Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins
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Template:Infobox Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins is a platforming game for the Game Boy. It is the sequel to its more popular predecessor, Super Mario Land[1], and also marks the debut of Wario. Like its predecessor, it received a Player's Choice and was produced by the late Gunpei Yokoi rather than the Mario series creator Shigeru Miyamoto who wasn't involved in the development of this game.
Story
The plot (which takes place directly after the first Mario Land game) sees Mario returning to his estate after rescuing Princess Daisy only to find that it has been taken over by an old enemy, Wario, while he was in Sarasaland. The six golden Coins (Mario's keys to the castle) were spread throughout Mario Land, and the game revolves around Mario traveling across his estate to collect the coins, then defeating Wario and regaining his castle.
The game begins with a simple "tutorial" level to help the player learn the controls of the game. After this is completed, the player must travel through seven different "zones" to collect the coins:
- The Tree Zone: Mario scales a large tree, fighting giant insects along the way. The Boss of this zone is a giant bird called Radonkel
- The Macro Zone: Mario is shrunk and must journey through a giant house to defeat the giant rat Ricky
- The Pumpkin Zone: Inside a giant jack o' lantern, Mario must brave graveyards and haunted houses to defeat the witch Sabasa
- The Mario Zone: Mario has to journey through a giant mechanical statue of himself and face the Three Little Pigheads at the end.
- The Turtle Zone: After being swallowed by a giant turtle, Mario ventures an aquatic environment, and has to go inside of a Whale to fight a Octopus
- The Hippo Zone is a small zone of one level that features a Hippo who shoots Bubbles that Mario can use to fly. This zone is the only one that has no boss and doesn't yield a golden coin, but is necessary to get to the Space Zone, which can be accessed by using a Bubble to float to the top exit of this level.
- The Space Zone: Mario has to don a space suit and explores the Moon and stars. The boss of this zone is Tatanga, the final boss of the original Super Mario Land, indicating that Wario may actually have orchestrated Daisy's kidnapping.
And, finally, Mario must enter his own castle and defeat Wario.
Each zone (besides the Hippo and Castle) features multiple levels.
In addition to the tutorial level, there is also another level that is not part of any "zone", which lies off the path between the Tree Zone and the Hippo Zone. Playing this level is entirely optional and its completion yields no progression towards completing the game.
With Wario as the antagonist, this is the the third Super Mario title to feature a major villain that is not Bowser, the first being Super Mario Bros. 2's Wart, and the second being Super Mario Land's Tatanga.
Gamplay
Overview
In many ways, this game was closer to the other contemporary Super Mario titles than its predecessor. Most notably, this game lacks the vehicle levels of Super Mario Land, but there are levels with water that Mario can swim through. It replaces the Superball Mario with a more traditional Fire Mario. The sprites are much bigger on the screen, lending to more focused and fast-paced action, not to mention a much higher visual quality to the game. Unlike Super Mario Bros. and Super Mario Land, the screen can now scroll left, and Mario can backtrack through levels, just like most other Super Mario titles.
The overall objective of the game is to defeat Wario. To do so, Mario must play through levels to get to the guardian levels at the end of every world (or “zone.”) Defeating the guardian at the end of these levels gives the player one of the six Golden Coins. Obtaining all 6 unlocks Wario’s Castle. If Mario can get to the end of the castle level he gets to fight Wario.
The game is one of the first Mario games to have two different difficulty levels. The level can be chosen by picking Mario's size with the before picking which file to save to.
Like Super Mario World, the game's locations can be traveled to and from by an overworld map. This gives rise to a few secrets, including "shortcuts" which allow Mario to traverse the map more quickly and a casino where Mario can gamble his coins to earn more lives. This is the first Super Mario title in which entire worlds do not have to be played linearly without requiring a hidden item or exit, but all worlds must be beaten. The player can exit back to the world map from a completed level by pressing to pause and then
On the map, pressing while standing on the stage marker Mario is standing on will have the player play the level. The tells Mario which direction to walk down on the path.
Main Controls
In levels, the allows the player to jump, while holding the will make Mario run faster. The controls where Mario walks or runs. The player can pause in a level with the . Jumping on most enemies will defeat them, as will attacking them with fireballs, a Starman, or hitting them with a Koopa Shell. A Koopa Shell can be picked up by running into it while holding and thrown by letting go, or can be kicked by walking into it or jumping on top of it. While underwater or in jelly, Mario can swim by tapping , and walking and falling are much slower in these states.
In the Space Zone's levels, Mario wears a spacesuit and becomes “Space Mario.” In the first level, Space Mario can jump higher and he floats instead of falling, just like he is in low-gravity. In the final level of the Space Zone, there is even less gravity, jump height is therefore unlimited and Space Mario can float to the top of the screen by holding . Mario also has similar control to the latter if in a Bubble.
Mario can use Warp Pipes in the same manner as other games, by holding down on the while standing on top of one, up while jumping up into one above, or left or right for pipes that are horizontal.
Rewards and Setbacks
Getting hit by an enemy or hazard while Mario is in his regular default state, or falling to the bottom of the screen or in lava, getting crushed behind the screen in an auto-scrolling level, or getting a time-up kills Mario, reducing him by one life and takes him out of the level and back to the map. If Mario loses all of his lives, he will also lose all the Golden Coins he has collected, and will have to fight their guardians once again, but he does not have to replay the other levels in their worlds to get there. 1-up are represented as hearts as opposed to Green Mushrooms in this game.
Each level has a checkpoint, which is a bell hanging from a block. If Mario rings the bell, he starts where the bell is if he retries the level right after dying.
