Super Mario Bros: ExtraMana Retrospective

Channel:

Mana

Subscribers:

1,980

Published on July 29, 2018 1:19:50 PM ● Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uWDl1jzVZ4

Game:

Super Mario Bros. (1985)

Duration: 6:30

2,369 views

31

https://twitter.com/ExtraMana

In 1983 Nintendo had manufactured an 8-bit videogame console called the ‘famicom’. The console sold well in Japan, but the company ran into problems when trying to market it in North America. Nintendo’s first attempt to market the console to the North American market was at the computer electronics show in January of 1985. The name of the machine had been changed to ‘Advanced video system’. This was done with the assumption that it would make the system more marketable to US consumers. The console garnered little interest, this was in part due to the fact it was showcased with musical and computer keyboards. After the initial setback Nintendo rebranded the AVS to the Nintendo Entertainment system for the next Computer electronics show in the summer of 1985. This time they took a different approach instead of a music and computer keyboard they now had a zapper and ROB the robot as the accessories for the machine. ROB the robot was actually a pretty pointless accessory to the Nintendo Entertainment System since it only had the ability to be used in conjunction with two games ‘Stack up’ and ‘Gyromite’. However the real reason for its inclusion was to subvert retailers as to what the NES really was. North America had undergone a huge video game crash in 1984 after low quality games produced by unscrupulous companies such as activision had flooded the market. At that time there was no quality control for games. This coupled with the enormous financial failure of Pacman and E.T on the Atari 2600 had been enough to cripple the video game market. Even in 1985 there was still huge backlash against video games in the media. The Atari ports of Pacman and ET weren’t given enough time to be developed properly so the quality was so poor that customers would demand to have their purchases of the games refunded.
After the crash some retailers where so wary of the failings of videogames they would outright refuse to stock them. By bundling the NES with ROB the ROBOT, Nintendo was able to convince retailers that it wasn’t just a videogame system but in fact a regular toy. Despite all the efforts Nintendo made to try to earn the trust of retailers their system sold poorly. Conversely the famicom had been extremely successful in Japan with millions of machines sold. What Nintendo needed to turn the tides in their favor was a smash hit a game that would sell that would convince Americans they needed to own the system. Nintendo’s biggest hit to date had been Donkey Kong, a game released in the Japanese arcades in 1981 and later sold in the US, making 100’s of millions of dollars. In that game there were three characters, an ape called donkey Kong, jumpman the hero, and the damsel in distress ‘The lady. Shigeru Miyamoto the creator of these characters would take the last two into his next game ‘Super Mario Bros’. Jumpman’s original design had been influenced by the technical limitations of the arcade machine. Miyamoto had wanted Jumpman to have moving hair, but since the hardware lacked this capability he had settled for a cap instead. Likewise jumpman had been given a moustache and overalls because these where easier to render than mouth and arms. Miyamoto’s first step of re-developing the character was to change his name from ‘jumpman’ to ‘Mario’ and to change ‘The lady’ to ‘Princess Toadstool’. Released in 1983 in Japan it the arcade machine eventually made its way to the North American arcade market. The aim of Mario Bro’s was simple to defeat all the enemies on each level while avoiding their attacks and any environmental hazards. Vertically the player needed to avoid dropping Icicles and horizontally they needed to avoid moving fireballs. Knocking an enemy on their back by jumping up to hit the platform they were on would allow Jumpman to defeat said enemy by walking into them. The POW block on every level could also be used to knock enemies over. The central processing unit of the famicom and NES was similar to that of the Atari 2600 but the NES and famicom also included a picture processing unit which would allow for sprites, and backgrounds along with a larger colour palette. All these technological innovations allowed the console sequel to Mario Bro’s called Super Mario bros to be almost as visually impressive as the arcade version. And just like pacman before it, had led to popularity of maze chase games, Super Mario Bros would help lead to the popularity of side scrollers. The game retained the jumping ability from Mario Bros but increased the complexity in many other areas of gameplay. Rather than being limited to a single screen the levels now scrolled horizontally, the player could collect power ups that gave him abilities like shooting the fireballs seem in the original Mario Bros. Enemies could now be jumped on from above and coins could now be collected to give Mario an extra life amongst several other additions.#nintendo #mario

Other Statistics