Bits and Bobs

BITS AND BOBS

Today is functionally one of our last game posts. Today we are covering a bunch of very small, very obscure games that are, more often than not, just small special versions of pre-existing games released for some singular special event, that type of thing. First up, we have Mario Bros. Special, Punch Ball Mario, Super Mario Bros. Special, a trio of games released by Hudson Soft as basically just loose remakes of Mario Bros. and Super Mario Bros. just with some odd tweaks for their own system. For instance, Punch Ball Mario Bros. featured a ball that could be used to hit the enemies with.

All-Night Nippon Super Mario Bros. was a retool of The Lost Levels to go along with the radio program All-Night Nippon and replaced the Toads in the castles with various Japanese celebrities. Kaettekita Mario Bros. is a retool of Mario Bros. released only in Japan and was technically the last game released on the Famicom system. BS Super Mario USA was a retool of Super Mario Bros. 2 released in four weekly installments for the Satellaview, and BS Super Mario Collection is the same for All-Stars.

Donkey Kong Jr. + Jr. Sansu Lesson is a pack-in game for the Sharp C1 Famicom TV (a TV and Famicom combined unit). Donkey Kong 3: Dai Gyakushu was a similar game to the previous Hudson Soft collection, but for Donkey Kong 3. Donkey Kong Country Competition Cartridge was a cut-down version of Donkey Kong Country to be used at the Nintendo PowerFest '94 game competition. Yoshi no Cookie: Kuruppon Oven de Cookie is a version of Yoshi's Cookie released to help a company promote their new oven. Excitebike: Bun Bun Mario Battle is another Satellaview 4-parter game, basically Excitebike but with Mario, Luigi, Peach, Toad, Yoshi, and Wario as the bikers.

New Play Control! were new releases of Game Cube games retooled for the Wii's remote system. Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat and Mario Power Tennis were the two prominently a part of the Mario series, likely because of Jungle Beat's reliance on the bongos and tennis being a good game to demonstrate Wiimote capabilities. Donkey Kong Original Edition was a second Virtual Console release of the arcade game, enhanced and pre-installed in the red limited-edition Wii released for Mario's 25th anniversary. And finally, Luigi Bros. is a special version of Mario Bros. released for the Year of Luigi.

Aah, that's nice. Although not technically done with all games yet, in many ways, it feels like I am. Here's what we've got so far:

Characters:

Mario: handstand, jump, crouch, spin, spin on bar, hammer, spring, key, pick up and throw, giant, float, fly

Cat Mario: glide, swipe, climb, evil cats, throw blocks, butt bash, Giga Cat Mode

Luigi: invisible

Wario: metal, Wario Man

Yoshi: fire breath, tongue

Donkey Kong: punch, barrel, stomp, jack, grow giant, throw enemies

Donkey Kong Jr.: hop, throw switches

Pauline

Birdo: Robirdo

Bowser Jr.: paintbrush, Klown Kar, hammer

All characters appearing in SMB2, SMW, SMW2, and SMB3

All characters appearing in the DKC series

All characters appearing in SM64

Diddy Kong

Dixie Kong

Tiny Kong

Wizpig

Taj

Timber and the other racers

Team Captains: deny, rally, bonus block, play dead, lightning, parry, bob-omb, thwomp, face off, backup, sneak attack, shell strike, aerial, melee, long range

Best Fitness Friends: rubber bands, malatone formula, doppelganger, fire punch, barrel, spin, divebomb, screech, fire, lightning, combine, laser beam, charge, cyclone, mystery box

Poochy: run, bash through objects, spin, Poochy pups, sliding, crouching, biting a hand, eating cake, catching a ball, carrying things, catching a frisbee, pulling on a rubber band, licking things, pushing a button with his tail, rolling.

Kat & Ana

Dribble & Spitz

I8-Volt

Nabbit

Peachette

Funky Kong: surfboard

King Boo

Dry Bones

Inklings

Bosses:

King Bob-Omb

Goomboss

King Boo

Chief Chilly

Stages:

Construction Site

Big City

Forest

Ship

Jungle

Desert

Airplane

Iceberg

Rocky-Valley

All stages appearing in SMB2, SMW, SMW2, and SMB3

All stages appearing in DKC series

Palm Beach

Poison Swamp

Secret Factory

Ice Area

All locations in Diddy Kong Racing

Minions Battlefield

Dribble & Spitz Rally

Kat & Ana's Sky Patrol

Jet 18Volt

World-9 Cloud

Battle Stadium

Sweet Sweet Kingdom

Dragon Palace

Lunar Colony

Wuhu Town

Luigi's Mansion

Battle Course 1

Urchin Underpass

Lake Lapcat

Mount Magmeow

Thanks for reading! Tomorrow, a short blog on all of Mario's guest game appearances.