

There are also bonus stages scattered the world that see the return of mini-games from New Super Mario Bros. Veteran Mario players will enjoy the nostalgia and should take delight from some of the new level designs - notably the Van Gogh "The Starry Night" inspired stage - but there's so little of that originality that it feels almost out of place. They're short, they work, they're well-balanced in terms of challenge, and there are a few twists and turns mixed in with plenty of welcome throwbacks (especially in terms of enemies) to Super Mario World from the SNES.Įach world contains castles, featuring bosses of old, and although the castle levels can be trickier than most - especially with multiple players - the end boss battles are uninventive and don't prove challenging to anyone who's played a Mario game before. Stages look and play nearly identical to the Wii version and any of the side-scroller Mario games. The themes of each world are mostly familiar, with ice, desert, plains, water and haunted lands, offering the usual lineup of aesthetics for the beautiful and improved background art of each stage, with a few new areas to explore as well.

The cartoonish cut scenes are back and the concept is the same: conquer each of the worlds until getting to the end. have invaded her castle, dispatching Mario, Luigi and the two Toads to the far ends of the Mushroom Kingdom where they must journey back to save the day. Instead of kidnapping Princess Peach this time around, Bowser and co. Bowser and the Koopalings are back again to cause more problems for the Princess and the heroes who've been been rescuing her for decades.
