It's amazing how 25 years have passed for our iconic red plumber. Mario has spawned over a hundred games during that time, spinoffs included, with platformers obviously being the highpoint of his career. To collaborate this historic moment, Nintendo re-released Super Mario All-Stars (originally on the Super Nintendo).
For those who do this game on the SNES, it's a bit of a letdown to be honest. It's initially the SNES games ported onto a Wii disc, virtually untouched. The games that are there though, are pretty much the games that put Mario and Nintendo on the map. Super Mario Bros. was the first and still stands as the game that saved the United States from the Video Game Crash in 1983, along with being one of the easiest to complete and fastest to speedrun. Super Mario Bros: The Lost Levels was the true sequel to the first game in Japan but was only released in the United States because Japan thought American gamers would not have been able to handle the difficulty (which is true to an extent) and it gave us the option to play as Mario's popular brother, Luigi. Super Mario Bros. 2 was not a Mario game. It was a smokes and mirrors remake of an unsuccessful NES game in Japan named Doki Doki Panic. Gamers still consider it to be the worst of the series while others such as myself actually enjoyed it. And finally, there's the granddaddy of them all: Super Mario Bros. 3. Arguably the greatest 2D game ever made on the NES that added a lot of new features to the franchise that can be seen in other games to this day.
Four NES games remade with SNES colorful graphics and music that would be a big deal when it first came out on the Super Nintendo in 1994. 2010 on the Wii, not so much. The games are still great regardless and the controls work just as well especially with the Wii Classic controller, but with something as special as Mario 25th Anniversary, you would think that they would do more to accommodate such a major accomplishment. Like, maybe, a few extra unlockables or add the GameBoy titles to the mix. Sadly, all we got was the SNES port. It's a bit of a disappointment for others, while a decent addition to anyone's gaming collection who remembered the SNES port and would love to relive those days again.