super mario bros
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See John McCain in POW Bros.
Right, so the Mario Bros. remake below the jump -- by former Joystiq writer Jared Rea -- might be just the slightest bit offensive (and not in a NSFW way). But, it's also very funny, which has always trumped offense in our book. He says it's the result of a Twitter joke gone too far, but in our book it's gone just far enough.Mr. Rea does provide some additional explanation for the gag on his blog, but we hope you don't need it (you're not that removed from the outside world, are you?).
It's-a Mario World: The Lost Premises
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/nintendo/The_Mario_games_that_never_were'; Being a solitary Mario fanatic is rewarding in its own right, but when the obsession is affirmed by other people, gaming geekery reaches new heights. More cultural icon than game character, Mario has inspired everything from an animated television series to an extremely lengthy scarf. And probably a couple of other things in between, like cakes and stuff. Most recently, though, we've become infatuated with the thriving community over at VGBoxArt.com, a website dedicated to all kinds of game box artwork, both real and imagined.Barring occasionally subpar Photoshop skills, voluntary contributors to the site's public database have created an interesting collection of box art. Whether it be a reinterpretation of an existing cover or a completely new idea for a game, box art in the Wii category is worth checking out. Of course, the Mario-themed works take precedence in this humble feature, and we've assembled a new gallery showcasing the finer of the bunch. Click on and imagine the Mario games you'll likely never see. It's-a Mario World is a weekly feature in which the ubiquity of Nintendo's flagship character is celebrated: We'll incessantly ruminate about mustache wax, debate the curious whereabouts of the princess and covet the luminous power stars strewn about the galaxy. Check back here every Friday to find out what strange and wonderful thing has got us tipping our caps.
VC Friday: Super Mario Update
It's only been three months since the previous Hanabi Festival ended, but a third has already kicked off, bringing us PAL gamers a slew of (usually) fantastic U.S. and Japan-only games that never saw the light of day in Europe or Australia. In the coming weeks, we'll be buying Wii Points for Bio Miracle Bokutte Upa (NES), Dig Dug (NES), Spelunker (NES), and DoReMi Fantasy: Milon's DokiDoki Adventure (SNES).This week is Mario week, meaning you're probably going to need to stock up on Wii Points. While Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels did appear for a limited period during the first Hanabi Festival, it's now here to stay forever. That's pretty exciting, but even more thrilling is the appearance of Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars, a full twelve years after its original Japanese release. Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars -- SNES -- 900 Wii Points Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels -- NES -- 600 Wii Points Jump in a green boot and hop past the break for footage of each game!
It's-a Mario World: Friends & Allies
Oh, hello there! You startled us. For some reason we've been so wrapped up in Wario World for Gamecube lately that we forgot we're supposed to be talking about Wario's goody-goody brother. So what if Wario World is five years old and was somewhat shrugged off by industry critics? How else are we supposed to satisfy our lust for treasure before Wario Land: Shake It arrives stateside? And don't tell us to try playing an actual Wario Land game on Game Boy, because we already did that. Like umpteen times. While jamming out to new music and shouting "WAHHH" to nobody in particular.Ok, you're right: We have another month and a new Mario sports title before we should be getting too worked up about Wario. So, what is the discussion this week? The last couple of issues focused on persistent and underrated foes, so maybe we should drop all of our sinister, gold-hoarding schemes to acknowledge the friendlier folk of the Mushroom Kingdom. Which characters have helped Mario on his way? Hop over to the gallery and reminisce! It's-a Mario World is a weekly feature in which the ubiquity of Nintendo's flagship character is celebrated: We'll incessantly ruminate about mustache wax, debate the curious whereabouts of the princess and covet the luminous power stars strewn about the galaxy. Check back here every Friday to find out what strange and wonderful thing has got us tipping our caps. Still hungry for plumber pasta? Go feed on the latest issue of Virtually Overlooked, which is cooked with a Mario base and served with awesome sauce.
Virtually Overlooked: All Night Nippon Super Mario Bros.
