Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels · Famicom Disk System · 1986 · Brutal by Design
Japan's Super Mario Bros. 2 was a sequel for people who had already mastered the first game, and it was built to punish exactly the habits they had learned. Nintendo of America decided Americans should not have to play it.
The Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2, released for the Famicom Disk System on 3 June 1986, was developed by Nintendo R&D4 under director Takashi Tezuka, with Shigeru Miyamoto producing. It looks almost exactly like its predecessor, and that is the trap. Every tool the first game taught the player has been turned against them. A Poison Mushroom resembles the ordinary power-up and hurts Mario instead of helping him. Gusts of wind push him in mid-air, lengthening or shortening jumps that the player had measured by instinct. Some warp zones send the player backwards to earlier worlds. Luigi, now a separate choice, jumps higher but has less friction on the ground, so he slides past the edges he was supposed to stop at. The game contains 52 levels in total, including a hidden World 9 that is only reachable by finishing without using any warp zones, and bonus Worlds A to D that open only after the game has been completed eight times. When the game reached Nintendo of America, Howard Phillips, who evaluated games for president Minoru Arakawa, judged it unfairly difficult. "Few games were more stymieing," he said. "Not having fun is bad when you're a company selling fun." North America got a reskinned Doki Doki Panic as its Super Mario Bros. 2 instead, and the original did not reach Western players until the 1993 Super NES compilation Super Mario All-Stars, where it was retitled The Lost Levels.
Most sequels are designed for a new audience as well as the old one. The Lost Levels is designed only for the old one. It assumes the player has finished Super Mario Bros., knows where the hidden blocks tend to be and jumps on muscle memory — and every one of its new tricks exploits that knowledge. A mushroom is no longer a reward. A jump that would have landed yesterday falls short today. A warp pipe may take you back.
This is difficulty as a conversation with an expert, and it is why the game is still admired by exactly the players who found the original too easy. It is also why Nintendo of America was right in commercial terms: a game that punishes the lessons of its predecessor is hostile to anyone who has not learned them yet, and in 1986 most American players had not.