Collection essentials #161: Super Mario Land (Game Boy)

 

And now we jump from the very last game made specifically for the original Game Boy (Pokémon Yellow) to one of the very first which was available on day one. 


It’s no surprise that the Game Boy would launch with a Mario game. What may perhaps be surprising is that the series’ creator, Shigeru Miyamoto, had nothing to do with it. As a result, Super Mario Land feels very distinct from most other Mario games. There are a lot of other things that are a little different, such as the jump physics, the way Mario’s fireball moves, and the fact that the music for the invincibility star is the can-can rather than the usual theme. Super Mario Land also introduces Princess Daisy as the damsel of distress, the third different lady that Mario has had to save up to this point. Daisy wouldn’t be seen again for a while, but eventually became a recurring character starting in the late ‘90s. Super Mario Land also features two “shoot ‘em up” levels where Mario pilots a submarine and a plane, flying around and shooting bullets to dispatch of his foes. 


Super Mario Land is a decently fun game, but it doesn’t reach the same level of brilliance as the console titles. Future Game Boy platformers would surpass it as well. It’s also really short with only a handful of levels, and a skilled gamer can likely reach the ending in not much more than a half hour. I’d say the game deserves at least a little slack, though, considering it was one of the very first games made for this handheld system that wasn’t very powerful. Super Mario Land sold very well, but in modern times it tends to get lost in the shadow of better Mario games, understandably. It is certainly a significant title and one of the first Game Boy games I owned, so I still definitely consider it an essential.

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