Super Mario Land 2
Back when I first owned an original black and white Nintendo Gameboy it was the only Nintendo system I would own for a while. And so, it was my only chance to play the Mario titles I'd always wanted to. Unfortunately Nintendo never directly ported any of their Mario 8bit titles from the NES home console onto the Gameboy and instead created a unique series specifically designed for the hardware. The first game, Super Mario Land, was a little bizarre and though it featured a lot of the standard Mario gameplay it also contained a lot of weird new designs that were never seen again. Super Mario Land 2 brought the series closer to it's NES counterparts, but still featured a unique take on the games.
Mario Land 2 was a huge jump graphically above it's predecessor from 3 years prior. It actually looks pretty impressive considering the limitations of the hardware at the time. Designers decided to slightly alter the camera view, tightening the field of view and increasing the size of the sprites on screen. The upside was that now we saw more recognizable artwork with more detail, but the downside was that you saw less of the level onscreen at once. This was not a uncommon choice among portable games with major resolutions restrictions but often meant levels that required a lot of running and jumping became more difficult since you couldn't tell what was coming up soon enough to make quite judgement calls on platforming. Though, as I remember it, Super Mario Land 2 didn't really have that much of an issue.
Mario Land 2 also added a feature that I was very happy to see carried over from my favorite Mario title at the time, Super Mario 3. This was the addition of the overworld map for level selection. Having all the levels graphically represented and laid out this way made the story and location feel more tangible and memorable. Rather than simply running left to right, from level 1-1 to 4-3 and so on.
Mario Land 2 also added a save-game feature, which was very useful and a number of other powerups that were similar and still unique to this game. Not unlike the raccoon tail, in this game you could pick up a carrot which gave you bunny ears, providing you with similar powers. You could also get a fire throwing power, but instead of a flower the pickup is represented by a feather you wear in your cap. I'm really not sure how the two are related. Not that a flower makes any more sense.
Super Mario Land 2 was really a strong game overall on the GameBoy platform, really showing off what you could do with the basic hardware. I played it through multiple times both when it came out in '93 and much more recently. Nintendo has even released this title as a downloadable, playable on the Nintendo 3DS portable console. If you've never tried this one before, it's well worth the price of admission.
Back when I first owned an original black and white Nintendo Gameboy it was the only Nintendo system I would own for a while. And so, it was my only chance to play the Mario titles I'd always wanted to. Unfortunately Nintendo never directly ported any of their Mario 8bit titles from the NES home console onto the Gameboy and instead created a unique series specifically designed for the hardware. The first game, Super Mario Land, was a little bizarre and though it featured a lot of the standard Mario gameplay it also contained a lot of weird new designs that were never seen again. Super Mario Land 2 brought the series closer to it's NES counterparts, but still featured a unique take on the games. Mario Land 2 was a huge jump graphically above it's predecessor from 3 years prior. It actually looks pretty impressive considering the limitations of the hardware at the time. Designers decided to slightly alter the camera view, tightening the field of view and increasing the size of the sprites on screen. The upside was that now we saw more recognizable artwork with more detail, but the downside was that you saw less of the level onscreen at once. This was not a uncommon choice among portable games with major resolutions restrictions but often meant levels that required a lot of running and jumping became more difficult since you couldn't tell what was coming up soon enough to make quite judgement calls on platforming. Though, as I remember it, Super Mario Land 2 didn't really have that much of an issue. Mario Land 2 also added a feature that I was very happy to see carried over from my favorite Mario title at the time, Super Mario 3. This was the addition of the overworld map for level selection. Having all the levels graphically represented and laid out this way made the story and location feel more tangible and memorable. Rather than simply running left to right, from level 1-1 to 4-3 and so on. Mario Land 2 also added a save-game feature, which was very useful and a number of other powerups that were similar and still unique to this game. Not unlike the raccoon tail, in this game you could pick up a carrot which gave you bunny ears, providing you with similar powers. You could also get a fire throwing power, but instead of a flower the pickup is represented by a feather you wear in your cap. I'm really not sure how the two are related. Not that a flower makes any more sense.
Super Mario Land 2 was really a strong game overall on the GameBoy platform, really showing off what you could do with the basic hardware. I played it through multiple times both when it came out in '93 and much more recently. Nintendo has even released this title as a downloadable, playable on the Nintendo 3DS portable console. If you've never tried this one before, it's well worth the price of admission.
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