Weird limited releases like All-Night Nippon Super Mario Bros. are exactly the kind of thing we imagined when Nintendo revealed the Virtual Console, and of course none of it has appeared. Since it's financially trivial and requires no real commitment of any kind to dump a game on the Virtual Console, there doesn't seem to be any reason not to put obscure games of historical or novelty interest on the service, and yet Nintendo and other companies have yet to jump at the opportunity beyond the occasional rare game like The Dynastic Hero. Never mind Nintendo of America, who seems hesitant to make any game available lest someone buy and enjoy it.
Long Mario scarf is long
Click for more images of the scarf Atlanta knitter Cassie (that'll be her boyfriend, Jason, pictured) is currently slaving away on what is likely to be the greatest scarf of all time -- a wool-based reproduction of the iconic World 1-1 from Super Mario Bros.Yep, you read that right -- every jump, bush, coin, Goomba, pipe (though not the sewer sections, understandably), item box, and cloud, accurately rendered in yarn. According to the determined Cassie, the scarf is currently around one-third complete, and is already at ten feet, meaning the finished article will come in at around thirty feet in length. A scarf fit for giants! See more of this glorious work-in-progress in our gallery.%Gallery-29448%[Via Geekologie] We totally heart homemade crafts of all shapes and sizes, from the most awesome quilts and bedding to fun-size Wiimotes to corsets to ... ANYTHING papercraft-related. We're just really soft inside. And a bit squishy.
Bowser's minions vent their frustrations
It isn't easy being one of Bowser's minions. Aside from the constant defeat at the hands of the Mario brothers, apparently there are some severe restrictions each class of baddie must adhere to in their roles as Bowser's employees. It's a tough life, we imagine, and a job we would certainly not enjoy. They must get amazing health benefits, because, in all honesty, why would you put up with it over and over again?We've embedded the video past the break, due to some possibly-NSFW action. So, check it out, if you so please.
It's-a Mario World: Mario is Missing (from E3)!
This week, gamers everywhere have been in a frenzy over the 2008 Electronic Entertainment Expo. Following Nintendo's big keynote address on Tuesday morning, coupled with a flood of new Nintendo media, we Fanboys have enough hard news and confirmed release dates to feed our blogging habits for the next ... well, week or so, anyway. Our unchecked enthusiasm is perhaps best exemplified in the wise words of Wii Fanboy's own David Hinkle: "I want to bathe in a sea of Nintendo splendor."But it feels like there is something amiss in the great Nintendo sea. Where is the Mario splendor amid all of our gleeful bathing? Happily, the horizon holds an August 25th release date for Super Mario Sluggers, and a September 29th release of Wario Land: Shake It!, but why haven't we seen much genuine Mario fanfare at this year's main event? Can we trust Iwata that the Mario team is hard at work, or are they hardly working? Take a stroll through our new gallery, in which we make conspiratorial speculation, scathing E3 commentary and as always, hopelessly inside references to Mario games of yesteryear. It's-a Mario World is a weekly feature in which the ubiquity of Nintendo's flagship character is celebrated: We'll incessantly ruminate about mustache wax, debate the curious whereabouts of the princess and covet the luminous power stars strewn about the galaxy. Check back here every Thursday to find out what strange and wonderful thing has got us tipping our caps.
It's-a Mario World: Mario's Many Professions, Part 2 of 2
We're back this week with the riveting conclusion of our two-part feature on Mario's professions. Last week, we uncovered some startling truths about Mario's early career, how he hit the scene as a kind-of carpenter with plumbing skills who was also licensed to prescribe medication and scale the throne of a tennis god. Then there was that whole dressing up like an Indian thing, which pretty obviously pointed to prurient debauchery.Anyway, the weird keeps on trucking. We've yet to reveal (or remind you of) Mario's part-time endeavors after 1991, back when he dropped a POW on a Pawn Shop, faced eviction from the kingdom's sewer-ghetto and struggled through 'shroom addiction. Yeah, this hero has been a long time in the making, but for the purposes of this feature let's focus on his game appearances and the types of jobs he had in them. Onward to the gallery! It's-a Mario World is a weekly feature in which the ubiquity of Nintendo's flagship character is celebrated: We'll incessantly ruminate about mustache wax, debate the curious whereabouts of the princess and covet the luminous power stars strewn about the galaxy. Check back here every Thursday to find out what strange and wonderful thing has got us tipping our caps.
