At the Eurogamer Expo I took 15 minutes out of my hustle and bustle for a little bit of relaxing New Super Mario Bros Wii (known as NSMBW or ‘it’ from henceforth). I was dropped into a game with 2 other players after being instructed to put the wrist strap on, even though I wasn’t using the motion controls I was still treated as a 4 year old. Thanks Nintendo.

Playing like good old SMB played on the Nintendo NSMBW has some noticeable improvements. The obvious graphics and sounds, although I couldn’t hear much it did sound like they tried to stay true to the style of the original 8-bit theme. The controls were, well the same. The fireball flower and star are no longer the top dog pickups as the iceball (snowball?) and a few other new items make an appearance.

The biggest difference came in the form of cooperative multiplayer. You can now have Mario, Luigi, and 2 annoying Toads on the screen at the same time. You can get in each others way (cannot walk through each other), bounce off each others heads like springboards, and steal desperately needed mushrooms from each other like a bunch of jackasses. When I was playing one Toad was nothing but dead weight, always getting in the way and having the screen force them forward. Once a player dies they re-appear in a bubble which your playmates can burst to set you back in play. And die a lot you will if you aren’t used to so much chaos on screen at once.

It’s a nice looking reboot of the original game that will make anyone nostalgic. The co-op can be a huge amount of fun if played with the right people (I definitely didn’t have the right people with me). NSMBW shows there is still some value in owning a Wii and still some decent titles to come for it.