Super Mario Bros. Deluxe

Super Mario Bros. Deluxe is a Game Boy Color enhanced port of the landmark 1985 NES platformer Super Mario Bros., released by Nintendo in 1999. By that point in the Game Boy family's lifecycle, the Game Boy Color had been on the market for roughly a year and was proving itself a capable home for faithful ports of classic titles. Super Mario Bros. Deluxe arrived as a showcase of just how much Nintendo could squeeze onto a Game Boy Color cartridge, delivering not only the complete original Super Mario Bros. experience but also a substantial suite of bonus content that gave returning players genuine reasons to revisit a game they had likely played many times before. The core gameplay follows Mario — or Luigi in the two-player challenge mode — through eight worlds of side-scrolling platforming action. Players run and jump across Mushroom Kingdom stages, stomping Goombas, kicking Koopa shells, and navigating underground caverns, underwater passages, castle fortresses, and overworld grasslands. The Game Boy Color's compact screen required Nintendo to implement a slight zoom and scroll system, meaning the camera follows Mario more tightly than on a television, and players cannot always see as far ahead as in the NES original. This subtle change meaningfully affects the experience, demanding sharper reflexes and a degree of memorization for hazards that appear with less warning. Controls map cleanly to the Game Boy Color's two-button layout, with the B button handling running and fireball throwing while A handles jumping — a direct translation of the NES scheme that feels natural almost immediately. Beyond the original game, Super Mario Bros. Deluxe includes a Challenge mode in which players replay stages hunting for hidden Red Coins and a Yoshi Egg, chasing high score targets unique to each level. A Toy Box unlockable gallery, a versus racing mode using the Game Boy Color's infrared link feature, and a Super Mario Bros. For Super Players mode — the Japanese Famicom Disk System's harder variant known in the West as Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels — round out the package considerably. The Lost Levels content, which had never been officially released in cartridge form in North America before this version, was a notable inclusion for players who had only encountered it through later compilations. Reception at the time was positive, with players and critics appreciating the faithfulness of the port and the generosity of the bonus content. The game was recognized as a technically impressive achievement for the handheld, demonstrating that a beloved home console classic could be carried in a pocket without sacrificing its essential character. For many younger players in 1999, Super Mario Bros. Deluxe served as a first introduction to the original NES game, making it a meaningful entry point into Nintendo's foundational platforming legacy.