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Trying to get your money as efficiently as possible is at least thematically appropriate on this occasion. That was probably their reasoning.

Hope we can see some new out-of-this-world levels
Maybe a galaxy level or something, where you hop from planet to planet?

I bet there's a Greek somewhere watching the E3 trailer of the game,and wishing he was Mario.

Maybe you just getting better at them.

Still haven't decided on this...grabbing ten bazillion coins per second sounds fun and all, but...there has to be more to it than that.

I'm starting to think that's the case with me. You know, after playing nearly every Mario game it does seem to be getting easier. Then again, the New Super Mario Bros. games are a lot easier than, lets say the Super Mario Galaxies, as far as the newer games go.

It'll hardly be the first Mario game where it's easy to rack up a bunch of lives.

SMB1: Turtle shell on stairs.
SMW: Top Secret.
NSMBW: The bullet bill location in the ice world (and other areas, but easiest and most fun there).

I'm sure there are ways in the other games, too, but I just don't see the point in discovering them. The games aren't hard enough to make you lose a ton of lives, and even if you aren't that good at the game, the consequences of Game Over aren't worth worrying about. In such a rare event, you lose maybe three levels of progress at the most.

One of my favorite games ever is Yoshi's Island and almost every playthrough I end up with like 120+ lives by the time I reach the final boss. There's many valid complaints for the NSMB games, that's not one of them.

@Adam: In the older games it was kinda hard to pull off compared to the new games though.

The secret World(whatever it was called) in NSMBWii posed a good challenge, especially if you were trying to get the star coins. And that's the thing, finding some of the 'star coins' or trying to get to them in general seems to be the only real challenge that i found in NSMB and NSMBWii especially. Because lets get realistic here, Nintendo has been far too kind on the entire '1-up' thing....It's absolutely reDUCKulous how many lives they give you in these new Mario titles....The intensity feels like it's been shattered, the urge to collection coins? Gone. Why, what's the point when 1-ups are being dished out like it's tricker treat mania on halloween day. Going to the mushroom houses now also feel completely pointless...

That's my main beef closely followed by NIntendo reusing the same plastic visual asthetics in the NSMB Series.....Nintendo got soft. I want the challenge that was present in 1-3. Far less lives and power ups please! Hell, i ended up finishing NMBWii with 99 lives....WTF? Lets say you get to level 2-6 and you end up losing all of your lives you THEN should start back at 2-1....Which was the case in SMB3. what's the point of having all of these lives when there are no consequences?

It's a big problem i have with many of these current gen titles. Mega Man 9 & 10 reminded me of what a video game challenge should be like.

WaveBoy has a point. I've been playing Super Mario Bros. on my 3DS and trying to get 100 coins is near impossible and 1-ups are as regular as a blue moon. I'm sure if I stop taking the warps I'll get 100 coins by the time I get to to the first castle, but still... I prefer taking the warps.

NSMB and NSMBW however, 1-ups and coins were bountiful. I finished both games with 99 lives and within 2 days of release. Wow... that was hard...

Maybe Nintendo are starting to view Mario as a game for the casual crowd rather than those die hard fans who enjoyed SMB to death. I love SMB because it's simple yet it can also be rather hard at times. The NSMB versions though are far too simple for their own good. Give me that challenge in my Mario Nintendo!

@WaveBoy ... EXACTLY! This was exactly my beef with 3D Land! It's not that being easy to finish is the biggest problem with that, it's just that you only need to finish the worlds and... The Coins are in plain sight! I personally found New Bros. on the DS great. It actually was a bit of a challenge, since you need to go back to the last save after a game over, 1-Ups are, at least less common than in the following games(EVEN WITHOUT EXPLOITS), and a few bosses do have erratic movements... But even that isn't the main great thing about it, which is hunting down all those hard-to get unlockables! And I felt, in New Super Mario Bros. Wii (but to be fair, I haven't played that for ages) and ESPICIALLY 3D Land, since the Coins are visible you'll generally look in their area as opposed to when you wouldn't be able to see them which made it that much more fun. And the thing about New Bros. 2 is I fear it will be the same!

