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Super Mario Bros.

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This article is about the Nintendo Entertainment System game. For other uses, see Super Mario Bros. (disambiguation).
"Mario 1", "Super Mario 1", "Super Mario Bros. 1", "Super Mario Brothers 1", and "SMB1" redirect here. For other uses, see Mario 1 (disambiguation).
"SMB" redirects here. For the Game Boy Advance game known as "Super Mario Ball" in Japan and Europe, see Mario Pinball Land.
"Mario's Adventure" redirects here. For the unreleased title referred to in German promotional material as "Mario Adventure", see VB Mario Land. For the music tracks known as "MARIO ADVENTURES", see Super Mario Land (album).
Not to be confused with Mario Bros. or Super Wario Bros.
Super Mario Bros.
United States box art for Super Mario Bros.
For alternate box art, see the related gallery.
Developer Nintendo R&D4
Publisher Nintendo
Platforms Family Computer, Nintendo Entertainment System
Family Computer Disk System, Famicom Box, Nintendo PlayChoice-10, Game Boy Advance, Virtual Console (Wii / 3DS / Wii U), Nintendo Classic Mini: Family Computer, NES Classic Edition, Nintendo Entertainment System – Nintendo Classics
Release dates Family Computer:
Japan September 13, 1985[1]
Nintendo Entertainment System:
USA October 18, 1985[2]
Europe May 15, 1987[3]
Australia July 1987[4]
South Africa (1928-1994) 1993[5]
Family Computer Disk System:
Japan February 21, 1986[6]
Nintendo PlayChoice-10:
USA August 1986[7]
Game Boy Advance:
Japan February 14, 2004[8]
USA June 7, 2004[9]
Europe July 9, 2004[10]
Virtual Console (Wii)
Japan December 2, 2006[11]
USA December 25, 2006[12]
Europe January 5, 2007[13]
Australia January 5, 2007[14]
South Korea April 26, 2008[15]
Virtual Console (Nintendo 3DS) (Ambassador Program release):
Japan September 1, 2011[16]
USA September 1, 2011[17]
Europe September 1, 2011[18]
Australia September 1, 2011[19]
Virtual Console (Nintendo 3DS) (Full release):
Japan January 5, 2012[20]
USA February 16, 2012[21]
Europe March 1, 2012[13]
Australia March 2012[22]
South Korea February 3, 2016[23]
Virtual Console (Wii U):
Japan June 5, 2013[24]
Europe September 12, 2013[13]
Australia September 12, 2013[25]
USA September 19, 2013[26]
Nintendo Classic Mini: Family Computer:
Japan November 10, 2016[27]
NES Classic Edition:
Australia November 10, 2016[28]
USA November 11, 2016[29]
Europe November 11, 2016[30]
Nintendo Entertainment System / Family Computer - Nintendo Classics:
USA September 18, 2018[31]
Japan September 19, 2018[32]
Europe September 19, 2018[33]
Australia September 19, 2018[34]
South Korea April 23, 2019[35]
HK April 23, 2019[35]
ROC September 9, 2025[36]
Singapore November 18, 2025[37]
Malaysia November 18, 2025[38]
Thailand November 18, 2025[39]
Language English
Genre 2D platformer
Ratings
ESRB:E - Everyone[40]
CERO:A - All ages[41]
PEGI:3 - Three years and older[13]
USK:0 - All ages[42]
RARS:0+ - All ages[43]
ClassInd:L - General audience[44]
GRAC:All - All ages[45]
ACB:G - General[46]
Mode 1–2 players
Format
Cartridge
Game Pak
Disk Card
Digital download
Digital download
Digital download
Game Pak
Digital download
Built-in
Input
Wii Remote (horizontal)
Wii Remote (horizontal)
Joy-Con (horizontal)
Serial codes Family Computer:
Japan HVC-SM
Nintendo Entertainment System:
USA NES-SM
Europe NES-P-SM
Australia NES-SM-AUS
South Africa (1928-1994) NES-SM-GPS[5]
Family Computer Disk System:
Japan FMC-SMA
Game Boy Advance:
Japan PRE-AGB-FSMJ-JPN-1 (Hot Mario! Campaign)
Japan AGB-FSMJ-JPN (Retail version)
Japan AGB-FSMJ-JPN-1 (20th Anniversary)
USA AGB-FSME-USA
Europe AGB-FSMP-EUR
Australia AGB-FSMP-AUS
“Do you have what it takes to save the Mushroom Princess?”
—Back of localized box art

