Super Mario All-Stars
One tragic casualty of the game industry’s creep towards digital distribution is videogame packaging. Games are, by definition, ethereal things: arcane lines of code that push clusters of coloured light from pixel to pixel on electronic displays. As such, the boxes they come in help ground these esoteric journeys of mind and screen in certain kind of reality. They bottle our experiences, allowing us to read their labels, share specimens between one another and feel their weight in the hands: none of which is possible with a file downloaded to a hard drive.
Boxes make the intangible tangible, allowing games to invade senses otherwise untouched by the medium. Who, as a child, didn’t press their nose against the pages of a freshly printed instruction manual and inhale the scent of possibility? And even today, running your nail along the spine of a game case, tearing the cellophane with a tiny rasp, feels like unlocking the door to a new dimension. Digital distribution offers convenience. But it does so at the expense of experience. And Nintendo has always understood the value of experience.
Super Mario All-Stars, a game that bundles together four of the series’ formative 8-bit titles, enjoys packaging that is both commemorative and celebratory. The smooth, dusky Famicom-mauve cardboard box is emblazoned with a gold leaf wreath, inside which an 8-bit Mario sprite stands, facing right, poised ready, as ever, to run off into the inviting distance. Understated but thoughtful, like a Criterion Collection version of a cherished children’s film, it strikes a welcome balance between playfulness and austerity.
Nintendo, unlike its cinematic counterpart, Disney, has always shied away from celebrating the past with re-releases and commemorative-boxed versions of its past creations. But Super Mario Bros. isn’t a run-of-the-mill classic. For over twenty years it remained the best-selling game ever, shifting over 40 million copies worldwide and popularizing a character that, by the 1990s had become more recognizable amongst American schoolchildren than Mickey Mouse.
Moreover, Super Mario Bros.’ iconography has come to define the medium in popular culture. The red splash of Mario’s plumber costume, the unfashionable cap and moustache, Koji Kondo’s irrepressibly joyful theme tune, the squat, shifty-eyed Goombas and the spike-backed kidnapper, Bowser, all symbolize video games to much of the world. If Mario’s most important game is 25 years old, we should absolutely throw him a party.
And physically, the re-release has been treated with an appropriate degree of care and attention. Inside the box, there’s a compilation soundtrack of music from the series, along with sound effects – trills and warbles that can be pinned to every action and reaction in the game from memory. Likewise, a Wii-box sized booklet outlining the origins of the series, and featuring comments from creator Shigeru Miyamoto and never-before seen artwork from its development, is a welcome bonus.
But inside the game, contemporary spit and polish is nowhere to be seen. This is, instead, a ROM dump of the Super Nintendo title, Super Mario All-Stars, which eschews Mario’s debut in Donkey Kong and the subsequent arcade game, Mario Bros. and instead bundles Super Mario Bros. and its sequels together, repainted in 16-bit sprites. The code remains untouched from its debut 17 years ago; the copyright line on the title screen reads 1993; the on-screen instructions are written for a SNES pad, not a Wii controller, Classic or otherwise. Without 60htz support the games must be played bordered and with the slightly fuzzy definition that plagues emulated SNES games when played on a modern, non-CRT television.
Does any of this matter? Yes and no. No, because each of the four games on offer still sparkles with creativity and assured design, not mere museum pieces, picked out as crucial forms in gaming’s evolution, but also as vibrant, relevant and exciting experiences today. Yes, because, when throwing someone a 25th birthday party, it’s a little stingy and awkward to put up the same decorations you used for their 8th birthday party.
You can read the rest over at Eurogamer here