User Rating: 8.4 | Super Mario Land 2: 6 Tsu no Kinka GB
Super Mario Land 2 is a fairly remarkable game. It features some things that were never seen before in a Mario game, and some that were never seen again. It might seem to some that this is nothing more than an insignificant Mario game on the original Game Boy, but it actually does feature one very special debut. That would be the first appearance of none other than Mario's rival, Wario! But still, this game does manage to bring out some other remarkable little features that make it worth looking for. It all begins when Mario returns to his castle after his adventures in the original Super Mario Land. "Wait, Mario has a castle?" you ask? Well, yes, at least according to this game he does. Anyway, he comes home to his castle to discover that it's been taken over by his lifelong rival, the very evil Wario. But not only has Wario moved into Mario's castle, he's also taken the six golden coins that open it's front door and scattered them all around the surrounding area. So, Mario sets out to find them so that he can take back what's his and kick Wario out. During his journey he’ll climb a giant tree, ride bubbles, go to outer space, and even climb a giant mechanical model of himself. The game plays almost exactly like any other Mario platformer. Still, any veteran of the series will notice a few differences. First of all, the control really doesn't feel quite the same as it does in other Mario games. Mario doesn't seem to run as fast as he could in some of his other appearances. Jumping seems to have changed just a little bit as well, although this may just be because Mario takes up more space on the smaller Game Boy screen than he does on a television set. Collecting coins in this game will not give you extra lives for every one hundred that you find. Instead, you have to redeem them at a sort of slot machine game that can be found on the main map screen. Also, for every one hundred enemies that you defeat, you'll get an invincibility star. And lastly, you'll discover Bunny Mario. "Bunny Mario? Are you serious?” Well yes, I am. Eating a carrot will give Mario special bunny ears that will allow him to slowly glide through the air by wiggling them up and down. Admittedly, it's almost stranger than using a raccoon tail to fly, but eventually you'll get used to it. And finally you can go to the game’s six worlds in any order that you wish, making this one of the least linear games in the Mario series. One other thing that you may notice about this game is that it seems to be a lot easier than most other Mario games. Often times, enemies are slow-moving and can be defeated or avoided with ease. Also, there are many places where you can fly over large parts of stages or even pass them by entirely. This is a bit excusable anyway because the game is still a lot of fun to play, but this still means that you'll be able to finish it's 32 stages in a very short amount of time. The game's graphics look great, at least for a game that was released on the original black-and-white Game Boy. Most of the characters and environments are drawn in a fashion that is light-years ahead of the original Mario Land's blocky environments. You might even notice that the graphics for the power-ups seem to be modeled directly after the ones in Super Mario World. The only problem that you might have is that sometimes characters tend to overlap, such as when Mario stands on moving objects. This doesn't exactly take much from the game's look, but it's still sort of an annoying glitch. The sound is about as good as it gets for an original Game Boy game. The sound effects and music are fairly basic, but they're done well enough. The music is composed incredibly well, and it's probably the best that you'll hear on the Game Boy. Other than that, there's not much else to speak of. Being an original Game Boy game, there aren't any voice samples or digitized instruments, but you won't really miss any of that. So overall, this is a very worthy purchase. It's probably impossible to find anything other than a used copy, but that won't be too much of a challenge. The biggest problem with the game is how short it is. You could probably finish the entire thing in a half of an afternoon if you put your mind to it. But it's still a lot of fun as it is, and it's definitely worth the cost of a used game. And besides, it's Wario's first game. You don't want to miss that, do you? Of course not! So go get it!
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