{"id":47053,"date":"2018-09-12T19:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-09-12T19:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/news\/2018\/09\/hardware_classics_exploring_luigis_debut_the_mario_bros_game_and_watch"},"modified":"2018-09-12T19:00:00","modified_gmt":"2018-09-12T19:00:00","slug":"hardware-classics-exploring-luigis-debut-the-mario-bros-game-watch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2018\/09\/12\/hardware-classics-exploring-luigis-debut-the-mario-bros-game-watch\/","title":{"rendered":"Hardware Classics: Exploring Luigi&#8217;s Debut, The Mario Bros. Game &amp; Watch"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"media_block\"><a href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/c54005f33aa90\/large.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/c54005f33aa90\/small.jpg\" class=\"media_thumbnail\"><\/a><\/div>\n<aside class=\"picture strip\">\n<div class=\"img\"><a title=\"IMG 8375.JPG\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/c54005f33aa90\/img-8375.original.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/c54005f33aa90\/img-8375.900x.jpg\" alt=\"IMG 8375.JPG\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Luigi may not be quite as famous as his illustrious sibling, but there&#8217;s a fair chance that you could stop a random person on the street and they&#8217;d still be able to identify him or at the very least acknowledge his association with the <strong>Super Mario Bros.<\/strong> series. Keeping this in mind, it&#8217;s an odd sensation to play the <em>first-ever<\/em> appearance of this iconic character \u2013 and it&#8217;s even odder when you consider that the setting is totally alien to rest of the series.<\/p>\n<p>The 1983 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/news\/2010\/02\/feature_the_history_of_the_nintendo_game_and_watch\">Game &amp; Watch<\/a> release <strong>Mario Bros.<\/strong> is noteworthy for being the first of the &#8216;Multi Screen&#8217; range to place two LCD displays side-by-side (the previous Multi Screen releases, such as <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/news\/2013\/01\/hardware_classics_game_and_watch_jr_55_donkey_kong_ii\">Donkey Kong II<\/a><\/strong>, used a design which would later be seen on the Nintendo DS). However, a more important milestone is the fact that this pocket-sized title marked the debut of Luigi, and pre-dates his (arguably better known) appearance in the arcade version of <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/switch-eshop\/arcade_archives_mario_bros\">Mario Bros.<\/a><\/strong> by four months (it released on March 14th in Japan, while the arcade game arrived on July 14th). Mario, of course, had opened his video game account in 1981&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/arcade\/donkey_kong\"><strong>Donkey Kong<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"gallery\">\n<div class=\"col\"><a title=\"IMG 8370.JPG\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/5099ef36502a3\/img-8370.original.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/5099ef36502a3\/img-8370.445x245.jpg\" width=\"445\" height=\"245\" alt=\"IMG 8370.JPG\" \/><\/a><a title=\"IMG 8373.JPG\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/1aa55ed0b9ad9\/img-8373.original.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/1aa55ed0b9ad9\/img-8373.445x245.jpg\" width=\"445\" height=\"245\" alt=\"IMG 8373.JPG\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<div class=\"col\"><a title=\"IMG 8369.JPG\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/c0e6411e6b35d\/img-8369.original.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/c0e6411e6b35d\/img-8369.445x245.jpg\" width=\"445\" height=\"245\" alt=\"IMG 8369.JPG\" \/><\/a><a title=\"IMG 8371.JPG\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/b7c170e0a2784\/img-8371.original.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/b7c170e0a2784\/img-8371.445x245.jpg\" width=\"445\" height=\"245\" alt=\"IMG 8371.JPG\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>It&#8217;s perhaps understandable that this landmark release has gone unnoticed by so many, because outside of the colour artwork on the front of the unit (which, it should be noted, opens &#8216;backwards&#8217; like a Japanese book), you wouldn&#8217;t be able to tell if the two protagonists were Mario or Luigi at all; their black silhouettes lack any facial detail and they both look identical. Only the text on the unit denotes who is who.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s also noteworthy that the signature platforming gameplay that would make Mario Bros. and its successor <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/nes\/super_mario_bros\">Super Mario Bros.<\/a><\/strong> so popular is absent; instead, the aim is to load a truck full of bottles by passing them from one screen to the next. You&#8217;re in control of both characters in this case, using the simplistic pair of rocker controls to switch between the various conveyor belts in the factory. Because of this setup, it&#8217;s possible to play Mario Bros. with a friend, making it a unique and sought-after entry in the Game &amp; Watch line.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"picture strip\">\n<div class=\"img\"><a title=\"IMG 8372.JPG\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/d142ceb0887f5\/img-8372.original.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/d142ceb0887f5\/img-8372.900x.jpg\" alt=\"IMG 8372.JPG\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Outside of its historical importance, Mario Bros. is your typical Game &amp; Watch release; despite the primitive nature of the technology used it is tightly-designed and instantly compelling, with the focus on achieving a high score ensuring that it boasts surprising longevity.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Powered by two LR44 batteries and equipped with the tremendous USP (well, for 1983 at least) of a digital clock and alarm, Mario Bros. may feel somewhat archaic by today&#8217;s standards, but like pretty much every Game &amp; Watch release, it&#8217;s akin to a work of art you can hold in the palm of your hand. It&#8217;s also relatively easy to find online at a reasonable price, so there&#8217;s no excuse not to sample Luigi&#8217;s debut and get a grounding in an important part of Nintendo history.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"picture strip\">\n<div class=\"img\"><a title=\"Luigi and Mario sure have changed over the years...\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/de948c5ab355e\/luigi-and-mario-sure-have-changed-over-the-years.original.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/de948c5ab355e\/luigi-and-mario-sure-have-changed-over-the-years.900x.jpg\" alt=\"Luigi and Mario sure have changed over the years...\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p>Luigi and Mario sure have changed over the years&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Luigi may not be quite as famous as his illustrious sibling, but there&#8217;s a fair chance that you could stop a random person on the street and they&#8217;d still be able to identify him or at the very least acknowledge his association with the Super Mario Bros. series. Keeping this in mind, it&#8217;s an odd [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47053","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nintendo-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47053","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47053"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47053\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}