SODABOMB

I’m not going to lie. I am obsessed with this game. Super Mario Land has this incredible effect on me. I can sit and play it for hours and not get tired of it. I only recently got a copy of my very own, but I have fond memories of playing it as a child. When I was younger, I spent a lot of time at my Grandma’s house, and I was really close friends with the neighbor kids. One of them had a Game Boy and a lot of games, including Super Mario Land and I got my first real taste of portable gaming. It is one of my earliest gaming related memories.

The game itself is kind of an anomaly in the series. For example, it is one of the few titles that creator Shigeru Miyamoto had no involvement in. It ended up being the child of Game Boy creator Gunpei Yokoi, and as a result, it has a certain quirkiness that makes it really stick out. In typical Mario fashion, you pick up a mushroom and you become super Mario, then you pick up a fire flower and that enables you to throw fireballs. The weird part about this game is that instead of throwing fireballs you throw these orbs that bounce off of everything. It controls like a regular game in the 2d series and has a similar sense of gravity, making it pretty easy to get used to. This game is very easy to just pick up and play.

Most entries in the series have classic Mario enemies along the way to make your life miserable. Super Mario Land is no exception. Some of the creatures you’ll come across are a little bizarre. I’ve had to fend off flying moai statues, spiders, angry bugs with spears, and ninjas. Sarasaland doesn’t fuck around.  The usual goombas, piranha plants and koopa troopas are also present, although Bowser is nowhere to be seen. In his place is a “mysterious spaceman” named Tatanga. Also absent is Princess Peach. Instead the quest is to save Princess Daisy who has been kidnapped by Tatanga with his plans to take over the kingdom of Sarasaland. This sounds oddly familiar.

Many things continually draw me back to this game, but one of the big selling points is the music. All of it is incredibly catchy and it gets stuck in your head for days. Hirokazu Tanaka composed some excellent music for this game, none of which relying on the classic Mario theme. For the most part it is all really upbeat and fun.

Another thing that makes this game a little bit different is that it is part shmup. That’s right. It has a couple horizontal style shmup levels in which Mario is cruising along in a submarine or an airplane, breaking bricks and shooting whatever comes at him. It is a nice break from the sometimes frustrating platforming, but it really does kind of come out of left field. I wish more of the games in the series would have little fun things like this in it. The final battle itself against Tatanga is in the shmup fashion and it can be irritating but it’s so entertaining as well.

For being a launch title on the Game Boy, Super Mario Land is still a lot of fun to play. I really recommend playing it if you never have. Like I’ve said before, it can be a little frustrating until you get used to it, but it is rewarding.

This game is short but sweet and I love it.