Mario gets super in his first 2D adventure since the SNES.
User Rating: 9.5 | New Super Mario Bros. DS
In a nutshell, New Super Mario Bros. is like a supercharged mixture of Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World. There is a world map structure reminiscent of the previous two games, but this time there are a bevy of different paths you can take to get to Bowser's final castle. And unlike past Super Mario games, skipping worlds entirely is commonplace. In fact, I, almost unknowingly, passed up two worlds my first time through.
The newest feature of the world map revolves around the use of Star Coins, of which there are three strategically placed in each stage. Certain branching paths of the world map require you cough up five Star Coins to pass, such as item houses or even paths to new worlds. For this reason, it's best to try and snag as many Star Coins as you can, though some are especially tricky to find.
