(also known as Super Mario Bros. DX) is a 1999 platform game developed and published by Nintendo for the Game Boy Color. It is a largely unaltered port of the 1985 Super Mario Bros., originally released for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), with an unlockable version of its 1986 Japanese sequel, Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels. The game also introduces several new features, including a single-player and two-player race mode, a challenge mode for individual levels, and various toys and collectibles, some of which utilize the functionality of the Game Boy Printer.

Upon release, Super Mario Bros. Deluxe received widespread acclaim. Critics praised its faithful adaptation of Super Mario Bros. on the Game Boy Color, as well as the additional gameplay modes and features, with minor criticism directed at the gameplay effects of the smaller screen size compared to the NES. Retrospective reception of Deluxe has praised the game as one of the best titles released for the Game Boy system. The game was also a commercial success, remaining on sales charts for two years and being one of the highest-selling video games of 1999 and 2000.

Gameplay

Deluxe features platforming gameplay largely similar to the original, allowing players to control Mario or Luigi through the 32 levels of Super Mario Bros., referred to in the game as Original 1985. The main addition is the ability to play Super Mario Bros. 2 when the player reaches a minimum score of 300,000 points in the original mode. Other unlockable features are included in a Toy Box menu. The developers developed and demonstrated a one-level prototype of Deluxe prior to the commercial release of the Game Boy Color. As an early Game Boy Color title, Deluxe was the first full-colour Mario title to appear on a handheld. The game was released in North America on May 10, 1999, and in the United Kingdom in December 1999. In Japan, Deluxe did not receive a commercial release but was distributed starting March 1, 2000, on Nintendo Power kiosks in Lawson stores, where consumers could have the game copied onto a memory cartridge.

Reception

Sales

Following release, Deluxe sold 2.8 million units in the United States. According to NPD sales charts, Deluxe ranked as the twelfth top selling video game on all platforms in the United States in 1999, and the fourteenth best-selling game in 2000. The game peaked in third place for weekly handheld sales charts in June 1999, and remained in overall weekly sales charts into 2001.

Critical reviews

Deluxe was met with critical acclaim upon release, with an average score of 92% according to review aggregator GameRankings.

Reviewers praised the faithfulness and quality of the game's port of Super Mario Bros. Chris Scullion of Official Nintendo Magazine similarly expressed that Deluxe was the "definitive version" of the original game, and surpassed its quality. Darryn Bonthuys of GameSpot commended the game as "timeless" and one of the best for the handheld due to the "tons of new content that made the entire game feel like a brand-new experience to play". Graeme Mason of GamesRadar praised the game as one of the best games on the Game Boy Color, describing the "almost-perfect replication" of the original and the additional features as an "excellent value-for-money package". Gabe Gurwin of Digital Trends ranked the game as the eleventh-best Game Boy Color game, stating the color made the graphics "appear to pop off the screen" and noting the game had "plenty for newcomers to love". Gavin Lane of Nintendo Life also ranked Deluxe as the eleventh-best title for the system, assessing it as a "special" title that offered a "great version of the original game", although noting its additional features compensated for its "reduced view" on the "diminutive screen" of the Color. Ashley Day of Retro Gamer ranked the game as the third-best Game Boy Color title, describing it as "unmissable", a perfect recreation of the original, and one of the first Game Boy Color titles to "use the full power" of the platform.

Notes

References

  • Super Mario Bros. Deluxe at Gameboy.com via the Wayback Machine