Super Mario Bros. 3 is a game I wish I liked more. Super Mario Bros. 3, which I will now just be referring to as simply “Mario 3,” is to me, a very culturally significant game. A phrase that big might sound a tad pretentious, as if I’m already lauding Mario 3 as one of the greatest games ever created. I don’t think Mario 3 is at all noteworthy by my own arbitrary metric for what “modern game standards” are. The levels in Mario 3 are enjoyable to me. The levels hit all the notes I need to keep me engaged, yet I’m never truly gripped by the game. It’s just fun enough.
The bias might be skewed by myself arriving to the metaphorical Mario Bros. 3 party later than the biggest fans. With my first console being the Super Nintendo Entertainment system, Mario World had already been unleashed onto the world by the time I had a chance to play 3 via the Super Mario All Stars port. Having already experienced Mario World many times over prior to getting my hands on Mario 3 for the first time had already removed so much of the luster from Mario 3.
I feel as if modern games don’t respect iterative sequels, with “modern” referring to games 2010-on or so. Games in this newer spectrum tend to value innovation and distinction more than iteration. With this shift to overhaul and do something new with each modern release, older release keep their charm as offering a different experience, not a lesser experience.
What that bit is trying to say is that World came from an era of iterative games, where World is just Mario 3 Plus. Stepping back from World to Mario 3 doesn’t give me a radically different game trying to do different things, it just gives me a bit less of a game. Mario 3 on release was a huge step forward from Mario 1 and 2J. Mario 3 was just the prior games but more. More levels, more graphics, more sound, bigger scope. Mario World usurped Mario 3 for me in exactly this way. When I’m left playing Mario 3 in a modern context, I’m having an enjoyable time, but I certainly don’t feel like I’m playing one of the best games ever made.
Although in the 2020s, with more younger generations being vocal with their gaming opinions and experiences, lauding games like Mario 3 feels exceedingly rare. Where I’m thinking of gamers slightly older than me who grew up on the NES, people younger than me who grew up after the SNES really don’t seem to have as much attachment to any of these old games. Especially kids (now adults, really) who grew up with the Wii and DS. That younger generation growing, while the older generation shrinks, really seems to be diminishing the volume of voices still claiming these old Nintendo games are the greatest games ever made.
For me at least, I’m a bit envious of people who can play Mario 3 and experience pure interactive video entertainment bliss. My romp through the Mushroom Kingdom on the 3DS VC version of the famicom release was merely enjoyable, yet forgettable. My time with the game came and went. Mario 3 to me may as well be ordering takeaway pizza. It’s very enjoyable in the moment, but it’s not something I’m going to recall specifics of other than stating “Yeah, I liked it.” I wish I could appreciate it in the way some people do where it’s a borderline religious experience due to their nostalgia, but for me it’s simply a brief but enjoyable distraction.
I started recording the names of levels I actually enjoyed enough to take special note of. These levels were the following:
3-4 - Boss bass and the water tide gimmick of this level has become a 2D Mario motif. This level is fun, especially with needing to grow vines through blocks that require koopa shell kicks to grow if you want to keep Mario’s feet dry.
5-3 - Kuribo’s shoe really does stand out just through rarity alone. It’s easy to not even realize you can steal the shoe, considering stomping on or using a fire flower on a Goomba will destroy the shoe as well.
6-4 - The ice floor paired with spinning bars really emphasizes Mario’s momentum and the athleticism implied by the “athletic theme.”
6-5 - First puzzle level, an interesting precursor to the ghost house concept.
6-10 - The one off gimmicks of melting ice blocks with fire flower shots makes this stand out a lot. These explicit gimmick levels really elevate themselves over just standard platforming challenges.
7-7 - The recurring star-chaining gimmick level motif started here.
If Mario 3 had more one-off gimmicks levels I think the game would stand out a lot more. They’re consistently the most enjoyable and memorable levels to me. Generic platforming challenges levels are fun but quickly blend together into mush in my mind, the gimmick challenges stay fresh in my brain. The reserve items also got some interesting use on my playthrough. I beat the game 100%, completing every level, but mentally I tried to make notes of where I felt clouds/hammers/pwings/special suits could be use to great effect.
7-4 - Especially on JP where one hit reduces a fully powered up Mario back to regular Mario, this underwater autoscroller really ups the ante by having you navigate a narrow Jelectrode path before needing to dodge two Bloober Mamas. Saving a Frog Suit for this level alone is worth it to me. This is the only level where I felt that having a special power up in reserve for it would really work wonders.
P-wings felt amusing in that they could be used to bypass certain levels that were supposed to force you into one-way detours. The obvious use for these would be to just fly over levels, but skipping sections of levels like door maze of 3-Fortress 1 with a pwing give a bit more breadth to its utility. The vehicle levels in world 8 can all easily be bypassed with a pwing, but worth noting is that you cannot skip them with clouds. So using a cloud on a normal level or a fortress earlier in the game would be preferred, if you planned on saving your p-wings for the vehicle levels.
I quite enjoy the idea of being able to skip fortress levels with clouds, but you can only remove the key gates on the overworld by going through the traditional process of beating a fortress. So you need to keep in mind where key doors are if you plan on skipping a fortress.
The Anchor might be useless in a 100% playthrough, but for players skipping lots of levels, it might be handy for an awkwardly difficult airship. The music box seems pointless to my cursory glance, since any power up at all in your reserve should allow you to conquer whatever overworld encouter is in your path. Although if real-time speed is of most concern during your playthrough, there could potentially be a spot where locking movement of overworld encounters to prevent you from having to engage with them saves more real time than blitzing through an encounter manually.
The difficulty of Mario 3 is high enough that it’s an engaging game to play and never felt boring to me, but isn’t actually high enough that planning out any special routes or strategies seems relevant to me. I might just be too much of a gamer though. 5-9, 7-4, and 8-airship I felt were the three most challenging levels in the game, but all of them are easily bypassed with pwings, and the prior two levels would be easily bypassed with clouds if so desired.
I enjoyed using the frog suit in water levels, but the proper tanuki suit was just an entertaining silly gimmick that didn’t feel particularly useful. The hammer suit never felt bad but I never thought to myself “wow, hammer suit would be great here.” I used it on the final level though and found out it deals damage seemingly on many frames. So Bowser died in just two hammer throws, although doing the Bowser fight normally is probably easier than getting through the whole level without taking a hit.
The tail flutter also struck me as unique. As a kid I felt it was awkward compared to the cape float just being a held input in Mario World. As an adult I realize the tail flutter is more analogous to the spin maneuver in Mario Galaxy. It’s not as much a tool for making a slow descent as it is a tool for making a midair quick correction.
This mechanical diatribe is rambling into incoherrence, so I'll end my notes here. Super Mario Bros. 3 is an enjoyable game with many ideas that I enjoy, however the majority of the game is ultimately just Mario flavored oatmeal. It's technically good, but you do wish it was spiced up a little more.
— Juni - April 22nd, 2024 —