During the June Nintendo Direct, Mario was back in the spotlight with a new 2D adventure game. Super Mario Wonder looks similar in style to the New Super Mario Bros. series, but upgraded with tons of new visual flourishes, enemies, and power-ups. The Nintendo Direct also announced that it’s releasing this year, on October 20.
While the art style was somewhat similar to NSMB, Mario has noticeably different animations for elements like jumping and running, and even little touches like grabbing his hat after it falls off when going through a pipe. The trailer also showed new power-ups, like one that turned Mario into an elephant, and gameplay elements that played with foreground and background layers.
In an announcement following the presentation, Nintendo explained that the adventure kicks off when Mario touches a “Wonder Flower.” That unlocks various wonders of the world that change gameplay in unique ways, like making pipes come alive or summoning hordes of enemies. Mario, Luigi, Toad, Princess Peach, Princess Daisy, and Yoshi are all playable characters, and the game features four-player co-op.
While Mario has featured in several spin-offs, remakes, and HD collections of older games over the last couple of years, he’s had a more limited solo career on the Switch since that console launched. Mario’s last original 2D game was Super Mario Maker 2 in 2019, a combination of Mario’s signature platforming action combined with a level creation system.
Other games in the franchise for Switch include the launch title Super Mario Odyssey, two crossovers with Ubisoft in the turn-based Mario + Rabbids series, and a port of the Wii U’s Super Mario 3D World, which expanded significantly on the original game.
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