Travel back 27 years ago to 1989… the era of the Gameboy. Chances are you were already born, but it’s likely that you were not (I personally was not). Gaming by that time was already somewhat of a global phenomenon and home consoles already existed. Mario’s adventures had already taken the world by storm many times and he was already becoming part of mainstream culture, and with the creation of the Gameboy, another market was created for Mario to entertain gamers around the world. Super Mario Land was released as one of the launch titles for the Gameboy. However, it was not produced by Shigeru Miyamoto. Gunpei Yokoi (R.I.P), the creator of the Gameboy, was the man behind the game.

Super Mario Land takes place in Sarasaland and features a mostly new cast (Princess Daisy makes her debut). Princess Peach, the Mushroom Kingdom and Koopa (Bowser) are not found anywhere. Luigi is also not playable (foreshadowing of Mario being cooler?). In a nutshell, exciting things were happening in 1989 and Super Mario Land was a key piece of an important step in the gaming industry. Let us commence this historic game’s review!

Graphics

Super Mario Land has 8 bit grey-scale graphics. At first instance, you are presented with a title screen reminiscent of Super Mario Bros. (clouds, mountains, blocks). The stages do contain those elements but they can look kind of plain at times without the colour. Mario’s sprite is the same as Super Mario Bros. The 1-up is a heart instead of the green mushroom, probably due to the colour limitation. Some enemies look kind of cartoony and weird, and it’s difficult to figure out exactly what they are, but I think that’s a positive point for a game like this. Mario has always been known for it’s colourful (grey-scale this time) and funny-looking characters.

8.5/10

Gameplay

Super Mario Land plays very much like Super Mario Bros but with a few additions. It is a side-scrolling game with no backtracking. The 2 most obvious additions are the submarine and plane stages. There is also a bonus at the end of each stage. Super Mario Land consists of 4 worlds (kingdoms) with 3 stages each. This makes for a total of 12 stages. The only enemies who were brought back were Goombas, Bullet Bills and Piranha Plants. I’m sorry, I seem to have made a mistake, they’re actually Goombos, Bullet Biffs, and… Piranha Plants, but in essence they’re the same thing. The rest of them are new enemies exclusive to their respective kingdom. The point system is also brought back and accumulating 100,000 points gives you one continue after Game Over. 

9/10

Sound

Super Mario Land has a completely new soundtrack that is more light-hearted than Super Mario Bros. There are some recycled sound effects such as the mushroom coming out of the block. The classic Starman theme is replaced by the Can-Can. Some people like the Can-Can but others do not. I personally like it and think it gives the Mario franchise an air of being an international phenomenon, and not just a bunch of games for snot-picking (but cool) kids. There are some enemies which make some funny and weird Metapod-like noises when you defeat them. These little effects definitely help in giving Super Mario Land an identity of it’s own. They also demonstrate Mario’s utter-bastard level epicness which preceded Pokémon with cool noises years before Pokémon was even in diapers. Go Mario!

10/10

Difficulty

Super Mario Land is definitely more on the hard side than the easy side. I played it for the first time when I was about five and the farthest I could get was World 3. It wasn’t until I was 14 that I was able to clear the game. Most of the game’s difficulty (as with other Mario games) lies in timing. However, what ultimately makes the game challenging is the lack of the save feature (The 3DS version does have a save feature at least). If you run out of continue’s, you need to start again from World 1 Stage 1. The game is relatively short, but the bonus’ and continues make up for that difficulty. It can be passed in about 30 minutes, but it still would have been nice to take a break between worlds.

8/10

Personal Issues

There are a couple of things which bother me in Super Mario Land and make it somewhat frustrating. First of all, the movement can seem kind of stiff at times. You have to time certain jumps like a robot to be able to get across some things. When you have the Superball you can only shoot 1 ball at a time. If you miss an enemy the ball will bounce around the screen for a few seconds. On the plus side, this feature can be used to your advantage to get some coins and stuff. Another bummer for me is that you need to grab the Starman before it reaches the floor. Unlike the mushroom and 1-up, the Starman doesn’t move along the floor, it just goes down the screen.   

8/10

Replay Value

After completing Super Mario Land, you can play in hard mode. The hard mode is basically the same as normal mode, but the stages have more enemies within them. You don’t keep your points, but you do keep your continues. Honestly, it feels tedious to play the exact same game again after just passing it, and to have to do so without saving.

7/10

Significance

Super Mario Land is also famous for being produced by Gunpei Yokoi and not Shigeru Miyamoto (Miyamoto had no role in Super Mario Land at all). As mentioned before, Gunpei Yokoi was the creator of the Gameboy and he also did a bunch of other important stuff. So, the fact that Super Mario Land was made by him makes it all the more epic. Super Mario Land was also one of the launch titles for the Gameboy and sold over 18 million copies (more than Super Mario Bros. 3 which is a pretty awesome and more complex game than Super Mario Land). Although being a simple game by today’s standards, Super Mario Land was pretty big for it’s time.

10/10

Overall verdict

Super Mario Land basically plays like a Super Mario game, but at times it does not feel like one. It is however, a must play. As mentioned above, Super Mario Land had a lot of sales and pretty much all of it’s success is due to it’s historical context. Without the historical context, we probably wouldn’t have this game, and this is definitely a classic among classics. However, it is completely overshadowed (IMO) by its successor…Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins, which I will review next week. Thanks for reading!