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Was Super Mario World graphically underwhelming?

nkarafo

nkarafo

Member
Although i started gaming in the late 80's, i missed most of what Nintendo was doing early on because, in my country, they started selling Nintendo stuff officially somewhere in 1991/92. Yeah, the NES was officially a new console for our market in 1991. That's a couple of years after the Mega Drive...

Anyway, along with the NES and Game Boy there was also the SNES and SMW. But when i played it for the first time around late 1991/early 92 i thought it looked pretty mediocre for a "super system" like the SNES.

It doesn't help that i had already played Sonic 1:

hqdefault.jpg
Super%20Mario%20World%20(U).png
Click to expand...
MD_Sonic_the_Hedgehog.png
super_mario_world_03_big.jpg
Click to expand...

Now, i do realize that SMW was actually released a few months before Sonic 1. But still, i was expecting far more (graphically) from this huge SNES release, especially after what Nintendo did with Super Mario Bros 3 on the NES.

Anyone else thought the same?
 
M

maxcriden

Member
Yeah, I think so. It has a clean and solid look but it never looked much better than SMB3 to me. (even though I understand it's objectively much more impressive.)

To me, it's with games like Yoshi's Island that SNES raised the bar compared to its predecessors (strictly in terms of first party platformers, I mean):
baby_mario_on_purple_yoshi.gif


YoshisIsland-MaceGuys.gif


YoshisIsland.gif
Click to expand...
 
P

Platy

Member
It had a more simplified style, but the amount of enemies and projectiles on the screen is higher than sonic could even dream of
 
B

BGBW

Maturity, bitches.
I was a Sonic fan when I was younger and really wanted a Mega Drive, but when I saw Super Mario World at a friend's house I changed my mind and went for a SNES instead so I'm guessing for my young mind thought SMW was impressive looking. Though I should note a lot of my experience with Sonic was the Master System games.
 
W

windsostrange

Member
You're seeing a difference in aesthetics, not "graphics," and Sonic is a masterclass on how to clutter a screen and make gameplay confusing.
 
Rhazer Fusion

Rhazer Fusion

Member
Ok, so it isn't just me. I thought Super Mario World graphics were not that impressive, especially when compared to Sonic and other SNES games.
 
P

PSqueak

Banned
Maybe it's just me but, while the graphics on sonic are on a technical level more complex, i always thought it was to cluttered, SMW was eye pleasing.

But other than that i assume it was to jam as many levels as possible, isnt SMW way, way longer than Sonic 1?
 
wapplew

wapplew

Member
It's the reason I choose Genesis over Snes...
Luckily all my friends beside me choose Snes.

SMB3 is superior thou.
 
R

Ridley327

Member
TBH, I've always felt that the 2D Mario platformers have always been really meat-and-potatoes as far as their art and presentation are concerned. That's why I've never been that down on the aesthetic of the NSMB series as some have because they're in line with what the first four games were, outside of the SMB2 detour that the west got. Nothing wrong with that, but it's solely been the 3D games that have excelled in the art department.
 
Cute Dragon Here

Cute Dragon Here

Member
In retrospect, it does.

When I first played it - mind you, as a GBA port - it looked fine to my eyes, though then I was a kid and it was my first time with a real GBA game, and I felt that the graphics were fine, and crucially easy to see and determine.

Works well with the slower pace, too.

I'd imagine if SMW had a 1MB cart they would probably take advantage of it in some way. Most of the SMW's sterile look probably had something to do with the fact that a lot of things had to be with a 7-colour palette or something for storage. I think?
 
E

Eiolon

Member
It's also worth noting that Sonic was released nearly 2 years after the Genesis and SMW was a launch title. Developers were more familiar with it and exploiting all of its power and features. When the SNES was launched, I don't think even Nintendo itself thought the rendering of Donkey Kong Country and Killer Instrinct was possible, but it got there.
 
nkarafo

nkarafo

Member
maxcriden said:
To me, it's with games like Yoshi's Island that SNES raised the bar compared to its predecessors (strictly in terms of first party platformers, I mean)
Click to expand...
Yoshi's Island is probably the most impressive 16 bit game but don't forget that it was released in 1995 and also used a SFX2 chip.

It had to compete with Genesis games like Comix Zone, Vectorman, etc, not Sonic 1.


Thud said:
Maybe it's underwhelming if you played yoshi's island first.
Click to expand...
I played Sonic 1 first, that's why i wasn't too impressed with SMW.
 
M

maxcriden

Member
nkarafo said:
Yoshi's Island is probably the most impressive 16 bit game but don't forget that it was released in 1995 and also used a SFX2 chip.

It had to compete with Genesis games like Comix Zone, Vectorman, etc, not Sonic 1.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that's absolutely a good point. Maybe just the base late NES --> early SNES wasn't as impressive to me personally for platformers.
 
