Super Mario Land

Super Mario Land was Nintendo's first attempt at bringing Mario to the handheld world, and for a Game Boy launch title, it's surprisingly ambitious. While it's far from perfect, it manages to carve out a unique identity, even with its limitations.

Chapter 1: Shrunk Down but Still Mario

The basics are familiar-run, jump, collect coins-but everything here feels just a little... off. Mario moves faster, jumps a bit differently, and the physics don't quite match the console versions. The art style is simplified due to the Game Boy's hardware, but it works well enough, and the soundtrack-especially the main theme-is catchy and memorable despite the bleeps and bloops.

Chapter 2: Offbeat Worlds and Weird Enemies

What really sets Super Mario Land apart is how different it feels. Instead of Bowser, you're fighting aliens and sphinxes. The settings go from Egypt to underwater to shooting sections in a submarine-and yes, that was unexpected in a Mario game. It's weird, but in a fun way. The inclusion of shoot-'em-up style levels was bold and helped the game feel fresh, even if short.

Chapter 3: Too Short, But Still Sweet

The biggest drawback is the length. You can beat Super Mario Land in under an hour, and there's not much reason to replay beyond nostalgia or score-chasing. It also lacks power-ups we now associate with Mario, like the Fire Flower or cape. But for what it is-a Game Boy launch game-it punches above its weight.

Final Thoughts

It's not the most refined Mario, but it's certainly one of the most unique. Super Mario Land is a charming, quirky little game that showed Mario could survive outside the living room-and that's a big deal.

7/10 - Short, strange, and kind of wonderful. An oddball handheld debut that still holds up in its own way.

Super Mario Land is a good Gameboy counterpart to the classic NES games. It embodies all the elements used in the original. What I most love about this game is the fact it was original. Instead of taking place in the Mushroom Kingdom, Mario journeys to the Kingdoms of Sarasaland to save Princess Daisy and instead of fighting King Bowser Koopa, Mario fights Tatanga. Also, in a couple levels Mario gets to use a vehicle. Either a plane or a submarine. Very fun. Super Mario Land was fun to play while the sequels were kind of stupid and pointless.

Super Mario Land I remember from childhood but never got to play it until getting an copy myself.

While it is easy to get a little upset about it as you would be used to playing Super Mario Bros on the Nintendo Entertainment System with the controller being simple.

The Gameboy did it fairness to making the game feel like the NES edition.

The game graphics are not impressive and it Hurts the game as i know this is a gameboy game but come on they could have made Mario look like Mario and the enemies as well. The graphics are not as good as the game boy could have done better.

The sound is also very weak and don't give you the same vibe as the other games of Super Mario Bros. It is such a letdown.

The game play at least makes up for it. It felt like playing the game as it should be.

Overall Super Mario Land is not a bad game but it could be better.

I give Super Mario Land an 7 out of 10.

Had I owned this back in the day, it mightve seemed more fun, but playing it today out of curiosity, it's not really much of a great entry in the Mario series.

The problem probably lies within it being created by the guy who designed the gameboy and the Metroid series. It just doesn't play or really look the way a Mario game should be. It has worse sprites than the NES here and you can really see and feel the difference between this and its Nintendo made sequel.

I've already mentioned the sprites don't look right. Even in larger mushroom form, the Mario brothers just look weird. Like small bodies and large heads. It is interesting tho that it's added a plane and submarine in certain levels, giving a new type of experience in a Mario game, however there are far better versions of that type of game out there.

Something also interesting is it introduces Daisy to rescue, instead of Princess Peach. The character then went on to appear in the Movie flop of 1993, leaving the impression for many fans that Daisy is Luigis girlfriend, tho I don't think that's ever been officially confirmed in the games series.

I found too many things rather annoying about this game, not just the sprites, but the mechanics of the game. Quite often it's annoying to position Mario/Luigi right to enter pipes, but worse is when trying to land on a platform and either slipping through the edge and dying or sliding off completely. Really annoying that.

It's a pretty short game too, I think it was only 4 worlds? 4 stages each? I'm not sure, but very short for a Mario game, even a Gameboy one.

Being 2023, I played a coloured version of the game, which did improve it a bit from the original black and white/green. However it still has all the cons and in my opinion one of the least favourable Mario games of them all.

I'd recommend Mario Land 2, but not this one. Not to any casual gamers anyway, if you're a Mario buff or just curious to play it, yeah, go for it. But if you've never played it, you're not missing out on a must-try experience here. There are much better Mario games out there actually created by the original Mario makers.

This game SUCKS. The controls are bad, the physics do not work, the Fire Flower is replaced with the Superball Flower, it sucks. If you find this game for free, don't play it. The only redeeming quality is the music, but otherwise, it's bad and you should never play it.