


Soundwise, “SMBX” reuses everything old as well, with a soundtrack ranging all the way from “Super Mario Bros.” to “New Super Mario Bros.” There is a slight problem with the looping of most tracks, however, that allows them to fade out after a while before restarting. By re-using ALL of the old graphical assets, “SMBX” answers the theoretical question of, “Why does the Mushroom Kingdom look different in each of the games?” by saying, “It doesn’t look different, each game just focuses on a different area.” I also found it quite delightful to see one random 8-bit warp pipe standing out amidst a row of 16-bit pipes… just for the hell of it.

In “SMBX,” it is not uncommon to find goombas and shyguys in the same stage, or a classic style goomba (that gets squashed when stomped) and a “Super Mario World” style goomba (that flips over onto its back when stomped) walking around within a few inches of each other. These classic assets look just as good as when they were originally created and can produce really interesting results when they are all mashed together. “SMBX” reuses 8-bit and 16-bit graphical assets from every classic ‘Mario’ game, as well as a few assets from “Metroid” and “Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link,” topped-off with a handful of custom sprites to represent things that Nintendo never imagined in their most fevered dreams (like Princess Peach wearing a Hammer Bro. Redigit learned not to mess with anything that might bring down the wrath of such an undying entity upon his head and created an entirely original game. X” (“SMBX”) was the first major project by Indie developer, Andrew ‘Redigit’ Spinks, who later went on to form the Indie game company, Re-Logic, and release his first commercial game, “Terraria.” Of course, thanks to the overbearing copyright, patent, and trademark laws we currently must live with worldwide, Nintendo flexed their might and kicked “SMBX” off the Internet, seized Redigits domain for the game, and otherwise acted in every way like a Big Evil Corporation.
