56/100
Players11 ratings: 50/100
Critics1 review

Where to get it

Nintendo eShop

2004 · Silverball Studios · Adventure · Arcade

Super Mario Ball

Nintendo exclusive

Jumping has always helped Mario perform heroic feats, but in Mario Pinball Land, the plumber must learn how to roll to rescue the princess. When Bowser kidnaps Peach and escapes to another dimension, a scientist transforms Mario into a ball to chase after the fiend. Now you must use your flippers to shoot a much rounder Mario into doors that lead to new areas. In his new form, Mario is also useful for knocking down enemies, picking up special bonuses, and finding power-ups.

Released: 26 August 2004
Platforms: Game Boy Advance Wii U
Genres: Adventure Arcade Pinball Sports
Developers: Silverball Studios
Publishers: Nintendo
Modes: Single-player
Perspective: Third person Bird view / Isometric
Themes: Action
Country: United Kingdom
Age ratings: ESRB E CERO A PEGI 3
Languages: English

About

Mario Pinball Land, known in Europe and Japan as Super Mario Ball, is a 2004 pinball video game developed by Fuse Games and published by Nintendo for the Game Boy Advance. It is a spin-off of the Super Mario series. The game was later re-released for the Wii U Virtual Console.

The game received mixed reviews from critics, who praised the game's presentation, especially its excellent graphics, and its premise of blending Mario with pinball, but criticized its high difficulty level alongside the playfield reset mechanic of its tables, with some also faulting its overall short length.

Keywords

ghosts
pinball
princess
high score
turtle
boss fight
polygonal 3d
digital pinball
virtual console
western games based on japanese ips
wii u virtual console
nintendo gateway system

Media

The articlegameplay, story, development, reception

Gameplay

The game is entirely single-player. To proceed, Mario must collect enough stars to open specific doors, a gameplay element borrowed from Super Mario 64. There are 35 stars to collect in total. Mario must explore different areas to reach his aim of saving the princess.

There are five different worlds, each guarded by a boss. The worlds consist of the Fun Fair (the main starting area), Grassy Greens, Frosty Frontier, Shifting Sands, and Bowser's Castle.

Story

Mario and Princess Peach visit a funfair and wait in line to try a ride called the Air Cannon, where the rider is turned into a ball via the Spherasizer and shot out of the cannon. As Peach is about to take her turn, two Goombas kidnap her by aiming the cannon towards Bowser's Castle. To save Peach, Mario uses the Spherasizer to turn into a ball, allowing for the pinball action of the game.

Development

As Adrian Barritt and Richard Horrocks, veterans of the Pro Pinball series, had founded Fuse Games, they decided that, in the words of Barritt, "we needed a bit of impact before they would even bother to speak to us". So they thought about a Mario pinball game, and produced a playable demo, featuring both the possible first area and the last one with a showdown with Bowser. Afterwards Barritt and Horrocks went to Seattle to pitch the idea to Nintendo of America executives, and were approved. As their resources were limited, Fuse decided not to develop the game for the GameCube, resorting to the Game Boy Advance instead.

Barritt added that he considered the portable "[an] ideal platform for a pinball game, something that you can just pick up and knock the ball around for a bit" and stated that "with experience on systems like the Super Nintendo Entertainment System we knew we'd be able to push the hardware of the GBA very hard to its limits". Despite Fuse hiring more people, the whole game was created by a small team of only five people.

Reception

Mario Pinball Land received "mixed" reviews according to the review aggregation website Metacritic. In Japan, Famitsu gave it a score of three sevens and one eight for a total of 29 out of 40.

Most reviews praised the excellent graphics, but criticized the game for being difficult and for its overall gameplay. IGN's review in particular criticized the gameplay for having "bad table layouts with an overwhelmingly annoying 'playfield reset' element". The review concluded that "the gameplay itself is far more flawed and annoying than it is fun to play". Adrian Barritt later admitted that during development they wound up not making the game easy enough for pinball beginners as "you had to take the time to control the ball", which led to Fuse trying to not repeat the same mistakes in follow-up Metroid Prime Pinball.