Topic: The best old Mario games.

So, how would you rank the old Mario games? Now that I've had a chance to play them for myself I'm interested to hear the thoughts of others.
Here's how I would rank them:

1 - Super Mario Bros 2. Yeah you read that right. This game features a unique throwing mechanic which sets it apart from all other Mario games to date and in my opinion it works. Throw in great controls, brilliant music, excellent enemy design and creative levels as well as the multiple player characters and you've got the best retro Mario game!

2 - Super Mario Land 2 - Has the honour of my first Mario game! The music is brilliant, a real highlight! It's short but it has so much character. Nice one-shot power up (Rabbit Mario is still the best), brilliant zones (Macro, Mario, Tree, Turtle, Pumpkin - they were all so great!) one of the best final boss battles in Mario history (vs Wario himself!) and so much more! The enemy designs, the environment... this was so close to the top spot!

3 - Super Mario Bros. - The first game, setting out the formula for the others to follow! (Other than SMB2). The controls are a little iffy but the level design is phenomenonal. A great game and highly addictive!

4 - Super Mario Land - The music. Right off the bat, the music hits you, a phenomenonal track which even stormed the UK charts! OK, so it is really short and the sprite work is mediocre, but the level designs are great, SuperBall Mario is excellent and those subpop levels are really fun!

-------Cut off point from brilliant games to simply good--------

5 - Super Mario Bros. 3 - Many awesome new power ups! However, there are some problems with level design. Rarely is there an opportunity to properly fly with the raccoon suit, and deaths feel cheaper than I would have liked. This isn't helped by the slippery controls.

6 - Super Mario World - Meh. OK, so this added nice graphics and Yoshi etc. But wow, the controls are terrible! Every level is like an ice world. Yoshi doesn't seem to add much to the overall experience and the levels are largely bland. A massive dissappoinment considering many see this as one of the best games of all time.

I admit I haven't played Lost levels yet but I'll try to unlock it in SMBDX!

Up to what generation is considered old?

For me, Super Mario World tops them all.
1. Super Mario World
2. Super Mario Bros. 3 (ah, the memories.......of me and my sister fighting over the frog suit, lol)
3. Super Mario Bros. 2 USA (I think I only beaten this game once, on the GBA version, lol)
4. Super Mario Bros. (haven't played this game much back then, since I thought it was too hard)
5. Super Mario Bros. 2/Lost Levels (meh, played a few levels...gotten to this seemingly impossible jump, stopped playing. xD )

Probably should have said, this is for 2D platformers, so no 3D! I wouldn't include remakes either, so no SMBDX. I just remembered I forgot about the handheld titles, so I'll update my list accordingly.
Wario Land and Yoshi's Island also aren't included. Basically, pure, original, 2D Mario platformers before NSMB!

#1 would Super Mario 3, literally the first game I ever played so great. (Hammer Bros suit 4 life)

Yeah I wanted to put Super Mario 64 up there too...was another great game I enjoyed back then. lol

I honestly think I could rave about Super Mario Land 2 for hours. It's so good, and available to download for only $4, £3.60 or 4€!
I placed Bros 2 higher because I went for substance over style: the gameplay is better. It really hurt me to do though, I love SML2 so much! Don't forget those space levels...

@WaveBoy So glad there's some love for SMB2 out there! I was completely surprised by how good it was, having only bought it on sale to complete my collection. It's the only one which managed to truly hook me. With regards to the music, yes there are only like 3 tracks but they are among the best in the Mario series (though I love the music in all the games - so many tracks stuck in my head!). It also helped that they took me right back to the Super Mario Bros Super Show!

1. Super Mario World - I might be biased since this was my first Mario game, but it's just a really fun game and is at least as good as many of the other classic Mario platformers.

2. Super Mario Bros. 3 - Easily the most varied classic Mario game in terms of power-ups.

3. Super Mario Bros. - Don't have much to say about it that anyone else hasn't already said. It's a classic that's still pretty enjoyable to this day.

4. Super Mario Bros. 2 - I haven't played much of this one, so there's not really much I can say about it.

5. Super Mario Bros: The Lost Levels - Mario games are usually really accessible to newcomers, which is why I feel this game pretty much goes against what the series stands for. Other games in the series introduce you to a new mechanic or challenge and then increase the difficulty, but this game doesn't really give players a chance to improve in a way that's enjoyable. Death in Lost Levels doesn't really feel like your fault, it feels like the game just keeps barraging you with even harder challenges that it already expects you to be able to deal with. That, and there's not really anything that will give the player a sense of satisfaction for overcoming these challenges unless they typically get enjoyment from games where the challenge forces players to improve. Just a completely unrewarding experience, really.

