in Birabuto, statues standing tall in Easton or trees and mountains in Chai, each landmark captured these areas perfectly. The music is very catchy again much like the early titles and adds variety to the soundtrack reflecting the lands. Just as Nintendo shows these landscapes, I found more questions than answers about the mystery of this kingdom. Between the pyramids in the desert and a mountain filled with stone head statues made the environments specials. It gave the Mushroom World the most imagination the series saw at the time. Yes, we could say the same thing for Subcon in SMB2 but here the environments have more meaning. The Birabuto Desert in the left pic does have a resembles to the ones in Subcon, but the Egyptian style props went a long way. It went even further in the Pyramid stage as sphinx statues and torches along with hieroglyphs lined the walls. R&D 1 even did the same thing within Easton who took inspiration from the stone heads on Easter Island. It was really the first time we got a good idea of the type of fantasy place the Mushroom World was. The lore of the series never really went into Sarasaland other than being a neighboring nation to the Mushroom Kingdom. We do know Daisy is obviously Peach’s best friend according to the recent lore. Of course, we got another glimpse of her kingdom on one of her courses in Mario Kart Wii. The gold statue showing her and Luigi holding hands together in a romantic manner in the same kart track is something that's hard to forget. There hasn’t been another adventure the plumbers have gone through that involved Daisy’s kingdom. Mario Land seems to come across as the only one where this place was ever relevant. For Daisy we didn’t know what kind of personality she had, and assumed it was similar to Peach’s own. Aside from this game and NES Tournament Golf where Daisy acted as Luigi’s caddy the assumption was easy to make. Of course, it wasn’t until the 2000’s where Nintendo finally crafted a personality of a tomboy like character. Unlike Waluigi, Daisy wasn’t an echo type character to Peach and actually acted very different from the polite mannerisms. Nintendo gave us the answers we wanted to know about Daisy over the years that weren't solely from that terrible live action film. However, there are still many mysteries with more questions that have yet been answered about Sarasaland. The graphics were simply fantastic, and it shows the amount of polish that went into this game. It was great for the Game Boy to get a killer app that proved the system was capable of developing nice graphics at launch. The enemies had better designs, and their exotic appearances weren't weird as seen from the American sequel. My personal favorites are the sphinxes, statues with the big heads and those Kung Fu Fighters. I'm glad Nintendo continued using bosses with varied appearances from each other. The new backgrounds were a nice improvement over the previous titles. That added to the level's themes even more which in turn brings these environments to life. Some of the enemies' animation, despite being limited, still did their movements accurately. I'm just amazed that water and fire special effects are animated in such detail even with the limited tech. The presentation was the best out of all the games released that year on the system. The music was amazing as it had the best soundtrack the series had at the time. These songs would help immerse us through the exotic levels in many ways. Rating: 9.1/10 Features/Content Unlike the American sequel where we got bummed out by the removal of the two player mode, but here I have no such disappointments. It's because the game was meant for one player and the development needed some difference for the Game Boy. The secrets were always cleverly placed and hidden masterfully through these levels. Having a block take me to the top of the screen to avoid the enemies, and terrain hazards were really good. That wasn’t the only thing to see improvements as the bonus game comes back. Similar to SMB2 the bonus happens at the end of the stage after successfully reaching the top exit. That helped me become more prepared for the next level just in case I lost a powerup in a previous stage. Even the Level Select on the title screen came back which made it easier to pick my favorite part of the adventure. Now, one of my critiques comes from SML being too short even compared to The Lost Levels. I mean only 12 levels and four worlds, that's just water down compared to the console titles. My only other issue came from the level select being available after beating the game twice. In the Original NES title, these ideas were available after one completion, so R&D 1 had no excuse to program it this way. The only thing that would make me play this again is a second quest mode. However, R&D 1 didn’t think to program one in either, so I see no reason to play the same quest again. Rating: 8.6/10 The bonus sees improvements from SMB2’s own and it’s basically switches Mario around until the player presses a button. I found this better since you don’t have to collect coins to earn extra lives. R&D 1 even gave options between 1ups to 3ups and the Super Ball Flower unless you wanted one. Final Rating Mario's first portable game was a great experience on the go that took everything good about the previous entries. It had the basic design from the Original and was well developed. You had everything from the ground and shoot'em' up stages, the enemies, the secrets and the varied bosses. The graphics were some of the best design choices between the exotic landscapes and characters which brought it to life. For limited tech, SML does a fantastic job on the visuals and animation as this was the best of the system in 1989. The presentation also had Nintendo continue the trend from SMB2 USA by having an interesting soundtrack. With the other lineup having little content in 1989, the portable entry offered enough replay value between the hidden features and a level select. The downside is the game is too short and there weren't enough shoot'em' up levels. By adding at least two more lands to explore would have made this title have more replay value. A second quest mode could have gone a long way since to unlock the level select the player had to complete the adventure twice. The game is one of the unique titles in the series from that time and a great addition to the Game Boy's library. Gameplay: 9.1/10 Graphic/Presentation: 9.1/10 Features/Content: 8.6/10 Final Rating: 9.0/10 Impressive
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Retro Gamer has over 25 years of gaming experience and played many classics since the Golden Age. She has been an avid fan since the day the NES graced her life and changed it forever.
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