New Super Mario Bros. Wii



New Super Mario Bros. Wii is a 2009 Platformer Video Game for the Wii, and the sequel to New Super Mario Bros. on the DS. It's the second Super Mario Bros. Video Game for the Wii, the first being Super Mario Galaxy. Unlike Galaxy, it plays like the side-scrolling Mario games, especially Super Mario World and Super Mario Bros 3, while having a mixture of 3D and 2D graphics. It's the first Mario game since Mario Bros. to let multiple people play cooperatively at the same time (for a certain definition of "cooperatively"), with this game being the first let up to four players at once, and the first 2D Mario platformer for consoles since World. New Super Mario Bros. for the Nintendo DS allowed competitive play in a set of competitive-only levels, but did not allow players to take on the levels of the main game together.

It starts out at Princess Peach's birthday party, which features an unusually large cake. It turns out that The Cake Is a Lie, and the seven Koopalings plus Junior jump out of it. They kidnap Peach (again), taking her into an airship. They fly across the Mushroom Kingdom, with Mario, Luigi, and two Toads taking chase.


 * Absurdly Spacious Sewer: World 6-3.
 * Advancing Boss of Doom:
 * Advancing Wall of Doom: A pyroclastic flow in World 8-1.
 * Air Jousting
 * An Ice Person: The Ice Flower returns from Super Mario Galaxy. Although it's less "turns you into ice", and more "Fire Mario, but throws Ice instead of Fire". Penguin Mario can do the same thing, but he can also slide (and has normal traction on ice).
 * And Your Reward Is Clothes: Inverted: Mario loses his hat if you have 99 lives (he gets his hat back should his lives be less than 99 by the end of a level). Nothing happens to Luigi or the Toads, though (even though Luigi does take his hat off briefly whenever he wins).
 * Asteroids Monster: The larger Goombas.
 * Auto-Scrolling Level
 * Ax Crazy: Iggy seems to have some shades of this.
 * Big Boo's Haunt: The Ghost Houses.
 * Big No: Lemmy, Iggy, and Bowser let one out when you defeat them at the end of their respective worlds.
 * Blackout Basement: A number of levels.
 * Blatant Item Placement: Oddly enough for the franchise, Justified. The Toads who stayed at the castle aided Mario, Luigi, Yvan, and Wolley on their mission by shooting power-ups throughout the land out of a cannon, scattering them across the lands.
 * Boring but Practical: Shaking the controller in midair makes your character spin and keeps them in the air slightly longer. It's not a spectacular difference by any means, but it's absolutely vital to controlling your jumps and making those tough landings. (The same action triggers propeller flight when Mario has the Propeller Suit.)
 * Boss Dissonance: Mario-type. And how. Getting to the boss of a tower/castle/whatever is generally most of the challenge. The rest is usually dealing with Kamek's Geo Effects.
 * The final boss, however, falls squarely into Kirby-type, shockingly enough. In all fairness,
 * Boss Remix: The music for the initial battle with Bowser is a heavily arranged version of the main overworld theme.
 * Breaking the Fourth Wall: See Mickey Mousing (which is inverted in this game) below.
 * Brutal Bonus Level: World 9 (and world 9-7 in particular).
 * Bubbly Clouds: World 7.
 * Call Forward: In the credits, you can hear Peach say she'll wait for Mario at the Star-- before being cut off. This implies that this game might take place before Super Mario Galaxy, set at the Star Festival, although SMG2 also has one. Considering what happened during the first game, though, it might be the same event.
 * The Chase: Mario and company chase the Airship throughout the game, but on two occasions,.
 * Chasing Your Tail: The rematch against Iggy.
 * Dog Walks You: Invoked.
 * All Chain Chomps Are Dogs: The reason the last trope applies.
 * Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Toadsworth, at least in this game. In the original NSMB, he appeared in the Toad Houses. Here, however, he makes no appearance, not even in Peach Castle.
 * Color-Coded Multiplayer: Yet Luigi and the two Toad colors are interchangeable.
 * Combination Attack: If two or more players ground pound at the same time, a massive shock wave will defeat all enemies on screen.
 * Continuity Nod/Call Back: Barrels, POW Blocks, rotating fire bars, the first Bowser battle, the wind, a secret ninth world, the ability to play as Toad, carrying things over your head, the Map Screen, the Koopalings, their Airship, the Spin Attack, Yoshi, aquatic animals that wear goggles and act as stepping stones for the player, Kamek enchanting boss battles, multi-player characters in floating bubbles after defeat, the coin switch collection music and sounds, mini mushrooms, dancing enemies, etc.
