Super Mario Wonder

Released on October 20, 2023 for the Nintendo Switch, and developed by Nintendo EPD, Super Mario Wonder features platforming action in the classic Mario 2D tradition

Though Breakout on my dad's Atari 2600 was my first video game, Super Mario Bros. is where my love for video games began. I've played every mainline Mario game since that mid-80s legend and never lost my love for the franchise...though obviously I've branched out in the last nearly 40 years of gaming. Fittingly, 2D platformers are still my skill level bread and butter, so I was quite excited when Nintendo announced last year's Super Mario Wonder, an all new 2D platforming game starring the mustachioed plumber. Does it hold up to the franchise's stellar legacy? 

Does Mario like mushrooms? That was meant to be rhetorical, but actually, does he? Or does he  just have to eat them to power up, and he doesn't even like them? What if he hates mushrooms?!

Well, duh! Nintendo, known for quality, was not about to release a poor entry in their flagship series, with their lead mascot character! Rather unsurprisingly, Super Mario Wonder is a great game. It's not quite in the highest top tier of Mario 2D games, i.e. where the two Super Mario World games, as well as Super Mario Bros. and Super Mario Bros. 3 reside, but it's still very, very good. 

It's certainly on the map!

The graphics are bright, colorful, and agreeable, like in any Mario game. Again, they don't innovate or necessarily delight from a design perspective, ala Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island, or Super Mario Bros. 3, but the graphics do look great. Mario and his pals are brilliantly animated, and the environments, from grasslands to lava pits to fungi forests are pleasant and inviting. The new costumes, like the Elephant Suit, are expectedly charming. Also, even when there's a lot going on onscreen, particularly in multiplayer, the game runs smoothly.

Pictured: me dying, smoothly

The same goes for the game's music and sound. Wonder isn't going to top many BEST MARIO SOUNDTRACK LISTS, but the soundtrack is still very good, and there are a handful of very memorable pieces, particularly the trippy, atmospheric suite played in the fungi forest levels. The sound effects, from jumps to Koopa shell boops, are what you want in a Mario game, as well as the character voices. All of the characters, from Mario, to Bowser, to Toad, to Peach and many more sound exactly as they should. On the other hand, the new flower character, who is placed throughout each level to offer encouragement, is kind of irritating, and I could have done without ever hearing his voice, let alone having heard his voice SO many times.

Pictured: what I'd like to do to that talking flower. Sorry red shell, you'll have to do!

2D Mario Games feature a simple formula. Start at the far left side of a 2D side-scrolling stage. Make it to the flag at the far right side of that 2D side-scrolling stage. Story is essentially irrelevant, though there is a story here. The king of the Mushroom Kingdom's neighbor, the Flower Kingdom, invites Mario and his crew over to see a display of his magical Flower Kingdom Wonder Seeds. Bowser comes, ruins the ceremony, and enslaves the Flower Kingdom. Mario has to defeat Bowser and set The Flower Kingdom free. He'll have to travel through six unique worlds, featuring interactive maps, full of multiple stages and challenges, gathering Wonder Seeds along the way.

Gathering, Toad! Not eating! You glutton!

Each normal 2D stage features, generally, two Wonder Seeds. One is hidden in the level, and finding it will morph the level into a weird, trippy version of itself, sometimes shifting the entire gameplay style of the level, sometimes morphing Mario himself...or Luigi...or Peach...or Daisy...or Toad...or any one of the many characters that the player select. The player also gets a Wonder Seed for beating each level, though a few levels have hidden exits (sometimes to hidden levels) that have their own Wonder Seed, as well. Each level throws a different sort of challenge at the player, whether it's a new type of enemy to defeat, type of obstacle to avoid, or type of terrain to traverse. Super Mario Wonder's levels offer a great mix of challenges.

Toad, I told you to stop eating! You're an elephant!

Sure would be easier to get that purple token if YOU'D EATEN LESS. Oh wait, sorry Luigi, I thought you were Toad.

Each of Wonder's six plus worlds holds some other types of levels in addition to a regular old 2D side-scrolling stages. There are puzzle levels, in which the player will have to find several hidden tokens to complete. There are enemy battle levels where the player will have to pass through several rooms and defeat all the enemies within a certain time limit. There are badge challenge levels where a player will learn a new ability, like dashing or high-jumping, and have to master it to reach the end. The player can then use that badge on any level they choose (except a different badge level). The player can only wear one badge at a time, but the ways the badges alter the gameplay are both fun and useful. In each world, there are also what essentially add up to fun, relaxing bonus areas that don't offer any type of threat to the player, but hold coins and a Wonder Seed after the player completes an often very simple challenge.

Some levels have dragons too

You're lucky Toad didn't drink all the water when he was washing down all those Wonder Seeds! That feckless gourmandizer!