Collecting & Obsessing: Game & Watch
Throughout the 1980s, Nintendo's Game & Watch series of handhelds provided the soundtrack to innumerable school playgrounds across the globe. A pre-Game Boy attempt to capture the portable games market, Game & Watch titles were relatively cheap but sturdily built toys which came with a single game and, as the name suggests, a watch. For the best part of eleven years, Nintendo kept manufacturing these forerunners to its other handheld devices, only for the Game Boy and Tetris to emerge in 1989 and squash the whole enterprise flat.Nevertheless, the spirit of Game & Watch lives on through the hundreds of individuals who collect the games. For this one-off piece, DS Fanboy decided to interview two hardcore collectors in a bid to understand their love of Nintendo's first portable phenomenon.Both 35-year-old Michael Panayiotakis (founder of Mike's Nintendo Game & Watch forum and the author of a quite superb FAQ on the subject) and 38-year-old Andy Cole possess the kind of retrolicious Game & Watch collections that we would maim (and possibly kill) for. To find out what they love about this charming series, why they collect Game & Watch, and why they dedicate so much time and money to their hobby, hit the break for our full interview. Once you've done that, don't forget to browse our gallery for a pictorial history of the Game & Watch phenomenon!%Gallery-25216%
Remember Mario? He's back -- in button form!
What are these perfect for? Making a fabric-based stop-motion Mario animation, that's what. This latest batch of buttons from Etsy craftsman Spooon features easily movable characters and items, each faithfully recreated from original NES sprites. Why, nab a set of these handy control buttons, and you'll have hours of fun manually moving our plucky hero through all kinds of pinning adventures.Better yet, Spooon also whipped up a bunch of magnets featuring Space Invaders and Pac-man characters, so there's no real need to ever leave your kitchen. Sit by the fridge and enjoy! The sets are available in button ($8) or magnet ($10) form, so the choice of creating a retro fridge or bag is entirely up to you. The store is open for business, so take a crafty trip down nostalgia street.[Via technabob]
Deaths that don't mix with Super Mario Bros.
Oh, the memories we have from our days playing Super Mario Bros. in our PJs, bellies full of sugary cereal. We can't tell you how many times we've watched Mario die, whether it be falling down an endless chasm or getting torched by a runaway fireball while penetrating the darkest corners of Bowser's castle.What would you get if Mario's death animation was swapped out for the death animation of, say, Mega Man? Or Q-Bert? Our personal favorite? The use of Friday the 13th.
Halo 3 video pays homage to Nintendo
What do you get when you combine Halo 3 with several franchises in the Nintendo universe? A pretty darn funny video, if you ask us, so give it a chance. It has direct references to Super Mario Bros., StarFox and even Pokemon Snap. Let's see if you can get all of the Nintendo properties directly referenced! Winner gets our undying love for all of eternity.[Thanks, Chris!]
Wii Warm Up: Through rose-tinted glasses
The appeal of the Virtual Console is obvious: nostalgia. The VC is jam-packed with memories from yesteryear, spilling over with wonderful software that defined our childhoods. But it isn't all lollipops and puppy dogs. Nostalgia can also be very misleading, and some of those packets of data you download from Nintendo's service can end up souring childhood memories. Personally speaking -- and this will probably sound like heresy in some quarters, so brace yourselves -- I was left disappointed by Mega Man 2, a game I adored as an eleven-year-old, but one that now seems slightly dated, with its repeated leaps of faith and enemies that like to spawn directly beneath you. On the other hand, a game such as Super Mario Bros. 3 still feels like a breath of fresh air, almost two decades after it was released. Thinking about this some more, we have three questions for you. One: which Virtual Console games don't hold the same magic for you as they once did? Two: have any titles aged better than you suspected they would? And three: have you ever held off from downloading a certain game, concerned that it may ruin one of those precious childhood memories?
