Nineteen ninety-nine was a weirdly transitional year for Nintendo. Everyone was obsessed with the upcoming "Dolphin" (which became the GameCube) and Pokemon was busy swallowing the world whole. Yet, in the middle of all that noise, Nintendo R&D2 decided to revisit a game that was already fourteen years old. They released Super Mario Bros Deluxe GameBoy Color, and honestly, it changed the way we think about "remakes" before that term was even a marketing buzzword.
It wasn't just a port.
If you grew up with a lime-green or berry-purple handheld, you remember the specific click of that cartridge. Most people think it’s just the NES game on a smaller screen. That’s a massive misconception. It’s actually a dense, feature-rich celebration of Mario’s history that, in many ways, offers more content than the original console version ever did. But it came with one massive, glaring compromise that still divides retro gamers today: the "screen crunch."
The Screen Crunch and Why It Matters
The GameBoy Color had a resolution of 160x144 pixels. The NES? 256x240. You do the math. Nintendo couldn't fit the whole height of a Mario level on that tiny reflective screen without shrinking the sprites into microscopic ants. Their solution was to zoom in.
This means when you're playing Super Mario Bros Deluxe GameBoy Color, you can't see what's directly above you or sometimes even the ground right in front of a long jump. It changes the physics of how you play. You aren't just reacting to Goombas; you’re internalizing the map layout because the camera is tethered so tightly to Mario’s nose. It's claustrophobic. It’s tense. To compensate, Nintendo let you press up or down on the D-pad to scroll the camera slightly, but in a fast-paced platformer, who has time for that?
Still, despite the camera issues, the game felt alive in a way the static NES version didn't.
👉 See also: Grand Theft Auto Games Timeline: Why the Chronology is a Beautiful Mess
It's Secretly Two Games in One
Most people who picked this up at a Toys "R" Us back in the day didn't realize they were getting the "Lost Levels" for free. Well, almost for free. You had to earn it. By hitting a high score of 300,000 points, you unlocked "Super Mario Bros. For Super Players."
This was the Japanese version of Super Mario Bros. 2. It was notoriously difficult—so hard that Nintendo of America originally deemed it too frustrating for Western audiences and gave us that weird (but great) game with the vegetable-plucking instead. Having the actual, punishingly difficult sequel tucked away as an unlockable on a handheld was a huge deal. It turned a casual nostalgia trip into a hardcore challenge.
The "For Super Players" mode in Super Mario Bros Deluxe GameBoy Color is actually slightly different from the Famicom original. It strips away the wind effects and some of the more "glitchy" feeling elements to make it playable on the small screen. It’s still brutal. You will die. A lot.
The Challenge Mode Obsession
Then there's the Challenge Mode. This is where the game stops being a port and starts being a precursor to modern completionist gaming. Each level has three specific goals:
- Find five Red Coins.
- Find the hidden Yoshi Egg.
- Beat a specific high score.
The Yoshi Eggs are the real killers. They are hidden in invisible blocks that don't exist in the NES version. You find yourself jumping randomly at every ceiling, desperately trying to hear that "ding" of a hidden block appearing. It adds a layer of "Where's Waldo" to a game about jumping on turtles. It's addictive. It's frustrating. It's brilliantly designed to keep you playing on a long car ride where you don't have any other games.
✨ Don't miss: Among Us Spider-Man: Why Everyone Is Still Obsessed With These Mods
The Toy Box and the Printer
Nintendo R&D2 went overboard with the extras. There’s a "Toy Box" feature that includes a calendar, a fortune teller (Omikuji), and a way to see where other players are on a map if you used the Infrared port. It felt like an early version of a digital assistant or a social hub, all crammed into a 32-megabit cartridge.
And we have to talk about the Game Boy Printer.
You could print out banners and "wanted" posters of Mario enemies. If you were a kid in 1999, having a physical sticker of a Cheep Cheep that you "earned" by beating a level was the peak of technology. It’s a feature that is completely lost if you play the game on a modern emulator or the Nintendo Switch Online service. The "Album" feature allowed you to collect digital stickers for achieving specific milestones, like defeating Bowser with fireballs or finding all the warp zones. It was essentially an achievement system five years before Xbox Live made it standard.
Physics, Glitches, and the "Feel" of the Game
Die-hard purists often complain that the physics in Super Mario Bros Deluxe GameBoy Color aren't a 1:1 match with the NES. They're right. Because of the lower resolution and the way the engine was rewritten, Mario feels a bit "heavier." The friction on the ground is slightly different.
Also, the famous "Minus World" glitch? It’s gone. You can’t clip through the wall in World 1-2 the same way. Nintendo cleaned up the code. While that makes for a "better" programmed game, it loses some of that 1985 jank that speedrunners love. However, they added the ability to save your game. On the NES, if your mom told you it was time for dinner, you lost your progress. On the GBC, you could save at any time. That single feature made the game accessible to a whole new generation who didn't have the patience for a single-sitting marathon.
🔗 Read more: Why the Among the Sleep Mom is Still Gaming's Most Uncomfortable Horror Twist
Why You Should Play It Over the Original
If you want the purest experience, play the NES version. If you want the most fun experience, play the Deluxe version.
The color palette is vibrant. The music, while transposed for the GBC's sound chip, has a certain "bounciness" to it. There's a world map! It’s such a small thing, but seeing Mario walk between levels on a map—similar to Super Mario Bros. 3—makes the journey feel like an actual adventure rather than just a sequence of stages.
Collecting the Deluxe Today
Finding a copy isn't hard, but finding a clean copy is. The labels on these cartridges were notorious for peeling at the corners. If you're looking to buy one, check the internal battery. Unlike many GBC games that used flash memory, early runs of SMB Deluxe used a battery to keep your save files and high scores. If that battery is dead, your 300,000-point grind to unlock the Lost Levels will vanish the moment you turn off the system.
The game also has a special interaction with the Game Boy Color’s boot-up hardware. If you play it on a Super Game Boy (the SNES adapter), you get a special border, but you lose the color depth. It was really designed specifically for the handheld’s LCD.
Actionable Next Steps for Retro Fans
If you’re looking to dive back into this classic, don’t just fire up an emulator and call it a day. To actually appreciate what Nintendo did here, you should:
- Check your hardware: If playing on original hardware, use a Game Boy Advance SP (AGS-101) or a modified GBC with an IPS screen. The original GBC screen is unlit and makes the "screen crunch" much harder to navigate in dark areas.
- Target the Red Coins: Don't just rush to the flagpole. Treat the game like a collect-a-thon. The real depth is in the Challenge Mode, which forces you to see the level design in a way you never did on the NES.
- Unlock the VS Mode: If you have a friend with a link cable and a second copy, the VS mode is a hidden gem. It’s a race where you can hit switches to mess with the other player's screen. It's chaotic and arguably the best multiplayer Mario until the "New" series arrived on the DS.
- Verify the Battery: If you buy a physical cart, open it up (you'll need a 3.8mm security bit) and check for a CR2025 battery. If it’s original, replace it now before you start your save file so you don't lose your progress mid-way through World 8.