Welcome back to The Nintendo Report! We’ve got a special 2-parter this time around. As we’ve reached the letter M in the alphabet, we’ve decided to do things just a bit differently and give Mario his very own report. Wrapping Mario up into a single entry just wouldn’t make any sense! The guy’s got tons of successful completely different franchises under his overalls! So, for the next two entries (Yes, there are that many Mario games worth mentioning here) we’re going to be looking at Mario’s career. How are Nintendo’s various Mario games doing? Let’s find out in The Nintendo Report. 

2D platformers

Let’s start at the start. 2D platformers are what Mario is known for. In fact, 2D platformers as a genre probably wouldn’t exist as they do today if not for Super Mario Bros. It was Nintendo and Mario who solidified the physics that just about every platformer since 1983 has been using as a base. 2D platformers are where Mario’s superstardom was born, and he’s arguably still the best at what he does. 

Health rating: Great

You know, not all that long ago this would have gotten a “Not so Good” out of me. Before New Super Mario Bros. on Nintendo DS, Mario had gone a very long time without a new 2D entry. But that game’s runaway success changed everything. 2D Mario games thrived, at least in terms of sales, under the “New” branding. But just recently, things got even better with the release of the brilliant Super Mario Bros. Wonder. That game not only re-injected the series trademark creativity into the works, but seems to have sold pretty dang well too. 2D Mario games are doing just fine. 

3D platformers

Much like 2D platformers, Mario may not have invented 3D platformers, but he sure broke the mold on them. Before Super Mario 64, 3D platformers were often rigid, hard to control, and most importantly of all, not very fun. Super Mario 64 may not be the easiest game to go back to nowadays but there’s no denying its historical importance, and Mario’s 3D adventures that followed have been some of the best examples of the genre around. 

Health rating: Great

Super Mario made his grand return to open 3D games in Super Mario Odyssey on Switch, then a few years later in the absolutely brilliant Bowser’s Fury. It’s kind of crazy how few companies have been doing 3D platformers outside of the indie space anymore, but Nintendo has never given up on them, especially when it comes to Mario. Bowser’s Fury may have been short, but it was a real knockout. The future for Mario’s 3D escapades is as bright as ever. 

2.5D Platformers

That’s right, Mario platformers have three distinctions! Back in 2011, Nintendo made an attempt to create something that combined elements from both their 2D and 3D games into one. That game was Super Mario 3D Land, a much more guided experience than the 3D Mario games before it, but also one that played out in 3 dimensions, unlike their traditional 2D games. It was a magnificent success. 

Health rating: Pretty good

Super Mario 3D Land was followed up by Super Mario 3D World on Wii U. If 3D Land was brilliant, its follow up was a masterpiece. It was one of the most successful games on its original platform, and got ported to Nintendo Switch in 2021. Of course, that’s just a port, and the original game came out back in 2013, over 10 years ago. There have been other Mario platformers since then, but none in this specific style. I’m not too concerned, but a decade without a new game is still worth knocking its health rating down a peg. Unless you count Captain Toad. Wow, I completely forgot to cover Captain Toad under C. Rats! 

Mario Kart

Mario Kart has been around since the Super NES days and has appeared on almost every Nintendo platform. It’s also one of the most successful video game franchises of all time. 

Health rating: Great

Look. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe on Switch has sold approximately 17 bajillion copies, and that doesn’t even include its original Wii U release. That game continues to do so darn well that Nintendo clearly didn’t feel the need to release a Mario Kart 9. This game’s so ubiquitous it was hardly even worth writing about here. But in the interest of being thorough, here we are. Mario Kart is unsurprisingly doing just fine. 

Mario Party

Mario Party got its start back on the Nintendo 64 in 1999. It’s a party game that basically works like a board game with minigames in it. It was originally developed by Hudson Soft for Nintendo, and like Mario Kart before it, basically created a whole new genre. It was a massive success and spawned numerous sequels and spinoffs. 

Health rating: Great

Super Mario Party Jamboree for Nintendo Switch just came out in October 2024, and it’s the third Mario Party to hit the system, not including the ones on Nintendo Switch Online. It reviewed and sold extremely well, so yeah. Mario Party isn’t going anywhere. 

Dr. Mario

Following the tremendous success of Tetris on NES, Nintendo decided to create either own falling block puzzle game in the form of Dr. Mario. It’s a color matching game where Mario tosses vitamins into a bottle containing multi-colored viruses. The point is to kill all the viruses in a stage by lining up 4 of the same color in a row. It’s super fun, very addictive, and features an absolutely iconic soundtrack song by Hirokazu Tanaka. 

