Super Mario Bros. 3 review - Nintendo Entertainment System
What the Mean Machines staff thought
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Retrospective comments
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Another game I recently revisited on the GBA. All the fond memories came rushing back. I was quite late to the party with this game having been a late-comer to the NES scene. My early allegiance to Sega almost made me miss out on this gem. So good was this game that on a hot summers day in the 6 weeks school hols I ran an power extension into my back garden and played through all the levels in one day! |
tim - 08 Jun 2008, 21:25 GMT
How do u beat the gray castle in world 8?
Dazza - 12 Jun 2008, 07:48 GMT
Try using a P-Wing if you really suck :-)
Tris Wicks - 05 Nov 2008, 04:27 GMT
An interesting review, and a learning curve for journos too. What happens when a bigger fish comes along? Give it 100%? And what about after that? Here's to you, Trojan
mitzibishi - 22 Jul 2009, 03:31 GMT
100% forget about GFX of the SNES & MD, its all about gameplay. a CLASSIC!
justin - 25 Nov 2009, 23:55 GMT
how do you get pass world 3's castle 1
Staresy - 21 Feb 2013, 12:19 GMT
I remember reading this review and then getting the game only to be mildly amused by it. I thought, and still think today that 98% is a gross overmarking of how good this game is. Don't get me wrong it it a great game but I just didn't find it the life changing experience it was made out to be.
Little things that frustrated the hell out of me like the mushroom programmed to always go in the opposite direction to you just seemed unnecessarily lazy to make the game harder than what was enjoyable.
I personally thought SMB2 or SMB USA was the best of the lot simply because I found it a great challenge and I didn't end up throwing my controller at the screen in rage.
Great fun but I came away with a sour face too many times after playing this game.
ed - 22 Jan 2014, 16:40 GMT
@ Staresy - The mushroom going the wrong way was you not realising - I believe - that if you hit the ? block on the left hand side, the mushroom would go to the right, and hitting it on the right would send it to the left. A trick Nintendo didn't repeat again in subsequent Mario games because it probably annoyed too many people like you. You needed precision and skill to nail that fungus.
But for me Mario 3 is still eminently playable and it's intriguing that this and Mario 4 haven't really been bettered as pixel perfect platformers where you have such *exact* control over your character. Rayman Origins/Legends are fantastic and, especially considering the lacklustre New SMB series, are the new torch bearers for imaginative entertaining 2D platform games, but they lack the exact precision and skills required for SM3/SM4. Just not as tight. IMHO.
Anyways I'm off to play this bad boy on my 3DS. Sweets.
Bob Joe - 04 Aug 2014, 14:02 GMT
Just a 2014 comment passing through…
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YawnBoyPest1957 - 23 May 2015, 08:10 GMT
Played through the NES version in it's entirety for the first time recently, having done most of it on the SNES mario all stars compilation back in the day. Thought it was overrated then, and still do now. No doubt it's a decent, meaty mario game that introduced some cool progressions, eg. flight. Challenging, but partly due to numerous noob traps catching out a first time player. Mediocre graphics on NES, looking like a spectrum game at times, yet somehow general consensus is that it's one of the better looking NES games. Pure groupthink. Castlevania III and Track and Field II are impressive looking NES games. This isn't. And why are Mario's dungarees black? Now I've done the UNTHINKABLE in objectively criticizing SMB 3, I'll round up my thoughts by stating that humble, arcadey SMB 1 has far superior fluidity and balance to it's gameplay.