Super Mario Bros. is a side-scrolling platformer video game released for the Family Computer and Nintendo Entertainment System in 1985. It shifted the gameplay away from its single-screen arcade predecessor, Mario Bros., by featuring scrolling screens, allowing for longer levels. While not the first game in the Super Mario franchise (the first being Donkey Kong), Super Mario Bros. is the most iconic. It introduced various series staples, including power-ups, Mushroom Kingdom, classic enemies such as Goombas, and the basic premise of rescuing Princess Peach from Bowser. As well as kicking off an entire series of Super Mario platform games, the wild success of Super Mario Bros. popularized the side-scrolling genre as a whole, helped revive the North American gaming industry after the video game crash of 1983, and was largely responsible for the initial success of the Nintendo Entertainment System, with which it was bundled as a launch title. Until it was eventually surpassed by Wii Sports, Super Mario Bros. was the best-selling video game of all time for nearly three decades, with over 40 million copies sold worldwide.

Nintendo confirms the North American release date of Super Mario Bros. as October 18, 1985.[2] Prior, English sources were disputed with different sources giving different dates with no way to verify them.[47]

Super Mario Bros. has been ported to many consoles, to the point where the Guinness Book of World Records 2011: Gamer's Edition erroneously stated that this game was also remade on the Nintendo 64.[48] It was one of the NES games that could be played on the Nintendo PlayChoice-10 and NES Classic Edition, and it was released on the Wii, Wii U, and Nintendo 3DS Virtual Console and on the Nintendo Switch's Nintendo Entertainment System – Nintendo Classics.

A successor named Super Mario Bros. 2 in Japan was released on June 3, 1986. Due to its difficulty, another game, Yume Kojo: Doki Doki Panic, was reworked into Super Mario Bros. 2 for North America, released on October 9, 1988. The Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2 would eventually be named Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels in the west. A separate game serving as an arrangement or spin-off of Super Mario Bros. featuring elements from previous Super Mario games, known as Super Mario Bros. Special, was developed by Hudson Soft and licensed by Nintendo, and released on Japanese home computers in September 1986. A definitive third successor named Super Mario Bros. 3 was released on October 23, 1988.

Story

The following text is taken directly from the NES instruction booklet localization.

One day the kingdom of the peaceful mushroom people was invaded by the Koopa, a tribe of turtles famous for their black magic. The quiet, peace-loving Mushroom People were turned into mere stones, bricks and even field horsehair plants, and the Mushroom Kingdom fell into ruin.

The only one who can undo the magic spell on the Mushroom People and return them to their normal selves is the Princess Toadstool, the daughter of the Mushroom King. Unfortunately, she is presently in the hands of the great Koopa turtle king.

Mario, the hero of the story (maybe) hears about the Mushroom People's plight and sets out on a quest to free the Mushroom Princess from the evil Koopa and restore the fallen kingdom of the Mushroom People.

You are Mario! It's up to you to save the Mushroom People from the black magic of the Koopa!

Mario must then travel through eight worlds in total. At the castle in each of the first seven, he battles Bowser, only to discover that he was a fake, and that only a Mushroom Retainer was being held there. At the end of the eighth castle, Bowser is finally defeated, and Princess Toadstool is saved.

Gameplay

World 1-1 (Super Mario Bros.)
Super Mario in World 1-1.

Super Mario Bros. is divided into eight worlds, each of them containing four levels. Mario[A] has to get to the end of the level by clearing an obstacle course featuring blocks, pits, enemies of various types, and other obstacles and objects. Certain pipes and beanstalks along the way allow Mario to visit secret bonus rooms which hold coins, and can skip a portion of the level. Unlike most later Super Mario games, the screen can only be scrolled to the right, making Mario unable to go to previous parts of a level. Certain levels can be skipped through the use of Warp Zones.

World 2-2 screenshot of SMB
Mario swimming in World 2-2.

If regular Mario takes a hit, falls down a pit, or if the Time Limit runs out, he loses a life and restarts the level. If Super Mario or Fiery Mario takes a hit, he downgrades to regular Mario (Fire Mario downgrades to Super Mario in later titles) and is given a brief period of invincibility to minimize consecutive hits. The point where Mario continues from a lost life depends on how far he ran through the level before getting defeated; either from the beginning or at one of several invisible "checkpoints" throughout the level. After a Game Over, pressing Start Button while holding A Button on the title screen allows the player to continue from the start of the world.[49] In a 2-player game, if this is done by whoever got a Game Over second, both players will begin in the same world where the second player's game ended. Otherwise, levels can only be replayed if the game is beaten or the console is reset.

By hitting ? Blocks and bricks found throughout a level, Mario can find coins or special power-ups which grant him new abilities. Some of those blocks are initially hidden, and only become visible when Mario hits them from beneath. The power-ups that Mario can find are the Magic Mushroom, the Fire Flower, the Starman and the 1 up Mushroom.

