How fast can you snag the initial mushroom in Super Mario Bros. World 1-1? Let’s talk exact milliseconds here. Striving to trim down each mushroomy millisecond, or taking on bite-sized challenges like defeating four Oktoroks on a single screen of The Legend of Zelda or scaling to the peak of an alien-infested shaft in Metroid, has been an absolute blast in Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition. This event once again remixes the iconic 1980s game library. Unlike WarioWare, NES Remix, and Super Mario 99, this version is solely centered on speedrunning. While it lacks challenge diversity, it’s still a delight to experience these classic games in a new light.
The challenges vary in length, from completing the entire first level of Super Mario Bros to even shorter tasks, with the shortest ones often being the most enjoyable. Your performance is ranked on a scale and you earn letter grades for even the slightest improvements. This means that repeating the series of jumps needed to defeat boss Wendy O. Koopa in Super Mario Bros. 3 can be distilled into a set of precise movements, etched into your memory and repeated endlessly to achieve that coveted S rank. It’s satisfying to push yourself, especially knowing that you’re honing skills that can be put to the test against other players online.
The precision of Mario’s jump (excluding Luigi’s jump in both versions of Super Mario Bros. 2) lends itself well to speedrunning. Similarly, Link’s calculated jabs in The Legend of Zelda on a grid-based layout allow for efficient navigation through dungeons by strategically defeating enemies. The best games provide room for methodical improvement through repetition.
Conversely, characters like Kirby, Ice Climber, and the Balloon Fight Guy, who are slower and less agile, are less enjoyable to speedrun. While the challenges revolving around these characters aren’t necessarily difficult, they lack the excitement of repetition. The imprecise movements can make you feel clumsy, which is less than ideal for aspiring speedrunners. Fortunately, titles like Balloon Fight and Ice Climber have minimal challenges, making them less of a hurdle to conquer in Nintendo World Championships. However, Kirby’s Adventure surprisingly offers the most challenges of any game in this collection apart from SMB3, hinting at a status as a speedrunning icon that may be exaggerated.
The primary obstacle for aspiring speedrunners in Nintendo World Championships is the inadequate design of the Switch’s Joy-Con controllers. NES games demand precise button inputs, and while handheld mode on the Switch provides minimal lag, the Joy-Cons’ subpar analog sticks, awkward layout of A and B buttons, and unconventional directional buttons make the game nearly unplayable with the default setup. Achieving a swift pair of jumps up the blocky pyramid in Super Mario Bros. World 1-1 with the Joy-Con becomes either impossible or exceedingly challenging. These controllers don’t respond well to the quick and accurate button inputs necessary for optimal gameplay. Thankfully, using a Pro Controller or a reliable third-party gamepad resolves these issues, though even the Pro Controller’s directional pad falls short. Opting for the NES controller accessory might offer the best and most authentic gameplay experience, yet this option hasn’t been personally tested. In my experience, the Pro Controller sufficed.
The ultimate objective of Nintendo World Championships is to unlock various rewards through successful speedrun scores and online victories. By unlocking additional microgames (totaling 156) and cosmetics such as pins and pixelated avatars, you enhance your multiplayer experience. Completing all challenges within a single game category unlocks a Legendary challenge, ranging from conquering an entire dungeon in Kid Icarus or Zelda II to finishing Super Mario Bros. from start to finish.
Completing Super Mario Bros., even at a leisurely pace, presents a significant challenge, especially in levels like World 8-3 and 8-4 which remain difficult by both past and present standards. However, in Nintendo World Championships’ runs, failure only sets you back a few seconds for another attempt. While losing time is inevitable, you can retry without starting from scratch, making it feasible to achieve your desired grade even after minor setbacks. This allowed me to power through every mission, unlocking all content and selecting which challenges to refine and replay. Occasionally, I needed to grind for a few extra minutes in online modes to accumulate the necessary points to swiftly unlock all 156 offline microgames (this process took about four hours). Keep in mind that players without a Nintendo Online subscription won’t have access to online modes (which offer rapid point accrual), so they must replay offline microgames to progress.
In terms of online modes, there are two options: World Championship and Survival Mode. World Championship selects five microgames weekly, providing seven days to submit your best times. These times are ranked globally and by birth year, adding a touch of amusement. It’s enjoyable to track your top scores, yet I would prefer real-time access to current leaderboards instead of delayed results. Competing against unseen opponents and lacking visibility into competitor performances until after the challenge concludes diminishes the competitive thrill.
Survival Mode, on the other hand, functions as an elimination round where you compete against the ghost data of other players—pre-recorded videos that appear on your screen as you play. To advance, you must outperform these virtual opponents. The three rounds consist of the same games (in alternating sequences), refreshed weekly. This weekly cycle may feel limiting, as once you complete the two weekly Survival Mode challenges, the only remaining activity is repeating them for point accumulation to unlock rewards.
Despite the periodic delays in leaderboards and new challenges within the online modes, the couch competitive mode with support for up to eight players provides readily accessible content. In this mode, you can engage in single games or packaged sets of microgames, earning points and determining a victor at the end. The primary challenge with these modes, similar to multiplayer WarioWare or Mario Party, is that participants who have practiced the microgames in advance will have a competitive edge. Inviting friends to join in fun competitions only to dominate every game may sour the experience until everyone reaches a similar skill level. It’s improbable that anyone will master the optimal strategy for defeating four Oktoroks in the most efficient manner on a random screen in The Legend of Zelda without prior practice. Thankfully, you can rehearse each microgame during the competition to level the playing field.