Super Mario Bros. 3

If Super Mario Bros. invented the Mushroom Kingdom, Super Mario Bros. 3 gave it a globe. Instead of marching from World 1-1 to 8-4 in a straight line, you now look down on a little board-game map of each land, pick your route between numbered panels, duck into Toad’s House for a present, gamble at a Spade Panel and decide whether tonight is the night you finally take on the fortress. Every world has its own theme, its own tricks and its own spoilt Koopa child waiting on an airship at the end.

The other revolution is in Mario’s wardrobe. A Super Leaf gives him raccoon ears and a striped tail that swats enemies and, after a good run-up, carries him into the sky. The Frog Suit makes him a champion swimmer, the Tanooki Suit lets him turn into an invulnerable statue, and the rare Hammer Suit turns him into a Hammer Brother. Better still, you can stockpile power-ups in an inventory and choose the right one on the map before a course begins. Add Goomba’s Shoe, P-Wings, Jugem’s Cloud, Music Boxes and three legendary Magic Whistles and you have the most generous toy box an 8-bit game ever offered.

It took Nintendo’s R&D4 team roughly two and a half years, far longer than planned. Takashi Tezuka first built it with an overhead view before switching back to side-on, the team swelled to between 20 and 30 people, and the Japanese release slipped from spring to October 1988. A chip shortage then held the American version back until February 1990, by which time the film The Wizard had turned its closing scenes into a feature-length trailer for the game. Europe waited until 29 August 1991.

The reward was one of the best-reviewed and best-selling games ever made: 17.28 million cartridges, long cited as the record for a game sold on its own rather than packed in with a console. Britain’s Mean Machines and Computer and Video Games both gave it 98%. Its ideas (the map, the stored items, the airships, the Koopalings, the P-Switch, the slide down a slope) became the grammar of every 2D Mario that followed.

“The Mushroom Kingdom has been a peaceful place thanks to the brave deeds of Mario and Luigi.”

Official text: Nintendo, Super Mario Bros. 3 instruction booklet (NES, 1990). One sentence quoted; the rest summarised.

The opening line of the story in the NES instruction booklet. It goes on to explain that the Mushroom Kingdom is only the doorway to a larger Mushroom World, where Bowser has sent his seven children to steal the royal magic wands and turn each country’s king into an animal, and that the Princess and Toad wave the brothers off on their journey.

The questions people ask most about Super Mario Bros. 3, answered briefly here and in depth further down the page.

The plot fits on one page of the manual, but the game tells it better than any Mario before it: a king transformed at the end of every map, a letter from the Princess after every victory, and a nasty surprise in the post after the seventh. Here is the whole journey, land by land.

Curtain up: trouble in the Mushroom World

Thanks to Mario and Luigi the Mushroom Kingdom is at peace. But the kingdom, the manual explains, is only the gateway to a much bigger place called the Mushroom World, a patchwork of countries each ruled by its own king. Bowser has a new plan and seven reasons to be confident: his children. He sends the Koopalings out in a fleet of flying warships, and one by one they break into the royal castles, steal each king’s magic wand and use it to turn him into an animal.

With the wands gone, nothing can turn the kings back. Princess Toadstool and Toad see the brothers off at the border, and the game begins the way no Mario had before: with a theatre curtain rising on a checkered stage. Keep that curtain in mind. Blocks in this game are bolted to the scenery, platforms dangle from above on wires, and at the end of every course Mario runs off into the darkness of the wings.

World 1, Grass Land: Larry and the royal dog

Grass Land is the gentle opening act: green hills, smiling bushes and a first course that hands you a Super Leaf and a long runway within thirty seconds. By World 1-3 the game is already whispering secrets (a pink Note Block that fires you into Coin Heaven; a white block that lets you slip behind the scenery), and 1-4 is the first course that scrolls by itself, hurrying you across moving platforms. Halfway along the map stands a mini-fortress, where a spiky-shelled bruiser called Boom Boom flails about until you have stomped him three times.

At the end of the path the castle is in uproar. The king has been turned into a dog and is bounding around the throne room while a Toad pleads for help. Overhead, Larry Koopa’s airship is pulling away. Mario grabs the anchor chain, fights along the deck past cannons and Bullet Bills, drops down a pipe into the cabin and flattens Larry three times. Mario catches the falling wand and drops back to the castle, the king is himself again, and a letter arrives from the Princess with a present tucked inside.

World 2, Desert Land: Morton and the spider king

The second map is all dunes, palm trees and pyramids. Firesnakes hop across the sand, Micro-Goombas burst out of bricks, quicksand swallows anyone who stands still, and in the course marked with a patch of desert an Angry Sun peels itself out of the sky and dive-bombs Mario all the way to the goal while a tornado tries to drag him backwards. World 2-5 introduces the Chain Chomp, straining at its post. The Pyramid is a maze of Buzzy Beetles and bricks.

Boomerang Brothers patrol this map, and one of them is carrying a Hammer. Use it on the rock in the top-right corner and a hidden corner of the desert opens up, where two Fire Brothers guard the third Magic Whistle. The king here has become a spider, courtesy of Morton Koopa Jr., who fights much as Larry did, only a little quicker.

World 3, Water Land: Wendy and the kappa

Water Land is the biggest map so far, a chain of islands joined by drawbridges that open and close as you play. Half of it is swum rather than run. Bloobers trail lines of babies, Jelectros hang in the water like mines, Lava Lotuses spit fire from the sea bed, and in Worlds 3-3 and 3-8 the land itself sinks beneath the waves while Boss Bass, a giant fish, leaps out to swallow Mario whole. The second fortress is completely flooded. This is the land the Frog Suit was made for.

A rock on the map hides a canoe that paddles to a cluster of bonus islands. The king has been turned into a kappa, a water imp from Japanese folklore, and the culprit is Wendy O. Koopa, the only girl among the seven, who fills her cabin with bouncing candy rings.

World 4, Giant Land: Iggy and the dinosaur

The joke of World 4 is as simple as it is brilliant: everything has been scaled up. Goombas are the size of Mario, Koopa Troopas tower over him, the Piranha Plants (Piranhacus Giganticus, to give them their full name) fill pipes as wide as a house, and even the clouds and blocks are oversized. World 4-6 goes one better with magic doors that flip the whole course between giant and ordinary scale.

Three Sledge Brothers roam the map. These heavyweight cousins of the Hammer Brothers shake the ground when they land, freezing Mario on the spot if his feet are on the floor. The king has become a dinosaur, and Iggy Koopa is waiting on the airship. Smash the rock to the left of World 4-1 with a Hammer and you will find a Toad House with a Tanooki Suit inside.

World 5, Sky Land: Roy and the bird king

Sky Land is two maps in one. The first half is on the ground, and it contains the course everybody remembers: World 5-3, where Goombas hop about inside enormous green wind-up boots and Mario can steal one for himself. Then a tower climbs through the clouds to a second map high above the first, where the courses are made of cloud platforms, crumbling Donut Lifts and, in 5-6, nothing at all except a swarm of flying Para-Beetles to ride across the sky.

The king up here has been turned into a bird, and Roy Koopa, the bully in pink sunglasses, is to blame. Roy is heavy: every time he lands he sends a shockwave through the floor, so stay in the air.

World 6, Ice Land: Lemmy and the seal

Ice Land is the longest world in the game: ten numbered courses, three fortresses and an airship. The floor is slippery, coins are frozen inside blocks of ice that only fireballs will melt, and Ptooies puff spiked balls into the air. Buster Beetles pick up ice blocks and throw them, and Mario can do the same. World 6-5 cannot be finished without something that flies.

