Genre: Platform

Platform: Nintendo Wii

Publisher: Nintendo

Classification: 3+ (PEGI)

Nothing says Nintendo more than the most iconic gaming character of all time. Whenever anybody talks of moustached brothers wearing caps and dungarees, whilst living in a surreal world, people instantly think of Mario – and sometimes maybe the chuckle brothers.

But the Mario brothers are not to be chuckled at and neither is their new game. Gone are the glitzy 3D worlds of the more recent Mario games as New Super Mario Bros goes back to its roots as a side-scrolling platformer. It’s crammed full of familiar items like shiny coins, brightly coloured skies and floating bricks. This is the same Mario that many remember sinking their pocket money into in the arcades if not at home playing it on their ugly grey box.

The musical score has obviously changed over the years, but the barebones of it’s ancestors are still recognisably there. Some of the exceedingly iconic and familiar sounds are blasted out of the Wii remote speakers causing a ripple of nostalgic pleasure to wash over the player’s body, leaving them with hair-raising goosebumps that saturate their skin.

But it’s not just because of these guilty nostalgic pleasures that make the game so great, it’s the back-to-basics gameplay and new surprise elements. Despite being branded as ‘New’, it’s an old format that has never been so beautifully crafted and still hasn’t lost its charm.

SCORE: 9 / 10