Hey everyone! This is my first Review, so I’m trying to make it the best I can. I’m reviewing the first ever Mario handheld game- Super Mario Land, released for the Gameboy in August 1989 (I think). I’ll get to the Review now so I’ll tell you how I scale difficulty. Like other Reviews in Lemmy’s Land, I’ll use a scale of 0-4 stars. 0 will usually mean bad and 4 will usually mean great. Here you go!
Graphics: *
The graphics were about the same as Super Mario Bros, maybe a little worse. Mario looks like some poorly designed digital guy. Also, everything is very small. If they took the feet and eyes off the Chibobos they’d look like mushrooms. Even in the original Super Mario Bros. they gave the Mushrooms some spots. The GBA’s color doesn't’ even help the graphics. The reason I gave it a star is because you CAN tell the difference between some things. Other than that, it’s a digital mess.
Sound: ***1/2
I LOVED the sound. The world 4 theme was my favorite. They even decided to put a different invincible song in. They used Can-Can instead of the normal invincible music. World 1 and 2’s themes were good too! I also liked the shooting theme when you’re in a submarine or airplane. Now, I took off half a star because of the annoying sounds when you hit something or that boss theme. The boss theme gets really old, really fast. I mean, Mario 2’s theme could get old, but at least it wasn’t the same set of notes all in a row.
Controls: *1/2
I HAD to give this a low score. The controls are pretty difficult. It’s hard to time your jump just right sometimes, and other times Mario will make a speedy jump and halfway through, he’ll go very slow, only for you to lose a life because you just seem to go so slow, you stop and speedily drop to your death. I gave it a star and a half because items are simple. So is roaming left and right. Jumping is something that needed to be improved, but that’s about it.
Difficulty: First time ** After that *
Level 3-2 is terribly hard. You’ll be attacked by enemies that fall from the ceiling, as well as spiders that jump on you. There are also long jumps, and spikes. You can use the coconut-like things to cross the spikes, but they fall off the edge of them, meaning you must jump on the non-spiked areas. The game can be hard the first time, mainly because the controls are, like I said, kinda challenging, as well as everything being so tiny, but you soon get used to it. I thought that the last level was going to be hard, but it was very easy. I liked the difficulty, not too easy and yet not too hard.
Length: ****
Short game, very short. About 1/2 the length of other platformers, and I think I can explain why: This was an early Gameboy game, as you know, and many systems didn’t allowing for saving games until about ‘92 or ‘93, meaning you can’t save in this game. It would be very hard if the game were long, since you wouldn’t be able to save. This was fixed by the time the sequel came out, that’s why that game is longer. I think this has good length for the inability to save. That’s one thing I didn’t like about the original Super Mario Bros, it couldn’t save and it was very long. At least this game has continues when you score enough points.
Items: **
Good items, but it just wasn’t enough to give it more than an average score. There are Super Mushrooms that act the same as other Mushrooms, and there are Super Flowers they give you super balls that can bounce around and get coins. They also help you in boss battles. There are 1-Up Hearts, and Stars. I dislike the Stars: if you miss it and it hits the ground, say “bye bye” to your invincibility, because they fall right off the screen. Very annoying.
Replayability: ****
Anyone who beats it is bound to want to play it again. When you beat it you can play the challenge mode. If you are lucky enough to beat the challenge mode, you are supposed to get a level select, so keep playing. I would recommend playing it on an SP, mainly because it can play those games AND it has a charger, useful for that kind of stuff. There are also some other puzzles to crack. You can also just play it because it’s fun and easy, that’s what I do.
Fun Factor!: ***
This is a fun game, anyone would like it. I can’t wait until the day I get the sequel, but back to this game. It’s very fun. I like it. You would too, I think.
Recommendation:
I’d get this game. You can probably get it for about $10 at Gamestop or someplace like that. If you can’t get it there, than go on eBay. You can find it there. So start hunting!
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