Super Mario Bros. Wonder
If I had to describe Super Mario Bros. Wonder with one word I’d say: Why am I being forced to describe this game in such an arbitrary fashion? But, if you asked again, I’d offer this word: Surprising.
To be clear, the actual formula and setup is very unsurprising. If you’ve played a 2D Mario game, you’ll be familiar with a lot of what Wonder is doing. But amid all those familiar elements are some genuinely experimental and wacky moments of surprise. Activating a Wonder Seed and suddenly turning the game from a sidescroller into a top-down adventure made me laugh. Likewise, becoming tiny or getting chased by a stampede of bulls also caught me off guard and made me feel like I never really knew what was going to happen next.
It’s the way Wonder plays around with what you know and with new ideas that kept me glued to my Switch for hours and hours, even as I dealt with covid-19.