The controls the player must utilize at the service of this gameplay are, like the rest of the game, very good, and better than the vast majority of games, but not quite at the top tier of 2D Mario games. Running, jumping, utilizing badges, all feels good and intuitive. Most of the time. Very rarely, particularly with a few of the badges, it doesn't. It's a small amount of the time...but the best Mario games' controls are perfect. In general, though, they're fine-tuned, especially in regard to the game's new suits. You've got old standbys like the fire flower, but there are new suits, including a Drill Suit that allows players to drill into ceilings and floors, a Bubble Suit that allows players to kill enemies with bubbles, but also to create bubbles to jump off of, and most prominently, an Elephant Suit that gives Mario and friends a trunk to smash bricks and enemies with, and also the ability to gather water to complete various tasks. The Elephant Suit feels perfect, the most finely-tuned new element in this game, and the obvious unit seller her, besides the Mario name.  

Look at these bloated idiots! I love the Elephant Suit!

Like most great modern Mario games,Wonder rewards both experts and novices. If you're a little tyke, or if you're just bad at video games, you can use Nabbit or several other special characters and not take any damage all the way through to the game's final boss (you still die if you fall in a pit or touch a hazardous liquid). However, if you are good at video games, particularly 2D platformers, there are three purple tokens hidden through each level to collect, hidden Wonder Seeds to find, and the top of the flag at the end of each level to reach. Finding all of these is not only a challenge, but unlocks further, far more difficult levels--and once you've beaten every level and found every item, there's one final challenge level as a last reward. It's not quite as hard as say, "Champion's Road" from Super Mario 3D World, but it's still quite difficult...and quite fun! There are also stores around the worlds that sell additional badges, extra lives (for some reason, you can only get up to 99 in this game, though that does add to the challenge of the final level), and collectible standees of the characters. These stores take purple coins, which are scattered throughout each level like the regular old gold ones (and pop back up again in those levels every time you return). I was shocked to find I'd played Mario Wonder for nearly 250 hours by end! That's a lot for me. There's a lot of game here to enjoy. Plus, I had to get all those standees.

How could I go on with my life until I've acquired Spike-Ball Daisy?!

Or wandered around this giant fungi forest a few dozen times

Or found every secret on this world map

To get back to throwing a little shade, the game's silhouette levels are a nice touch, but they were already done in the Donkey Kong Country series...to greater effect. I still like them, though! 

Last but not least is Wonder's multiplayer mode, which is equal parts excellent and infuriating. I played through a large chunk of this game with my high school-aged son. As many know from the experience of either once being one or being around them, teenaged boys are not exactly known for their selfless altruism. Local multiplayer involves up to four players traversing a level together. However, only one gets the "crown," meaning the camera follows that player. If the second player falls behind, they turn into a flying ghost, and if the ghost player can't make contact with the crowned player within five seconds, they die. I should also note, if both players jump over a deep pit, and the camera follows the crowned player who has fallen, the non-crown player who successfully made the jump is out of luck. On the other hand, if the player with the crown dies and the non-crowned player does not, the non-crowned player gets the crown. The other player can immediately rejoin, but no more crown for him. My son loves to both have the crown AND run through levels as quickly as possible, which can be maddening when you have my "take your time" playstyle. We yelled at each other. A lot. We also had a lot of fun!

And we stomped on Bowser's head! (the final boss battle is a blast)

You can also play with strangers online, which is a strangely comforting mode. The strangers appear as ghosts, as they traverse a level at the same time you do. If they--or you--die, the player still alive can quickly make contact with that player's ghost to bring them back to life. Players can also leave standees behind to mark a level, or power-ups for other players. However, what you do in the level doesn't effect the other player, i.e. if THEY get the Wonder Seed or some coins, YOU don't get the Wonder Seed or some coins, and the Wonder Seed and coins in your level are still yours to find. We didn't try the online multiplayer until we 100%'d the game. My son wanted to go back to that last level, "The Final-Final Test Badge Marathon." There were plenty of players on the earlier levels and on the world maps, but for "The Final-Final Test Badge Marathon" there was only one, a Japanese player using Toadette. This highly skilled player stalked us around, waited for us to die and then try to make contact with him (or her), then paused on his end so that we could not. We greatly admired this magnificent troll.

All the toad insults I've been making are just self-loathing comments. I used him throughout the majority of the game.

Jump faster, you blue buffoon! You let that online Yoshi get to the top flag first, you walking radioactive shroud!  

Overall, I had an elephant ton of fun with Super Mario Wonder. As I've mentioned, it doesn't quite enter the highest Mario tier. The controls are high caliber, but not quite perfect. The talking flowers are a bit too childish and annoying. There isn't anything mind-blowing or transcendent in the otherwise tight level-design, solid graphics, or music, like in the best games in the series. Mario Wonder isn't a legendary masterpiece like those entries. It's just a great game. And as I review it, I realize, it's kind of a weird ode to the late 1960s and early 1970s. The font choices. The psychotropic, mind-bending colors. The overly positive, hippy attitude. The way your character trips balls when they eat a Wonder Seed. The Mario series, a product of the 80s, missed those decades. Maybe this is Nintendo's "what if Mario was around then" game? Maybe they'll send him back to the 13th Century in the next game and make him an acrobatic feudal lord? I'm sure I'll still play and enjoy it regardless!

Mario Lives!

SCORE: 9.0/10