All About the Mario Game

The Mario series was created by Nintendo, and the game that made the character a household name, Super Mario Bros., launched in 1985. It stars Mario as the first player and his brother Luigi as the second. The goal is to travel across the Mushroom Kingdom and rescue Princess Peach from the villain Bowser, collecting coins and smashing bricks along the way. Mushrooms make Mario grow larger, while a Fire Flower lets him throw fireballs. His most common enemies are the Goomba and the Koopa Troopa, and later stages add hazards such as piranha plants, fire bars and Bowser himself. The original game spans eight worlds of four stages each, and warp zones near the end of some levels let skilled players jump ahead to later kingdoms.

At its heart the series is about advancing through levels by beating enemies, gathering items and solving light platforming puzzles without dying. Power-ups are central to how it plays. Over the years the games have covered both two-dimensional and three-dimensional gameplay.

In the 2D Super Mario games, the player usually controls Mario as he runs and jumps across platforms and over enemies while moving toward the right of a scrolling screen. Each 2D level has a single exit that must be reached before the timer runs out, leading into the next stage. Super Mario Bros. 3 introduced an overworld map of branching, non-linear levels, and Super Mario World added stages with multiple exits. The New Super Mario Bros. sub-series later revived that classic 2D feel for modern consoles.

Super Mario 64 was the first fully 3D game in the series. Its levels are far more open, letting the player roam freely and explore in every direction to collect Power Stars (and, in later titles, Shine Sprites) that unlock new areas of the world. As you progress, more of each level and more of the hub become accessible.

Mario began on home and arcade hardware and has since appeared in countless variations — among them Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels, Super Mario All-Stars and Super Mario Bros. Deluxe. Super Mario Bros. remains one of the most celebrated video games ever made and has been re-released many times so that new generations can keep playing it, long after the console it debuted on.