It was the clay-modeled SMB2 version of Mario that graced the first-ever cover of Nintendo Power, July-August 1988, and the first animated version of the game series released in the United States, The Super Mario Bros. Merchandise featured the versions of Mario, Luigi and the princess that you’d see in the SMB2 instruction manual, for example, Mario often leaping into the sky with turnip in hand. Shortly following SMB2’s release in the United States on October 9, 1988, the many elements it introduced to the series were inescapable.
I am, I should say, very much so biased in favor of Super Mario Bros. That is a bias that has receded in recent years, perhaps because institutions tend to gain respect over time but also perhaps because objectors have since realized that the Japanese sequel, the game we in the United States would come to call The Lost Levels, isn’t a perfected piece of standard Mario “hop and bop” gameplay so much as a retread of the original game made more frustrating and cruel.