Mine is SMB 3. It's the ultimate.

Question: Does anybody find mario hard to control in Super Mario World? Compared to other games and especially the NSMB series, he feels so light and slippery and I find its hard to do just a quick "touch and jump" when running between platforms. It's reason I don't like that game.

1. Super Mario World - Some nostalgia here!
2. Yoshi's Island - It IS technically SMW2
3. Super Mario Bros. 3
4. Super Mario Bros.
5. Super Mario Land.

[insert huge margin here]

6. Super Mario Bros. 2 (The Lost Levels) - Plays just like a hack of the original. Sometimes the level design is so bizarre I have to convince myself the game isn't a Chinese bootleg. The difficulty just feels wrong to me, and most deaths don't feel like my fault.

Super Mario 64 is actually my favorite of all time. However, since apparently there's a no 3D rule in effect:

1. Super Mario World
2. Super Mario Bros (with Duck Hunt!)
3. Super Mario Bros. 2
4. Yoshi's Island
5. Super Mario Land
6. Super Mario Bros 3

I don't consider anything after Super Mario 64 to be an 'old' Mario game.

You might actually be the first person I've seen who suggest Mario 3/World had anything but the best level design.

for me it's probably Yoshi's Island > Mario 3 > Mario World > Mario 2 > Mario 1 (shocked at how not amazing it felt the last couple of times I played it :/) > Mario Land > Mario Land 2

Mine would have to be Super Mario Bros 3 without a doubt. I love the level designs the variety of powerups and the minigames, plus it was way cool that my brother and I can play together and actually help each out clearing a world. At that time to many games had it like you were competing like the first SMB for example. SMB 3 was great how I would do a level and then he would do another different level etc.

I would have to give the second spot to Super Mario Bros 2 LIke most people just because of how unique it was for a Mario game. It took what we learned in the first SMB and completely threw it out the window lol. The Boss fights were great, the level designs. Plus the fact that I spent a whole summer one year traveling back and forth between a friends house and my own playing nothing but this game till we finished it.

Third would have to be Super Mario World Now dont get me wrong this is a great Mario game and I still get that OMG feeling every time I boot this game up. The graphics very bright and colorful, the level design was good especially the Ghost Houses and of course Yoshi but the one thing that this game lacked that SMB3 had was the variety of power ups. I thought that just having the mushroom fire flower and cape was a little odd after having all the suits in the last one. Also I wasn't big on the Bowser fight in this one either.

1. SMB3 - probably the Mario game I played more than any other aside perhaps from 64, I feel like everything about this game is what made me really love Nintendo and I still come back and play through it once every year or two.

2. SMW - a better game than SMB3, but I always preferred the look and feel of 3

3. SM64 - pretty much did for 3D platforming what SMB did for 2D platforming, also probably the first game I ever 100%ed. I remember being blown away when I tried out a demo of it I couldn't even comprehend the N64 controller

Honorable Mentions:

1. Yoshi's Island - only left it off because it feels like its own series, I would have placed it 2nd overall

2. Donkey Kong - the Game Boy version, besides Pokémon Blue was by far the best game I owned on that system with much tighter gameplay than any actual Mario game.. also the fact that you get the triple jump and reverse jump which appear in other main series games, only left off because like Yoshi's Island I feel it's in a different series. If both were included, it'd take 3rd overall

edit: oh didn't read far enough in to see SM64 can't be included. Ehh in that case I guess I'll put Super Mario Land 2 in the 3rd spot. Always felt like the Game Boy games were fun just too short.

1) Super Mario World - My most replayed Mario game. Quite the nostalgia trip for me.
2) Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island: Played this for the first time within the pas year and was pretty impressed.
3) Super Mario Bros. 3 - I thought SMB 2 was going to go abover3 until I recently played it and was a little disappointed by it. Maybe this will change again when Super Mario Bros. 3 comes to the VC and I give it another whirl.
4) Super Mario Bros. 2 - See above
5) Super Mario Bros. - Wasn't a big fan in '87 and not a big fan '14.

I have a friend who hates SMW's physics. I personally have no problem with them, but I can see how they make some people uncomfortable.

As for me, SMB3 is king. SMB2 is highly underrated, though- it's way better than Lost Levels.

Too many to list.