Mario Bros.

is about to defeat a Shellcreeper, in the arcade version. Mario Bros. features two plumbers, Italian brothers Mario and Luigi, having to investigate the sewers of New York after strange creatures have been appearing down there. The objective of the game is to defeat all of the enemies in each phase, using only running and jumping. Unlike subsequent Mario games, players cannot jump on enemies to squash them, until they are already flipped on their back. Each phase consists of a series of platforms with pipes at each corner of the screen, along with an object called a "POW" block in the center. Points are scored for defeating enemies and collecting the bonus coins that emerge from the pipes afterward. Enemies are defeated by kicking them over once they have been flipped on their back. Sidestepper; Fireballs are a fifth enemy, floating around the screen instead of sticking to platforms. The "POW" block flips all enemies touching a platform or the floor when activated, but can only be used three times before disappearing. The game contains bonus stages. In later rounds, icicles begin to form on the underside of the platforms and fall off. One life is lost whenever the player touches an un-flipped enemy, fireball, or fully formed icicle. The game ends when all lives are lost. ==Development==

(pictured) and Gunpei Yokoi collaborated on the design of Mario Bros. Mario Bros. was created by Shigeru Miyamoto and Gunpei Yokoi, two of the lead developers for Donkey Kong (1981). In Donkey Kong, Mario dies if he falls too far. For Mario Bros., Yokoi suggested to Miyamoto that Mario should be able to fall from any height, which Miyamoto hesitantly thought would make it "not much of a game". He eventually agreed on some superhuman abilities. He designed a prototype that had Mario "jumping and bouncing around", which he was satisfied with. Yokoi suggested combating enemies from below, observing that it would work because there are multiple floors, but this proved too easy in gameplay, which the developers fixed by requiring the enemies to be touched after flipping. This was also how they introduced the turtle as an enemy that could only be hit from below. Because of Mario's appearance in Donkey Kong with overalls, a hat, and a thick moustache, and because Mario Bros. has a large network of giant pipes, Miyamoto changed Mario's occupation from carpenter to plumber. A popular story of how Mario went from Jumpman to Mario is that an Italian American landlord, Mario Segale, had barged in on Nintendo of America (NoA)'s staff to demand rent, and they decided to rename Jumpman after him. This story is contradicted by former NoA warehouse manager Don James, who has stated that he and NoA president Minoru Arakawa named the character after Segale as a joke because Segale was so reclusive that none of the employees had ever met him. Miyamoto set the game in subterranean New York City due to what he called its "labyrinthine network of sewage pipes". To date, Mario Bros. has been released for more than a dozen platforms. The first movement from Mozart's Eine kleine Nachtmusik is used at the start of the game. This song has been used in later video games, including Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix ==Release==

Game Machine magazine reported that the game made its North American debut at the Amusement & Music Operators Association show during March 25–27, 1983, and entered mass production in Japan on June 21. The book Arcade TV Game List (2006), authored by Masumi Akagi and published by the Amusement News Agency, lists the release dates as March 1983 in North America and June 1983 in Japan. However, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata said in a 2013 Nintendo Direct presentation that the game was released in Japan on July 14, 1983. Upon release, Mario Bros. was initially labeled as being the third game in the Donkey Kong series. For home video game conversions, Nintendo held the rights to the game in Japan, while licensing the overseas rights to Atari, Inc. Other versions Mario Bros. was ported by other companies to the Atari 2600, Atari 5200, Atari 8-bit computers, Atari 7800, Amstrad CPC, and ZX Spectrum. The two versions for Commodore 64 are an unreleased Atarisoft version, and a 1986 version by Ocean Software. The Atari 8-bit computer version by Sculptured Software is the only home port which includes the falling icicles. An Apple II version was never commercially released. A version by Nintendo and Intelligent Systems for the Famicom/Nintendo Entertainment System was released in Japan on September 9, 1983, followed by North America in June 1986. Another NES version was released exclusively in Germany in August 1993 as part of the Classic Series. A version for NEC's PC-8001, unrelated to the Hudson Soft-developed Mario Bros. Special and Punch Ball Mario Bros., was developed by MISA and published by Westside Soft House in 1984. A modified version for the Famicom Disk System, titled was released only in Japan on November 30, 1988, through the Disk Writer service. This version featured product placement from Japanese food company , with cutscenes advertising various food products. Nintendo 3DS, and Wii U. The original arcade version of Mario Bros. was released in September 2017 for the Nintendo Switch as part of the Arcade Archives series. The NES version is one of the first games to have been added to the Nintendo Classics service on the Switch. Nintendo included Mario Bros. as a bonus in several releases, including Super Mario Bros. 3 in the form of a two-player minigame, as a single-player mode in the Game Boy Advance's Super Mario Advance series, The NES version is in a piece of furniture in Animal Crossing for the GameCube, along with many other NES games, though this one requires the use of a Nintendo e-Reader and a North America-exclusive e-Card. In 2004, Namco released an arcade cabinet containing Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., and Mario Bros. under license from Nintendo. The latter was altered for the vertical screen used by the other games, with the visible play area cropped on the sides. ==Reception==