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Top Secret is incredibly easy to get, then you just go in over and over and you'll have as many lives as you want. Not like Super Mario World really requires a ton of lives. The koopa shell on the stairs trick is not that complicated either, though it may take a few tries to figure out exactly when to hit it.

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If you're taking warps, you'll have to complete something like 5 levels (I forget) plus the two where you go in the warps halfway through, so you shouldn't need many lives, and it's not like you have much progress at hazard if you get game over, anyway. By the way, as long as you're skipping stuff, there is an infinite-continue trick for SMB1. I think you hold A while pressing start at the game over screen? I never used it, so I don't know.

Thanks for that Adam. I don't like using glitches so I doubt I'll use it... sneaks over to 3DS and turns on SMB... I promise, I'm not using the glitch Adam just told me...

@Adam: You do release I posted that same trick earlier in this forum, unless there's another NSMB2 forum, right?
EDIT: It's on page 10.

You kids and your nostalgia. Super Mario Bros. and Super Mario Bros. 3 along with World as easy as heck. (Yeah I have trouble beating SMB2 starting with the Ice World). I had 99 lives on NSMBW but I lost about 54 on them on World 9 trying to get the Star Coins. You can easily beat all 4 Mario games in 30min without warps Mario World 3 I keep getting lives from the Goal Game, never miss getting 3 stars. Then you have those mini games on the World Map. Mario World you have multiple ways to get lives as well. The first game is one I will agree with but you shouldn't need many lives in the first place.

I was one of the people who thought the old games were hard until I replayed all the Mario games. The games NOW actually have been getting more difficult. I mean the levels themselves. Just because you have 100 lives doesn't make the levels themselves easy.

I still stand by the fact that the New Super Mario Bros. games are easier than the original series. Its obvious that Nintendo does it on purpose. They've used the "New" series to appeal to everyone - including the casual market who might not have played a Mario game before. They then have the 3D adventure Mario games, such as the Super Mario Galaxy games, appeal to the more hardcore Mario fans. It shows in the sales. I'm sure they would admit to the difficulty being different in the games, because its obvious to me at least.

Of course we might find some of the older games easier now, because we've gotten better at it. I can't speak for anyone else, but Super Mario Bros. 3 is usually considered to be one of the more difficult Mario games, and it used to be super hard for me. But after playing through it so many times on my GBA (it was my first game ever by the way) I progressively got better at it. I can play it now and speed through the entire game easily. Its not that we used to think the games were hard and now we realize they're easy, we just got better. Someone said that on this thread earlier. The New Super Mario Bros. games however, didn't take me multiple plays to breeze through; it was just once, the first time. There's the difference.

This casual hardcore poo is all in your head. Mario was never a hardcore pow pow kaboom character. My cousins wouldn't consider themselves "gamers" but they love Mario. My 9year old cousin can beat Mario Bros. 1 without any problems the same as I could when I was around the same age. Mario was always for everyone and still is.

I have to disagree. Mario has always been for everyone, but the concept of "everyone" has significantly changed in video games over the years. You're honestly going to tell me New Super Mario Bros. Wii wasn't made with appealing to the casual market in mind? That game was made soley for the hope of good sales and attracting those who weren't as familiar with Mario. The multiplayer, the similar style to the DS game, its all apparently clear. Explain why New Super Mario Bros. Wii sold waaay more than Super Mario Galaxy. When nearly everyone can agree that Galaxy is by far the better game. Its because of the consumers in mind. The Mario fans bought Galaxy, while the Mario fans + the Wii fans bought New Super Mario Bros.

Also, why else would they release two New Super Mario Bros. games back to back? Why else would they rush to release another 3DS Mario game not even a year after Super Mario 3D Land? Why else would they hold their imagination back, by not releasing something like Super Mario Galaxy in all its HD glory to start off Wii U? Because they know these two games will sell better. Why do they know this? Because they appeal to more people. Why does it appeal to more people? Because its the Mario fans + the "everyone" install base that's been picked up by the DS and the Wii. Just proving my point here.

Two words, (or three) 2D Mario.