Super Mario Bros. Wonder just dropped last month on Oct. 10 and I could not be more happy with the game I received when I went to GameStop to pick it up. Nintendo outdid itself by straying from the overused New Super Marios Bros. concept and instead going for a fresh new version of Mario and his friends as they adventure through Mushroom World to defeat Bowser. I have spent countless hours collecting flower coins, jet running through levels, and trying the brand new power-ups available in this title. This game has many fun surprises and is worth a look.
Wonder includes some new and exciting power-ups that have never been seen before in a 2D Mario game. My favorite power up is the drill power-up because you can jump and dig into the cling and attack enemies with the drill on your head. I also like the bubble power-up. Not only does it allow you to trap enemies in bubbles and turn them into coins, it gives you a slight jump boost if you land on one. You can also transform into an elephant and slam enemies with your trunk that also holds water. Using the water in your trunk, you can water wilted flowers to get coins, flower coins, and even wonder effects. These wonder effects add unique and surprising challenges to the levels. They also give you a wonder seed, which is what you get for completing a level, and they are used to unlock new areas of the world as you progress through the game.
In addition to new power-ups, this game has different types of levels. I personally like the puzzle levels as you have to figure out how to navigate through the level to collect wonder tokens that are scattered around. This is fun to do if you have online play enabled as you can see how other players move around and help each other out to find the tokens. The multiplayer does not have a chat so you get to play a fun game of Charades to communicate. My least favorite type of level is the KO arenas. In these levels, you get to choose a power-up to enter with and you have to defeat all the enemies in a series of stages to get to the end. These are timed, and the reward for a faster time is more Purple 10 Coins. I am bad at these but they still are fun to play if you are good at destroying lots of enemies very quickly. A third type of level is badge levels. Badges give your character a buff such as being able to run faster or allowing you to bounce off voids or lava if you fall. These levels test your ability to utilize these abilities and are always a fun challenge. The badges give levels lots of replayability too as you can test new things out and try different strategies to make it to the end.
I had a blast playing Super Mario Bros. Wonder and I know this game will stay as one of my top favorite switch games of all time. I love the upgraded graphics and the new mechanics added into the game. This is a game I think every Mario lover should have in their library.