G

ghibli99

Member
It didn't blow me away or anything the way Sonic's aesthetic, parallax, and line scrolling did, although I do think it has aged well (as has Sonic). I was more impressed with the hardware scaling/rotation, which was pretty eye-opening at the time, and I think the only other way you would have gotten that at home was on a Neo Geo, which was cost-prohibitive for the vast majority of gamers. Having those capabilities on a $200 home system was way cool.
 
Danny Dudekisser

Danny Dudekisser

I paid good money for this Dynex!
Sonic might have looked more impressive at the time because the visuals are so damn busy, but SMW was never underwhelming. That giant bullet bill in the first level was all it took to sell me on it.
 
W

wrowa

Member
This was actually a topic in that Console Wars book. According to that, Sega America was really relieved when they saw Mario World for the first time, since they found it to be rather underwhelming graphically and mostly just more of the same on the gamplay side.

Of course, the way the book is written, you never know what actually happened and what is just a fabrication of the author.
 
V

visiblemode

Member
No....like, just no.

SMW blew my mind back in the day.

It's graphics suited their purpose, perfectly. It looked great and still looks good, imo.
 
stuminus3

stuminus3

Member
Pretty much everything about Super Mario World was considered underwhelming at the time, especially with Sega being a "bigger and badder" competitor in the teen market. Critically acclaimed, obviously, but filed under "must try harder" for sure.

The interesting thing is how well Super Mario World has aged thanks to its graphics. It looks and plays great in 2016.
 
E

Earthpainting

Member
Just on a pure technical skill level, its sprite art is indeed kind of poor. A Link to the Past and especially Earthbound are in the same boat. They survive off their art style, so your mileage may still vary.
 
M

mantis23

Member
I remember playing SMW on the demo unit at Sears the day before the SNES launched and at the time I thought it was the best looking game I had ever seen. Granted I was a kid excited for the promise of new hardware but I don't recall anyone looking at it and saying it was underwhelming. Almost any of the kids that came by to play it were excited by t he game and graphics. That held true after I got the system and had friends come over to play it.

It might be more obvious now looking back, but at the time people were very impressed with the graphics.
 
Strangelove77

Strangelove77

Member
Technically, it sure looks like it.

Both games aged really well though. 16 bit era in general might have aged the best overall.
 
Rhazer Fusion

Rhazer Fusion

Member
Eiolon said:
It's also worth noting that Sonic was released nearly 2 years after the Genesis and SMW was a launch title. Developers were more familiar with it and exploiting all of its power and features. When the SNES was launched, I don't think even Nintendo itself thought the rendering of Donkey Kong Country and Killer Instrinct was possible, but it got there.
Click to expand...

That's very true, but then again Nintendo had a MUCH higher color palette of 32,000 colors to work with on the SNES while Sega had a paltry 512. Obviously, they had limitations with what they could display on screen, but I guess that's why I expected Mario too decimate Sonic visually back in the day. I owned both systems and games though and I loved both anyway.
 
NeOak

NeOak

Member
Well, if you want lots of stuff on screen, you have to compromise.

That's what the people here that think SMW doesn't look good don't get.
 
S

Schlomo

Member
I remember we felt that way as kids when comparing it to Sonic (which came out earlier here). The parallax layers in Sonic were damn impressive.
 
SolVanderlyn

SolVanderlyn

Thanos acquires the fully powered Infinity Gauntlet in The Avengers: Infinity War, but loses when all the superheroes team up together to stop him.
maxcriden said:
Yeah, I think so. It has a clean and solid look but it never looked much better than SMB3 to me. (even though I understand it's objectively much more impressive.)

To me, it's with games like Yoshi's Island that SNES raised the bar compared to its predecessors (strictly in terms of first party platformers, I mean):
Click to expand...
Man, if SMW1 looked like SMW2...
 
N

ninjaboyjohn

Member
I'm with the OP on this one - never was a huge fan of SMW graphically.

Specifically, while I liked the colors and some of the enemy designs, I never liked Mario's sprites.

Like, he just didn't look like the Mario from the box art and instruction books.

The death sprite still looks strange to me - with the red eyes and all
xLfUBaL.png


*Note* all of this is also colored by the fact that the game looked "the same" as NES games to my parents, which meant they were not on board helping me get an SNES, so I never actually owned one and stuck to PC gaming most of the 16 bit generation. If SMW was more revolutionary on that front, I may have had a stronger argument. :D
 
G

gafneo

Banned
No, it still is timeless even today. Playing it back then was like seeing a UFO and Wizzards in the real world.
 
J

Jmille99

Member
I think it did, and still looks, absolutely fantastic. Its much more simplistic than what Sonic was going for, but I think thats what I prefer. Sonic feels much more crowded and overwhelming while SMW is more relaxed and comforting.
 
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