At the end of each level, a castle stands with a flagpole nearby. When Mario reaches the flagpole, he takes down the enemy flag and enters the castle, completing the level. The higher the spot that Mario hits the flagpole, the more points he receives. If two players are playing the game, Luigi's turn comes whenever Mario loses a life. Luigi has no special abilities in the game that are different from Mario's.

The fourth level of each world plays inside a castle. They are usually filled with Fire-Bars and Podoboos. At the end of a castle level, Mario is confronted with a fake Bowser in Worlds 1 through 7 and the actual Bowser in World 8. Mario ordinarily has no way to hurt the fake Bowsers or the actual Bowser and has to either use the ax to destroy the bridge, causing either the false or real one to fall into the lava, or pelt him with many fireballs, which produces the same result and reveals the true forms of the fakes. After defeating an impostor, Mario frees one of the seven remaining mushroom retainers from the castle, at which point they say their iconic phrase: "Thank you, Mario! But our princess is in another castle!" At the end of the castle in World 8, Mario frees Princess Toadstool and completes his adventure, unlocking a harder new quest.

Time clock

The game's levels have a Time Limit in the upper right, which counts down, with the background music speeding up when going below 100. If it reaches 0, the game declares "Time Up", and Mario loses a life. However, the in-game timer runs much faster than real seconds; 400 seconds on the timer, which is the default when starting most of the levels, is equal to 160 seconds in real time. The timer countdown speed is the same across NTSC and PAL versions.

The demo version of Super Mario Bros. from amiibo tap: Nintendo's Greatest Bits starts with a real-time 180 second limit, which is sufficient to finish any level, presuming it is finished without losing any lives, and would have 32 timer seconds (15 real-time seconds) to spare for any follow-up levels. For its seventh scene, this is enough to see the game's ending.

Hard mode

Main section: Hard Mode § Super Mario Bros.

After beating the main game, the player is given the option to pick a world (by pressing B Button on the title screen to change the world counter in the upper right) to play in "a new quest"—a harder mode where all Little Goombas are replaced by Buzzy Beetles, and all enemies walk faster. Elevator-style lifts that were originally in their wide forms (six holes wide) are now in their small forms (four holes wide), which are used from World 5-1 onwards in the main game. Mario[A] gains no new powers in hard mode, and enemies still give the same amount of points as normal. Additionally, earlier levels in hard mode that had harder versions later on the in the main game, now have the harder version used for both levels; for instance, World 1-3, which is an easier version of World 5-3 in the normal game, is identical to World 5-3 in Hard Mode. If the player finishes the game on hard mode, nothing else is unlocked.

Controls

The controls can be customized on Wii U Virtual Console and in the Suspend Menu on Nintendo Classics.

Action(s) NES Controller
Famicom Controller 		Wii Remote Classic Controller GameCube Controller Game Boy Advance Nintendo 3DS Wii U GamePad
Wii U Pro Controller 		Dual Joy-Con (2)
Pro Controller 		Single Joy-Con (2)
Move ← +Control Pad → +Control Pad left or right +Control Pad left or right / ← Classic Controller Left Stick → +Control Pad Left-Right / ← Control Stick → +Control Pad left or right +Control Pad left or right / ← Circle Pad → +Control Pad left or right / ← Control Stick → Left or Right Buttons (+Control Pad left or right) / ← Left Stick → ← Control Stick →
Crouch / Enter Warp Pipe +Control Pad ↓ +Control Pad down +Control Pad down / Classic Controller Left Stick ↓ +Control Pad Down / Control Stick ↓ +Control Pad down +Control Pad down / Circle Pad ↓ +Control Pad down / Control Stick ↓ Down Button (+Control Pad down) / Left Stick ↓ Control Stick ↓
Climb Beanstalk +Control Pad ↕ +Control Pad up or down +Control Pad up or down / Classic Controller Left Stick ↕ +Control Pad Up-Down / Control Stick ↕ +Control Pad up or down +Control Pad up or down / Circle Pad ↕ +Control Pad up or down / Control Stick ↕ Up or Down Buttons (+Control Pad up or down) / Left Stick ↕ Control Stick ↕
Jump / Swim A Button Two Button Classic Controller a Button A Button A Button A Button A Button A Button Single Joy-Con Right Button
Run / Throw Fireball B Button One Button Classic Controller b Button B Button B Button B Button / X Button B Button / X Button B Button / X Button Single Joy-Con Bottom Button / Single Joy-Con Top Button
Pause / Start Game Start Button Plus Button START/PAUSE Button Start Button Start Button Plus Button Plus Button Plus Button or Minus Button + SR Button
(Title screen) Select Game Select Button Minus Button Z Button[B] Select Button Select Button Minus Button Minus Button Plus Button or Minus Button + SL Button
Continue after Game Over Hold