Super Mario Bros. Special

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This article was copied (instead of imported) from the now-deleted Crappy Games Wiki from the Internet Archive, with some minor edits.
Super Mario Bros. Special
Very special indeed.
Protagonist(s): Mario
Genre(s): Platform
Platform(s): NEC PC-88
Sharp X1
Release Date: August 1985
Developer(s): Hudson Soft
Publisher(s): Hudson Soft
Country: Japan
Series: Mario

Super Mario Bros. Special is a video game released by Hudson Soft in 1986 for the Japanese PC-88 and Sharp X1 home computers. It is an expansion pack for Super Mario Bros. for the NES and adds some new items, powerups and levels. It also features various enemies from previous Mario games.

Why It's-a Nothing Special

  1. The PC-88 version has eye-searingly terrible colors due to hardware limitations, with a dark pallet that makes the game difficult to see, not helped by Mario, who often flickers horribly and tends to blend into the the hills and other background scenery. The Sharp X1 version looks better, though still not that great, and has a terrible frame-rate.
  2. There are no warp zones in the game. In World 1-2, reaching the area over the pipe instead leads to the single bonus room that could be accessed normally in the stage, but with a pipe that still leads to the overworld, thus to the end of the level.[1] World 4-2 has an area with a pipe that appears to lead to a warp zone, but when Mario enters the pipe, nothing happens! Mario is essentially trapped in the pipe, and the player can't do anything but wait for the time to run out!
  3. The PC-88 version is not a sidescroller, Mario moves from one end of the screen to the other, then the screen will go black and show the next part of the level. The Sharp X1 version is again slightly better, using a scrolling system vaguely like that of the Mega Man series, but it still scrolls between each screen instead of just different areas of the level.
    • Because of the sidescrolling (or lack thereof), you can't really anticipate what will be on the next screen, and have to make blind leaps, hoping you'll land safely on the next screen.
  4. Awkwardly placed invisible coin blocks which can lead to cheap deaths.
  5. At the start of underground levels like World 1-2, Mario does not automatically walk over to the pipe, the player has to move him to it as in some of the later games, which is not really that big of a problem, but still an annoying extra step, especially with the game's timer (more on that below)...
  6. Poor jumping mechanics and edge detection, with even short gaps often requiring running jumps to cross safely, not helped by the above mentioned lack of sidescrolling. Mario cannot bounce off Paratroopas like he can in other games, and the jumping board in World 2-1 is much more difficult to perform a higher jump off of due to poor collision detection, sometimes being stuck in its animation frames when Mario jumps off. Fortunately, there are hidden coin blocks to get around using it.
  7. The levels are much longer than they need to be, which can make it hard to complete even the early levels in the given time limit.
    • While the timer didn't exactly match up with real time in Super Mario Bros. or Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels, this game's timer moves even faster, speeding up in certain situations, requiring the player to rush through the level, often reaching the goal with less than 10 seconds left, if the player can make it safely!
  8. Poor remix of the NES original's music, again due to hardware limitations.
  9. Some copies of the PC-88 version are missing the data necessary to trigger the IPL switch to load World 8-4. Because of this, after clearing World 8-3, the game will manage to show a blank screen reading "DISK ERROR! PLEASE TURN IPL SWITCH ON", which makes the game unbeatable.
  10. Horrible ending. The original game's ending may not have been great, but all you get here is a message saying "You cleared every world. You are the greatest player. Congraturation!" [sic]

Special Qualities

  1. Includes items exclusive to this game and enemies from Donkey Kong and Mario Bros. Like the Hammer, Barrels, Sidesteppers, Fighter Flies, and the Hudson Soft Bee.
  2. The Starman power-up is depicted with a smile.
  3. The graphics are faithful to the original game.
  4. It was the only official way to play Super Mario Bros. on your PC, and that at least deserves appreciation.

Videos

MrPodoboo Super Mario Bros. Special Playthrough Play List

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References

  1. ↑ The above text is from the Super Mario Wiki and is available under a Creative Commons license. Attribution must be provided through a list of authors or a link back to the original article. Source: https://www.mariowiki.com/Super_Mario_Bros._Special

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