Music Box

The Music Box is a common item found in Super Mario Bros. 3. It makes all Hammer Brothers (as well as their cousins, the Fire Brothers, the Boomerang Brothers, and the Sledge Brothers) on the map screen, as well as the Munchers in Pipe Land, fall asleep so that Mario and Luigi can sneak past them. After a while, they will wake up again. The song that is played is a soothing version of the Super Mario Bros. main theme song. The pitch level of the music was adjusted for the SNES remake in Super Mario All-Stars.

Music Boxes also have a large role in Wario Land 3. In fact, this game is set within an enigmatic Music Box with an entire world inside of it and focuses on the collection of five different Music Boxes, which, if all played, can free a hidden figure who, claiming to be the Music Box World's unjustly accursed leader, helps Wario through his quest. Wario, in the end, collects the five Music Boxes scattered around the larger one and frees the figure, only to discover that he is the evil Rudy the Clown; Wario then defeats Rudy and saves the Music Box, which he is permitted to leave. Wario later claims the Music Box World as his own, as evidenced by its cameo in his house in WarioWare: Twisted!.

In the book Koopa Capers from the Nintendo Adventure Books series, Luigi tries to whistle the tune from the Music Box to escape the Sledge Bros. While it does make them drowsy, they avoid falling asleep completely.