Have you seen these 8-bit games in The Super Mario Bros. Movie

As we gathered in this morning’s review of The Super Mario Bros. Movie without spoilers, the movie is a deluge of references to the entire Mario universe, but using scenes set in New York, it also saves a good handful of nods to other Nintendo games and franchises that were successful in the 1980s on the NES and in arcades and that we’ve compiled here.

Of course, we encourage you to read on once you’ve seen the movie (and let us know if we’re missing any!) as we inevitably get into spoiler territory …

Did you chase all these NES games in The Super Mario Bros. Movie?

1. Donkey Kong, 1981. The first task given to the young Miyamoto to save Nintendo in the West, the one that started it all, was to have his appearance in the film, apart from the fact that Mario and Donkey Kong themselves share many of the images that stage their rivalry. In the film, you can even see the arcade machine named Jumpman (like Pac-Man or Walkman, before being christened Mario in honor of Mario Segale). The references to the game that led to Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros. and the Donkey series itself don’t stop throughout the film, including the appearance of Pauline or the red jet stage and the music that plays when Mario and DK fight. a la Smash Bros.
2. Punch-Out!!! , 1983. The pizzeria featured in the film in a few scenes in Brooklyn is named after the innovative boxing game first released in arcades. It marked the debut of a certain Koji Kondo as a composer….
3. Baseball, 1983. Ok, this one is a little more convulsive, but you can’t tell us that the merchandise and fonts on Mario and Luigi’s possessions don’t make reference to the NES game that made the console a hit with American children and their parents. Designed by Shigeru Miyamoto himself and presented in New York with professional players, Baseball was one of the best sports successes in Nintendo history.
4. Balloon Fight, 1984. A Yoshio Sakamoto design programmed by one Satoru Iwata, first as an arcade game and later expanded for the NES. One of the balloon fighters can be clearly seen on Brooklyn night.
5. Wrecking Crew, 1985. In the midst of the Super Mario Bros. boom, Miyamoto lent his characters to various titles and sports. Here, Yoshio Sakamoto put them to work as masons for the evil foreman Spike, whose actor first leaked the film a few years ago. In it, he plays Mario and Luigi’s former boss plumber and gives a nod to the NES and arcade game.
6. Kid Icarus, 1986. A year later, guess who, Sakamoto-san was working on Pit’s first adventure while creating something much more ambitious called Metroid. In the film, Mario himself plays a game on his NES when he feels like a failure.

If we count all the references to Mario’s own games in his more than 40-year history, it still gives us an almost endless list, but what do you think of these nods to Nintendo’s beginnings in homes and stores during that decade?