Virtually Overlooked: Super Mario Bros. Special
We've missed out on a lot of gaming culture in the U.S. due to the fact that Japanese computer systems never caught on here. We didn't see the sequel to Metal Gear until 2006, because there was no MSX. We didn't see the superior X68000 Castlevania remake until it appeared on the PlayStation. Falcom's Ys made its first appearance on the NEC PC-8801, as did countless RPGs and arcade ports that we'll never see.Perhaps most notably, the lack of support for the PC-8801 outside Japan means that we missed the sequel to Super Mario Bros. No, not The Lost Levels. Even lost-er.
Mega Man pays homage to Super Mario Bros.
Sure, it's from a PSP game, but we can all admit that, aside from that small flaw, this video is pretty sweet. Apparently, this PSP game lets you create and download custom stages. From the looks of this recreation of 1-1 in Super Mario Bros., we're sure there are plenty of other sweet homages to other iconic gaming levels available for it, as well. Of course, the only problem with this user-created stage is that it lacks the music from the original Super Mario Bros. game. But, that's to be expected.Someone let us know when there's a user-created stage that is modeled after the introductory level in Castlevania.[Via Siliconera]
Unreal Tournament meets Super Mario
If any of you own either the PC or PS3 versions of Unreal Tournament 3, you might enjoy downloading this Mario-inspired map made by FrontAXL. The blocky platforms will look familar to players of the original Super Mario Bros., as well as many of the background elements. It's not an exact replica (nor is it meant to be), but the similarities are impossible to deny. Also, the PC version of the map includes music and sounds from the beloved classic. Check out the awesome in-game video of the stage in action after the break, along with some other screens. You can also download the stage here at the UT3 forums.
Working NES squeezed into ... an NES cartridge
All right, we'll admit that headline is a little inaccurate. The heavily modified Super Mario Bros. cart shown above actually plays Japanese Famicom carts (like the not-at-all-bootleg Super Bros. 5), not the slightly larger American NES carts. Semantics aside, we're sure you'll share our sense of awe at the accomplishment of fitting an entire video game system into what, at one point, was used to hold the data for a single game. All the pieces are there, believe it or not, including A/V outputs, a svelte power switch, and two controller ports sticking out at the bottom of the cartridge. The machine seems like a one-of-a-kind hack, and doesn't look like it's going to be sold any time soon. It's a shame, too ... we' d love to get our hands on one of these, if only so we could plug in our Flash Memory PowerPak via an adapter to create the ultimate NES-cartridge-shaped hacking monstrosity. [Via Engadget]
NES cart becomes NES system
If you don't think this is awesome, you should have the nearest human being check you for a pulse. French modder Kotomi, who you might recall made some pretty awesome DS and Wii-based stuff, has put his skills to the test and managed to fit the guts of a NES into a Super Mario Bros. cartridge. Pretty impressive, if we may say so.But, Kotomi, buddy, pal, couldn't you have gone with a game that was, oh, a bit crappier? Sure, Super Mario Bros. is a fairly common NES game, we get that, but if it were us, we'd probably find the worst NES game we could and rip the innards out of that. It sure would be satisfying to rip out the guts of a crappy NES game. But, hey, that's just us.[Via Technabob]
Students tackle Nintendo tunes, a capella style [update]
If there is one thing we can appreciate, it's talent. And these folk have it, as the students from Hermann Wesselink College manage to bust out into a pair of great Nintendo themes a capella style. They handle a choice selection from The Legend of Zelda, as well as Super Mario Bros. in the video above. If our school had stuff like this back when we were in our developing stages, maybe we would've paid attention and not grown up to become blogging scum. Update: Some readers point out that this isn't a capella. Sorry folks, we're not a music blog![Thanks, SpinachConvention!]