The king is now a seal, balancing on his throne. Lemmy Koopa, the smallest of the brood, wobbles about his cabin on a circus ball and conjures more balls to bounce around the room. This is also the only world from which a Magic Whistle will send you backwards.

World 7, Pipe Land: Ludwig and the plant

The seventh map is a tangle of plumbing. Pipes on the map lead to other pipes, courses twist upwards through vertical mazes, and two panels are not numbered courses at all but short gauntlets of Piranha Plants. World 7-7 is a carpet of Munchers that can only be crossed by chaining Starmen; the first fortress contains no enemies whatsoever and is all the more unsettling for it.

The king has been turned into a Piranha Plant by Ludwig von Koopa, the eldest and cleverest Koopaling, who fights like Roy but faster. Beat him and the usual letter arrives. This time it is not from the Princess. Bowser, in his own hand, announces that while the brothers were running around he has kidnapped her, and invites them to come and get her if they dare.

World 8, Dark Land: the Castle of Koopa

Dark Land is Bowser’s own country, a scorched, sunless map with no Toad Houses, no bonus games and no friendly faces. It opens with an armoured column: a convoy of tanks bristling with cannons, then a navy of battleships. After that, hands reach up out of the map and drag Mario into three short ambush courses, and a squadron of fast little airships follows. Part of the map is in pitch darkness, lit only by a small circle around the player.

Two ordinary courses, a fortress full of false doors and one last, enormous Super Tank (with Boom Boom at the controls) stand before the Castle of Koopa. Inside, statues fire lasers across the corridors. Bowser himself is waiting in a brick-floored chamber, spitting fire and leaping into the air to crush Mario flat. Every time he misses, he smashes through a layer of bricks. Dodge enough of his jumps and he breaks the floor completely and plunges out of sight.

Behind the last door, Princess Toadstool has the final word, and it is a joke at the expense of the first game: thank you, she says, but our Princess is in another castle. Then: just kidding. The curtain comes down, and the eight lands take a bow one by one.

The curtain call

The ending presents each of the eight worlds in turn as a little scene with its name beneath, like a cast taking its bows, before the words The End. It fits the idea that the whole adventure is a performance rather neatly. In the international versions, pressing a button afterwards sends you back to the title screen with a gift for your next run: an inventory stuffed with P-Wings.

The eight worlds of Super Mario Bros. 3

Eight kingdoms of the Mushroom World, plus the Warp Zone. Course totals count numbered courses, fortresses, special stages and the airship. Names are those of the manual and the revised American cartridge; the first American printing’s names are given in brackets. The kings’ animal forms are those of the NES original (the 16-bit remakes swapped them for familiar Mario characters).

1. 
   World 1: Grass Land8 courses · 1 fortress · Boss: Larry Koopa · King: dogRolling plains to learn the ropes. Two of the three Magic Whistles are hidden here, in 1-3 and the fortress. Hammer Brothers walk the map.
2. 
   World 2: Desert Land (Desert Hill)9 courses · 1 fortress, a quicksand desert and a pyramid · Boss: Morton Koopa Jr. · King: spiderQuicksand, Firesnakes, the Angry Sun and the first Chain Chomp. Boomerang Brothers on the map; Fire Brothers guard the third whistle.
3. 
   World 3: Water Land (Ocean Side)12 courses · 2 fortresses · Boss: Wendy O. Koopa · King: kappaIslands, drawbridges and a canoe. Tide courses with Boss Bass, a flooded fortress and the best excuse to wear the Frog Suit.
4. 
   World 4: Giant Land (Big Island)9 courses · 2 fortresses · Boss: Iggy Koopa · King: dinosaurEverything is enormous. Sledge Brothers on the map, and doors in 4-6 that switch the course between giant and normal size.
5. 
   World 5: Sky Land (The Sky)13 courses · 2 fortresses and a tower · Boss: Roy Koopa · King: birdA ground map and a cloud map joined by a tower. Goomba’s Shoe in 5-3 and a ride on the Para-Beetles in 5-6.
6. 
   World 6: Ice Land (Iced Land)14 courses · 3 fortresses · Boss: Lemmy Koopa · King: sealSlippery floors, frozen coins and thrown ice blocks. The longest world in the game.
7. 
   World 7: Pipe Land (Pipe Maze)14 courses · 2 fortresses, 2 Piranha Plant nests · Boss: Ludwig von Koopa · King: Piranha PlantVertical mazes, a Muncher field crossed on Starmen and a fortress with nobody home.
8. 
   World 8: Dark Land (Castle of Koopa)11 courses · tanks, battleships, 3 Hand Traps, airships, 1 fortress · Boss: BowserBowser’s war machine in full: Big Tanks, Battleships, Airships, the Super Tank and finally his castle. No bonus houses at all.
9. 
   World 9: Warp ZoneNo courses · reached with a Magic WhistleA strip of pipes among the stars. From World 1 it offers Worlds 2, 3 and 4; from Worlds 2 to 6, Worlds 5, 6 and 7; from World 7 or from the Warp Zone itself, World 8.

SLB’s own worlds-and-maps guide charts every map panel by panel, and the Reference links below lead to it.

At heart this is still the run-and-jump game of 1985: hold B to sprint, hold A to jump higher, stomp what can be stomped and dodge what cannot. What changes is everything around it. Mario can now pick up a Koopa shell and carry it, slide down slopes on his backside to bowl enemies over, swim against bubble-jet currents, ride lifts along rails and climb through courses that scroll up, down and diagonally as well as left to right. The screen follows him backwards, too, so a missed block is no longer gone for good.

Courses are short, dense and constantly inventing. One is built entirely from Donut Lifts that drop away under your feet; another hands you a wind-up green boot; another floods and drains as you run. Each ends at a spinning roulette of cards rather than a flagpole, and each sits on a map where you choose what to tackle next.

Controls and the P-Meter

Left and Right walk, and holding B turns the walk into a run. A jumps, swims and, with the right power-up, flaps. Down ducks (only when Mario is big), slides him down a slope and drops him into pipes; Up opens doors and enters pipes in the ceiling. B is also the action button: it throws fireballs or hammers, swings the raccoon tail and, held down, lets Mario carry a shell or ice block until you let go. Tanooki Mario turns to stone with Down and B together.

Along the bottom of the screen sits the Power Meter, a row of six arrows and a letter P. Run on clear ground and the arrows fill; when the P flashes, Mario is at top speed, his arms go out like an aeroplane and, if he is wearing a tail, tapping A will lift him off the ground for a few precious seconds. Learning where the runways are is half the fun of the game.

The map screen

Each world is laid out like a board game. Numbered panels are courses (the manual calls them Action Scenes), and clearing one lets you walk past it. Locked gates and missing bridges are opened by beating the mini-fortress that guards them. Toad’s Houses offer a choice of three treasure chests, Spade Panels deal a slot-machine game for extra lives, and pipes shuttle you between corners of the map. In several worlds Hammer Brothers stroll about between turns: bump into one and you fight a quick duel for a treasure chest.

When the Koopaling’s airship is reached and you fail to finish it, the ship lifts anchor and flies to another part of the map, and you have to chase it. Rocks block side paths until you break them with a Hammer from your inventory, and in Water Land a canoe waits behind one of them for a trip to bonus islands. It is a small thing by modern standards, but in 1988 the feeling of exploring a place, rather than clearing a list, was new to Mario.

