difficulty of the NES Super Marios - which did you beat?

[Tanooki]

They also moved added and changed the sizes of gaps in the ground to die within as well.  I've had some access to that game over the years, in more recent times it's now one of those early hamster aca releases Nintendo was warm to on the Switch.

[bubufubu]

8 hours ago, 7800Knight said:

For what it's worth, the Japanese also complained about the insane difficulty.

 

Seeing as how they're Easterners, they don't speak for Westerners, either.  Despite this supposed extreme level of difficulty, it sold more than 2 million copies over there.  Clearly, it didn't sully Nintendo's reputation.

 

8 hours ago, 7800Knight said:

Hell, even Shigeru Miyamoto disliked the difficulty spike!

 

The same guy who would go on to complain about the game not getting a wide enough release because he wanted more people to play it.  Yeah.

[7800Knight]

If you were in Japan or South Korea, you had access to a computer game called Super Mario Bros. Special.

 

https://www.mariowiki.com/Super_Mario_Bros._Special

 

I'm surprised Nintendo didn't try to port this to the Western world as "Super Mario Bros. 2" instead of the Lost Levels.  I've seen some NES hacks of this game and it is a clever twist on the traditional SMB1 title.

 

SMB Special was 1 player only and was somewhat more challenging in that the time ran down faster.  Plus you had more power-ups.  The Hudson Soft bee appeared to give you more points, the hammer from Donkey Kong returned and another new power-up was wings that could make Mario fly as if he were swimming in the air.

 

Speaking of Donkey Kong, the barrel from that game and the foes from Mario Bros. returned as enemies - you also had to deal with Sidesteppers, Fighter Flies, fireballs and icicles.

[Downland1983]

On 5/24/2021 at 1:18 PM, kisrael said:

I was listening to https://www.earwolf.com/show/how-did-this-get-played/ about SMB2, and near the wrapup they mention how difficult this game was.

So, like, SMB2 was the only 2D Mario game I beat! (or maybe some DS stuff idk)

I came to the NES after SMB's heyday, so it's like... you don't have to play this game, you can kind of just "get it", and it kicks your butt, and then the stupid "pick a door maze" finished you off.
SMB3... it's such an expansive game. I watched my friend who I think could finish it, and I think the end run still looks intimidating.

 

But SMB2... you could stockpile some lives w/ the casino game, and learn how to finish up the final castle and it wasn't that bad, I thought.

(Also SMB2 and Mega Man 2 were such huge jumps in what video games could look like! My thought was "man games are now playable cartoons!")

So what do you think, which NES Mario was easiest, which was hardest? Did you beat any or all of them or none?

Exact same for me.  In Super Mario Bros, I never mastered the 1-up mechanic from repeatedly kicking the koopa troopa into the staircase, and I would always run out of lives in world 8.  I had the same problem with Super Mario Bros 3, always getting stuck in World 8.  Meanwhile, I beat Super Mario Bros 2 countless times.