 * An interesting note about the Koopalings is that, not only do they have their scepters from Super Mario Bros 3, the scepters are even the same colors that they were in the artwork for 3. Of course, then you remember that they originally received them by stealing them from the Kings, who aren't heard from in this game.
 * Also, that sting that plays when Kamek's magic starts doing its stuff in the boss battles shows up in Yoshi's Island under the exact same conditions. Really, just about anything even related to the Magikoopa is a call back to the game.
 * Convection, Schmonvection: Everything ELSE about lava and volcanoes is portrayed somewhat realistically in this game, down to wrinkly, rippling air from rising heat and World 8-1 going so far as to sic a rapidly-advancing ash cloud on you, but Mario still doesn't get hurt from lava unless he directly touches it.
 * Co-Op Multiplayer: With teamwork, you can do lots of things that would otherwise be impossible to do alone (without a specific power-up, anyways). Without teamwork, see Video Game Cruelty Potential.
 * Corridor Cubbyhole Run: Several instances. Most notably, a few of the towers and castles have long spiked pillars which appear at regular intervals, and safe spots must be used to take cover.
 * Creative Closing Credits: Every letter of the credits is a unique brick block. You can destroy them for points, and even compete with other players to see who can find the most coins.
 * Cutscene Incompetence: Mario not using the Propeller to get on the airship if he has it upon beating a world's Koopaling in the rematch.
 * Damn You, Muscle Memory!: One may get into the habit of shaking the controller if he or she plays a 2D Mario game after this one, due to the vital spin move that is activated this way.
 * Death Mountain: World 6.
 * Degraded Boss: Instead of Roy being the fifth Koopaling to be faced, he ends up being the second instead.
 * Dem Bones: The Dry Bones.
 * Difficulty Spike: The first four worlds (mushroom, desert, snow, and beach) are, for the most part, perfectly manageable, with possible exception made for World 3 until you get the hang of sliding/keeping the Penguin suit. But the last four worlds (jungle, mountains, clouds, and volcano), not so much.
 * Disc One Final Dungeon: The Airship levels. After each castle, it becomes clear that Peach is aboard Bowser Jr.'s ship, but you never find her on the ship levels. After beating Bowser Jr. for the third and final time, Peach gets taken away again just as Mario and/or the others reach her.
 * Disc One Nuke: The Propeller power-up is incredibly useful for many of the later levels, including the final boss -- and it can be acquired easily in level 1-1!
 * Damsel in Distress: Peach, of course.
 * Divergent Character Evolution: Inverted. Mr. Green's Luigification was revoked so that all four characters would play identically.
 * Double Jump: The function of the propeller suit is to essentially gain a second jump in midair.
 * Dummied Out: Quite a few things, actually.
 * Easy Mode Mockery: If the Super Guide was made available to you for any level (even if you don't actually use it), the stars you earn on your save file after beating the game won't sparkle. This was done so the Super Guide could be both a tool to assist newer players, and a goal to avoid for the better ones.
 * And if you use it to the end of a level, it skips the level for you, which means it doesn't count as being completed. Which means using it on castles and towers, which are the most common places to use it, will result in the victory flag not being there afterwards.
 * Escape Sequence
 * Escort Mission: Escorting those Toads in single player. Mercifully, they are completely optional.
 * And if you really want to be a bastard, you can toss Toad into a pit and be on your way.
 * Everything's Better with Penguins: The new Penguin Suit powerup, which is similar to Super Mario Bros 3's Tanooki Suit in that it gives you the same powers as Ice Mario, but with additional abilities.
 * Face Ship: The airship that the Koopalings and Bowser Jr. ride in has Bowser's face at the front.
 * Floating Water: One level in World 7 has water bubbles you can swim in. ...I guess they're a different kind of cloud?
 * Fragile Speedster: As in the DS version, the Mini-Mushroom makes you both a One-Hit-Point Wonder and weaker with your Goomba Stomp, but it greatly increases your mobility.
 * Game Mod: Are you looking forward to New Kaizo Mario Bros. Wii?
 * That's only the start -- the modding community for this game is surprisingly large and active.
 * Geo Effects: Just like in Yoshi's Island, Kamek swoops in during each Koopaling rematch to sway the odds in their favor by enchanting the battlefield somehow.
