SMB Advance (GBA)

[Alienblue]

SUPER MARIO ADVANCE (one) -GBA A+

How many here can remember when the Gameboy Advance first came out? Where were you? What game(s) did you get for it? HOW DISSAPOINTED WHERE YOU WHEN YOU REALIZED YOU COULD BARELY SEE ANYTHING ON THE NON-BACKLIT SCREEN!? (I apoligize for the capital letters, I cannot get boldface using my computer).....I do. I was at my # (er...lost count) girlfreinds' house in a town 150 miles away, we rode to a big neihboring city and I bought it at Circuit city. I got Castlevania, Pac Man Collection and THIS game, Super Mario Advance one with it. Although I was excited to be holding a system with more power than the 16-bit SNES in my hand, that excitement faded fast as I realized I had to get up at DAWN and sit in an open window with the sun shining on the screen to see even the fore ground characters- FORGET the background especially dark blues and greys! Yet I kept playing SMBA1 , because the game it was based on, SMB2, was my favorite mario game ever (well, up until the DS New SMB anyway)....

Flash forward to the release of the Back-lit GBA-SP. I really wanted to play SMBA1 now but could not find it anywhere (I lost the original between moves long ago).

Flash forward again to last week. SMBA1 is now available as a PLAYERS CHOICE GBA game! For only $20 I snapped it up fast! Upon first playing it, I made a post here asking if IT HAD BEEN REPROGRAMMED, I was so sure all this stuff I was hearing and seeing were NOT in the original I had played many moons ago! Yet they were always there-hiding in the background.

Playing Super Mario Advance one on a GBA-SP or EVEN BETTER- A DS LITE!!!! - is an awesome experience for Super Mario lovers. I still think Super Mario two is one of the most underated games in history. It is DIFFERENT then the usual mario (the "real" SMB2 from Japan was deemed to similiar to the first AND too difficult for american players, so "the dream factory" was given to Mario and his freinds to play in!) , Ah, but there is it's awesome greatness. You are on a true adventure, not just playing for points. You can take your time to thouroughly explore each world.
The enemies are all new, shy guys and birds wearing masks, blue hedgehogs(!), birdos and giant mice. You can walk on whales, ride their spouts, pluck plants and items from the ground, enter subspace-THE TWILGHT ZONE!- and BEST of all, you get to pick four different characters with their own abilities, like GUANTLET! - Toad is strong but a poor jumper, The princess Floats on air but is rather weak, Luigi jumps super high but is hard to control, and of course Mario is balanced.

Yet, there are still things from past mario games all will recognize. POW blocks and a crab from the original Mario Bros.; turtle shells and starmen, even mushroom blocks.

If you never played this game or if you played it long ago but never on a back-lit handheld with POWERFUL audio (the voices are extremely crisp and funny!) -pick up this players choice game today. You really can't go wrong with ANY SMB advance game but as I said, my rose colored glasses make SMBA1 the BEST! (:

[Shawn]

Wow! EVERY game some viewer reviews on this site is an A+! Amazing! I must be playing the wrong games.

[m0zart1]

[QUOTE=Shawn]

Wow! EVERY game some viewer reviews on this site is an A+! Amazing! I must be playing the wrong games.

[/QUOTE]

Well, we didn't want to say that, but since you did already...

 

Seriously though, I didn't even give grades up until now.  So I can hardly be said to have given A+ scores to various games.

 

This is what I don't like about scores anyway.  It's impossible to encapsulate a game being good in objective terms when everyone is different.  I'd much rather have detailed reviews that tell me why the game was good -- that way I can disagree if I have to.  I've read many reviews on Gamespot rated above 8.0 and thought to myself that I was sure glad I didn't just look at the score and leave.  the review content made it clear that while it might be an 8.0 or above to most people, it certainly wasn't to me.

 

But since there were no scores previously, I'll go ahead and prove your assertion wrong:

 

Baby Pac-Man (Arcade) -- D-

Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Atari 2600) -- F

Table Tennis (Magnavox Odyssey) -- B

Time Pilot (XBOX Live Arcade) -- A

Ms. Pac-Man (Arcade) -- A+

Siren (Playstation 2) -- B+

Silent Hill 2: Restless Dreams (XBOX) -- A-

[m0zart1]

Oh yeah, and...

 

Custer's Revenge (Atari 2600) -- D-

[Shawn]

I was just giving "blue" a hard time. The review was well done but to be honest, most of the "reader reviews" are a bit too long for my tastes. This is a great game though, that's for sure.

[voorhiessa]

Speaking of.....any other sequels ya'll can think of that feature a dramatic change in style and gameplay like SMB2?   None that I can think of...

[Alienblue]

Shawn, thanks so much for giving me a hard time, ..aw y' shouldn't have!

Seriously, When I give a game an A+ I am just saying "I highly reccomend you buy this game if you are at all INTO this type of game!" ..... not that it's the greatest game ever. I mean it IS GREAT but it surely is not on a par with CUSTERS REVENGE!

Sorry my review was a bit long, but mine are shorter than mostmOzarts! ....and to add a few lines to it, I also think SMB2 has the best CONTROL of any SMB game-pinpoint precision. AND it is more strategic, letting you pick characters and take your time. I also dig the graphic style....and lastly, THIS GAME HAS CHERRIES! What more need be said? (:

[m0zart1]

[QUOTE=Shawn]

Speaking of.....any other sequels ya'll can think of that feature a dramatic change in style and gameplay like SMB2? None that I can think of...

[/QUOTE]

 

Yes.  "Legend of Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link" and "Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest".  A lot of early NES games seemed to want to reinvent their gameplay almost immediately.

 

Of course I love all three of those games, so I don't think the risk they took was bad by any stretch.

 

Also, I think the gameplay in "Majora's Mask" was much altered from the standard Zelda formula.  It's hard to say that given that the engine was the same as "Ocarina of Time", but the whole thing about repeating the same three days all over again was a very different concept which worked out quite well.

[Alienblue]

Sequals that were not the same but brand new;
Yes my freind I've played a few
straight through
too!

Donkey Kong Junior was an about face on DK. Now MARIO was the villian, and the setting was a jungle. Mario Bros. was more like Joust than the DK games. And Donkey Kong 3 was a SHOOTER for heavens sake! Lastly, all of the Mr. Do games were different. Dig a maze like dig dug, knock out blocks in a castle, climb a roller coaster and finally, Do! run run! had an overhead perspective and Qix (or AMIDAR) like game play; draw lines aroun enemies. Mr. DO! was certainly a odd-job Game character (yet never did he star in a CIRCUS game despite being a CLOWN!)

[voorhiessa]

So I just got back into gaming, but on a much smaller scale.  No consoles (none for 5 years), but I picked up a DS Lite, and I had to get SMB Advance with it (the orginal is my favorite platformer of all time).

 

I never played All-Stars, and I was SHOCKED at the changes.

 

First, the voices--I have no idea why this was necessary, as one reviewer put it "they never shut up".  With the exception of 2 levels, I play exclusively as Toad and his voice is the most irriating.

 

Then, the abundance of hearts and other powerup--I'm guessing to make it easier?

 

Other stuff too--big enemies, carnavil rides, pointless vases--just doesn't seem to do anything to the game, and to be honest, I just don't get it.

 

SOOOOO.....Alien gave this game a A+, and I'll stick with that for the gameplay, but as for the 'upgrades', I'd give them a C-, averaging out the pak for a solid B.

 

By the way, what's the point of collecting the big coins in all the levels?  (I don't have a manuel).