Super Mario Advance is a side-scrolling platformer developed and published by Nintendo for the Game Boy Advance, released in Japan on March 21, 2001 and in North America on June 11, 2001 as a launch title for the handheld. It is an enhanced port of Super Mario Bros. 2 (1988, NES), itself based on the Super Mario All-Stars (1993, SNES) visual overhaul, with additional gameplay tweaks and a bundled version of the original Mario Bros. arcade game.
Players choose from Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, or Toad, each with distinct movement abilities carried over from the NES original: Peach floats, Luigi jumps the highest, Toad pulls vegetables the fastest, and Mario is the balanced option. The game follows the same seven-world structure as Super Mario Bros. 2, with players pulling vegetables, riding enemies, and defeating bosses on the way to the final confrontation with Wart.
New to the Advance version are character voice clips, a point-scoring system, additional oversized enemies and items (large Shy Guys, giant vegetables, an enlarged POW Block), extra 1-Up opportunities, and the Yoshi Challenge (hidden eggs in each level). The bundled Mario Bros. game supports up to four players via Game Boy Advance link cable.
Super Mario Advance was a commercial success, benefiting from the Game Boy Advance's strong launch. It received generally positive reviews for bringing a well-regarded NES classic to the handheld, though it was also criticized for a lack of innovation and for voice samples that many players found grating. It was followed by three additional Super Mario Advance titles on the GBA, each porting a different SNES-era Mario game.
