Nintendo Reveals a Ton of Super Mario Bros. Wonder Details

10 months ago
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IGN

The Super Mario Bros. Wonder Nintendo Direct revealed a ton of new gameplay details for the game including information on its multiplayer, power-ups, and more.

The presentation began with a trailer for the new game that introduced players to the Flower Kingdom, a different start from most Mario games' Mushroom Kingdom. Bowser is back as per though, and instantly merges with the prince's castle to become a giant spiky ball of doom.

The Flower Kingdom

Nintendo then showed off the different areas present in Super Mario Bros. Wonder's Flower Kingdom. Six worlds circle the Petal Isles, giving players seven areas to explore total, also including Pipe-Rock Plateau, Fluff-Puff Peaks, Shining Falls, and three mystery areas.

Players can move around the maps in a more traditional method, from one level to another, though open areas also exist where players can take on levels in any order they wish.

A more direct Courses Menu has also been added, letting players quickly return to levels once they've visited them.

Eight Playable Characters

Playable characters were also revealed, with Nintendo taking a new move in making Mario, Luigi, Peach, Daisy, and two Toads all play the same.

Luigi will no longer have a higher jump, for example, nor Peach have the ability to float. Yoshi and Nabbit are also playable, but these two work differently in that they can't take damage. Yoshi can also flutter jump and eat objects like in previous games.

These characters will come across Talking Flowers as they explore each level, being presented with everything from motivating advice ("onward and upward") to disturbing dark thoughts ("I wonder what Goombas taste like.")

Power-Ups

Power-ups were the next focus as Nintendo outlined the fan-favourite Elephant Mario and showed off Luigi's, Peach's, and Toad's Elephant forms. These chonks can use their trunks to attack enemies, destroy blocks with their raw power, store water in their trunks and spray it out, and more.

The Bubble and Drill power-ups were also revealed, though Nintendo reassured fans that the classic Fire Flower power-up would be making a return too. The Bubble form lets players blow bubbles that can be used to capture and defeat enemies or jumped on to reach new areas, while the Drill protects players from tougher enemies and can be used to burrow underground or drill down through some objects.

The Wonder Flower, which is intrinsically tied to the Wonder in the game's title and the Flower in the Flower Kingdom, was also given a deep dive during the event. Though we saw a brief look at this in the reveal trailer, Nintendo showed the bizarre Wonder events that can trigger with one of these flowers. Mario can turn into a Goomba, for example, or the level will warp in different ways, fill up with giant glowing bubbles, and more.

Other Features

Badges serve as a perk system of sorts in Super Mario Bros. Wonder. These are upgrades unlockable throughout the game and add some major gameplay changes to each level. Safety Bounce stops players falling in lava, Coin Magnet pulls coins towards the player, Jet Run adds endless speed, and so on.

Four-player local was also revealed for Super Mario Bros. Wonder, though this looks fairly similar to prior Mario games. Online connectivity was revealed too, including what is essentially ghost mode data that comes with some extra gameplay benefits. Traditional online multiplayer was not revealed during the Nintendo Direct.

Finally, Nintendo closed the direct by revealing a limited edition OLED Nintendo Switch based on Super Mario Bros. Wonder.

The game was announced as the cherry on top of an already packed June Nintendo Direct as the latest and long anticipated Mario title. People instantly fell in love with a lot of new features but none more than the Elephant Mario power-up.

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.

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Ryan Dinsdale

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