Full review on my website: https://www.nepikigaming.com/reviews/super-mario-bros-2/

''I’m glad to say that I’ve finally beaten Super Mario Bros. 2, as I can now conclude that it’s a pretty fun game overall even though I’ve never beaten it when I was younger. Despite not initially being intended as the sequel of the original Super Mario Bros., it’s a worthy follow-up with ideas that are still being used in the franchise today. Most of the game revolves around the grabbing mechanic which is unique to this game when it comes to the Super Mario franchise, and it works pretty well with the ability to destroy other enemies or fun bosses. They aren’t simple ”jump over Bowser, hit the axe” bosses anymore, and are definitely one of the high points of this game alongside overall good- and smart level design. Furthermore, there are a total of four different characters to choose from after every level- or game over, giving you full control over how you would like to play this game. As for what version to play; I feel both stand on equal grounds to each other, so it mostly comes down to how difficult you want it to be for yourself. Regardless of what version, I would definitely recommend this game to any fan of the Super Mario franchise who hasn’t played this game yet, or (retro) 2D platformer fans in general.''

Juntamente com o Super Mario Land, é o jogo mais diferente da franquia, porém o Super Mario Land ainda conseguia me entreter. Super Mario Bros 2 tem toda uma história conturbada de desenvolvimento que já é bastante manjada, e sua maior fama vem disso. Sempre o via e o olhava torto, pois parecia um jogo ruim, então quando eu enfim joguei, vi que minha expectativa estava bastante correta. Começando pelo fato de que demorei 12 dias para terminar ele, e não por ser difícil e eu não conseguia passar, embora eu vá falar disso depois, mas sim porque eu não tinha vontade nenhuma em jogar. O jogo não conseguia me cativar, jogava apenas por terminar, e não porque eu estava me divertindo. Cada fase era mais chata e repetitiva que a outra, e eu já estava me sentindo assim desde o terceiro mundo. Super Mario Bros 2 tem 4 personagens, Mario e Toad são descartáveis, Luigi é legal mas acaba ofuscado quando se há a Peach no jogo, que é disparada a melhor personagem e que torna a experiência mais suportável. A trilha sonora é ruim, e muito repetitiva. Há 7 mundos no jogo, e praticamente 3 músicas apenas, que após minutos jogados já se tornam cansativas. Tem a música das fases, a das cavernas, e de chefes, as três são saturadas ao máximo durante o jogo inteiro. A dificuldade é irritante, o jogo não dá tantas vidas quanto deveria, e é muito mais injusto do que justo, o que faz que a raiva gerada por ele seja genuína. As fases são repetitivas, mudando uma coisinha ou outra, mas no geral, mudam pouquíssima coisa uma da outra. Os inimigos poderiam ser melhores, também há muita repetição. A jogabilidade é interessante, e é única do jogo, e até que conseguem utilizar ela bem. Os chefes é o básico, Birdo com algumas diferenças em cada fase, e os chefes mais diferentes são os que realmente brilham e são legais, com boas mecânicas. Agora, é inegável a beleza do jogo e seus sprites, nisso sim, houve uma grande melhoria de seu anterior. Escrevendo tais pontos positivos fazem o jogo parecer melhor do que realmente é, pois a minha experiência foi realmente muito desgostosa, me obrigava a jogar só para ver o final, e eu realmente não acho que o jogo seja o divertido, é apenas frustrante e repetitivo, vale mais pelas diferenças dos outros jogos convencionais da série, mas é muito melhor jogar o primeiro mundo e deixar o jogo de lado, pois eu realmente não gostei da experiência que eu tive com ele, e também não acho que ela como um todo seja válida. Nota 4

