89. Super Mario Bros (NES)
I was a Sega kid back in the early and mid 90s, and that was despite getting an SNES towards the end of that console's life (I think I got it for my birthday in 1995...it was around then). One console I played quite a bit, but wouldn't own until well after Nintendo stopped supporting it was the original Nintendo Entertainment System. Many of my friends, neighbors, and relatives had NES consoles when I was younger and because of them, I got to experience a decent chunk of the NES' most iconic games as a kid. While all their NES collections were different, one staple of every single one was a Super Mario Bros/Duck Hunt cartridge. Literally, they all had this game and because of that, I got to play a lot of Super Mario Bros as a youngster. However, one almost embarrassing reality I've lived with for nearly four decades of my life is I've never actually beat Super Mario Bros. I decided to change that this afternoon. I also want to mention I only used warp pipes to get to worlds I already beat all the way through; I wasn't skipping over 75% of the game just so I could scratch this one off quickly. I really wanted to experience the full game from start to finish and say I beat what is possibly the most iconic video game ever made.
I wasn't alive when Super Mario Bros first hit the scene, but I have to imagine how much it blew people's minds in the mid 80s. Going from Atari and Intellivision to the Super Mario Bros had to be similar to how I felt the first time playing Super Mario 64 in the mid-90s. And unlike those old late 70s and early 80s home consoles and their games, Super Mario Bros is still a game that's enjoyable and fun to go back and play. Visually, there was almost nothing that could beat it, even if it seems fairly plain by modern platformer standards. There are a fair amount of levels that look very similar to others, but again, in the mid 80s, this game was way ahead of practically everything else in terms of visuals, including those repetetive stages.
The music is also still excellent, with certain tracks from this game burned firmly in my brain since I was in elementary school.
Perhaps the only things that really can be faulted with this game is its gameplay, which while not perfect, is still pretty damn good. My main grip with Super Mario Bros' gameplay is how slippery it can feel, particularly when running. It's so easy to accidentally run into an enemy or off into a bottomless pit on accident. Another issue I have is with the more technical platforming sections which require you to do a bit of Dpad rocking to ensure you don't fall to your death. This is also true of jumping on enemies, which I found myself messing up more times than I'd like to admit. There are also some really annoying stages in the last two worlds that tested my patience more than the rest of the game combined. But they are definitely beatable and once you do, you feel like a champion.
Super Mario Bros is about as must play a video game as they come. While there are a decent amount of retro 2D platformers I enjoy more, including other Mario games, it's just such an iconic and still highly relevant game that I feel like I could recommend it to nearly anyone who calls themselves a gamer. This game is a classic if there ever was one, and I am so glad I finally beat it. (8/23/25) [37/50]
