“Super Mario Bros.” Celebrates Its twenty-fifth Anniversary

Super Mario Bros. was published in Japan 25 years ago now on the Famicom, the Japanese version of what Americans call the Nintendo Entertainment System. Since then, Mario has became one of the most iconic characters and amusement brands in the world.

Mario had previously appeared in the arcade games Donkey Kong and Mario Bros., but it was Super Mario Bros. that propelled the Italian plumber to icon position and contributed importantly to having video games ready-made in homes around the world and reversing the video game collapse of the early 1980s.


The game was packed with the Nintendo Entertainment System in the U.S., and it’s hard to say whether it was successful because of the NES or vice versa, but either way, Super Mario Bros. has sold more than 40 million copies over the past 25 years. As A Matter Of Fact, it was the popular video game of all time until just recently. That title now belongs to Wii Sports, the game packed with the Nintendo Wii.

To celebrate the 25th Anniversary, Nintendo released a video, which I’ve embedded below. It’s a kind of video timeline of the major Mario publishes, though it omits Super Mario Kart and other genre-bending spinoffs that have featured Mario and friends.

I’ve also included Nintendo’s Mario timeline graphic in case you don’t want to sit through the video. The Guardian too listed 25 fun Mario facts and Nintendo set up a star-studded ad campaign to remember the date.

Super Mario Bros. 25th Anniversary Video


Super Mario Bros. Timeline