After the Super Mario Bros. movie took over the box office, it was only time until Nintendo finally released the next installment in the franchise on its original stomping grounds, video games. Super Mario Bros. Wonder follows Mario and Luigi in their first side-scrolling adventure in over ten years — and since the defunct Wii U. In the game, you can play as one of eight characters through the flower kingdom: Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, Princess Daisy, Toad, Toadette, Yoshi, and the slightly terrifying Nabbit all make a return. There are new power-ups to discover, like one that turns your character into an elephant, plus the wonder flower that makes your surroundings come to life. Despite all of the new additions and possible new fans coming into the series, are video games critics as impressed by Super Mario Bros. Wonder as Nintendo wants them to be?
“I was left with the nagging sense that the Wonder Flowers represent a growing disconnect between novelty and substance. The past 15 years (at least) of Mario titles has largely focused on introducing a flashy new mechanic that generates a lot of fan buzz but ultimately doesn’t add much to the core gameplay … All of these games are fun to play and got good-to-great reviews. But the simple joy of platforming starts to get muddled by the marketing-driven need to keep adding stuff.†—Emily Palmer Heller, Vulture
“But by turning its star into an elephant, Nintendo is also acknowledging a simple fact of its Goomba-stomping, Koopa-kicking empire: Mario himself is a little boring. The smorgasbord of power-ups is what keeps players excited. Mario’s greatest natural ability is high-jumping. And his motivation has been the same for decades, usually involving his need to rescue Princess Peach from the evil King Bowser. But the stakes are ultimately low, with heroes and villains who come together elsewhere for party games and go-kart antics … Now there’s Super Mario Bros. Wonder, which turns the franchise into a carnival of bizarre delights. Each level includes a Wonder Flower, a new mechanic that sends Mario on something like a psychedelic trip, reconfiguring the world around him — warp pipes start crawling like caterpillars, rhinos begin a stampede, and some mountains gain a set of googly eyes.â€â€”Zachary Small, The New York Times
“This is very much a classic left-to-right, run-and-jump Mario game, easy to pick up and hard to master, with levels ranging from cheerful strolls through green fields with sleepy Goombas, to fist-eatingly difficult gauntlets with disappearing platforms that would test anyone’s skill and patience. But a combination of clever character balancing and badges that either ameliorate or enhance the challenge make it conquerable and enjoyable for learning players and Mario-literate adults.†—Keza MacDonald, The Guardian
“Super Mario Bros. Wonder, ultimately, feels like a flex — proof that Nintendo can still innovate with some of gaming’s oldest verbs: run and jump. It’s a pristine extravaganza designed to appeal to nostalgic players and newcomers who may have only encountered the franchise through this year’s blockbuster movie. Every frame bursts with charming detail. Enemies glare at you as they approach, then look up in dismay the moment before you stomp on them. Mario will reach out to catch his hat after squeezing through a warp pipe. Untold hours of animation and programming talent went into delivering spectacles that parade by in seconds, leaving you dazzled in their wake.†—James Perkins Mastromarino, NPR
“With varied world maps full of secrets to uncover, absurdly clever level design, and a real sense of surprise and — well — wonder for the first time in ages, Super Mario Bros. Wonder is more than capable of carrying the Switch to the end of the road.†—Alex Perry, Mashable
“Hardcore fans will notice several breaks from tradition here, as almost none of the sound effects for things like stomping on an enemy or even jumping sound the same as previous entries. Stuff like entering a warp pipe or hitting a block to reveal an item has sounded the same for decades. Art styles may have changed, but sound design never had. And with good reason, a lot of it holds up today, but making a ground pound sound like a drum roll heightens Wonder’s best aspects.†—Charlie Wacholz, CNN Underscored
“Amazingly, Wonder is not only an incredible remix of the Super Mario formula; it’s also quite possibly the most accessible entry in the series. And that’s because it gives you a whole bunch of ways to fine-tune the experience to your tastes. You don’t have to complete every level in order to get to the end, for instance, so I never found myself stuck on an impassable stage with no way to progress. There are also new unlockable badges that give you skill boosts, like a faster run or floatier jump … These features are especially important if you’re playing multiplayer with a group of varying skill levels. Wonder supports co-op play with up to four players, and I was able to play with my two young kids with no issues.†—Andrew Webster, the Verge
“Despite the joy radiating from most of the 2-D Super Mario Bros. Wonder, it’s not quite up to par with the last mainline 3-D Mario masterpiece, Super Mario Odyssey. The music, while not at all bad, is surprisingly forgettable this time around, and while there are some five-star difficulty stages — including an entire group of them I won’t spoil here — Wonder is a bit light on the challenge side of things, so there’s not as much here for seasoned series veterans as its predecessor has.†—Ryan McCaffrey, IGN
“I will say this: What a joy it is to play a Mario game and not already know how to read it, to not have my muscle memory do more work than my brain.†—Chris Plante, Polygon