The real Super Mario Bros. 2 hit the shelves in Japan back in June 1986 affixed by The Lost Levels.
It’s the same graphical and gameplay style as the landmark 1985 outing, although the difficulty level was ramped up to such a degree it was deemed too much hard work for Westerners.
The result? America and Europe received a radically different experience in 1988 which was adapted from a NES peripheral game called Yume Kōjō: Doki Doki Panic. Let’s take a look.
Super Mario Bros 2.
As kids playing the sequel, circa 1990, we had no idea it wasn’t the intended follow-up to Super Mario Bros.
Looking back now, it certainly has some weird inconsistencies from other Mario platformers – in fact, it’s a radically warped take which has gained a fair bit of criticism online in recent years. It’s the bad Mario, apparently.
We really like it, though, and it’s a welcome addition to the Mario canon, even if it’s a little far removed from its NES counterparts.
Even the plot with this one is different—Mario dreams of an alternate world called Subcon, into which he and his mates (Princess Peach, Toad, and Luigi – that’s his brother, but probably a good friend as well) are warped to.
There, the dastardly frog monster Wart rules the land and it’s your job to defeat him. No Bowser in this one!
As the player, you can pick any of those four, but they all feature a slightly different ability. As kids, we always picked Luigi or Peach.
The former can jump super high, whilst the latter had a really handy floating ability. Mario is a, sort of, all-rounder, but Toad has a decent turn of speed on him. Plus, it’s Toad. He/she/it is ace.
Across multiple worlds you go romping, with the level design remaining interesting and some fun stuff going on… but it is pretty weirdly removed from other Mario games.
The boss battles are certainly a highlight, though, as you take those mothers out, plus there are these key sections where you grab it to open a door somewhere else, then this smiley emoji dude starts angrily chasing you about. That used to cause us anxiety as kids – it’s freaky.
The different level design has led some to suggest this isn’t a proper Mario game, though, and it does feel like Nintendo took the characters and dumped them into an already designed game and made a few tweaks here and there.
You could complain, but as the game is such good fun there’s really no point being a misery guts about it.
The Lost Levels
It took over 20 years, but we finally got to play the real sequel when it hit the Wii U. The notorious difficulty level kicks in immediately.
Aas we’ve discussed on other posts, such as Ghosts N’ Goblins, many developers ramped up difficulty levels to make short NES games appear longer.
With Nintendo, it just seemed to do it for a laugh, “You played the first one? Well here it is again, but MUCH more difficult! Cry, fools!”
In The Lost Levels, some of the jumps you’re expected to complete are outrageous. We found ourselves regularly stopping to stare in disbelief at the arrangement of blocks you’re expected to negotiate.
Our run through was helped along enormously by the Wii U’s standby feature, which lets you save at specific points and immediately have another go.
Some of the springy jumps are mental as well, which all makes this title enjoyable, but also something of a weird entry into the series.
The company realised the series’ full potential a game later, however, when the almighty Super Mario Bros. 3 landed.
It’s still one of the greatest games of all time and almost certainly the NES’ masterpiece.
It overshadows 2 by a long margin (both versions), but we still have a lot of love for this peculiar little number (again, both of them). Well! That wasn’t confusing, Nintendo! Indeed.
Professional Moron 
Playing this game, when it came out as a 10-year old, totally blew my mind. I mean, it was inspiration for alternate dimensions creating easy metaphors to understand string theory and all sorts or wacky stuff. Then we later find out it’s from this whole other game… makes sense, but I wonder to what degree things were added to the game in the SM2 version…
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I remember just loving it, it was much different to the first one, but I didn’t think anything strange was going on. A lot of wacky level design and fun stuff to get up to – no complaints!
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Same here. It just seemed like they outdid themselves compared to the last Mario. I mean, it was only the second (or third if you count Mario Bros.) iteration.
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Indeed! And Zelda had a strange second outing as well, being a 2D platformer, basically, so they were trying things on, it would appear. As always. The cardboard thing they’re doing for the Switch… kinda want it!
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Exactly, experimenting is in their DNA. I don’t have a switch, but I can afford cardboard! Now their at my income level
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Nowt wrong with a bit of good old cardboard. Hours of fun!
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It’s amazing how much easier game became when you played as Peach. I do kind of like Super Mario Bros. 2, but I have to admit it’s not one of my favorites; I kind of appreciate it in the same way I do Zelda II, in that I like that they went in a different direction, but they wouldn’t achieve true greatness until they made a return to form with the next installment. Granted, the Western Super Mario Bros. 2 was a reskin of an entirely different game, but I still find it interesting how Mario and a lot of other series followed similar paths back then.
I’m proud to say that I managed to beat the All-Stars (SNES) version of The Lost Levels some time back. Honestly, it ended up being easier than I thought it would be (discounting the fact that I could restart from any level), so I’m led to believe the Famicom Disk version was way harder.
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Interestingly, Retro Studios is doing something similar with the re-release of DKC: Tropical Freeze in May. As Funky Kong, the game is a lot easier. In SMB2, Peach just makes the game very easy, although I didn’t argue with that as a kid.
Ah, All Stars! Loved that. Regularly in my SNES back as a nipper. The Lost Levels wasn’t too bad, as NES games go, but the one I can’t beat is Ghosts ‘N Goblins. My god, it’s difficult!
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It was made for the disk-system thingy which only one guy in the neighborhood had. I still wonder why nintendo didn’t release it just for nes…
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I guess they thought the disk thingy would be a big hit. Like the 64DD. Discs never took off…
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This my friend, is an excellent review! I loved Super Mario 2! I know it was vastly different and it was criticized, but the level layout, the fact that you could play with 4 players interchangeably during the game, and the music made me give this game 2 thumbs up. My only real criticism was that Nintendo should have kept Bowser as the final boss. Other than that, great game! My wife hates it though hehehe!😆
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Why thank you very much, sir! I really like it, too, but yeah it’s a bit weird having no Bowser at the end… just that frog monster.
Your wife hates it!? You should play it as often as possible, then! I’m sure she’ll change her ways the more she’s around the legend that is SMB2.
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Amen brother!!
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