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Classic Game of the Week  Super Mario World
- By Eric Tajchman
The year is 1991. Sega launched its 16-bit system, the Genesis, just 2 years before, but it wasn’t until 1990 that Sega began to steal sales from Nintendo’s 90+ percent control of total game consoles sold. Slowly over the next year, the Sega sales team came up with advertisements and promotions that were powerful and persuasive. Sega tried to appeal to the older gamer, boys between the ages of 10 and 14, by showing that Nintendo was for kids and Sega was for the older, more rebellious gamer. Naturally, kids weren’t ones to like being called kids, and Genesis sales steadily rose.
Then Sega upped the ante. Up until this time, the Genesis presented games that were merely graphically superior but weren’t very entertaining (the biggest game until then was Michael Jackson’s Moonwalker; pick it up for laughs only). Then, Yuji Naka presented the world with Sonic the Hedgehog, the biggest contender to Mario and Nintendo ever. Magazines called it one of the best games ever, and gamers were excited and anxious to get their hands on the hot title. Nintendo did not fully realize the growing popularity of Sonic and Sega until Sega had a commanding lead in the next-generation of consoles. Sega then started to bundle Sonic with the Genesis, and people who were waiting for Nintendo’s next console instead went with Sega and Sonic.
But Nintendo was not one to give up their massive control of the gaming market. Hiroshi Yamauchi asked Shigeru Miyamoto for a new Mario game for release on Nintendo’s new Super Nintendo system. Yamauchi was riding on the popularity and reputation of the Mario franchise to win back sales, and was counting on Miyamoto to deliver a new and unique experience that retained the same style and fun of Mario. Miyamoto and his team had taken some time off after the release of Super Mario Bros. 3 to study and experiment with the 16-bit architecture of the Super Nintendo when Yamuachi made his request. The pressure that was put on Miyamoto and his team was staggering, as the success of the Super NES depended upon their work. Needless to say, Super Mario World was a very critical game for Nintendo.
When the SNES and Super Mario World finally launched on September 9, 1991 (a now infamous date), the whole world saw the newest Mario revolution. Gamers who had thought that Super Mario Bros. 3 for the NES was impossible to top were proven wrong by the genius and talent of Shigeru Miyamoto. Super Mario World had everything that people expected and so much more.
In this adventure, Mario, Luigi, and Princess Toadstool had decided to vacation from their ordeals on nearby Dinosaur Island. But it seems that evil spiked-shelled turtles can’t seem to relax, and Bowser soon interrupts the trio’s vacation and once again kidnaps Princess Toadstool. Again, it was up to Mario and Luigi to save the day.
In this new adventure, Mario sported new moves, items, and a new dinosaur friend, Yoshi, who could slurp up enemies with a long, red tongue and spit them out at other enemies or swallow them for coins. Unlike Mario’s previous adventures, the game was nonlinear in that you could pick which path you wanted to take to proceed through the game and return to levels you had already defeated. Some levels even had different goals to reach that opened up secret paths to strange and hidden lands, such as Star Road and the Special levels.
Super Mario World was the definitive, must-have title Nintendo needed to market the SNES, and the fact that Nintendo bundled the title with the system and an extra controller made the package much more appealing. Kids went crazy that holiday season begging their parents for a new Super Nintendo with Super Mario World (me included), and angry parents cursed Nintendo for releasing another must-have product that their kids would rave and whine about until they got it (my parents included).
Though the Super NES was over two generations ago, Super Mario World has been released on the Game Boy Advance as Super Mario Advance 2. Do yourself a favor and pick up a copy, as this game never seems to lose its appeal. The fun and innovation in this game will keep you coming back for years, literally.
Pictures courtesy of The Mushroom Kingdom.
- 8.10.2001 |
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