10 Awful Versions Of Iconic Video Games You Didn't Know Existed
3. Super Mario Bros. Special - PC8801
Whilst in this day and age, Nintendo are very careful about who they let come near their sacred intellectual properties that wasn’t always the case. During the mid-1980s, they loaned the Mario name to the likes of esteemed development studio Hudson Soft who created various versions of Mario titles for home computers.
Super Mario Bros Special, in particular the PC-8801 version, is the worst of the bunch. First of all, they couldn’t even get the character’s colour-scheme right and the now yellow and red suited plumber looks more like Hulk Hogan than Super Mario. That is, when you can see him at all as the screen is almost always blinking wildly to try and keep up with the fast-moving graphics.
The PC-8801 just couldn’t handle what was originally made for the NES and, as a result, one of the game’s best features is totally cut. Mario’s smooth sideways scrolling is what blew minds in 1985 and this port instead had to settle for long and awkward screen transitions every time the player moves forward.
Whilst Super Mario Bros itself might feel like a dinosaur compared to gaming in the current day, at the time the Special port made gamers appreciate just how cutting edge and powerful the NES was.