The inventory

Press B on the map and the status bar flips over to show your stored items, up to 28 of them. Anything won in a Toad House, taken from a beaten Hammer Brother or sent by the Princess in a letter is kept here, and you may use one before entering a course: a Super Leaf for a level with a long runway, a Frog Suit for anything underwater, a Starman to begin a course already invincible. Five items only work on the map itself: Jugem’s Cloud skips a course, the Hammer smashes rocks, the Music Box sends wandering enemies to sleep, the Anchor pins the airship in place and the Magic Whistle whisks you to the Warp Zone.

Goal cards, lives and bonus games

Every ordinary course ends in a dark strip of stage where a box flickers between a mushroom, a flower and a star. Jump into it and you keep that card. Three cards of any kind earn an extra life; three mushrooms earn two, three flowers three and three stars five. Any enemies still on screen when you hit the box are turned into coins, and unused seconds on the clock are paid out as points.

Lives also come from 100 coins, 1-Up Mushrooms, long stomp chains and the bonus games. The Spade Panel is a three-reel slot machine: line up the picture of a mushroom, flower or star for two, three or five lives. Every 80,000 points an N-Mark Spade Panel pops up on the map with a memory game of 18 face-down cards; match pairs to win the item shown, and two misses end your turn. The board remembers what you have already matched until you clear it.

Two players and Battle Mode

The two-player game puts Mario and Luigi on the same map, taking turns: your go ends when you clear a course or lose a life, and whatever one brother clears stays cleared for both. Luigi plays exactly like Mario. Walk onto your brother’s map marker and press A, and the pair drop into a remake of the 1983 arcade game Mario Bros., complete with Crabs, Fighter Flies and a POW Block. Flip and kick five enemies to win, or punch the floor under your rival to knock one of his goal cards loose and steal it. The winner takes the next turn on the map.

Japan versus the West

The game changed on its way across the Pacific. In the Japanese original any hit, whatever you are wearing, knocks Mario straight back to his small form, just as in the first game. The international versions introduced the kinder rule the series has used ever since: a suited or Fire Mario drops to Super Mario first. Losing a suit shows a puff of smoke in the West, where in Japan the suit visibly pops off. The Western versions also redrew the airship throne rooms, moved the Boom Boom door in the first fortress and, once the credits have finished, let you start again with an inventory of 28 P-Wings.

North America received two printings. The first calls the lands Desert Hill, Ocean Side, Big Island, The Sky, Iced Land, Pipe Maze and Castle of Koopa on the ending screens and has the Princess mention “Kuribo’s shoe” (Kuribo being the Goomba’s Japanese name). The revised cartridge switched to Desert Land, Water Land, Giant Land, Sky Land, Ice Land, Pipe Land and Dark Land, renamed the shoe Goomba’s and fixed Toad’s grammar in the card game. The European version is built on that revision, retimed for 50Hz televisions, and adds one famous slip of its own: Bowser signs his ransom letter “Koopa Troopa”.

Suits, power-ups and items

Everything Mario and Luigi can wear, grab or store, with the names used in the English manual.

• 
  Super MushroomTurns small Mario into Super Mario, who can break bricks and take a hit.
• 
  Fire FlowerFire Mario throws bouncing fireballs, which also melt the ice around the frozen coins of Ice Land.
• 
  Super LeafRaccoon Mario: a tail swipe with B, a slower fall if you tap A, and flight for a few seconds once the P-Meter is full.
• 
  Frog SuitSwims precisely in any direction and ignores bubble-jet currents. On land Frog Mario can only manage an awkward hop.
• 
  Tanooki SuitAll of Raccoon Mario’s tricks plus a statue form (Down and B) that enemies ignore. A falling statue can even destroy a Roto-Disc.
• 
  Hammer SuitThe rarest suit. Hammers arc out and defeat Thwomps, Boos and even Bowser; crouch and the shell shrugs off fireballs. Hammer Mario cannot slide down slopes.
• 
  StarmanA burst of invincibility. Use one from the inventory to begin a course already flashing.
• 
  P-WingRaccoon Mario with a P-Meter that never empties, for one whole course. The manual calls it the Magic Wing.
• 
  Goomba’s ShoeA giant wind-up boot found only in World 5-3. Knock a Goomba out of it, hop in and stroll across Munchers and Spinies. Kuribo’s Shoe in the first American printing.
• 
  Jugem’s CloudMap item. Floats you over one uncleared course. Jugem is Lakitu’s Japanese name.
• 
  HammerMap item. Smashes a rock on the map to open a shortcut or a secret.
• 
  Music BoxMap item. Puts the Hammer Brothers and other map wanderers to sleep for a few turns so you can walk past.
• 
  AnchorMap item. Stops a Koopaling’s airship from flying off if you fail the course.
• 
  Magic WhistleMap item. Summons a whirlwind that carries you to the Warp Zone. Only three exist.
• 
  1-Up MushroomAn extra life. One in World 6-3 appears white because of a palette bug.
• 
  Switch BlockThe P-Switch makes its debut: stomp it and, for a few seconds, bricks become coins and coins become bricks.
• 
  Magic Note BlockA pink Jump Block. Bounce on it and you are thrown up to Coin Heaven.
• 
  Goal cardsMushroom, Flower or Star. Three of a kind pay two, three or five extra lives.

Super Mario Bros. 3 was a film star before most of the world could buy it, a Saturday-morning cartoon within months of its American launch and, quite by accident, the starting gun for one of the most important PC developers in history.

The WizardFilm · Universal Pictures · 15 December 1989Todd Holland’s road movie follows three children (Fred Savage, Luke Edwards and Jenny Lewis, with Christian Slater and Beau Bridges in support) to a video game tournament in California called Video Armageddon. The surprise final round is Super Mario Bros. 3, two months before America could buy it. Young Jimmy Woods wins after being told where to find the “Magic Flute” in the first fortress and warping to World 4. Super Mario Wiki puts its takings at $14.3 million on a $6 million budget. SLB has a full page on the film.

The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3TV · DIC Entertainment · NBC, 8 September to 1 December 1990The second of DIC’s three Mario cartoons drops the live-action sketches of the Super Show and sets 26 episodes in the lands of this game, airships and all. King Koopa’s children are the regular villains but under names of the writers’ own: Cheatsy (Larry), Big Mouth (Morton), Kootie Pie (Wendy), Hop (Iggy), Bully (Roy), Hip (Lemmy) and Kooky (Ludwig). SLB’s TV section covers every episode.

Nintendo PowerMagazine · 1989–1990Nintendo’s magazine built the hype issue by issue: a preview in Vol. 9, “The Making of Super Mario Bros. 3” in Vol. 10 (January/February 1990), a feature with maps in Vol. 11 and then a whole issue, the June 1990 Strategy Guide, given over to the game. The game entered the readers’ Top 30 at number 20 before it was even on sale and hit number one in the May/June 1990 issue. SLB archives the Vol. 9, 10 and 11 articles.

Nintendo Adventure BooksGamebooks · 1991–1992The choose-your-path paperbacks borrow this game’s cast and items freely. In Leaping Lizards the prize of the International Mushroom Games is a Magic Silver Whistle, and Iggy Koopa has his claws on it. SLB has a guide to the whole series.

