How many levels were in the original "Super Mario Bros."?

Parents worldwide watched their kids become obsessed with a jumping plumber and his quest to save a princess. What started as a simple idea - run from left to right, stomp on enemies - became the blueprint for platform games when "Super Mario Bros." hit living rooms in 1985. With modern games packing hundreds of levels, how many did Mario need to clear in his first big adventure?

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The answer is: 32

The original "Super Mario Bros." was released in 1985 and contained 32 levels spread across eight worlds, with four stages in each world. Simple math, simple structure – but it worked.

Take World 1-1, for example. In the '80s, no one had time for tutorials, so many games just used the first level as a chance to introduce the player to how the game worked. Repetitive actions created a familiarity without needing to jam a bunch of text on the screen to explain the game. It was just you, a Goomba, and your jump button.

Each world followed a pattern: an outdoor level, an underground coin-filled stage, another outdoor section (usually with platforms), and finally a castle. Those castles housed what appeared to be Bowser, but only the last one contained the real deal. The others were just minions in convincing costumes – talk about a catfish. And can I just call out Bowser for having eight castles in the Mushroom Kingdom? I wouldn't be able to keep track of where the princess even was!

Building the difficulty curve was its own challenge. Early levels let players experiment with mushrooms, fire flowers, and basic jumps. But by World 8, those same players were threading Mario through intricate gauntlets of Hammer Bros, Bullet Bills, and perfectly-timed leaps over lava. It was like graduating from jumping rope to performing in Cirque du Soleil.

Eventually, players discovered warp zones and speed runs were never the same. The ability to beat the game in only eight levels, the equivalent of skipping your car for a rocket on a drive, meant missing out on some of the most fun parts of the game. But it's a small price to pay for competitive people looking for the fastest title.

Today, modern players treat 32 levels as a quick break between more challenging gameplay. In fact, the most recent Mario platformer "Super Mario Bros. Wonder" has up to 152 levels. But longer doesn't always mean better, and there's always a simple joy in returning to where the Mario platform universe began.