List of New Super Mario Bros. pre-release and unused content

This is a list of beta elements of the game New Super Mario Bros..

Early ideas
The game was referred to as Super Mario Bros. DS in early footage.

Early builds
During early stages of production, Mega Goombas were going to be a generic species (the result of a Goomba colliding with a Super Mushroom and powering up), rather than an individual boss. There was also supposed to be a Mario and Luigi co-op mode at one time, which is now available in the direct sequel of the game. An illustration of early map icons still exists as a screenshot on page twelve of the final game's manual. There were originally three item reserve spots rather than one. There also was an underwater stage which also featured Manta Ray in VS. Mode. Spindrift was also supposed to be in the game, but got replaced by the blue spinning platforms in World 1-3 and other levels.

As seen in an image, it was possible to obtain the Blue Shell by first defeating a Blue Koopa Troopa. Then when the player Ground Pounded on the shell, the player got in the shell and became Shell Mario. The idea was removed from adventure mode in the final game, but it survives in Vs. Mode, although the player no longer had to Ground Pound the shell. The advertisement showing the Vs. mode revealed some levels that were not available on the final release, including a desert stage, an underwater stage and a few others. The Mega Mushroom was originally just a Super Mushroom from Super Mario 64 DS. Later, it was red with white spots instead of yellow with red spots.

The player could store up to 3 items in the beta. In the final version, they could only store 1.

During the near-final state when screens were shown in Nintendo Power, there were some very slight differences in level design, etc. A screenshot at this stage suggests that World 3-B, a sky level, was originally intended to be a desert level. The coin sprites were different and the music wasn't at its final state (the vocals "ba-baa" were originally an orchestra-like "hit" similar to one made by a MIDI keyboard). The Desert overworld was shown in a video from E3 2006 (before the other songs were known), and the main song was completed but did not have vocals; therefore, the enemies did not dance. Additionally, the game did not pause as Mario transformed after obtaining a powerup. In addition, the theme that was used in the beta was slower than in the final. It was possible to kick and punch in the game, but it was removed because of the way Mega Mario moves in the game. Mario was also meant to sideflip. Mega Mario was also able to run, and was given a point counter.

Unused data
There is also data to support a single player snowball throwing mini-game, that was possibly scrapped due to the DS's inability to support sophisticated enough AI. Also, as seen in video footage, the way the enemies are defeated is different.

There is an unused E3 ring object called "obj_e3_ring.nsbmd" in the final ROM. There is also a file called "obj_e3_ring.nsbtp" This ring looks similar to those found in early versions of the game.

At the end of the map directory in the final ROM, there are eight 3D models that are based of the 8 world themes in the game. However, World 4 and 6 do not display forest and mountain themes, respectively, but rather World 4 is named "ancient" with an island with a volcano in its graphic. World 6 is named "machine" and its graphic seems to be a placeholder. This implies that the world themes were much different in the early builds.

There is an unused fauna-like image named "Junglekusa" hidden in the game. It is sprite number 255, and is not a default sprite (like Goombas or Koopa Troopas), but also has a "Swimmable" nybble.