Japanese guides and mangaBooks · 1988 onwardsJapan’s publishers went into overdrive. Family Computer Magazine issued a run of strategy supplements, and Wikipedia cites a 1993 Famitsu count of 20 separate guide books, a record at the time. Several manga retold the adventure, and the game’s lands and Koopalings became fixtures of Mario comics for years afterwards.

id Software’s PC demoUnreleased port · 1990When John Carmack worked out how to scroll a PC screen as smoothly as an NES, he and Tom Hall rebuilt the first level of this game overnight as a joke, starring the hero of an older PC game, under the title Dangerous Dave in Copyright Infringement. With John Romero they then made a faithful demo and offered Nintendo a PC version. Nintendo said no, and the team used the technology for Commander Keen and founded id Software. A copy of the demo surfaced at the Strong National Museum of Play in July 2021.

In later gamesCameos and revivalsThe Koopalings, airships and Toad Houses returned in force in New Super Mario Bros. Wii; the Super Leaf and Tanooki Suit were the stars of Super Mario 3D Land, with Boom Boom in tow; the raccoon tail came back again in New Super Mario Bros. 2. Super Mario Maker and its sequel include the game as one of their building styles, and Goomba’s Shoe with it. Its music turns up everywhere from Super Mario Galaxy’s airships to the Smash Bros. series.

On the big screen againFilm · 2026Grass Land is among the places Super Mario Wiki lists as appearing in The Super Mario Galaxy Movie, nearly four decades after the game put it on the map.

A bigger cast than any Mario before it: two brothers, a princess with a sense of humour, seven unlucky kings and a villain who has brought the whole family.

Character	Who they are	In this game	Abilities & notes
MarioThe star of the show	The hero of the Mushroom Kingdom, redrawn for this game with a black outline and, as Miyamoto later pointed out, an eye now set one pixel apart from his cap, which made him look cuter.	Crosses the seven kingdoms of the Mushroom World recovering the stolen wands, then storms Dark Land to rescue the Princess.	Forms: small, Super, Fire, Raccoon, Frog, Tanooki (and statue), Hammer New moves: carry and throw shells, slide down slopes, fly Keeps up to 28 items in his inventory
LuigiPlayer two	Mario’s younger brother, seen here in Nintendo’s group art beside the Princess and Toad. In the NES game he uses Mario’s sprite in green.	Shares the map with Mario in the two-player game and can challenge him to Battle Mode for goal cards and the next turn.	Plays identically to Mario in this version. His higher, floatier jump was added for Super Mario Advance 4.
Princess ToadstoolPen pal, then prisoner	The ruler of the Mushroom Kingdom, Peach to Japan and, later, to everyone.	Sends a letter and an item each time a king is rescued, often with a hint (one explains what Kuribo’s shoe is for). Kidnapped by Bowser while the brothers are busy in Pipe Land and held in Dark Land.	Not playable. Delivers the game’s closing joke.
ToadHost of the Mushroom World	The Princess’s loyal attendant, now running a chain of gift shops where everything is free.	Greets Mario in every Toad’s House, deals the cards at Spade Panels and wrings his hands beside each transformed king.	Toad’s Houses appear in every world except Dark Land. White ones only appear if you collect enough coins in a particular course.
The seven kingsRulers of the Mushroom World	Each land of the Mushroom World has a king, a castle and a royal magic wand.	Transformed by the Koopalings into a dog, a spider, a kappa, a dinosaur, a bird, a seal and a Piranha Plant, in that order, and restored when the wand is returned.	In Super Mario All-Stars and Advance 4 they become a Cobrat, Hoopster, Dino Rhino, Donkey Kong Jr., Albatoss, Monty Mole and Yoshi instead.
BowserKing of the Koopa	The Koopa King, drawn here with the shock of red hair he has worn ever since.	Masterminds the invasion from Dark Land, kidnaps the Princess while his children keep Mario busy and waits at the end of his castle.	Breathes fireballs and tries to flatten Mario with a leaping stomp His own weight breaks the brick floor: let him fall Fireballs and hammers also work, slowly
Larry KoopaWorld 1, Grass Land	The youngest-looking of the seven, with a blue mohawk. Dayvv Brooks of Nintendo of America, who named the brood, has said variously that he was named after U2’s drummer Larry Mullen Jr. and that he simply looked like a Larry.	Turns the Grass Land king into a dog.	Fires rings from the wand and hops about the cabin. Three stomps.
Morton Koopa Jr.World 2, Desert Land	A grey-faced heavyweight with a star over one eye, named after the American talk-show host Morton Downey Jr.	Turns the Desert Land king into a spider.	Larry’s routine, a little quicker. Three stomps.
Wendy O. KoopaWorld 3, Water Land	The only daughter, in a bow and beads, named after punk singer Wendy O. Williams of the Plasmatics.	Turns the Water Land king into a kappa.	Throws up to three candy rings that bounce around the walls for the rest of the fight. Three stomps.
Iggy KoopaWorld 4, Giant Land	A wild-haired schemer in glasses, named after Iggy Pop.	Turns the Giant Land king into a dinosaur.	Jumps higher than his brothers while firing from the wand. Three stomps.
Roy KoopaWorld 5, Sky Land	The bruiser of the family, in pink shades, named after Roy Orbison and his sunglasses.	Turns the Sky Land king into a bird.	His landings shake the floor and stun a grounded Mario. Three stomps.
Lemmy KoopaWorld 6, Ice Land	The tiny one with the rainbow mohawk, named after Lemmy Kilmister of Motörhead.	Turns the Ice Land king into a seal.	Rolls back and forth on a circus ball and conjures bouncing copies of it. Three stomps.
Ludwig von KoopaWorld 7, Pipe Land	The eldest, a wild-haired composer named after Beethoven. Nintendo Power’s 1990 guide calls him Bowser’s second in command.	Turns the Pipe Land king into a Piranha Plant.	Roy’s ground-shaking stomps at a faster, less predictable pace. Three stomps.
Boom BoomKeeper of the fortresses	A burly Koopa with a spiked shell and windmilling arms who guards every mini-fortress in the game.	Stands between Mario and the lock or bridge each fortress controls. Returns at the helm of the Super Tank in World 8.	Three stomps, and he gets faster and angrier after each. Later versions sprout wings and swoop.
The BrothersHammer, Boomerang, Fire and Sledge	Bowser’s elite troops, now a whole family: the original hammer-throwers plus boomerang specialists, rare fire-spitters and ground-shaking Sledge Brothers.	Wander the maps of Worlds 1 to 6 and challenge Mario to a duel when they meet. Each carries an item for his inventory.	Rewards include the Hammer, Music Box, Starman, P-Wing and Jugem’s Cloud. The Fire Brothers of World 2 hold a Magic Whistle.

Enemies and bosses

Bowser’s biggest army yet. Names are those of the 1990 English manual, which is why Boo is a “Boo” Diddly and Blooper is still a Bloober.