 * Giant Mook: Nearly every classic enemy can be found supersized. Some even have multiple levels of it.
 * Gimmick Level: A curious example, as nearly every stage features one or two level-specific enemies or gimmicks.
 * Green Hill Zone: World 1 even starts as a Nostalgia Level, but also introduces you to many of the new elements and features.
 * Griefer: Admit it, you picked up one of your teammates and threw him into a pit or into lava or purple slime, didn't you?
 * Grimy Water: In the forest levels.
 * Ground Pound: Also see Combination Attack.
 * Guide Dang It: In order to unlock the world 9 levels, one must find all three Star Coins in every level in an earlier world. These coins can be very hard to find or acquire without help. Most of them do have subtle hints that mark them out from the rest of the level, but how to get them is another trick entirely.
 * Hailfire Peaks: The infamous World 9-7 is a bizarre mix of jungle and snow themes.
 * Hat of Flight: The Propeller Suit has a helmet with a propeller on it.
 * Healing Checkpoint: If Mario is in his small form when reaching the checkpoint, he will automatically change into Super Mario.
 * Hoist by His Own Petard: Kamek takes himself out by casting his magic on Bowser.
 * I Was Told There Would Be Cake/The Cake Is a Lie/Jumping Out of a Cake: Bowser Jr. and the Koopalings hide in a birthday cake to nab Peach.
 * Incredible Shrinking Man: The Mini Mushroom, vital for reaching some secret areas, makes its return from New Super Mario Bros..
 * Infinite 1-Ups: A whole slew of ways to collect them, as shown in the Infinite 1-Up Hint Movies. The "World 2-3 Infinite 1-Ups" hint movie even shows Mario doing it to gain 30 lives.
 * Instant Runes: The Magikoopa's signature geometric shapes act as a giveaway to what stage feature they're enchanting.
 * Inventional Wisdom:
 * Invincibility Power-Up: The Super Star.
 * Invisible Block: Which are often blocks that don't exist until the player hits the location.
 * It's All Upstairs From Here: Many of the tower/fortress levels.
 * The Jimmy Hart Version: While some of Koji Kondo's original themes can be heard, most of the score consists of themes that are similar in style, but otherwise entirely new. In addition, influences can be heard from a number of Hollywood composers, such as Randy Newman (the ending themes) and Danny Elfman (the ghost house and castle themes).
 * Jungle Japes: World 5.
 * Kaizo Trap (sort of):
 * Kill It with Fire: The Fire Flower, unchanged from Super Mario Bros.
 * Kill It with Ice: The Ice Flower and the Penguin Suit -- notable in that there are some enemies resistant to fireballs which get easily taken out with this, and vice-versa.
 * Laughing Mad: Iggy Koopa.
 * Lava Pit: It is Mario. Try to make it through World 8 without falling in one. You won't.
 * Law of One Hundred: Just like every other Mario game, 100 coins equal an extra life. In this version, all current players get this extra life and the coins are communally gathered.
 * Lead In: The intro is certainly this, as the birthday angle was never brought up again after the intro.
 * Lethal Lava Land: Most of the castles, and World 8, which seriously ups the ante for lava levels!
 * Let's Play: Undoubtedly the best portrayal of all this game's greatness and flaws from both the game and the players themselves, comes from The Freelance Astronauts. A compilation of the best parts can be seen here.
 * Another LP is being done by TippingForties. One episode in and it's already full of dickery.
 * NakaTeleeli and ElementalOgre took a shot at this game too, and it ended up the same way as the others.
 * The Runaway Guys (featuring Josh Jepson) are currently going through an LP of this game, too. Dickery! Dickery everywhere! In World 1-1.
 * Both ClementJ64 and Brain Scratch Commentaries have also LP'd this game. Somecallme Johnny did it with Elliot and Matt Metelli, and there was lots of dickery to be had.
 * Letting the Air Out of the Band: Near the end of the game, when . Also occurs during multi-player, if all players put themselves in bubbles.
 * Levels Take Flight: Two examples: One in World 5 involves Mario navigating across a flock of large flying manta rays going in his direction, and one in World 7 has Mario crossing a swarm of flying beetles smaller than the rays (but still very large for bugs) going in the opposite direction from him.
 * Literally Shattered Lives: Averted. Though you can freeze enemies in ice blocks and then shatter them, if you look closely, only the ice shatters, while the enemy falls offscreen in the usual fashion.
