Random Things You Never Knew About Super Mario Bros. (19 items)

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  (#1) There Are 256 Glitched Levels in Super Mario Bros.

  If you want to access the 256(!) extra glitch levels in Super Mario Bros. you need to go find yourself a top loading NES system and a copy of Nintendo Tennis. Put your Mario cartridge in, then take it out with the system still on. Put the Tennis cartridge in, then reset. Serve once, run around for a bit, and then take Tennis out with the system still on and put Mario back in. Reset Mario, then press both A and start at once and you’ll be on one of the 256 glitched out “secret levels."
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  (#2) Super Mario Bros. Was Meant to Be the Last Cartridge Game EVER

  Before becoming Nintendo's first big hit in America, Super Mario Bros. was supposed to be Nintendo's cartridge based ride into the sunset before they switched to the floppy disk-based Famicom Disk System. Ironically, the game was so popular that cartridges stuck around for another two decades. 
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  (#3) The 1-Up Turtle is Not a Glitch

  Gamers love to find glitches, so when players came across a slow poke turtle (specifically in level 3-1) that gave out almost 100 1-ups, they thought they'd hit glitch paydirt. It wasn't until much later that Miyamato revealed that this was meant to be in the game all along. 
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  (#4) Mario's Design Is Based on Graphical Impossibilities

  We live in a world of almost infinite possibilities when it comes to graphics in video games, but when Shigeru Miyamoto was creating Super Mario Bros., he had to come up with interesting ways around his very real limitations. Mario was given a mustache in order to get around drawing a mouth, and he sports a hat because it was almost impossible to portray hair.

  What about the overalls? Those ensured that players could tell that he was swinging his hands back and forth as he was walking or running.
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  (#5) Mario Was Named After Nintendo's Landlord

  Long before Mario was Mario, he was called “Jumpman” because they had to call him something. Before that, he was called “Mr. Video” which is actually kind of awesome. Even before that, he was known as “Ossan,” which translates to “middle-aged guy.” And because no one wants to play a game called "Super Middle-Aged Guy," a proper name was sought and found in Nintendo's American offices.

  The story goes that Nintendo was supposedly late on rent and their landlord, Mario Segale, looked the other way. In thanks, he was forever immortalized as the namesake for the most popular video game mascot of all time - Super Segale. 
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  (#6) Bowser Was Originally an Ox

  Shigeru Miyamoto initially sketched Bowser as an ox. His drawings were misinterpreted by animator Yoichi Kotabe as a turtle, but then the duo worked together to mix the two ideas and the Bowser we know today was born.
  
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  (#7) You Can Actually Jump Over the Flag Pole

  This flagpole rumor has been floating around for years, but thanks to the Internet, you can actually see people jumping the infamous flagpole for yourself. And you thought your big sister was just messing with you. (But it's only possible on a couple specific levels, and at times requires triggering a glitch.)
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  (#8) Super Mario Bros. Took a Few Moves from the Legend of Zelda

  Even though they were released years apart in the states, Super Mario Bros. and Legend of Zelda were actually developed in tandem. That not only meant that creator Shigeru Miyamoto was able to compartmentalize two games, but that he simultaneously spearheaded two franchises that would change gaming forever.

  While Super Mario Bros. was still in the development stage, much of Zelda was completed, which meant that whenever Miyamoto needed an element for his game about a brick smashing plumber, he would grab it from the world of Link. Specifically the firebars in Bowser's castle were originally created for Zelda, but later appropriated into Mario Bros.  
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  (#9) Japan's Version of the Minus World Is Totally Different

  The Minus World is a giant glitch in Super Mario Bros. that allows you to pass through a wall at the end of World 1-2 and get to the first Warp Zone via a method the game didn’t intend. Enter the far left pipe and you’ll end up in World -1, an infinitely looping underwater stage. In the Japanese Famicom Disk System version, the Minus World remains, but you can actually finish it and go on to two more Minus Worlds.

  If you beat those, you're taken back to the title screen and you can unlock hard mode. Was this a glitch or an Easter egg for the Japanese audience?
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  (#10) Super Mario Bros. Only Takes Up 256 Kilobits

  If you don't know why this is a big (or not so big) deal, 256 kilobits translates to 32 kilobytes. This means it would take around three Super Mario Bros. cartridges to store one JPEG of a photo from the game. 
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  (#11) Luigi's Name Is Making Fun of Him a Little Bit

  Poor Luigi, he always gets the short end of the stick (except for Luigi's Mansion, that game was dope). Coincidentally, his name is based on a Japanese word that means "similar" and is spelt Ruij. In the early games, Luigi is almost exactly the same as Mario in appearance, so the name was a little joke on the sidekick.
  
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  (#12) Bowser's Fireball is Backwards

  If you look closely at fireballs hurled by Bowser, you can see that they are, in fact, backwards. The flames of the fireball are actually pointing forward, while the lighter fiery part of ball is pointing at Bowser.
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  (#13) Mario Has a Super Dark Backstory

  Have you ever read the backstory for Super Mario Bros.? It basically reads like what would have happened if Lord Voldemort actually killed infant Harry Potter. Basically, everyone in the Mushroom Kingdom has either been turned into blocks or goombas by King Koopa (who is a wizard by the way), and every time Mario stomps on a goomba or breaks a block, he's killing a peasant from the kingdom. Talk about collateral damage. 
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  (#14) You Can Thank Excitebike for Warp Zones

  Before creating Super Mario Bros. and Legend of Zelda, Shigeru Miyamoto worked on the racing game Excitebike. For those that don't remember, Excitebike allowed you to choose which track (Easy, Medium, Hard) you wanted to play. Miyamoto loved the idea so much that he wanted to put it in Mario, but he didn't want players to skip to the end. That's when the Warp Zone after level 1-2 was born. 
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  (#15) The Clouds and Bushes Are Recycled

  The makers of Super Mario Bros. were way into recycling before everybody on your block had four different recycling bins. Not only are the clouds and bushes the same sprite with different colors, but the big castle is a bunch of small castles stacked on top of each other, and the sound you hear when Mario gets hit is the same sound you hear when you travel down a pipe. 
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  (#16) Mario Started Out as a Carpenter, Not a Pumber

  Most people are aware that Mario’s first appearance was in the classic arcade game Donkey Kong. Less widely remembered: Mario wasn't a plumber, but was a carpenter instead. Mario made a career change because of the pipes and sewers in the original Mario Bros. arcade game. 
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  (#17) Mario Dies on the Super Mario Bros. Cover

  This is actually kind of crazy that it made the cover, but once you see it you can totally tell that Mario is jumping into a lava pit while running into a wall. It's kind of the equivalent of your senior portrait being a photo of you sitting on the toilet. 
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  (#18) Mario Originally Carried a Beam Gun and Rode a Cloud

  Before becoming the jumping brick smasher gamers know and love, Mario was going to be the star of an action game that was closer to Metroid. He was even going to ride a rocket at one point. 
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  (#19) Koji Kondo Designed the 10 Lives Crown

  Is there anything Koji Kondo can't do? Besides composing the musical score for Super Mario Bros. and Legend of Zelda, he also designed the little crown you get when you collect 10 extra lives. 
  
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  (#20) There Was a Super Mario Bros. Computer Game

  Mario has lent his recognizable visage to numerous educational computer games over the years (Mario's Time Machine, anyone?), but did you know that there was a follow up to Super Mario Bros. released on the PC called Super Mario Bros. Special? It looked an awful lot like the NES game but lacked any of its other good qualities.

  Odd colors aside, the physics of SMBS are a nightmare, and the music sounds like someone trying to learn the Mario theme on a broken Casio. 

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