• 
  Little GoombaWorld 1-1 onwardsStill the first thing you meet, still walks off ledges.
• 
  Para-GoombaWorld 1-1 onwardsA Goomba with wings. Red ones, from World 1-1, just hop after you; brown ones, from 1-2, scatter Micro-Goombas.
• 
  Mugger Micro-GoombaWorld 1-2 onwardsTiny Goombas that cling to Mario and weigh down his jump. Shake them off with A.
• 
  Pile Driver Micro-GoombaDesert Land onwardsHides under a brick and hops at you wearing it.
• 
  Grand GoombaGiant LandMario-sized Goomba. One stomp still does it.
• 
  Kuribo’s GoombaWorld 5-3 onlyBounces about in a wind-up boot. Hit it from below to take the boot.
• 
  Koopa TroopaThroughoutGreen ones walk off edges, red ones turn back. Shells can now be carried.
• 
  Koopa ParatroopaThroughoutGreen ones hop or fly across; red ones patrol up and down.
• 
  Dry BonesFortressesA skeleton Koopa that collapses when stomped and pulls itself together again.
• 
  Buzzy BeetleWorlds 1 to 4Fireproof. Some now walk on ceilings and drop as you pass.
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  Buster BeetleWorlds 5 and 6Picks up white blocks and hurls them at Mario.
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  Para-BeetleWorld 5-6A flying Buzzy Beetle that doubles as a platform.
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  Hammer BrotherMaps and Dark LandThrows hammers in arcs, usually with a partner.
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  Boomerang BrotherWorld 1-3 onwardsHis boomerangs come back for a second try.
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  Fire BrotherWorld 2 secret, Dark LandRed-skinned and rare. Spits fireballs.
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  Sledge BrotherGiant Land, Dark LandTwice the size; his landings stun Mario if he is on the ground.
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  Lakitu and SpinyWorld 3-4 onwardsDrops Spiny eggs from his cloud. Green eggs in 3-4 roll after you instead of hatching.
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  Rocky WrenchAirships and tanksPops out of a hatch on deck and throws a spanner.
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  SpikeWorlds 3 to 6Coughs up a spiked ball and lobs it.
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  Piranha PlantThroughoutLives in pipes, and in the desert in the sand itself.
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  Venus Fire TrapWorld 1-1 onwardsA Piranha Plant that spits one or two fireballs.
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  PtooieWorlds 6 and 7A Piranha Plant that keeps a spiked ball in the air with its breath.
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  Walking PiranhaWorlds 5 to 7A small white plant that snaps and jumps. One in 7-8 breathes fire.
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  MuncherWorlds 5 to 7A black plant nothing can kill. Cross them in the shoe, as a statue or with a Starman.
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  Chain ChompWorld 2-5, World 5-1Lunges on the end of its chain. Wait long enough and it breaks free.
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  Fire ChompWorlds 5 and 6Flies after Mario spitting its tail of fireballs, then explodes.
• 
  FiresnakeDesert LandA hopping flame with a tail of sparks.
• 
  Angry SunWorld 2 desert, World 8-2Leaves its place in the sky and swoops at Mario again and again.
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  ThwompFortressesA stone face that slams down, or sideways, when you come near.
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  “Boo” DiddlyFortressesA shy ghost that only moves when your back is turned. Named after Bo Diddley.
• 
  StretchLater fortressesA white platform with Boos rising out of it.
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  Hot FootFortresses from World 4A candle flame that hops off its stand and follows when you look away.
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  Roto-DiscFortressesA glowing disc orbiting a block. Only Statue Mario can destroy one.
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  PodobooFortressesFireballs that leap out of the lava.
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  Bullet Bill and Missile BillAirships onwardsMissile Bills in 4-5 flash red and turn round for a second pass.
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  Bob-ombWorld 3-9 onwardsFired from cannons in Dark Land. Can be picked up before it blows.
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  Cheep-CheepWater coursesRed ones leap from the water; green ones cruise below. A spiny variety guards 7-4.
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  Boss BassWorlds 3-3 and 3-8A giant fish on the surface that swallows Mario whole, whatever he is wearing.
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  Big BerthaDeep waterBoss Bass’s underwater cousin, who spits out a baby Cheep and sucks it back in.
• 
  BlooberWater coursesSome trail four children behind them; others fling them outwards.
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  JelectroWater coursesA motionless jellyfish that cannot be harmed.
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  Lava LotusWater coursesA sea-bed flower that releases a cluster of fireballs.
• 
  Boom BoomEvery fortressThree stomps; leaves a Magic Ball (a “?” orb) that ends the course.
• 
  The seven KoopalingsAirships, Worlds 1 to 7Three stomps each. Catch the falling wand to finish.
• 
  BowserThe Castle of KoopaMakes his own exit through the floor.

The people who made it

The NES game has no staff roll, so these credits come from Nintendo interviews and Super Mario Wiki’s compiled list.

Nintendo told the story at the time in Nintendo Power’s “The Making of Super Mario Bros. 3” and again in November 2016, when Miyamoto, Tezuka and Kondo sat down for the NES Classic Edition interview series. Between them the two accounts explain how a sequel planned for spring 1988 became a two-and-a-half-year epic.

The Mario you nearly looked down on

Work began in 1986, once the Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2 was out of the door. That game had been Takashi Tezuka’s first as director, and it was essentially the original with harder courses. He did not want to do that twice. His plan was to change everything, starting with the camera: the first version of the new game looked down on Mario from above at an angle, a little like The Legend of Zelda.

Miyamoto warned him it would be hard, and it was. In a game about jumping, players must be able to see at a glance whether Mario’s feet are on the ground, and from overhead they could not. Part-way through, the team went back to a side view. Traces of the first idea survived, Tezuka says, and the black-and-white checkered floor of the title screen is the one everyone can see.

A tail, a centaur and a boot

Tezuka redrew Mario with a dark outline and set about giving him new things to do. The raccoon tail arrived early, and at first it had nothing to do with flying: the idea was a button press that spun Mario round and swatted enemies away. But Tezuka had wanted Mario to fly ever since the first game, and the tail ended up doing both jobs. He admits he wondered whether a raccoon was really the right animal. Nintendo Power reported that one rejected idea was to turn Mario into a centaur.

The Frog Suit, the Tanooki statue and Goomba’s Shoe came out of the same period of what Tezuka calls experimenting with a bunch of things. Miyamoto’s contribution to the bestiary was more personal: the Chain Chomp, according to Nintendo Power, is the dog that once lunged at him as a boy and was yanked back by its lead just short of his face. The same feature said that Bowser’s seven children were each modelled on one of the programmers, as a thank-you for their work.

Human wave tactics

The original Super Mario Bros. was made by seven or eight people. This one, Miyamoto estimates, took 20 to 30. Many of them sat in a long, narrow meeting room that became known as the Map Room, where programmers worked in a row all day turning sheets of hand-drawn course designs into data. Miyamoto has described the final push as “human wave tactics”.

Nintendo Power described the tools: characters were drawn on a system it called Character Generator Computer Aided Design, which gave every shape a number for the program to assemble on the fly. On the cartridge, Nintendo’s MMC3 chip did the heavy lifting, animating background tiles, supplying the extra memory needed for diagonal scrolling and timing a mid-screen split so that the status bar could sit still while the world moved above it.

The game had been pencilled in for spring 1988. Tezuka’s team kept adding features, each of which opened what he calls holes that needed patching, and it finally shipped in Japan on 23 October.

Kondo’s hardest ground theme

Koji Kondo handled all the sound by himself and found one tune harder than the rest: the main overworld theme. The first game’s melody was already famous, and he could not see how to follow it. This time he began by thinking about style. People had told him the original sounded Latin, or like fusion, so he weighed up different genres, and in the end wrote two complete themes and asked Miyamoto and Tezuka to choose between them shortly before the deadline.

He had more to work with than in 1985. Larger cartridges meant the NES’s sample channel could finally be used properly, which is why this soundtrack has sampled drums and thumping timpani where the first game had none.

The long wait for America

Japan bought the game in enormous numbers from October 1988. America did not get it for another sixteen months. A shortage of memory chips in 1988, together with the decision to release the Western Super Mario Bros. 2 first, pushed several American releases back, this one among them. In the meantime the game appeared in arcades on the PlayChoice-10 from July 1989, and Nintendo of America’s Dayvv Brooks gave Bowser’s children their rock-and-roll names.

