I’ve been on a bit of a platforming binge recently.  Between Super Mario World on Virtual Console, Donkey Kong Country Returns, and Kirby’s Return to Dreamland – my butt has been handed to me more than a few times.  Nintendo originally released New Super Mario Bros for the Nintendo DS a little while back, and in 2009 Nintendo fans were given New Super Mario Bros Wii.  There isn’t anything wrong with the 3D Mario games like Mario 64 and Mario Galaxy.  It’s just the simpler side-scrolling games are still fun and so now Mario has an all new side-scrolling adventure for a new generation of gamers to enjoy.

Nintendo draws inspiration for NSMB from two of the most iconic Mario games released:  Super Mario Bros 3 and Super Mario World.  Mixed in with some more modern elements as well as new challenges that give gamers a run for their money.  The story is typical for a Mario game.  Bowser and his lot of Koopa brats have kidnapped Princess Peach and now it’s up to Mario to beat up on the brats and big poppa to rescue her. 

You make your way through several worlds and levels on an updated over world map made popular in SMB3 and made even better in SMW.  There are sub-boss castles as well as main boss castles.  I don’t know what the point of the midway castle is, it felt like filler to me and wasn’t really necessary.  Toad houses make their return so you can win power-ups to help you when you need it and stock up on 1UP mushrooms.  The Boo mansions from SMW are also included, though they’re not nearly as frustrating and confusing as they were in their 16-bit days. 

There are about eight or so levels to complete per level, including Boo mansions and castle levels.  The first half of the game isn’t very challenging.  But the difficulty picks up by around world 4, and the rest of the game is actually really challenging.  It’s not as hard as SMW was on the Super Nintendo, but with the genuine difficulty of games decreasing over the years it’s nice that Nintendo didn’t dumb the game down.  However they did include the help movies that show up in green item boxes after you die so many times in a certain level and thankfully it’s completely optional.  I’ll put my man card on the line and enjoy a chick flick or cheesy romance novel from time to time, but I’ll be damned if I don’t finish a level by myself, so I never used the help feature.  It’s good for younger gamers, though I never had that luxury back when Super Mario Bros 3 was kicking my butt.

If you haven’t figured it out yet, New Super Mario Bros Wii is a pure side-scrolling old school platformer.  You make your way through each level jumping over or on enemies, on ledges, and over chasms while avoiding various obstacles designed to hinder and keep you from reaching the flagpole at the end of the level.  Mario's traditional move is his jump, and you can also spin, butt stomp, and my favorite the wall jump.  Many times I've almost fallen to my death in a pit or up in a sky level and been able to use the wall jump to give myself a second chance.  You can also slide down a wall too if a situation ever arises that you need a slow decent.  

I was actually kind of underwhelmed with the level designs in the game, but the brilliantly designed challenges really made up for it.  Part of the allure of Mario games isn’t primarily from these level designs though.  A lot of it comes from the power-ups.  Classic ones like the Super Mario mushroom and Fire Flower makes their return, but it’s the new ones that really have me excited.  Sadly there’s no Tanooki suit or cape, but the Helicopter suit kind of makes up for that.  Mario looks like he’s wearing onesie pajamas with a helicopter hat on, but when you shake the Wii remote it’ll send Mario spinning high into the air before floating down slowly allowing you to pick a safe place to land.  Then there’s the Ice Flower, which spits out snowballs rather than fireballs.  This power-up comes in handy quite a bit as you can use it to freeze enemies and either pick them up and use them as a projectile or as temporary platforms to reach higher areas or cross long voids a lot easier.  My favorite of the new suits is the Penguin suit.  The penguin is my favorite animal (I even have a penguin tattoo), and this power-up was the most fun to use.  You can throw snowballs like the Ice Flower, but you also have the added ability to run on ice like normal, slide on your belly, and have better control and faster swimming while underwater.  Yoshi also makes a return, whether you think he’s a power-up or not, and the portions of the game where he’s used are usually pretty fun.

If you have friends to play with, you can now play through the game with up to three other people.   I rarely play offline multiplayer with anymore than two players, so I haven’t experienced how crazy that can be.  I did play a little bit of two players though.  Just playing with two people was chaotic enough while jumping on small moving platforms and navigating through tighter spaces; I can’t imagine what it would be like with four players jumping around.  It’s pretty cool that multiplayer was included, but some of the levels clearly weren’t designed for three or four players scattering around the screen.

Nintendo makes use of the motion controls in NSMB with some interesting results.  While having to press and hold “1” and shake the remote at the same time to spin and pick items up doesn’t really make sense, that’s about the only oddity with the controls.  Some levels will have you balancing a steel beam by tilting the Wii remote either way while you jump and avoid various Goombas and other enemies.  Another one has you balancing a light in a dark cavern.  There’s one level in particular when I was playing two player multiplayer that was so chaotic and frustrating - it was actually fun as we yelled at each other trying to coordinate what to do and who’s jumping when and who’s balancing what.

Nintendo doesn’t push any new boundaries with the visuals in New Super Mario Bros.  The worlds are colorful and enemies are beautifully animated in 3-D against 2-D backdrops.  I am disappointed that the backgrounds are so plain though.  They’re really not much better than the background art from Super Mario World on the Super Nintendo and that came out about 15 years ago.  I know the Wii can do better, Donkey Kong Country Returns proved that.  Nothing else really stands out, hopefully if Nintendo releases another traditional side-scrolling Mario they’ll do more with the visuals (hopefully there’s one in the works for the Wii U).

The soundtrack includes a mixture of new and old tracks.  Some of the older tracks are remixed a little to fit the game, while others like the main theme are left untouched.  If it aint broke, don’t fix it right?   The new theme song is really catchy and the best part is Koopas and Goombas will dance to certain parts of a song.  Simple entertainment seeing enemies stop to do a little dance several times!  Of course, classic sound effects like grabbing a mushroom for Super Mario and the 1UP twinkle are left intact.  There'd be a for sure uproar if they did change those sounds up too much though so once again, if it aint broke, don't fix it.

Overall
 
New Super Mario Bros Wii is a fun platformer designed with both classic and new players in mind.  It’s not perfect; I wish the level designs were more elaborate, and the final battle felt way too easy.  The world boss battles are really cool and while easier than I thought they’d be, the actual battles are different based on each Koopa kid.  Casual gamers can easily get 20-25 hours out of the game, while more hardcore gamers can collect all the star coins in each world that unlocks another world of challenges.  Not as deep as Super Mario Galaxy 2, but an extra bit of challenge for those that seek it.

Related Reviews:
Super Mario Bros
Super Mario Bros Advance 4: Mario Bros 3
Super Mario Galaxy
Super Mario Galaxy 2
Kirby's Return to Dream Land 

Recommended: Yes