Together with Super Mario Land, it is the most different game in the franchise, but Super Mario Land still managed to entertain me. Super Mario Bros 2 has a whole troubled development history that is already quite manageable, and its greatest fame comes from that. I always saw him and looked at him crookedly, because it looked like a bad game, so when I finally played,
I saw that my expectation was quite correct. Starting with the fact that it took me 12 days to finish it, and not because it was difficult and I couldn't get through, although I will talk about it later, but because I had no desire to play. The game was not able to captivate me, I played just to finish, and not because I was having fun.
Each phase was more boring and repetitive than the other, and I had been feeling this way since the third world. Super Mario Bros 2 has 4 characters, Mario and Toad are disposable, Luigi is cool but ends up overshadowed when there is Peach in the game, which is shot the best character and that makes the experience more bearable. The soundtrack is bad,
and very repetitive. There are 7 worlds in the game, and practically 3 songs only, that after minutes played are already tiring. There is the music of the stages, the caverns, and the bosses, the three of which are saturated to the maximum during the entire game. The difficulty is annoying, the game doesn't give as many lives as it should, and it's much more unfair than fair,
which makes the anger generated by it genuine. The phases are repetitive, changing one thing or another, but in general, they change very little of each other. The enemies could be better, there is also a lot of repetition. The gameplay is interesting, and it is unique to the game, and they even manage to use it well. The bosses are the basics,
Birdo with some differences in each stage, and the most different bosses are the ones that really shine and are cool, with good mechanics. Now, the beauty of the game and its sprites is undeniable, but there was a big improvement over its previous one. Writing such positives makes the game look better than it really is,
because my experience was really disgusting, it forced me to play just to see the end, and I really don't think the game is fun, it is just frustrating and repetitive, it is worth more for the differences from the other conventional games in the series, but it is much better to play the first world and put the game aside,
because I really didn’t like the experience I had with him, and I also don’t think it’s valid as a whole. Note 4

The black sheep of the Mario series, due to how different it is and the fact that it's technically not even a Mario game. That being said, I still really liked it. The controls do take a bit to get used to, but once you do there are really good and responsive for the time. Picking up and throwing enemies is a fun gimmick that this game introduces, as it creates more strategy when it comes to beating them and combo-ing a bunch of enemies in a single throw. The level design is incredible for the time and manages to be both difficult and fair (For the most part. A couple later levels like 6-2 have BS trial-and-error moments, but these are few and far between). The soundtrack is pretty good, though there are only about 7 tracks in the game. The bosses, while primitive today, were probably revolutionary for the time and they all put up a pretty good fight, even Birdo, this dinosaur-looking miniboss you fight at the end of each level. And lastly, I do like how each playable character has different stats to make them feel different from each other and give them special advantages/disadvantages.

No game is without issues, though, and I do have a few issues, some of which really detriment the game for me. Firstly, and this is probably the biggest issue, the lives system sucks. You get most of them by cashing the coins that you collected in the levels' subspace areas in a slot machine that shows up at the end of every level, and by a match of 3 or a correct sequence of images on the slot machine, you can get-5 (1-10 in the SNES port) extra lives. Now, this isn't a bad concept and could be really fun, but it's held back due to the fact that the images on the slot machine scroll way too fast, and it's hard to differentiate the images at such high speeds due to the fact that a lot of the images share color schemes with another image, making them all blur together. As such, you'll frequently only get a small handful of lives by the end of the minigame, and as the levels become harder and longer, your lives will dwindle much quicker, making the game much more frustrating and stressful. I mean, sure, you could find 1-Ups in the normal levels, but those are incredibly rare and a couple of them are even RNG-dependent. I have other minor issues with the game, namely how Peach and Toad are noticeably more OP than Mario and Luigi, the quicksand is way too strong and is pretty much an insta-kill if you wandered into it while carrying something, crouching is useless due to the fact that your crouching hitbox is still pretty massive, the enemies respawning can be super annoying at times, and the Super Star is basically useless due to the fact it has a way shorter duration compared to SMB1 and the Lost Levels, but those don't really hinder my experience unlike the lives system.

If you can get past the flawed lives system or feel like spamming savestates to compensate for it, I'd strongly recommend SMB2. It's not my favorite Mario game of all time, but it's still a really fun time and a massive step-up from SMB1 and the Lost Levels.

What a weird and wonderful game. Though it looks like a Mario game, it doesn’t play like one. Instead of stamping on enemies’ heads, you now throw them at each other, and you can now play as four characters with varying jump physics, rather than just being restricted to Mario. After playing so many Mario games, this mix up to the formula was a breath of fresh air. Though it’s a shame these elements were executed with varying levels of success. There are some weird design decisions like having only three lives, leading to a lot of retries and having to repeatedly fight the same dumb bird(o) at the end of each level. However, this game did also establish some series staples with various world themes and some really creative enemy designs. Paired with some great level design, though slightly restrained by having to accommodate for the four different characters, makes for some great platforming. I had a lot of fun as well as frustration with this one, but regardless I appreciate the experiment.