Then came The Wizard in December 1989, a Universal film Nintendo had licensed its products to and whose finale revealed the game to a cinema audience. By the time the cartridge went on sale on 12 February 1990, backed by a marketing budget reported at $25 million, it was one of the most eagerly awaited games the industry had seen. Europe’s turn did not come until 29 August 1991, almost three years after Japan.

What began here. Each of these was checked against the three earlier Super Mario Bros. games.

There are no button codes in Super Mario Bros. 3. There is something better: a game so full of hidden doors, secret houses and vanishing ships that playgrounds argued about them for years. These are the ones worth knowing; SLB’s cheats and maps pages go further.

The three Magic Whistles

World 1-3: near the end of the course, stand on the white block and hold Down for a few seconds until Mario drops behind the scenery. Run right to the very end of the course, behind the black backdrop, before the effect wears off and you arrive in a secret Toad House with a whistle in the chest. World 1 fortress: become Raccoon Mario, get a run-up in the first room and fly up over the ceiling at its right-hand end; walk along the top to a hidden door. World 2: beat the Boomerang Brother who is carrying a Hammer, break the rock in the top-right corner of the map and defeat the two Fire Brothers behind it.

How the Warp Zone works

Blow a whistle and a whirlwind carries you to World 9. Which pipes you see depends on where you blew it: from World 1 you may choose Worlds 2, 3 or 4; from Worlds 2 to 6, Worlds 5, 6 or 7; from World 7, only World 8. Blow a second whistle while standing in the Warp Zone and you go straight to the World 8 pipe, so two whistles from Grass Land are all it takes to reach Dark Land in minutes. The six-note tune and the whirlwind are borrowed from the recorder in The Legend of Zelda.

White Mushroom Houses

Collect enough coins in one particular course of each world and a white Toad House appears on the map with a rare prize. The targets are 44 coins in World 1-4 (P-Wing), 30 in 2-2 (Anchor), 44 in 3-8 (P-Wing), 24 in 4-2 (Anchor), 28 in 5-5 (P-Wing), 78 in 6-7 (Anchor) and 46 in 7-2 (P-Wing).

The Treasure Ship

In Worlds 1, 3, 5 and 6 a wandering Hammer Brother can be turned into a flying ship full of coins. Finish any course with a coin total that is a multiple of 11 and a score whose tens digit matches that multiple (11 coins and a 1, 22 and a 2, and so on), and stop the clock on an even number. The ship has well over 150 coins, a hidden 1-Up and two Boomerang Brothers guarding the chest at the end. It works once per world.

The N-Mark card game

The memory game that appears every 80,000 points was meant to be shuffled, but a programming slip means there are only eight possible layouts, and three cards in the bottom row are always a mushroom, a flower and a star. Learn the eight (SLB’s cheats page lists them) and you can clear the board without a miss.

Hammers, rocks and hidden houses

Always save a Hammer. In Desert Land it opens the way to the third whistle. In Water Land a rock hides a canoe to bonus islands. In Giant Land the rock just left of World 4-1 hides a Toad House with a Tanooki Suit.

Coin Heaven

Pink Note Blocks look like ordinary ones until you bounce on them. The first is in World 1-3 and there is another in 1-5: jump on one and you are launched to a sky full of coins.

Statues, shoes and Starmen

Statue Mario is more than a hiding place: dropping as a statue destroys enemies that are otherwise invulnerable, including Roto-Discs. Goomba’s Shoe lets you walk on Munchers. And World 7-7 is designed to be crossed by running from one Starman block to the next without stopping.

Chasing the airship

Fail an airship course and the ship flies somewhere else on the map, sometimes behind courses you have not cleared. An Anchor from the inventory holds it still, and a Music Box sends the wandering Hammer Brothers to sleep so that you can slip past them.

A present after the credits

Finish the game on the American or European cartridge, wait for The End and press a button. You return to the title screen, and your next game begins with all 28 inventory slots filled with P-Wings. The Japanese version stays on the ending screen until you reset, and the bonus was not kept in the remakes.

Free lives in World 3-9

SLB’s long-standing tip: kick a Koopa shell so that it is trapped between the second and third Bullet Bill cannons of World 3-9. Every Bullet Bill fired into it scores, and after a few the rewards turn into 1-Ups.

Compiled from the instruction booklet, Super Mario Wiki (Warp Whistle, Toad House, Treasure Ship and N-Mark Spade Panel articles) and SLB’s own cheats page. SLB’s cheats page also carries tips for the All-Stars and Advance versions, which use different buttons.

For a game that pushed the NES this hard, Super Mario Bros. 3 is remarkably solid. But speedrunners and the curious have found cracks, and one of them finishes the game in a matter of minutes.

The World 7-1 wrong warp

The most famous exploit in the game. By arranging enemies and objects so that their positions in memory spell out machine instructions, then clipping into the downward pipe at the very start of World 7-1, a player can make the game run their own code and jump directly to the Princess’s chamber, skipping Bowser and all of World 8. It works on the Japanese and American originals, partly in All-Stars, and was fixed for Advance 4.

Walking on air

As Raccoon or Tanooki Mario, fill the P-Meter (or use a P-Wing), touch quicksand and jump. Mario flies with his walking animation still running, as if strolling up an invisible staircase. Present in the NES game and All-Stars.

The canoe and the whistle

Only on the Famicom. In Water Land, break the rock, board the canoe and blow a Magic Whistle while still afloat. Mario arrives in a corrupted Warp Zone where he can paddle off the edge of the map, revealing an unused castle graphic. Western cartridges fixed it, and All-Stars simply refuses to let you whistle in a boat.

Flame cards

In the two-player Battle Mode, after many rounds, pausing at the right moment as a card box passes a brother can award a glitched goal card showing a flame. A set of them pays out a huge number of lives, and Super Mario Wiki notes that the largest combination can crash the game.

Through the wall to a second Bowser

In the Castle of Koopa, a flying Mario who ducks on top of a particular Bowser statue can pass through the wall into the other route’s boss room. Stay crouched in that room and Bowser can neither breathe fire nor hurt you. Original and All-Stars only.

The wall jump

As in the first game, if Mario’s foot catches the lip of a wall or pipe at the right instant, a press of A kicks him off it. It is a frame-perfect accident rather than a move, but it is real.

The 1-Up that should not be

Stomp a chain of enemies and the points climb towards an extra life. If the fifth or later enemy in the chain is a Boomerang Brother or Lakitu, the NES game hands over a 1-Up at once in place of the 1,000 points it should give. All-Stars corrected it.

Small oddities

A 1-Up Mushroom in World 6-3 is drawn white. The Fire Flower in a Hammer Brother duel turns black and white when the treasure chest appears. Wag the raccoon tail a fraction of a second after a 1-Up Mushroom emerges and its jingle plays extra notes. And the title-screen demo still shows Raccoon Mario shrinking to small Mario after one hit, a leftover of the Japanese rules that was never corrected, even in the remakes.

Nintendo’s own trailer for the Virtual Console release, and the best documentary yet made about how the game came to be and how America fell for it.

• 

  It really is a play. The curtain, the bolted-on blocks, the hanging platforms and the exit into the wings were all deliberate, and Shigeru Miyamoto confirmed it with a nod in a Nintendo video for the series’ 30th anniversary in September 2015.
• The checkered floor on the title screen is a relic of the game’s first prototype, which was viewed from overhead.
• The Magic Whistle plays the same six notes, and summons the same whirlwind, as the recorder in The Legend of Zelda.

