Super Mario Bros. 2 - Gameplay

Gameplay

Super Mario Bros. 2 is set in the dream-land known as Subcon. Mario's task is to free Subcon from Wart, the game's final boss.

The game is a side-scrolling platform game. At the beginning of each stage, the player is given a choice of four protagonists to control: Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Princess Toadstool. Each character has different strengths: Mario runs faster; Luigi can jump the highest of the four; Toad can run and pluck vegetables the fastest but is the poorest jumper; and Peach can jump the farthest, due to her ability to hover for a short time, though she is the slowest runner and slowest at plucking items from the ground. All characters have the ability to increase the height of their jump by ducking briefly before they jump.

Unlike the previous and following Mario games, no enemies can be defeated by jumping on them. Instead, the player character must throw objects at enemies, such as vegetables plucked from the ground. Certain opponents can be picked up and thrown as well, and several levels feature blocks marked with the word "POW", which when picked up and thrown kill all the enemies on screen at impact, similar to the one in Mario Bros.

The game features a life meter, a then-unusual feature in the series. The player begins each stage with two points of health, represented by red hexagons (in remakes, they are shaped like hearts), and can increase the number of health points in the meter by collecting mushrooms. Health can be replenished by floating hearts, which appear after a certain number of opponents have been defeated. The invincibility star from the previous game appears, with a player needing to collect five pairs of cherries to acquire it.

Each stage contains one or more hidden flasks of potion. When plucked and thrown, a potion creates a door to Sub-Space, an alternate world in which coins are collected instead of vegetables when plucked. The mushrooms used to increase the health meter can also be found here. The player automatically leaves Sub-Space after a short time. The coins collected are used in a slot machine mini-game played between stages. This mini-game is the chief means of obtaining additional lives. In addition to the mushrooms and slot machine coins, several Sub-Spaces are also used as warp zones; these involve the use of vases as pipes.