Health rating: Okay…

The last entry in the Dr. Mario series was Dr. Mario World for mobile devices. It was actually a really cool spin on the classic formula with some killer music and a whole host of absurd characters. Dr. Goomba Stack? A literal stack of Goombas in a lab coat? Sign me up. Unfortunately, the game was shut down in 2021 and can no longer be played, which is a huge bummer! How is there no offline mode for this game? There hasn’t been anything new mentioned in the world of Dr. Mario ever since. It will probably come back at some point, but as of right now, things could be better. 

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Mario Tennis

You could theoretically trace Mario’s sports outings a bit further than this, but the original Mario’s Tennis for Virtual Boy was the game that really kicked off the weird sub-genre that is Mario Sports. The first game was effectively just a tennis game with Mario characters in it, but it quickly evolved into something much more fantastic. 

Health rating: great

Mario Tennis never really went away. They’ve made new entries for just about every Nintendo platform since the N64, with the most recent being Mario Tennis: Aces for Nintendo Switch. The series quality has been called into question with many often clamoring for a return to the RPG Mechanics of earlier entries, but even when it hits its low points, it still manages to perform well enough sales-wise to warrant another release. Mario Tennis is just fine. 

Mario Golf

If you were going to argue that Mario sports games started earlier than Mario’s Tennis for Virtual Boy, your best bet would be to bring up NES Open: Tournament Golf. In that game you play as Mario or Luigi and it features numerous non-playable characters including Princess Daisy in one of her earliest roles, as well as wholly original creations like Steve, Mark, and Billy. However, this game only really features the Mario Bros. as playable characters, and a hallmark of Mario sports games is its roster of playable characters. Yes, I am aware that some folks like to claim this is the third Mario Golf game, but that’s hogwash as far as I’m concerned. Mario Golf started in earnest on the Nintendo 64. 

Health rating: Great

Mario Golf is doing quite well these days, with its most recent release being Mario Golf: Super Rush for Nintendo Switch. That game’s only about 3 years old by now, and while it wasn’t everyone’s favorite entry in the series (as it once again did not include the excellent RPG mechanics of earlier entries) it was still pretty well liked and sold admirably. There’s no reason to believe Mario Golf won’t be with us for generations to come. 

Mario Baseball

Back in 2005, Nintendo released Mario Superstar Baseball for the GameCube, applying the craziness of Mario’s universe to America’s pastime. The result was a blast of a game that featured an insane roster of characters and some incredibly fun gameplay to boot. Mario and baseball go great together. Who knew?

Health rating: Not so good

Mario Superstar Baseball was followed up by Mario Super Sluggers on Wii, which arrived to mixed reviews. Players seemed to like it quite a bit, but critics were considerably less impressed. That game came out in 2008, and it’s the last Mario Baseball title to ever be released. Of course, there was more Mario-related baseball in Mario Sports Superstars, but that’s kind of a different animal. I would declare this one basically dead, but well, a new Mario Strikers game came out recently, so I guess anything’s possible! Speaking of Strikers…

Mario Strikers

Super Mario Strikers for Nintendo GameCube released in 2005 and stuck out like the coolest sore thumb you’ve ever seen. The art direction for the game was far more edgy than Mario had ever been before, and the gameplay itself was like a cross between Soccer and Mario Kart. This game was absurdly violent, and the local multiplayer was an absolute blast. 

Health rating: Good

Just like Mario Baseball, Strikers hit GameCube, then Wii, then went completely dark for over a decade. But then, out of nowhere, Nintendo released Mario Strikers: Battle League for Switch, and Mario’s soccer career was right back on track. It’s my understanding that the game didn’t perform incredibly well. It was far from a failure, it just didn’t reach quite the same levels as other Mario sports titles. That being the case, along with a lot of fans being slightly let down by the game’s scope, tells me that Battle League was a sort of last chance for the brand. It’s still too early to say for sure, and with such a recent release under its belt it’s hard to call its health rating anything but good, but I have a bad feeling about this one. 

Other Sports

Okay, I’ve decided to lump these games into a single category, but it’s got sort of a weird throughline. In 2006, Square-Enix, of all companies, developed a Mario Basketball game for Nintendo DS called Mario Hoops 3-on-3. The game performed pretty well, so Square Enix got a shot at following it up, expanding the game into something a lot more broad, Mario Sports Mix. This game featured basketball in addition to a myriad of other sports. Again, that this was developed by Square is freaking weird. 

Health rating: Basically dead

Mario Sports Mix sort of got a followup for the 3DS a few years later. I say “sort of,” because Mario Sports Superstars, while similar in concept to Mario Sports Mix, was a Bandai Namco joint, and thus felt considerably different from Square’s efforts. Superstars failed to move the needle in any way for Nintendo, and it’s a pretty frequently overlooked game, even with Mario's face on the box. I think Nintendo might be done with this line for good. 

And that wraps things up for part 1 of our lok into how Mario’s sports outings are doing. But don’t worry, there’s still a ton of Mario-related games to cover! From RPGs to art games and beyond, Mario’s career is positively bugnuts, and we’re going to do our best to cover it all.