• 

  The Koopalings were named in America, by Nintendo of America’s Dayvv Brooks, mostly after musicians: Iggy Pop, Lemmy Kilmister, Roy Orbison, Wendy O. Williams and Ludwig van Beethoven, plus talk-show host Morton Downey Jr. Brooks has given two different explanations for Larry.
• Boo’s first English name, “Boo” Diddly, is a pun on the rock-and-roll pioneer Bo Diddley.
• According to Nintendo Power, the Chain Chomp is based on a dog that lunged at the young Miyamoto and was stopped by its chain inches from him.
• Tezuka had wanted Mario to fly ever since the first game. The raccoon tail was originally only meant for spinning round and swatting enemies.
• In the 16-bit and Game Boy Advance remakes the transformed kings are cameos: a Cobrat and a Hoopster from Super Mario Bros. 2, a Dino Rhino and Monty Mole from Super Mario World, an Albatoss, Donkey Kong Jr. and Yoshi.
• The pond in Desert Land’s secret corner is shaped like a number 3.
• In the European version Bowser signs his kidnap letter “Koopa Troopa” instead of King of the Koopa.
• The first American cartridges call World 8 “Castle of Koopa” and the boot “Kuribo’s shoe”. The revised printing changed seven of the eight world names.
• The N-Mark card game should have had billions of possible arrangements. A coding error left it with eight.
• Ice Land is the only world from which a Magic Whistle can send you backwards: the Warp Zone it leads to offers World 5.

• 

  The game data still contains at least fifteen unfinished courses, bonus-game hosts who never appeared (a Koopa Troopa and a Hammer Brother) and plans for a dice roll to choose between bonus games. A promotional video from the September 1988 issue of the magazine Famimaga shows some of the cut levels in action.
• One unused sprite is a Para-Beetle in green, and another is a tan Cheep-Cheep that appears only in an abandoned level.
• Princess Toadstool’s last line (“our Princess is in another castle”, followed by “Just kidding!”) parodies the Mushroom retainers of the first game.
• The Battle Mode is a remake of the 1983 arcade game Mario Bros., with its Crabs, Fighter Flies and POW Block all present.
• In The Wizard the Magic Whistle is called the “Magic Flute”, and nobody explains how a character who has never seen the game knows where it is.

• 

  A sealed first-print copy sold for $156,000 at Heritage Auctions on 20 November 2020, then the highest price ever paid for a video game. What made it special was the placement of the word “Bros.” on the box.
• On 28 July 2021 Nintendo Switch Online added a special save of the game called Mario, the quick-change artist!, which starts in World 8 with 35 lives and every power-up in the inventory.
• The 35th-anniversary celebrations of 2020 gave the game its own commemorative pin.

One image, a dozen frames. The flying Raccoon Mario on a plain yellow background fronted the game in every territory; what changed was the lettering, the border and, on the first American print run, the position of a single word.

More from the NES original, including a few of its best-kept secrets.

Official artwork, map scenes, sprites, adverts and curios from Super Mario Bros. 3. Select any image to see it full size; SLB’s artwork, box art and screenshot galleries have more.

Super Mario Bros. 3 has been remade twice and re-released on almost every Nintendo machine since. Here is every version, followed by what the game left behind.

Every version since 1988

• Family Computer 23 October 1988The Japanese original, with the harsher one-hit rule for suited Mario.
• PlayChoice-10 (arcade) 15 July 1989The first American printing of the game, running on Nintendo’s coin-operated NES cabinet seven months before the home release.
• NES (North America) 12 February 1990Two printings: the original, and a revision with renamed worlds and corrected text.
• NES (Europe and Australia) 29 August 1991A 50Hz conversion of the revised American version.
• Super Mario All-Stars (SNES) 1993Japan 14 July, North America 1 August, Europe 16 December 1993. Redrawn in 16 bits with new backgrounds, battery saves and a Battle Game selectable from the title screen. Reissued with Super Mario World in 1994.
• Super Mario Advance 4 (GBA) 2003Japan 11 July, Europe 17 October, North America 21 October, Australia 24 October 2003. The All-Stars version reworked for a handheld, with a floatier Luigi, saving and e-Reader cards that add items and the new courses of World-e.
• Wii Virtual Console 2007North America 5 November, Europe and Australia 9 November, Japan 11 December 2007. The NES game for 500 Wii Points.
• Super Mario All-Stars Limited Edition (Wii) 2010The SNES collection on a disc for the series’ 25th anniversary: Japan 21 October, Europe 3 December, North America 12 December 2010. See SLB’s All-Stars 25th Anniversary page.
• Nintendo 3DS and Wii U Virtual Console 2013–2014Japan first (3DS on 1 January 2013, Wii U on 25 December 2013), Europe and Australia on 26 December 2013 and North America in April 2014.
• NES Remix 2 (Wii U) 2014Bite-sized challenges cut from the game.
• Super Mario Maker 2015The game becomes one of four building styles in Super Mario Maker, and again in Super Mario Maker 2 (2019).
• Super Mario Advance 4 (Wii U Virtual Console) 2015–2016Japan 29 December 2015, North America 21 January 2016, Europe 10 March 2016. Notable for including every e-Reader course, among them the ones only ever issued in Japan.
• NES Classic Edition November 2016One of the 30 built-in games, with suspend points at last.
• Nintendo Switch Online September 2018Part of the NES library from the service’s first day, with online play. A special “quick-change artist” save followed on 28 July 2021.
• All-Stars and Advance 4 on Switch Online 2020 and 2023Super Mario All-Stars joined the SNES library on 3 September 2020 and Super Mario Advance 4 arrived with the Game Boy Advance library in February 2023.

All-Stars: the 16-bit curtain

For many players outside Japan, the Super Mario All-Stars version of 1993 is Super Mario Bros. 3. It keeps the Western rules and level layouts but repaints every screen: the kings turn into characters from other Mario games, backgrounds gain parallax hills and storm clouds, and the game finally remembers your progress. It restored the first American printing’s world names (Desert Hill, Ocean Side and the rest) and fixed several of the bugs listed above.

Super Mario Advance 4 and World-e

The last of the four Super Mario Advance games, developed by Nintendo R&D2, reached the Game Boy Advance in 2003. On the surface it is the All-Stars version squeezed onto a smaller screen, with a remake of Mario Bros. on the side. Underneath was Nintendo’s most ambitious use of the e-Reader. Swiping paper cards through the accessory fed the cartridge new power-ups, including Super Mario World’s Cape Feather, switches that changed the rules, and dozens of brand-new courses collected on a ninth map called World-e. Some of those courses borrow enemies and ideas from the other Mario games, and one, “It’s a Shoe-In”, brings back Goomba’s Shoe.

The e-Reader was never sold in Europe, so the European cartridge shipped with the feature disabled, and many cards were only printed in Japan. It took until the Wii U Virtual Console release of 2015 and 2016 for the complete set of e-Reader courses to be playable everywhere.

What it changed

Almost every structural idea in later 2D Mario games can be traced to this cartridge. Super Mario World took the map and made it one continuous country; the New Super Mario Bros. series revived the Toad Houses, the fortress-then-castle rhythm and, from the Wii game onwards, the Koopalings and their airships; Super Mario 3D Land rebuilt a whole 3D game around the Super Leaf. The stored-item idea runs from Super Mario World’s reserve box to Super Mario Bros. Wonder.