 * Lost Forever: The sparkling save file stars, if you ever make the Super Guide box appear on any level at any time.
 * Make My Monster Grow: As in Yoshi's Island, Kamek does this -- once on a Chain Chomp during Iggy's rematch, and again on . It can also be said to happen to Lemmy's balls.
 * Mercy Mode: Failing a level at least eight times lets you use the "Super Guide" feature, where a CPU Luigi runs through the level you're having trouble with. The more obnoxious among elite Mario players complained that this would make the game too easy -- and therefore sucky -- until it turned out to be genuinely necessary.
 * People complaining about the guide making the game too easy was mostly Fridge Logic, since the guide allowed Nintendo to add a feature to help new players if they fail too much and concentrate on designing levels that challenge players. It's shown up again in Super Mario Galaxy 2 and Donkey Kong Country Returns in the same sense.
 * Mickey Mousing is inverted: Some of the music is apparently so catchy that some enemies and even some power-ups and Yoshis (when players are not riding) will dance and sing along at certain cues.
 * Mythology Gag: As with the DS game, there is a homage to World 1-1 from the first Super Mario Bros. and a Bowser battle that can be defeated simply by breaking the bridge and dropping Bowser in the lava (or down a pit a la Super Mario Bros 3), replacing the axe with a button.
 * Never Say "Die": The instruction manual refers only to "blunders" and "making mistakes" while still saying you "lose a life."
 * The New Adventures
 * Nintendo Hard: By the time you get to World 8, the game makes it quite clear that it wants you to die several, incredibly painful deaths.
 * No Name Given: The two Toads, although the development team nicknamed them Ala-Gold and Bucken-Berry.
 * And the fans called them Yvan and Wolley.
 * Nostalgia Level: 1-1 starts off with that very familiar arrangement of blocks and a Goomba.
 * Coin Level 2 in the multi-player Coin Battle mode is the original World 1-1, with a bunch of new coins and odd little toys.
 * For that matter, Coin Level 1 starts off with an area based on the original Mario Bros arcade game.
 * For that matter, the entire game.
 * Ominous Latin Chanting: The final boss theme, when you get to the lava portion.
 * Ominous Pipe Organ: The castle theme, the airship theme, and some of the boss themes.
 * Opening Narration: "Today is Princess Peach's birthday!"
 * Palmtree Panic: World 4
 * Platform Battle: The first fight with Iggy and the second fight with Ludwig.
 * Powerup Mount: Yoshi. Unlike in Super Mario World, however, players can't simply take Yoshi to other levels.
 * Press X to Die: In multi-player, you can press A to turn into a bubble, just like the one you end up in after dying in the level. Guess what happens if you press A while all the other players are in bubbles? However, no lives are lost directly -- every player just gets thrown into small form and kicked out of the level.
 * Reconstruction: Of the original 2D Mario sidescrollers.
 * Recurring Boss: Bowser Jr. in the latest model Clown Copter. Each Koopaling is also fought twice, with a different attack pattern.
 * Recurring Boss Template: When facing any of the Koopalings in the tower stages halfway through each world, every battle is a relatively straightforward affair of dodging their wand attack and then delivering a Goomba Stomp to the head (much like they were in Super Mario Bros. 3, for that matter). This is not the case when facing them again, in their castles at the end of each world.
 * Red Zone Remix Vid: Starring the Koopalings!
 * Remixed Level: A few of the exclusive Coin Battle courses from Super Mario Bros.
 * Ring Out Boss: Inverted. Lemmy is incapable of actually harming you (unless you jump into him like a moron), and instead tries to knock you into one of the bottomless pits on either side of the arena with his bouncy rubber balls.
 * Rise to the Challenge: World 8-6. With lava. Good luck!
 * Roar Before Beating: Roy and Bowser.
 * Rubber Band AI: The volcanic smog in World 8-1.
 * Save the Princess: Well, it wouldn't be Mario otherwise.
 * Schmuck Bait: Yes, don't mind the cake with 6 different hair styles, a bow, and sunglasses on it....
 * Secret Level: World 9. Some other levels are borderline -- in Worlds 4 and 6, there are only eight levels displayed in the Star Coin menu initially, but when you clear the castle of those worlds, a ninth level is suddenly revealed. Likewise, only nine levels are depicted in World 8's Star Menu until you clear the Airship level and a tenth level is revealed with much fanfare. World 7-6 and 8-7 are kinda-sorta examples in that they're already on the Star Coin menu to begin with, but they are obscured on the map until you find the secret exits in World 7-Tower and 8-2 respectively.