Mario Bros. was initially a modest success in arcades, with an estimated 2,000 arcade cabinets sold in the United States by July 1983. It became highly successful in American arcades. In Japan, Game Machine listed Mario Bros. as the third most successful new table arcade unit of July 1983. In the United States, Nintendo sold 3,800 Mario Bros. arcade cabinets. The arcade cabinets have since become mildly rare. The arcade game was not affected by its release during the video game crash of 1983. Video game author Dave Ellis considers it one of the more memorable classic games. In Japan, more than 1.63 million copies of the Famicom version of Mario Bros. have been sold, and more than 90,000 copies of the Famicom Mini re-release. The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) version had 2.28 million cartridges sold worldwide. The Atari 2600 version's sales of 1.59 million cartridges made it one of the bestselling games of 1983. This brings total Atari 2600, NES, and Famicom Mini cartridge sales to units sold worldwide. The NES and Atari versions of Mario Bros. received positive reviews from Computer and Video Games in 1989. They said the NES version is "incredibly good fun" especially in two-player mode, the Atari VCS version is "just as much fun" but with graphical restrictions, and the Atari 7800 version is slightly better. In a review of the Virtual Console release, GameSpot criticized the NES version for being a poor arcade conversion that retains all of the technical flaws found in this version. IGN complimented the Virtual Console version's gameplay, even though it was critical of Nintendo's decision to release an "inferior" NES version on the Virtual Console. The Super Mario Advance releases and Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga all featured the same version of Mario Bros. (titled Mario Bros. Classic). The mode was first included in Super Mario Advance, and was praised for its simplicity and entertainment value. IGN called this mode fun in its review of Super Mario World: Super Mario Advance 2, but complained that it would have been nice if the developers had come up with a new game to replace it. Their review of ''Yoshi's Island: Super Mario Advance 3 criticizes it more than in the review of Super Mario Advance 2 because Nintendo chose not to add multiplayer to any of the mini-games found in that game, sticking instead with an identical version of the Mario Bros. game found in previous versions. GameSpots review of Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros. 3'' calls it a throwaway feature that could have simply been removed. Other reviewers were not as negative on the feature's use in later Super Mario Advance games. Though it was criticized in most Super Mario Advance games, a GameSpy review praised the version within Super Mario Advance 2 in multi-player because it only requires at least two Game Boy Advances, one copy of the game, and a link cable. ==Legacy==

'' (1995) is on the Virtual Boy. In 1984, Hudson Soft made two different games based on Mario Bros. is a reimagining with new phases and gameplay. includes a new gameplay mechanic: punching small balls to stun enemies. Both games were released for the PC-6001mkII, PC-8001mkII, PC-8801, FM-7, and Sharp X1. Super Mario 3D World for the Wii U contains Luigi Bros., starring Luigi. This version, based on the NES version and included as a part of 2013's Year of Luigi celebrations, replaces Mario with Luigi in his modern color scheme; the second player's sprite retains the original Luigi colors. On October 16, 2015, Steve Kleisath obtained the world record for the arcade version at 5,424,920 points verified by Twin Galaxies. ==Notes==