The exits of regular levels are marked “goal” and are composed of a door in the wall, and a bell hanging from a post above it. If the player enters the door, the level immediately ends, and Mario returns to the map and progresses to the next stage marker, but if he hits the bell first, he gets to play a bonus game which can reward him with power-ups or 1-up.
Collecting 100 coins does not immediately reward Mario with a 1-Up like it does in other titles, but coins do allow the player to play a roulette-type game in the hill between Wario’s Castle and the tutorial level where they can earn lives; this is different from other games where collecting one-hundred coins earns a 1-Up. Mario hold up to 999 coins.
There is no “score” in the traditional sense that Mario gets in this game for defeating enemies or completing the level with extra time, but he does have an enemy counter for each enemy he defeats, and defeating one hundred enemies will cause a Starman to fall down to Mario.
Power Ups
The Super Mushroom grows Mario into Super Mario, which allows Mario to take a hit without dying (reverting to him to regular Mario,) and gives him the ability to break Brick Blocks by jumping underneath them, like previous in previous titles, but also allows him to perform a Spin Jump to break Brick Blocks beneath him by pressing down in midair. The Spin Jump does not have quite the same effect that it does in Super Mario World, and will function the same way as a normal jump when Mario lands on enemies or other hazards with it.
The Fire Flower performs its usual ability, allowing Mario to shoot fireballs by hitting that bounce along the ground as a weapon, but Mario can now also use them to break a special kind of block as well. Fire Mario is differentiated by a single feather in the front of his cap in this game instead of changing color, perhaps due to the Gameboy’s limitations.
The introduction of the new Carrot, a power-up that will sit on top of the ? Block, transforms Mario into Rabbit Mario. This gives him the ability to flap his rabbit ears and hover by tapping the , giving him the ability to stay in the air longer, and cross or maneuver around obstacles and hazards with greater ease.
The Starman turns Mario invincible to enemies, but instead of the power-up moving like it does in other titles, it will stay still on the ? Block. The 5th enemy killed while invincible and every enemy afterwards until Mario reverts gives a 1-Up.
Enemies
Common enemies
Tree Zone
- Bopping Toady
- Battle Beetle
- Grubby
- Noko Bombette
- Bē
- Skeleton Bee
- Bee Larva
- Bee'zerk
- Cowfish
- Dragonfly
- Drill Mole
- Egghead
- Bwomp
- Spikey
- Sparrow
Macro Zone
Pumpkin Zone
Mario Zone
Turtle Zone
Space Zone
Wario's Castle
Bosses
Sequels & Prequels
After the introduction of Wario (who quickly became popular) the Super Mario Land series shifted its attention to him. The next game, Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3, featured Wario as the protagonist, with Mario only making a minor cameo at the very end of the game. The next game in the series was simply titled Wario Land II, thus making Wario Land the final entry in the Super Mario Land series.
Although this game marked the first appearance of Wario, dialogue in the instruction booklet suggested that Wario was an old enemy of Mario who was jealous of his fame and fortune. In the comic book inspired by this game, Mario Vs. Wario, Wario was said to have been one of Mario's friends when they were both children. However, because of the numerous indignities Mario (unknowingly) forced Wario to suffer, Wario swore revenge on him (which led to the events of both Super Mario Land and Super Mario Land 2: Six Golden Coins).
References to Other Games
- Super Mario Land – A prequel of this game. It is also revealed that Wario stole Mario's castle during Mario's rescue of Princess Daisy. Tatanga is seen working for him in Space Zone implying a connection between the two.
- Super Mario World – Many enemies in this game return here. Also the spin jump returns.
References in Later Games
- Wario World – The castle shown on the title graphic bears a striking resembelance to Mario's castle.
Beta Elements
- Main article: Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins/Beta elements
Glitches
- Main article: Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins/Glitches
Trivia
This trivia section is overly long. Please relocate any relevant information into appropriate sections and articles.
- There is an easy way to avoid losing all the player's golden coins even if the player loses all of their lives. Simply reset or turn off the game before the "Game Over" screen appears, and the player will restart the game right before they enter the level in which the player lost their last life.
- If the player loses a life in a level they have already completed, it is possible to exit the level by pressing + (even when the death animation is playing) without losing any lives.
- On the File Select screen, if the player is deleting a file, Mario will transform into Bomb Mario.
- The music for this game was done by Kazumi Totaka. If the player waits on the Game Over screen for 2 minutes and 30 seconds, Totaka's Song will play.
- This is the first Mario game to feature a stage with an outer space setting.
- This is the second Super Mario title (with Super Mario Land being the first) to not include Luigi, or make a reference to him.
- This is the second game to feature a completely different Starman theme, the first being Super Mario Land.
- This is the only game where Mario's castle makes a direct appearance.
- This is the first Mario game for the Gameboy to feature a level map, and the third Mario game overall to do this.
- Despite being a sequel, this is the first game that actually takes place in a location called "Mario Land".
Staff
- Main article: Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins/Staff
References
Game Boy games | |
---|---|
Super Mario franchise | Alleyway (1989) • Baseball (1989) • Super Mario Land (1989) • Golf (1989) • Dr. Mario (1990) • Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins (1992) • Donkey Kong (1994) • Mario's Picross (1995) • Picross 2 (1996) |
Donkey Kong franchise | Donkey Kong (1994) • Donkey Kong Land (1995) • Donkey Kong Land 2 (1996) • Donkey Kong Land III (1997) |
Yoshi franchise | Yoshi (1991) • Yoshi's Cookie (1992) • Tetris Attack (1996) |
Wario franchise | Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3 (1994) • Wario Blast: Featuring Bomberman! (1994) • Wario Land II (1998) |
Miscellaneous | Tetris (1989) • The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening (1993) • Game & Watch Gallery (1997) • Game & Watch Gallery 2 (1997) |