 * Shifting Sand Land: World 2, complete with blowing wind, quicksand, and sand geysers(!).
 * Skippable Boss: The first battles with . It turns out there's a secret exit to each of the relevant levels, the former leading to a cannon to World 6. The latter leads to a secret level
 * Slippy-Slidey Ice World: World 3.
 * Smashing Hallway Traps of Doom: More accurately Smashing Tower Trap of Doom. 6-Tower (Morton's) has some incredibly Freudian spiked pillars that repeatedly jam into each other. (Previous levels have similar large black spiked... protuberances, too.)
 * Smash to Black: Happens in The Stinger.
 * Smug Snake: Ludwig von Koopa.
 * Spin Attack: Spinning in the air gives you a tiny little bit more airtime (unless you have the propeller or are holding a propeller block/someone who does have the propeller, in which case you'll get a LOT more airtime and altitude.)
 * Spread Shot: Ludwig uses an Initial Burst in the second fight against him.
 * Stalactite Spite: Lots of icicles in the third world. In one level, the entire ceiling is full of them.
 * The Stinger: The Koopalings helping Bowser up from his shell....
 * Super Not-Drowning Skills
 * Super Title 64 Advance: Obviously.
 * Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: The multi-player has a knack for varying between this and Enemy Mine.
 * Those Two Guys: Blue Toad and Gold Toad don't even have names.
 * Throw a Barrel At It: The barrels here work almost the same way as in Donkey Kong Country.
 * Trick Boss:
 * Took a Level in Badass: Morton Koopa's the sixth Koopaling to be fought instead of the second.
 * Trojan Horse: Bowser Jr. and the Koopalings sneak inside Princess Peach's Castle by delivering themselves in a giant cake.
 * Turns Red: Iggy's Chain Chomp.
 * A Twinkle in the Sky: Using a warp cannon.
 * Under the Sea: As usual, a lot of levels (particularly in world 4) take place partly or completely underwater. Super Not-Drowning Skills as usual.
 * Underwater Boss Battle: The second fight with Wendy.
 * Unexpected Gameplay Change: The second Bowser Jr. battle has you.
 * The Very Definitely Final Dungeon: You know it when you get there... the game even goes one step further and has the final boss confrontation take place in the catacombs under the castle.
 * Video Game Caring Potential: You can save trapped citizens and carry your friends to safety...
 * Video Game Cruelty Potential: ...Or you can pick them up and throw them into lava, slime, or pits. Guess which one you're more likely to see?
 * Villain Exit Stage Left: There is a sequence after every castle where the character(s) run(s) up to Bowser Jr., who has the airship behind him, complete with Princess Peach on deck. Bowser Jr. taunts you and boards the airship, and you can do nothing but watch it fly away...
 * Visual Pun: Most levels in the first world have rolling hills... and a couple of levels take it literally.
 * Walking on Water: Mini characters can run on the water's surface, as in New Super Mario Bros.. Apparently, the Mushroom Kingdom laughs at conservation of mass. But then again, it is magic.
 * Considering Conservation of Mass would mean you'd become a lot denser and probably couldn't even move while mini, let alone jump better and walk on water, I'm gonna say we're better off without it in this instance.
 * Warmup Boss: Larry's painfully easy, even by Mario standards. (In fact, given how the shifting pipes can trap him and give you a breather, he's even easier the second time.)
 * You All Look Familiar: The Toads.
 * You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Bowser Jr. invokes this with his Clown Copter (which may or may not be sentiment). He kicks it off the screen when choosing between his original, which is badly beaten and sad looking, and his dad's, which is in better shape and larger.
 * Considering Conservation of Mass would mean you'd become a lot denser and probably couldn't even move while mini, let alone jump better and walk on water, I'm gonna say we're better off without it in this instance.
 * Warmup Boss: Larry's painfully easy, even by Mario standards. (In fact, given how the shifting pipes can trap him and give you a breather, he's even easier the second time.)
 * You All Look Familiar: The Toads.
 * You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Bowser Jr. invokes this with his Clown Copter (which may or may not be sentiment). He kicks it off the screen when choosing between his original, which is badly beaten and sad looking, and his dad's, which is in better shape and larger.