Its influence reached well beyond Nintendo. The demo that John Carmack, Tom Hall and John Romero built to show Nintendo that a PC could scroll like an NES became the engine of Commander Keen and the foundation of id Software. And in 2007, when a committee of historians and designers proposed a first canon of ten games for the Library of Congress to preserve, Super Mario Bros. 3 was on it.

Sales

Super Mario Wiki, drawing on Nintendo’s own sales data, puts the lifetime total for the Famicom and NES cartridge at about 17.28 million. Unlike Super Mario Bros., which was boxed with the console for years, it was overwhelmingly bought on its own, and for a long time it was cited as the best-selling game that had never been a pack-in.

Wikipedia’s sourced sales history fills in the detail. In Japan the game topped the Famitsu charts over the winter of 1988 and was the country’s best-selling game of 1989. In the United States a reported 250,000 copies went in the first two days and more than 8 million in the course of 1990. David Sheff’s book Game Over counted 11 million sold across Japan and America by 1993, and American revenue alone was reported at $595 million by early 1992. A 2011 CNBC list put its inflation-adjusted takings at $1.7 billion.

• 17.28mNES and Famicom cartridges worldwide
• 8m+sold in the United States in 1990
• 250,000American copies in the first two days
• $156,000for a sealed copy, November 2020

Reviews and rankings

The Japanese and American reviews came first, but it was the British press of 1991 that reached for the superlatives. Period scores are as listed in Wikipedia’s review table with their issues; the later scores are for the Wii Virtual Console release.

In Mean Machines, Julian Rignall called it the finest game he had ever played. Computer and Video Games went further and named it the “Mona Lisa” of gaming. Famitsu’s four reviewers praised its variety and challenge in 1988, one of them judging it the best in the series since the original. Nintendo Power did not give review scores in the modern sense but rated it highly in every category of its preview.

Reviewers of the Virtual Console release two decades later found little to mark down. IGN’s Lucas M. Thomas called it “the best representation of the Super Mario universe to come from the NES”, and Nintendo Life wrote that it “cannot come any more highly recommended”. The usual complaint, then and now, is the lack of a save feature in the 8-bit original.

Honours

Super Luigi Bros readers have reviewed Super Mario Bros. 3 over the years. Their write-ups are kept exactly as they were sent in:

• WebWhizzTommy
• SnowDragon
• Stevers
• Water Gemini
• Flying Omelette
• J Thomson

Played it? If you’d like to add your own review, please get in touch.

In this section you can see all the references of this game to other Nintendo releases:

• Mario Bros. – The Battle Mode is basically a remake of the multiplayer mode of this game

• Super Mario Bros. – Once you beat Bowser in the final stage of the game, Princess Peach says: “Thank you. But our Princess is in another castle! …Just kidding!”, which is an obvious hint to the legendary reference of the original game (“Thank you Mario, but our princess is in another castle!”)

• Super Mario Bros. 2 – Princess Peach’s character design is, practically, imported from this game.

Just like it was the case with the previous 2 games, and like it was already mentioned, this game made a huge influence on the future titles in the franchise. In this section you can see all of its mentions in the later games that were made and published by Nintendo:

• Super Mario RPG: The Legend of the Seven Stars – The music that is heard in Grate Guy’s Casino is a cover of the mini-games theme from this game, and the music that is heard during the battle with Bowser is a cover of the final boss theme from this game as well

• Super Mario 64 – Many stages from Big Island resemble Tiny-Huge Island in Super Mario 64 (and Super Mario 64 DS). Changing the size by using the doors is a pretty similar concept to changing the size by entering the elevator-pipes in Super Mario Bros. 3

• Mario Party – The music that is heard in Ghost Guess and Pedal Power is a cover of the Iced Land theme

• Paper Mario – The jingle that is heard when Mario saves the Star Spirit is a cover of the jingle that is heard when Mario recovers the stolen wand in this game

• Super Smash Bros. Melee – The main overworld theme has 2 covers in this game. One is heard in the Mushroom Kingdom and the other in Princess Peach’s Castle

• Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door – As soon as Jolene calls Mario, you can hear the Iced Land theme

• Tetris DS – Levels 4, 5 and 6 in Marathon Mode use the gameplay of this title on the top screen. Spirtes of Racoon Mario, Frog Mario and Tanooki Mario can be seen on the touch-screen as well. Also, you can hear a cover of the overworld theme

• Dance Dance Revolution Mario Mix – Music from the third NES game is a cover in this release

• WarioWare: Twisted! – The Super Mario Bros. 3 microgame and Super Mario Bros. 3-Lift microgame are both based on this legendary NES classic

• Super Mario 64 DS – The Rec Room theme is a cover of of the Grass Land theme of this game.

• Mario Party Advance – The music that you can hear after beating Boom Boom (or the Koopaling), from the third NES game, is heard when you complete a quest in this one. Also, the mini-game Drop’em has a similar background design like the levels from Super Mario Bros. 3

• New Super Mario Bros. – Many concepts from this game have made their reappearance in this DS release (for example, the Toad Houses). A lot of the worlds have very similar music themes as well, and the fortress theme is a cover of the same theme from Super Mario Bros. 3

• Super Paper Mario – A cover of the underwater theme from the NES classic is heard when the Big Blooper appears

• Super Smash Bros. Brawl – The main overworld theme of the previous Super Smash Bros. game (Melee) appears in this title as well

• Mario Kart Wii – A license plate with the writing “SMB 3” can be found in the Moonway Highway track

• Super Mario Galaxy – The airship and athletic music is a cover of the same theme from Super Mario Bros. 3

• New Super Mario Bros. Wii – The Penguin Suit in this game is directly inspired by the various power-ups from the NES classic. A cover of the Koopalings battle theme can be heard in this game just like the cover of the airship theme. Fortresses in this game are made very similar to the fortresses from the third NES game, and the enemy courses are similar during the fights with a Hammer Bro., Fire Bro. Boomerang Bro., or Sledge Bro, and they even use a cover of the same song. Also, you can use the back-up power-ups from the menu, just like in Super Mario Bros. 3. The Parabeetle makes its reappearance in this game as well. The Ice Flower resembles the flower that can be found in one of the Toad Houses

• Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games – The Athletic theme that can be heard in this game is one of the optional tracks

• Super Mario 3D Land – The jump blocks, the Tanooki Suit, the Super Leaf power-up, the Airships and Boom Boom all reappear in this game

• New Super Mario Bros. 2 – Colorful blocks from SMB 3 can be found in some levels of this game. Also, the Super Leaf power-up, the jump blocks, the Tanooki Suit, as well as the Koopalings, all return in this game. In the Coin Rush Gold Classics pack, the second course is inspired by World 1-1, as well as the coin heaven

• New Super Mario Bros. U – Boom Boom appears again, and he is the boss of the six of the Towers, Koopalings, and he also has some personalized ships in this game. The P-acorn sounds and behaves identical to the P-Wing. The first part of the Soda Jungle is inspired by the Grass Land world from the NES game, and many enemies from that game return as well

• Mario & Luigi: Dream Team – Nipper Plants reappear in this game

• Super Mario 3D World – The Spikes appear for the first time in a 3D Mario game. The music that is heard when Mario loses a life is a cover of this one

• NES Remix 2 – Super Mario Bros. 3 – The game is available in this release

• Mario Kart 8 – The Koopalings appear as playable characters for the first time.

Detailed sub-pages, walkthroughs, manuals and reader-submitted reviews covering every angle of Super Mario Bros. 3.

Box art galleries, rendered artwork, screenshots and the official Super Mario Bros. 3 cartoon episodes.

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